Oakland Teachers Go on Strike

Thousands of Oakland public school educators are walking off the job on Thursday as they call for improved working conditions and wages that would better keep pace with inflation and the high cost of living in the Bay Area.

The walkout by roughly 3,000 teachers, librarians, nurses and other staff members in the Oakland Unified School District left parents scrambling. Schools will be open, officials said, but classes are canceled for the 34,000 students in the school district, one of the state’s largest. The strike is the third that the Oakland Education Association, the union representing the educators, has authorized over the past five years. It does not have a set end date.

There have been a string of labor standoffs involving academic institutions in California. Teachers in Los Angeles went on a three-day strike in March in solidarity with bus drivers, cafeteria workers and other support staff members. Last fall, about 48,000 employees of the University of California system walked off the job, seeking better pay. In March 2022, teachers in Sacramento went on an eight-day strike before reaching a deal for higher salaries.

“This is a national crisis,” Ismael Armendariz, the president of the Oakland Education Association, said. “We have a huge teacher retention problem and recruitment problem. We are disrespected. We are not paid enough.”

Some parents condemned the strike plans, arguing that children had already missed too much school during the coronavirus pandemic.

“As Oakland district families, we are enraged by this action,” said an online petition signed by 660 people as of Wednesday evening. “Our kids’ education is too important to be used as a pawn by adults who are using bad-faith tactics in (what are supposed to be) good-faith negotiations.”

Armendariz said the Oakland Unified School District lost around 20 to 25 percent of its teachers every year to retirement and to other districts where the pay is higher. Salaries for teachers in Oakland are the lowest of any major urban district, he said.

The starting salary for a first-year teacher in the district is $52,905. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development classifies a salary under $50,000 for a single-person household in Oakland as “very low” and eligible for housing vouchers.

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The district is proposing to raise first-year salaries to $63,604, a bump of about 20 percent. Veteran teachers would receive a 16 percent raise, to $109,746.

District officials say that their offer constitutes large wage increases, and they pleaded this week with teachers not to strike.

“Following all the turmoil and disruption of Covid, the idea that our children might be out of school yet again while both sides work to reach an agreement only harms our students and families,” the district said in a statement on Tuesday. “The adults need to be adults, so that students can be students.”

The union — which has been in negotiations with the district since the fall, when the last contract expired — has made other demands on the district, including hiring more nurses, providing more mental health support for students and improving services for students with disabilities.

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Oakland Teachers Return to work

• Thousands of students and teachers returned to school in Oakland on Monday after a deal to give teachers a raise and improve some school conditions ended a seven-day strike. But protests continued yesterday as district officials cut $21.75 million from the budget for things like administrative jobs and restorative justice programs. [The East Bay Times]

Tentative Agreement in Oakland Teachers Strike

TENTATIVE AGREEMENT HERE: https://oaklandea.org/updates/oea-reaches-tentative-agreement-with-ousd/

After seven days on strike — with 95% of our members on the line, 97% of students out of school, and tens of thousands on our picket lines and rallies — we have reached a Tentative Agreement! 

This is a historic contract with a win in every major proposal we made. We are now leaps and bounds closer... 
Congratulations. 

OAKLAND TEACHERS have gone on STRIKE, and you won't believe why (or mayb...

Oakland Teachers Strike- Day 2

“We’re Fighting a Mean-Spirited and Antidemocratic Attack on Public Education”

AN INTERVIEW WITH

TIM MARSHALL

Oakland teachers aren’t just fighting for a living wage and better working conditions. They’re fighting against the closure of dozens of schools, which would pave the way for the privatization and destruction of public education.

Oakland teachers on strike on February 21, 2019. Joe Brusky

INTERVIEW BY

Meagan Day

On the first day of the Oakland teachers’ strike, I met up with Oakland teacher and union activist Tim Marshall at the rally downtown. Marshall has been an Oakland public school teacher for twenty-two years. He sits on the organizing committee for the Oakland Education Association (OEA), the teachers union that’s fighting for a living wage, smaller class sizes, more student supports, and an end to school closures. He’s also a cluster leader, in charge of organizing union activity at a handful of school sites. And he’s a member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), having joined in the big post-Bernie membership wave.

Marshall and I peeled off the rally and settled into a restaurant called Ed’s Cheesesteak. From our booth, we could hear more than five thousand teachers chanting and singing outside City Hall. Before the interview began, Marshall got a phone call from a leader at one of his school sites. “It’s a propaganda war right now,” he told the organizer on the other end. “That’s why you take attendance. We need to show that we shut it down.”

Read more: 

https://www.jacobinmag.com/2019/02/oakland-teachers-strike-closures-privatization

We Stand With Oakland Teachers

The union contends that all of the district’s offers to date don’t leave teachers with enough money to keep pace with the Bay Area’s soaring housing costs. The average annual salary for Oakland teachers was $63,149 during the 2017-18 school year, according to a report from the state’s Department of Education. Salaries range from $46,570 to $83,724.

Before talks broke off Wednesday, Oakland Unified offered a 7 percent raise across 2 1/2 years retroactive to Jan. 1, 2019 and ending June 30, 2021, plus a 1.5 percent bonus. That’s up from the district’s original offer of 5 percent over three years but far short of the union’s demand of 12 percent over three years.

The union — which represents nurses, counselors, psychologists and other faculty members as well as teachers — wants smaller class sizes and the hiring of additional counselors and nurses.

“It isn’t a great increase, it isn’t a great raise, it’s just stretching things out, and it does not address the high cost of living that’s driving educators out of Oakland,” Oakland Education Association president said at a news conference Wednesday.

District spokesman John Sasaki would not say whether the district upped its offer ahead of the strike but did confirm that both parties met again at the bargaining table Wednesday morning following the release of an independent fact-finding report.

According to the report, the district can’t afford the union’s demand for a 12 percent raise across three years, not when it faces a budget shortfall estimated to reach $56.6 million by the 2020-21 school year. The deficit stems in part from a sharp decline in student enrollment over the past 15 years, from 54,000 to 37,000, and the district’s failure to budget accordingly. Union officials and other critics say that’s a result of the district’s fiscal mismanagement.

East Bay Voice.

Denver Strike Settled : Oakland May Be Next

DENVER (CBS4) – An agreement between the Denver teachers’ union and Denver Public Schools has been reached, bringing a resolution to a three-day strike that caused a major disruption to the district’s operations this week. It was the first time in 25 years that public school teachers in the city had gone on strike.
It is a tentative agreement. 

Last month, the Los Angeles teachers led a historic strike. 35,000 teachers and support staff walked off the job, taking on their investment banker superintendent, Austin Beutner, and the racist billionaire privatizers who are at war with public education. Through mass rallies, and a near complete shutdown of the school system, the LA teachers, parents, and students won smaller class sizes, more student support, a nurse in every school, and an immigrant defense fund for families within the school district, among much more.

As we enter what appears to be a time of renewed labor militancy, the teacher strike wave shows no end in sight. Striking Denver teachers just won their demands, and Oakland teachers are preparing to strike as I write. DSAers are with striking teachers all the way — read on to learn how you can help!

Maria Svart
DSA National Director

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Last week a 95% supermajority of Oakland public school teachers voted to authorize a strike. The vote turnout was a record-breaking 84%. With the future of public education on the line.

When the teachers strike wave hits the Bay Area, democratic socialists will be there to stand with Oakland teachers!

Just like Los Angeles teachers earlier this month, teachers in the Oakland Education Association are fighting a school district bought and paid for by billionaire school privatizers. Funded by the likes of the Walton family, these billionaire-backed politicians are carrying out a nationwide plan to privatize schools, segregate education, and break teachers unions. The end goal? To slash taxes for the hyper wealthy who don’t want to pay for the schools our students deserve.

Oakland teachers are demanding smaller class sizes, more student support, a living wage to keep teachers in the city, and an end to school closures. Their fight is our fight!

Los Angeles and Oakland Teachers Rally Amid Deadlocked Contract Talks

LEARNING CURVES

A Los Angeles school board meeting turned raucous days ahead of two solidarity rallies to be held Saturday in L.A. and Oakland.

Published By

 Bill Raden 

LAUSD school board photo and video by Bill Raden.

Two California teachers unions, which are currently deadlocked in separate contract talks with their respective school districts, are on the verge of launching the West Coast’s biggest teacher walkout since 1989. What happens next will decide far more than fair wages for career educators. At stake are broader principles of equity, expressed as contract demands for smaller class sizes and less testing, the addition of sufficient health and social services staff, and an investment in community schooling and fair funding — aimed at restoring public education as a public good for all Californians, rather than as a private interest granted to the lucky few.

While they await the results of a state-mediated fact-finding process, United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA) and the Oakland Education Association (OEA) have declared Saturday, December 15, a day of solidarity, and have invited all to join teachers in a rally to defend public education. The Oakland action kicks off at Omni Commons at 11 a.m., while L.A.’s march and rally begins at Grand Park at 10 a.m.

Multicultural Education Conference

National Association for Multicultural Education - Conference

Obama is not a socialist. But, we are !

DEMOCRATIC SOCIALISTS OF AMERICA

75 Maiden Lane / Suite 702 / New York, NY 10038

212-727-8610 / fax 212-608-6955 / www.dsausa.org

Obama is not a socialist, but we are !

The  nation’s largest  democratic socialist organization meets in Emeryville  Oct. 25/27  to plan for :

 Socialism in the Age of Obama.   

The  DSA convention begins with a Bay Area  outreach event -- Building the Next Left -- Rebirth and Renewal,  Friday, October 25, 2013,  Humanist Hall,  390 27^th Street, Oakland. The event features writer John Nichols; Catherine Tactaquin, Director of the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights; Steve Williams, Co-founder of POWER ( People Organized to Win Employment Rights); and Maria Svart, National Director of Democratic Socialists of America.

Last week  right-wing politics in the Congress forced the nation precariously close to a default on the national debt that could  have produced  a second great economic crisis.  The Democratic Socialists of America view this political corruption and cynicism as an opportunity to organize a New Left -- a powerful political movement left of the Democrats working with labor, workers organizations, immigrant groups and social movements to --

Rebuild a Participatory Democracy in a Multicultural U.S.

Speakers at the convention include: John Nichols, Tom Hayden, union leaders Jose La Luz and Michael Lighty, immigrant rights activists Catherine Tactaquin and David Bacon,  Joe Schwartz, Maria Svart, Steve Williams and more.

Mayor Quan: Stop the Police Brutality at OCCUPY OAKLAND

Oakland, California

Oakland Police attack demonstrators

Last night, Scott Olsen, a Marine who served two tours in Iraq, was struck in the head by a "nonlethal" projectile fired by the Oakland police. The round fractured his skull, leaving him in critical condition.¹ 

Olsen had joined with other members of Occupy Oakland to peacefully protest the group's eviction that morning. When a group gathered to help Olsen after he was hit, a police officer threw a flash bang grenade into the group from a few feet away. 

Deeply disturbing video of the incident was captured by a local news crew and provides the clearest evidence yet of the lengths that authorities will go to to stop Occupy protesters from voicing uncomfortable truths about our economy.

Yesterday's eviction in the predawn hours², and last night's violence against protesters, are only the latest attempts to silence the voices of those who are speaking up for the 99%. But members of Occupy Oakland, who faced the most brutal crackdown yet, refuse to be intimidated. They've called for another peaceful gathering tonight to stand up for their First Amendment rights.³

To help defend their rights, we're scrambling to put together a rapid response ad to run in Oakland urging the mayor and the police to end their brutal tactics and respect the protesters' rights. We want to make sure everyone in Oakland sees the footage of the crackdown for themselves. Every dollar we raise will go to pay for the ad, and if there's anything left over, we'll donate it to a group doing good work helping our veterans as they come home from war.

Click here to chip in.

We're also supporting a petition by a local Oakland group—Causa Justa :: Just Cause—to Oakland's mayor to stop the police repression of Occupy Oakland. 

Click here to sign the petition to Oakland's mayor.