Report: Most 2018 teacher protests led to big boosts in school funding — but not enough to make up for earlier cuts - The Washington Post

Report: Most 2018 teacher protests led to big boosts in school funding — but not enough to make up for earlier cuts - The Washington Post

Report: Most 2018 teacher protests led to big boosts in school funding — but not enough to make up for earlier cuts

Teacher protests in 2018 helped lead to a big boost in education funding in four states, but a new report says it wasn’t enough to make up for earlier cuts. In those states and more than dozen others, state spending on general education is still less than before the 2008 Great Recession.

And the report, issued Wednesday by the nonprofit, nonpartisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, says most of the places that increased general education funding did it in ways that are not sustainable.

The study found that when education spending has grown relative to pre-recession levels, that growth has come at the local level. And that’s a problem for poor districts because local funding is dependent on property taxes. Wealthier areas have more to spend, and funding from the state and the federal government can’t make up the difference between affluent and poor districts.

“These trends are very concerning for the country’s future prospects,” said Michael Leachman, senior director of state fiscal research at the center and co-author of the report with senior policy analyst Eric Figueroa.

The report focuses on general education funding over the last decade in the 12 states that made the deepest cuts during the recession: Alabama, Arizona, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah and West Virginia.

Using data from the U.S. Census Bureau and state budgets, the authors said state general education funding in those 12 states “remains well below 2008 levels.”

States distribute most of their education funding through a formula that allocates money to school districts to support general educational activities, including teacher salaries, supplies and textbooks (but usually does not include transportation or pension contributions). Each state has its own formula. Most target some extra money to poorer districts, which disproportionately educate children of color. But those districts can’t raise as much in local money as wealthier ones. CONTINUE READING: Report: Most 2018 teacher protests led to big boosts in school funding — but not enough to make up for earlier cuts - The Washington Post

We need to be disruptors of institutional racism in our schools - Lily's Blackboard

We need to be disruptors of institutional racism in our schools - Lily's Blackboard

We need to be disruptors of institutional racism in our schools

This is a long post, but we can’t talk about race in sound bytes. These are the remarks I delivered at the South by SouthWest conference in Austin, Texas. March 5th, 2019.

Gracias a todos! Gracias por venir a esta conversación acerca de la justicia.

Thanks for coming to a conversation about justice. Specifically, racial justice – because that’s always easy to talk about. And even more specific than that – racial justice in education.

I feel perfectly qualified to talk about racial justice in education because I am a 6th grade teacher from Utah (where diversity means you found a Presbyterian). Which is not true, but it’s what people think.

I’m also the president of the National Education Association, the largest union in the United States of America. We represent over 3 million teachers, support professionals like school custodians and secretaries, college professors, retired educators and student teachers.

But more than that, I think you should know that I am a fabulous teacher. You would want to be in my 6th grade. I’ve taught suburban kids who’ve never missed a meal. I’ve taught kids with disabilities. I’ve taught homeless kids and foster kids waiting for families. I’ve taught kids who don’t speak English. I’ve taught kids who are gifted and talented.

And I’ve taught more than one Gifted and Talented homeless kid with a disability who was learning English and teaching me Spanish. (Thank you, Julio)

I’ve taught white Mormon kids and black Muslim kids and brown Catholic kids and I’ve taught Sunday school at the Unitarian Church where we pray ‘To Whom it May Concern.”

I think it’s important to have a teacher like me talk to social justice Rabble Rousers like you – about Racial Justice in Education. Because you may not think racial justice and education are necessarily connected, but I want to make the case that it’s where you begin.

First, as a teacher let me say I have done my homework. Our history is clear: We have never in this country from the Mayflower to this very moment EVER achieved Racial Justice in Education. Never.

Half our Founding Fathers were slave holders in states where you could go to prison for teaching a black child how to read. Please let that sink in: Teaching a black person the ABC’s was a criminal offense.

Racial – Justice – Education… Not everyone gets that link. RACIAL – JUSTICE – EDUCATION. These concepts are interconnected. And we have to talk about them together.

That is harder than you might think. I know how hard it is to talk about Race – that our education system was designed CONTINUE READING:We need to be disruptors of institutional racism in our schools - Lily's Blackboard

'Brazen Effort to Distort the Tax Code': DeVos Won't Give Up on Vouchers

'Brazen Effort to Distort the Tax Code': DeVos Won't Give Up on Vouchers

‘Brazen Effort to Distort the Tax Code’: Betsy DeVos Not Giving Up on Vouchers

In her two years as U.S. Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos has seized on every opportunity to undermine public education. She has called for deep cuts to federal funding, rolled back protections for our most vulnerable students and shilled for the for-profit college industry that has defrauded countless students.

DeVos has floundered, however, in advancing her pet cause: the federal expansion of school vouchers. Even with GOP majorities in the House and Senate and the strong backing of President Trump, Congress in 2017 and 2018 rejected DeVos’ efforts to create federal vouchers to attend private schools.

Despite this setback and the recent 2018 elections that sent a pro-public education majority to the House of Representatives, DeVos’ enthusiasm for school vouchers hasn’t dampened. This was evident last week with the introduction of  something called the Education Freedom Scholarships and Opportunity Act.

In a USA Today op-ed touting the proposal, DeVos, Senator Ted Cruz and Representative Bradley Byrne, the bills’ sponsors in Congress, called it “a historic investment in America’s students.”

The majority of Americans who reject vouchers know better. DeVos’ proposal, said NEA President Lily Eskelsen García, is just the “latest attempt to push an agenda that is academically ineffective, fiscally irresponsible and that funds discrimination at the expense of student opportunity.”

The good news is that Congress – who soundly rejected a similar proposal during the 2017 tax debate – isn’t likely to give this reboot a serious look.Still, the corporate interests who have doggedly pursued school privatization for more than a decade are nothing if not persistent, which is why public education activists aren’t about to let down their guard.

What is an Education Freedom Scholarship?

Quite simply, it’s a federal school voucher.  For years now, proponents, CONTINUE READING: 'Brazen Effort to Distort the Tax Code': DeVos Won't Give Up on Vouchers

Using Critical Race Theory (CRT) to Evaluate Teach For America Recruiting | Cloaking Inequity

Using Critical Race Theory (CRT) to Evaluate Teach For America Recruiting | Cloaking Inequity

USING CRITICAL RACE THEORY (CRT) TO EVALUATE TEACH FOR AMERICA RECRUITING

A primarily White organization for decades, Teach For America has recently sought recruit people of color into their 2-year “leadership program.” Notice, I didn’t say new teacher program… see Teach For America: Now With Less Teaching. As a result, academics are starting to publish on TFA’s new recruiting approach. I am excited to announce that we have a new piece that uses Critical Race Theory (CRT) to evaluate Teach For America’s recruiting in the new book Critical Considerations of Race, Ethnicity, and Culture in Fraternity & Sorority Life.

Excited to share that our monograph is published. Thank you to the co-editors @kathleenegillon @CameronCarl & I
Thank you to all the authors: @DrJessicaHarris @SusanaPhD @trans_killjoy @ProfessorJVH @MLBoettcher @ISUSOE and many more Here is the link:https://t.co/FfNtK3b8Ou pic.twitter.com/CMWAnyQPwx

— Dr. Criss Salinas (@drcriss_salinas) March 1, 2019

Muñoz, C. Vasquez Heilig, J & Del Real, M. (2019) Property Functions of Whiteness: Counter-Narrative Analysis of Teach For America and Their Partnership With Black and Latinx Fraternities and Sororities. In K. Gillion, C. Beatty, & C. Salinas (Eds.), New Directions for Student Affairs: Critical considerations of race, ethnicity, and culture in fraternity/sorority life, (61-71) San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishing.

You can read the new piece here. Spring break reading?!

Also, don’t forget You are Invited!: Should Teach For America (TFA) be banned in California Schools? We hope to see you March 13!

For all of Cloaking Inequity’s posts on Teach For America click here.

Twitter: @ProfessorJVH

Click here for Vitae.

Please Facebook Like, Tweet, etc below and/or reblog to share this discussion with others.

Using Critical Race Theory (CRT) to Evaluate Teach For America Recruiting | Cloaking Inequity

Big Education Ape: Teach For America in Charlotte: Making segregated schools work | The Charlotte Observer - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2016/12/teach-for-america-in-charlotte-making.html

Results for Mar. 5 Special Election, LAUSD District 5 Likely Going to Runoff - NBC Southern California #VOTEJackieGoldberg #TEAMGoldberg

Early Results for Mar. 5 Special Election, LAUSD District 5 Likely Going to Runoff - NBC Southern California

Results for Mar. 5 Special Election, LAUSD District 5 Likely Going to Runoff

LA County Election Results - https://www.lavote.net/election-results#year=2019&election=3983

A total of 57,201 ballots were processed and counted, and 11.54 percent of eligible registered voters cast ballots in the Mar. 5 General Law and Charter City Elections, according to Dean C. Logan, the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk.

Many ballots remain outstanding and uncounted, according to the LARR/CC. The first ballot counting update is scheduled for Mar. 8, and the LARR/CC is scheduled to certify the election results on Mar. 22, with the election due to be officially concluded on Apr. 2, declared by the LA County Board of Supervisors.

For full special election results, click here.

Former school board member Jackie Goldberg led the 10-candidate field in the early returns for Tuesday's special election in the Los Angeles Unified School District's District 5, and was just short of the majority needed to avoid a runoff.

Goldberg received 46.89 percent of the vote, with 10 of 122 precincts, 8.2 percent, reporting and some vote by mail ballots counted, according to figures released by the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk.

Heather Repenning, a former teacher and aide to Mayor Eric Garcetti, was second with 13.45 percent. Huntington Park City Councilwoman Graciela "Grace" Ortiz was third at 12.47 percent, followed by educator Cynthia Gonzalez at 9.34 percent and Allison Bajracharya, a former executive of the California Charter Schools Association, at 5.74 percent.

No other candidate had more than 4 percent.

If no candidate receives a majority, a runoff between the top two vote-getters will be held May 14.

The vacancy was created last July when board member Ref Rodriguez pleaded guilty to conspiracy and other charges for laundering campaign donations from family and friends. He resigned from his board seat the same day.

District 5 seat stretches from Eagle Rock, Highland Park and to Atwater Village, Los Feliz, and Silver Lake south to Vernon, Maywood, Huntington Park, Cudahy, South Gate and Bell.

Goldberg, 74, is a former teacher, LAUSD board member, Los Angeles City Council member and Democratic state legislator. Two LAUSD board members last year unsuccessfully tried to have her appointed to the seat to serve out the balance of Rodriguez's term, which runs through next year. But the proposal was rejected in favor of calling the special election.

Goldberg is heavily backed by United Teachers Los Angeles, the union representing the district's teachers. The union has been pouring money into Goldberg's campaign, hoping to undo a board majority that generally favored expansion of charter schools in the district.

Rodriguez's departure left the board with a 3-3 split on the issue, and a Goldberg victory would swing the panel back in UTLA's favor.

"I'm running to be a strong progressive voice on the board who will put the interests of the students first, and as someone who will not have a big learning curve when elected," according to a statement on Goldberg's campaign website. "I believe my experience and passion for helping students will be a steadying force on a board that continues to face turmoil."

Bajracharya is also a former chief operations and strategy officer for Camino Nuevo Charter Academy in the MacArthur Park area.

"As a parent, former teacher and school leader, I understand the strengths and weaknesses of LAUSD from all perspectives," she told City News Service. "I believe it is essential that every child in L.A. have access to great schools that give them the opportunity to graduate and succeed. Unfortunately, that's not the case now. I am running because I believe I have the experience and credentials to turn that around."

Repenning has the backing of Garcetti and several City Council members, along with a host of labor unions.

Repenning told CNS that LAUSD schools are "not currently set up to meet the challenges facing the many students whose families are living in poverty, 80 percent of which qualify for free and reduced lunch.

"Many of our families have enrolled their kids in charter schools which are not subjected to the same level of transparency and accountability as district schools, and many union jobs have been lost in this process," Repenning said.

Ortiz is also a licensed social worker and longtime LAUSD school counselor.

"What I can promise the people who live in Board District 5 is that I will work CONTINUE READING: Early Results for Mar. 5 Special Election, LAUSD District 5 Likely Going to Runoff - NBC Southern California

Proposed legislation would substantially curb growth of California charter schools | EdSource

Proposed legislation would substantially curb growth of California charter schools | EdSource

Proposed legislation would substantially curb growth of California charter schools
Restrictions would limit appeals, cap number of new charters, factor fiscal impact

The chairman of the Assembly Education Committee and several Democratic colleagues introduced a package of bills Monday that would impose severe restrictions on the growth of charter schools.

Three of the bills would eliminate the ability of charter schools to appeal rejected applications to the county and state, place an unspecified cap on charter school growth and enable school districts to consider the financial impact of charter schools when deciding whether to approve them. A fourth bill would abolish the right of a charter school that can’t find a facility in its authorizing district to locate a school in an adjoining district.

Assemblyman Patrick O’Donnell, D-Long Beach, who chairs the Education Committee, said the bills collectively would enable school districts “to make responsible and informed decisions” that are “critical for student success and taxpayer accountability.” Eric Premack, a veteran charter school adviser and advocate, called the legislation a “full-frontal” assault and “scorched earth” approach to charter schools.

Charter schools are publicly funded schools that have greater flexibility in hiring, curriculum and other aspects of their operations. Unlike traditional public schools run by elected school boards, charter schools in California are nonprofit organizations with self-appointed boards.

The California Teachers Association, which put out the press announcement on Monday, other teachers and school employees unions and the California state chapter of the NAACP endorsed the bills. Their release coincides with the continuing teachers strike in Oakland Unified, where teachers are blaming charter school growth for weakening the district’s financial strength and are demanding restrictions on charter school expansion.

Another bill that O’Donnell co-authored with Sen. Connie Leyva, D-Chino, requiring charter schools to comply with the state’s open meeting, public records and conflict of interest laws, passed the Senate last week and, on a fast track, is scheduled to be heard in O’Donnell’s Education Committee on Feb. 26. Many charter schools already adhere to the laws, but Senate Bill 126 would make enforcement universal. Gov. Gavin Newsom, who campaigned for more charter CONTINUE READING: Proposed legislation would substantially curb growth of California charter schools | EdSource

Local Leaders Play Critical Role to Drive U.S. Toward More Loving and Just Society | Schott Foundation for Public Education

Local Leaders Play Critical Role to Drive U.S. Toward More Loving and Just Society | Schott Foundation for Public Education

Local Leaders Play Critical Role to Drive U.S. Toward More Loving and Just Society

Today, we have more information available than ever before to understand the state of our cities. An exciting new addition, the Loving Cities Index recently launched by the Schott Foundation, measures how well cities are doing at creating loving systems that provide children and families with the resources and supports they need to have the opportunity to learn and succeed. Schott researched 24 indicators of access to opportunities and disaggregated the data by race to examine differences across 10 cities.

This latest research underscores the grim reality that we still face great challenges. In cities across the country, many working people are struggling against high levels of poverty (individuals working full time and earning less than 200% of the federal poverty guidelines), an affordable housing crisis, and persistent racial and economic segregation within communities and schools. Loving Cities Index research reveals that on average local systems are still only delivering between 30-50% of the supports children need to have a fair and substantive opportunity to learn and thrive.

Fortunately, we also know a lot about what it takes to foster loving, supportive local systems:

1. Local leaders present our best opportunity for progress. They can disproportionately impact the specific systems for children and families to receive basic resources and supports. Although the 10 cities profiled in the Loving Cities Indexspan different geographies, population sizes/demographics, and political leanings, in each there were positive instances of success and innovations in local systems to deliver health and livelihood supports that increase the likelihood that a child will grow up in a healthy living and learning climate. Popular models like school-based health clinics and Community Schools (which transform traditional schools into community hubs for extended learning and access to resources and supports) were conceptualized and developed locally in cities, and over time expanded throughout states due to their success and popularity. These critical collaborations did not come from federal policy – instead they can be attributed to the persistence of local officials, administrators, teachers and social workers who have worked tirelessly together to understand the unique barriers to access and developed highly localized strategies to connect people with resources they need.
2. Local government must be a player in social change. At Living Cities, a decade of work with cross-sector tables in communities across the country focused on expanding economic opportunity has taught us that it matters who has a seat at the problem-solving table. Local government is one of the most influential actors in peoples’ day-to-day lives, and it has the steady resources, convening power and innate ability to scale up solutions that many non-profits struggle to create for themselves. From supporting entrepreneurs of color and promoting economic growth, to removing barriers in policy and process that create an environment where everyone can thrive, local government is a critical and underinvested in partner in the work of creating thriving cities.
3. We must address racial inequities head-on. Across almost every indicator of well-being people of color suffer worse CONTINUE READING: Local Leaders Play Critical Role to Drive U.S. Toward More Loving and Just Society | Schott Foundation for Public Education

United and Determined, Educators Strike a Blow Against For-Profit Charter Schools - Education Votes

United and Determined, Educators Strike a Blow Against For-Profit Charter Schools - Education Votes

United and Determined, Educators Strike a Blow Against For-Profit Charter Schools

In his January 15 State of the State Address, Arizona Governor Doug Ducey seemed to acknowledge that his zealous pursuit of what he calls “choice and competition” in education was careening a little off course.

“We know improvements can be made,” Ducey said. “More transparency, more accountability, and granting financial review and oversight over taxpayer dollars.”

But, as EJ Montini pointed out in The Arizona Republic, Ducey, an ardent supporter of school privatization, couldn’t actually bring himself to attach the words “charter school” to that or any other sentence in his speech.

“You can’t begin to confront a problem when you can’t even speak its name,” Montini wrote. “If the governor really wants ‘more transparency’ and ‘more accountability,’ as he says, a good first step would be admitting where the problem lies. Just say it … charter schools.”

As catalogued in an investigative series by The Republic, the state’s for-profit charter sector is plagued by financial mismanagement, profiteering, and a mixed (at best) academic record. Glossing over this reality, however, has become something of a time-consuming — and increasingly futile — task for pro-privatization lawmakers in the state and across the nation.

According to an investigation by the Arizona Republic, Primavera Online charter school has the third-highest dropout rate in the state and test scores that are below average. Despite this record, its CEO received an $8.8 million payout in 2017.

Although the rate of expansion has slowed somewhat in recent years, charter schools are deeply entrenched in the American education landscape. (There are approximately 7,000 charter schools spread across 44 states and the District of Columbia.) Some of these schools are generally effective and are subject to the same basic safeguards as public schools. They also adhere to the original vision that led to the opening of the first charter school in 1992 — as incubators of innovation that would collaborate with public schools. Many charter schools today, however, are for-profit, corporate chains that seek not to collaborate, but to compete with public schools for enrollment and taxpayer dollars.

As these schools have saturated many districts across the country, the costs to public CONTINUE READING: United and Determined, Educators Strike a Blow Against For-Profit Charter Schools - Education Votes

Arizona charter schools: Parents with complaints find nowhere to turn

Arizona charter schools: Parents with complaints find nowhere to turn

At Arizona charter schools, parents with complaints or objections find nowhere to turn
A lack of independent oversight leaves students and families without recourse to challenge charter school officials' actions.

Evan George had finished his classes for the day and was hanging out with friends at American Leadership Academy's Queen Creek campus, when two staff members approached and accused him of vaping.

Evan, 16, says he was doing a trick with his mouth that produces a plume of moist air that resembles vapor from an electronic cigarette.

His explanation didn't convince the charter school's staffers.

Evan was ordered to the administration office, where Athletic Director Rich Edwards took him into a room and searched him, looking for a vape pen, which would have been a violation of school policy.

"He told me to take my pants down, and he put his fingers in my underwear," said Evan, who is a junior. "I felt scared."

The search didn't turn up a vaping device, according to records the school provided to the Arizona State Board for Charter Schools. 

ALA still suspended Evan from school for eight days.

His parents, Chris and Kimberlie George, said both the Dec. 11 search and the suspension were wrong.

The athletic director inappropriately touched their son, they said. And the school suspended Evan without proof he'd had been vaping, even though their son's only prior disciplinary issues were for wearing torn jeans and chewing gum, they said.

But when the Georges sought an independent review of Evan's suspension, they found they had nowhere to turn.

Arizona's charter schools are primarily run by private companies. They must have a governing board, but school owners get to pick who's on the board, so many are stocked with relatives, friends and even the charter's owner. In some instances, boards have just one member — the charter operator.

American Leadership Academy Queen Creek student says he was strip searched over vape trick

16-year-old Evan George says he was strip searched in December 2018 after performing a trick that made it appear vapor was coming from his mouth.

THOMAS HAWTHORNE, THE REPUBLIC | AZCENTRAL.COM

Beyond the school, parents can only turn to the state Charter Board. And regulators there, because of limited resources and limited authority, rarely investigate such complaints against schools, an Arizona Republicinvestigation shows.

The result is a lack of independent oversight that leaves students and families at some charter schools, in disagreements big and small, with no recourse to challenge school officials' actions — even if they think those moves inhibit their students' academic progress or personal safety.

ALA Queen Creek officials denied the Georges' request for an appeal hearing before ALA's Board of Directors, which is composed of friends of ALA founder Glenn Way.

"Evan was never afforded due process," Chris George said. "He wasn't able to speak to his accusers, and the dismissal hearing was a farce. There was no interest in what the truth was."

The family escalated their complaint to the state Charter Board. But after ALA provided regulators with written CONTINUE READING: Arizona charter schools: Parents with complaints find nowhere to turn

Charter School Promoters Terrified of Growing Opposition to Their Full-Frontal Assault on Public Education | Dissident Voice

Charter School Promoters Terrified of Growing Opposition to Their Full-Frontal Assault on Public Education | Dissident Voice

Charter School Promoters Terrified of Growing Opposition to Their Full-Frontal Assault on Public Education

The ongoing widely-supported teachers’ strikes across the United States are bringing to the fore many problems that have been confronting public education for decades, including a big and overdue focus on the havoc and destruction caused by charter schools against public schools and the public interest for the last 28 years.

Teacher strikes everywhere are smashing the silence on charter schools and awakening many out of their charter school stupor. Even the most anti-conscious individual is slowly beginning to see the disaster that charter schools and the neoliberal antisocial offensive are producing. Criticism and rejection of charter schools is becoming more mainstream with each passing month. The charter school fairytale seems to be losing traction.

Charter school promoters are rightly fearful that their scorched earth approach to education may be slowing down due to growing social consciousness of the endless problems caused by charter schools. It is clear that nonprofit and for-profit charter schools are harming every aspect of public education and the public interest. Education privatization cannot be prettified or justified.

Approximately seven thousand charter schools, legal in 44 states, Washington DC, Puerto Rico, and Guam, currently enroll slightly more than three million students. While hundreds of nonprofit and for-profit charter schools close each year due mainly to financial malfeasance and poor academic performance, hundreds of these test-obsessed “free market” schools still keep opening every year.

Nonprofit and for-profit charter schools must be stopped if public education and the public interest are to be defended and affirmed. Education privatization offers no solutions, just more problems and more impunity. Teachers, school boards, and the public should keep pushing for more moratoriums on these privatized schools that are making the rich even richer while causing more problems for everyone else.

Even with the unrestricted ability to routinely cherry pick their students, CONTINUE READING: Charter School Promoters Terrified of Growing Opposition to Their Full-Frontal Assault on Public Education | Dissident Voice

Responsibility for hair discrimination in schools falls on federal government

Responsibility for hair discrimination in schools falls on federal government

“Stay out of my hair!”
Black students need the federal government to tell schools to leave their hair alone

he federal government and the Department of Education need to start taking their responsibility for prohibiting discrimination seriously and crack down on schools that punish black people for their hair and hair styles. It’s past time the DOE issued guidance, telling schools to leave black students’ hair alone.

When 16-year-old twins Mya and Deanna Cook went to Mystic Valley Regional Charter School with braided hair extensions in 2017, the school issued several infractions to both of them and asked the black girls to step out of class. The school, located just north of Boston, had previously banned hair extensions, which were deemed “distracting” by school administration officials. Since the girls refused to “fix” their hair, they were barred from extracurricular activities, prom, and threatened with suspension. The girls’ mother claims that other black girls with hair extensions have also been pulled out of class and given detention. Parents of the twins pointed out to administrators that white girls wearing extensions, as pictured in the school’s year book, were not punished.

Hair bans do include hair styles worn by (few) white students — blue hair, two-toned hair — but the bottom line is these prohibitions are very subjective, driven by a negative view of blackness, which CONTINUE READING: Responsibility for hair discrimination in schools falls on federal government

Lessons from the Los Angeles and Oakland teachers’ strikes | EdSource

Lessons from the Los Angeles and Oakland teachers’ strikes | EdSource

Lessons from the Los Angeles and Oakland teachers' strikes

fter two teachers’ strikes in as many months in California, it is too soon to tell whether the labor disputes in Oakland and Los Angeles presage a new era of school-based activism.

But regardless of what comes next, this year’s strikes had much in common, and yielded valuable lessons and insights for other districts where labor troubles may also be brewing.

• Both strikes were relatively short, lasting about a week. The timeline was shaped by the troubled finances of both districts that couldn’t afford to lose excessive amounts of state funds they receive based on student attendance.  Teachers also couldn’t afford to lose excessive wages by being out on strike for a lengthy period, or to take money off the bargaining table that could have been used to meet some of their demands. So there was pressure on both sides to resolve the strike within a reasonable amount of time.
• In both cases, teachers appeared to come out ahead, achieving gains they might not have won without a strike. In Oakland’s case, teachers earned a gradual salary increase of 11 percent  — more than double the 5 percent the district offered before the strike began — although most of the gains will only come in the 3d year of the agreement. In the case of Los Angeles, on the salary front teachers got less than what they demanded initially, and settled for the 6 percent the district had already offered. But they did get commitments from the district to reduce class sizes and significantly increase support staff like counselors.
• In both strikes, demands went beyond those more typical of labor strikes which tend to focus on wages and benefits. Those were on the table, but equally important were a range of other issues , including lowering class sizes, providing more counselors, psychologists, nurses and other support staff, limiting school closures in Oakland and creating community schools in Los Angeles.  Both contracts also included provisions tied to regulating charter schools.re
• In both Oakland and Los Angeles there remains a great deal of uncertainty about how the districts will pay for what they agreed to. In Los Angeles, Debra Duardo, the county superintendent of schools, said that the district has yet to address a projected $500 million operating deficit in 2021-22, and that the bargaining agreement “continues to move the district to insolvency.” In Oakland, Najeeb Khoury, in his official fact-finding report issued before the strike, doubted that the district could afford anywhere near a 12 percent salary increase.  Chris Learned, the state trustee appointed to approve budget expenditures, also suggested before the strike that such an increase ran the risk of putting “the district in financial distress.”
• In both Oakland and Los Angeles, the strikes demonstrated deep public support for the teachers. It suggests that the days when teachers were held solely responsible for seemingly every shortcoming in the state’s public schools, along with the success or failure of their students, are over, at least for now.
• In both conflicts, the teachers unions and their allies are looking to Sacramento, as CONTINUE READING: Lessons from the Los Angeles and Oakland teachers’ strikes | EdSource

California education reform must be multi-faceted, support students and teachers (AND PARENTS)| The Sacramento Bee

California education reform must be multi-faceted, support students and teachers | The Sacramento Bee

California education reform must be multi-faceted, support students and teachers

The teachers’ strike in Los Angeles, bolstered by vociferous support from parents, forced the 500,000-student L.A. Unified School District to agree to reduce some class sizes and hire more nurses and counselors. Teachers in Oakland are now following suit with similar demands.

Meanwhile, Gov. Gavin Newsom has commissioned a study of how charter schools affect public school funding, which is also a beef in the teacher labor unrest. A suite of bills pending in the Legislature would pretty much halt the progress of charters here.

Despite support from wealthy philanthropists who tout standardized testing, charter schools and the closing of low-performing schools, the school reform movement’s chosen candidate for governor — Antonio R. Villaraigosa — never came close. Their candidate for schools superintendent was also bested by a candidate backed by the California Teachers Association.

Remember the “parent trigger” law? It was going to shift the paradigm in California schools by giving parents whose kids attended low-performing schools unprecedented new power. Parents would be able to force various reforms at their child’s school by signing a petition — including changing it to a charter school.

When’s the last time you heard about that happening? Yeah, I can’t remember either.

OPINION

The school reform movement isn’t dead, but it’s definitely taken a beating. It has itself to blame. Too many new initiatives were hailed as the great new thing and later turned out not to be so great.

At times, they were unfairly punitive. The combination of intense focus on tests, including forcing teachers to program their lessons around the tests, turned college students off of teaching careers. The charter movement’s general “blame the teacher” attitude also helped.

Ten years ago, President Obama was at the forefront of pressing for a range of unproven reforms, including unlimited charter schools and tying teacher evaluations to their students’ performance on tests. The latter eventually proved to be an ineffective way to help students learn.

When the Every Student Succeeds Act was making its way through Congress, I asked then-Education Secretary Arne Duncan, an ardent reform proponent, how he would keep those measures going under a new law that empowered states far more than the old No Child Left Behind Act.

“The state improvement plans will have to be approved by my office,” he said. “So we’ll make sure they’re strong ones.”

Duncan was soon gone. Early attempts by his successor, Betsy Devos, to tighten those state CONTINUE READING: California education reform must be multi-faceted, support students and teachers | The Sacramento Bee