Teachers’ strike in Oakland and California.
Teachers in two states, Oakland and California, have voted with 88 percent in favor of strikes, which are scheduled to begin on May 1.
Action to strike in these two states is a continuation of strikes held by teachers for three days in Los Angeles. Teachers in both states are demanding higher pay and better benefits.
Most of 2019, Oakland teachers went on strike due to increasing injustice in their workplace.
We’re not making progress at this point right now. This is why we’re at this point. But, we are still continuing to bargain, and we are still hoping to settle at the table,” said Oakland Education Association Bargaining Chief Vilma Serrano.
The superintendent sees it this way: “While I deeply support our teachers and other educators system-wide, and would love to provide them with all the things they asked for at the table, we have to prioritize our resources,” said Oakland Schools Superintendent Kyla Johnson Trammell.
While the union has a lot of parental support, a growing number of parents are not strike supporters. “Our kids cannot read. Our kids cannot do math. We were struggling with our kids’ outcome before the pandemic and we are still on a long road to recovery and cannot afford any learning disruption,” said parent and OUSD REACH founder Lakisha Young. “It’s very frustrating as a parent because we’ve just come off pandemic, zoom classes. My kids lost so much learning from that time and they’re just now starting to catch up,” said parent Justine Nguyen.
