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On Thursday August 29th thirty percent of Seattle Schools SEA represented staff voted nearly unanimously to reject the contract proposal offered by the district. The district refuses to reduce the case load for support staff (counselors, psychologists, physical therapists, etc.), they want to increase the work day by thirty minutes without compensation and want to tie teacher evaluations to test scores.
Although contract negotiations between the union and the district have been under way since spring, the two sides are still far apart.
Although another vote may be scheduled for this coming Tuesday, teachers on Friday August 30th braved everything Mother Nature threw at them (thunder lightning and torrential downpours) and stood about a hundred fold (at my location) on busy intersections around Seattle. I attended the northern most rally by North Gate Mall where motorists travel across four-lane roads coming on and off of I-5. Counting the corners flanking the I-5 on ramp, four corners were filled by red clad teachers (some had their children joining them), waving signs stating Fair Contract Now against a dark grey sky swollen with heavy clouds.
As motorists continually honked their support, I kept reminding myself that I was in Seattle, a city that is predominantly progressive and supports education. I also did a cursory head count of the difference between male and female teachers and estimated about fifteen percent of the protesters were male. This concurred with my belief that the war that’s currently waging against public school teachers is really just an extension of the overall war on women. Who’s heard of a war on professors who teach at public universities? University professors are still mostly men.
Public school teachers are asked to educate twenty-six to twenty-eight students in a class and of those twenty-eight students, five may not speak English proficiently, two to three may have autism, there may be up to ten who have family issues that interfere with learning. Teachers and support staff have not had any meaningful pay raise for years (even Gary Locke, the governor in the nineties and the self proclaimed education is my first priority governor) froze our cost of living (COLA) raises.
The district is offering a two percent pay increase for each of the next two years. The union wants two and a half percent. Neither raise will be enough for me to quit my second job. I find I cannot attend meetings after school pertaining to my students and cannot attend any other after school activities as I have to rush off to a second job.
Meanwhile the district continues spending millions on standardized tests, but can’t seem to find the money to keep teachers in the classroom. I am not the only one who finds that totally backward and counter productive. Even when teachers were furloughed over the last two years, the district never reduced the number of tests they purchased because of low funds. Sorry, kids, we can’t afford to keep you in the classroom, but here, take this test and if you don’t pass it, we’ll fire your teachers. It is this lack of respect that is pushing Seattle educators to the brink.
