Oakland Education Association attempts to defuse anger over reckless return to schools
Oakland teachers returned from spring break this week to find no significant preparations for a return to in-person instruction in place. With students expected to return to classrooms on Monday, there is growing anger among teachers over the unsafe and rushed plans pursued by the Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) and Oakland Education Association (OEA). Basic issues like work schedules and precisely which students are returning were left up in the air and have been determined haphazardly on a site-by-site basis this week.
With signs of a new surge of COVID-19 developing in California, the OEA executive board has cynically put a vote of “no confidence” in OUSD before its membership. This is a diversionary tactic, which was also employed by the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) in February as they pushed through their miserable deal to reopen the third-largest district in the US. Instead of organizing any resistance to the unsafe reopening of schools, the OEA has declared an impasse in negotiations and called for a state mediator to rule on the issues of work schedules, special education workload, accommodations and leaves.