This just in:
** MEDIA ADVISORY **
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Aug. 22, 2018
Media Contact: (213) 305-9654 (Cell)
Anna Bakalis, UTLA Communications Director
Tomorrow: Nation’s Second-Largest Teacher Union Local Begins Strike Authorization Vote
WHO: United Teachers Los Angeles represents more than 33,000 LAUSD educators, including teachers, librarians, counselors, nurses, psychologists, psychiatric social workers, therapists, substitutes, early childhood and adult teachers. They have been working without a contract for over one year. This strike authorization vote will allow the UTLA Board of Directors to call for a strike if one becomes necessary. Voting results are expected Aug. 31.
WHAT: After 17 months of fruitless bargaining, the California Public Employment Relations Board has declared we are at impasse with LAUSD. As UTLA demands that LAUSD stop stalling and get to mediation immediately, tens of thousands of LAUSD educators begin a strike authorization vote tomorrow that lasts through Aug. 30. UTLA has made it clear to LAUSD that we are ready and willing to meet for mediation on August 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 29, 30, & 31. However, Supt. Austin Beutner and the district have basically ignored their legal and moral obligation to participate and refused to meet until September 27. Despite a $1.7 billion projected reserve, LAUSD refuses to make progress on key issues, including:
· Smaller class sizes
· Fair pay raise
· More nurses, counselors, psychologists, and librarians
· Less testing and more teaching
· Charter and co-location regulation
· Real support for school safety
· Community schools and support for families
· Greater stakeholder input to help magnet school conversions
· Expanded support for bilingual education
· Improved working conditions for early education and adult education teachers
Event Details: Teachers at Thomas Starr King Magnet Middle School will be casting their strike authorization votes after school. They will be available to give interviews in English and Spanish. The district has been giving out false information that UTLA opposes magnetization. UTLA does not oppose magnets. In fact, King MS is a successful school that, with the approval and input of educators, went all-magnet in 2013 and includes three on campus: Gifted Arts & Tech, Environmental STEAM and Film and Media magnets. These educators will be joined by parents who are supporting their fight for a fair contract. Visuals include: Educators, parents, exterior of school, handmade signs and ballots being cast.
WHEN: Thursday, Aug. 23
TIME: 3 – 4 PM
WHERE: Corner of Bates and Fountain Avenues Thomas Starr King Middle School / 4201 Fountain Avenue Los Angeles, CA
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Sounds good. GO, TEAM! No more gaga.
Wish United Teachers Los Angeles well. They are the ones concerned about children. Everything they ask for would mean a better education. Shame on Supt. Austin Beutner and the LAUSD who refuse to negotiate.
Hardly anyone in Los Angeles seems aware of Superintendent Beutner’s history as a master privatizer of public institutions. He’s got a lot of experience at privatization.
Austin Beutner was very active in Russia back in the 1990s, as the old Soviet Union converted billions of dollars of public assets into private assets owned by just a few Oligarchs. Beutner assisted in this process as a young investor/economist, as Russia transitioned from Communist tyranny (rule of many by a few) to free-market tyranny (rule by Oligarchs).
Beutner went to Russia in the early-mid 1990s along with a group of economists (many of them from Harvard Business School) and financial experts at the request of Boris Yeltsin who asked then-President Clinton for help in converting the Soviet PUBLIC economy into a PRIVATIZED economy controlled by a few ultra-wealth Oligarchs. When these Americans returned from Russia in the late 1990s, they all came back MUCH richer than when they went over, including Mr. Beutner. Some (not Beutner) even faced federal charges for financial crimes when they got back. So, it would seem Mr. Beutner has major experience at transforming vast public a$$ets into private ones. One must ask: Is that his intention for LAUSD as well?
Godspeed Los Angeles teachers, and thank you for your courage and commitment.
Teachers do not want to strike. They only do it when they have hit a brick wall of intransigence. There is so much expensive real estate in Los Angeles the city should be able to pay the teachers a living wage and benefits.
No one likes to strike. But the lack of ability to call for secondary boycotts has crippled the labor movement. Notice what happens when European Unions go on strike. The Train operators go on strike and the airports and cabs shut down in support.
The expensive real estate in Los Angeles is what Beutner and Broad and the rest of the privatizers are after. They want to own the land. What’s new?
How crazy is this? Educators are not happy about the prospect of a colleague carrying a gun. DeVos is totally out of touch with what is happening in schools.
……..
Report: DeVos May Allow Schools Use Federal Funds for Guns
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos is reportedly examining a plan that would allow states to use federal funding to purchase guns for educators. Multiple sources cited by The New York Times late Wednesday said the Education Department is considering using a program in federal education law that does not prohibit weapons purchases, the Student Support and Academic Enrichment grants. Congress has long forbidden that federal funds for school safety be used to purchase weapons, but a loophole in the Student Support and Academic Enrichment program would reportedly allow DeVos to approve plans by states or school districts to use the grants on firearms or firearm training. A spokeswoman for the Education Department cited by the Times declined to comment directly on the plans, saying only that the department is “constantly considering and evaluating policy issues, particularly issues related to school safety.”
I know I lose sleep every night worrying about grizzlies in our public schools.!