Los Angeles is about to try to prove that class size doesn’t matter. The district, on orders from investment banker Austin Beutner, has hired about 400 substitutes to fill in for thousands of teachers who are preparing to strike on January 10. Let’s see: 400 teachers for 600,000 students. Those are very large classes!
As leaders of Los Angeles Unified School District and United Teachers Los Angeles remain locked in an impasse over a new contract, the district has hired hundreds of substitute staffers to replace picketing educators in the event of a potential strike come Jan. 10. But the move has sparked outrage from the union.
The districts’ preliminary move, alongside the union’s strike preparations, is a sign of the increasing likelihood of a strike that would be LAUSD’s first since 1989 and stands to impact the daily operations of hundreds of schools in the country’s second largest district.
LA Unified Superintendent Austin Beutner said Thursday that the district remains “at the bargaining table” but is actively preparing for teachers’ absence by hiring approximately 400 substitute teachers and fallback instruction for students.
“We have hired substitutes, we have made plans as to alternate curriculums for days that there is a strike but our goal is to make sure schools are safe and open so kids continue to learn,” Beutner said on Thursday. “My concern first and foremost is the safety and well being of our students.”
The move to hire replacement staff drew a sharp rebuke from the union over the last two days.
“It is outrageously irresponsible for Supt. Austin Beutner to force this strike when the district holds $1.9 billion in reserves and it is even more irresponsible to think that 400 substitutes can educate more than 600,000 students,” UTLA said in a statement Friday. “We believe that it is illegal for the district to hire people outside our bargaining unit to teach in LAUSD classrooms.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I sub for 1500 students? The $uperintendent thinks this is reasonable? What a farce. The scabs should be ashamed.
When I was subbing, in Utah, I thought classes of 45 were bad!
But 1499 would have been where I drew the line.
This year’s Women’s March is Jan. 19. Last year, Melinda Gates reportedly supported the March. What a hypocrite, in light of her and Bill’s de-professionalizing of the single career that lifted the most women into financial independence. Gates funds the charter-loving Center for American Progress, what a surprise (sarcasm).
BTW, no American news broadcast is willing to acknowledge and report that the yellow vest protestors in France are angry about Macron cutting taxes for the wealthy. Instead, the network news covers up, by attaching the protests to rising gas prices.
And who gets to control the “narrative” here in the Good old US of A? Certainly not the people paying the taxes. The yellow vest protestors are also angry about the education dephorm that is happening. The French government is clearly trying to Americanize on all levels…..and they are trying to do it very quickly.
Macron is another neoliberal that serves corporate power over citizens. The French are less tolerant of this treatment than we are.
This has been in overdrive since Bill Clinton and most taxpayers have been oblivious of the situation. Greed has gotten out of hand here and it’s NOW that we are starting to realize what has been happening for many years. France, being a much smaller country has size as it’s advantage….tax payers get to see changes on a much larger scale. The French have a chance to turn things around….I think here in the USA we have gone too far down the rabbit hole.
the media “redirection” of protest demands is extremely harmful; few not directly connected to schools are aware that last year’s teachers’ strikes had so much to do with anger against charter invasions, the push to stop longevity protections, and legislators looking to gamble with pensions
In contrast to Howard Fuller’s false claims that hedge funders, tech tyrants, and discount retailing heirs want debate, they want anything but a process that exposes them. They seek to hide the ways they have corrupted the United States. And, they use media, DINO politicians and think tanks and, astroturfing to do it.
The district will be sending certificated administrators from local and downtown offices to schools. This will be interesting. First, you can bet that these administrators are not happy about being forced to supervise kids they don’t know and without support services such as counselors. To me, it’s a recipe for disaster. Also, no one knows exactly how many kids will show up at individual schools. I kind of feel sorry for the principals who have no choice but to do their best without having any idea what is going to happen. Of course, the district is going to pretend that they have everything under control. It’s clear that the parents are organizing against the district to an extent never seen in the past. You can thank social media for this.
I hope every “suit” making decisions is given a few weeks of trying to “teach” under the conditions that they created for teachers and students. I hope that every student shows up for classes and demands a decent education. I hope that parents will join the picket lines. I don’t live in CA, but I wish this would happen in every single state across the nation.
posted at OEN : https://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/Los-Angeles-Hires-Hundreds-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Class_Educators–Teachers_Mass-Teacher-Firings_Students-181231-459.html
No doubt the 400 subs are an attempt to supplement the administrators that will be doing the bulk of the filling in for teachers. There’s still no chance that they’ll be able to continue adequate school operations, even at a “babysitting” level, much less keep instruction of any kind going. There are 658 schools in the district, so even if we’re being generous in the number of administrators, they’ll be hard pressed to field more than about 2,500 total replacements and still be able to carry on any administrative functions at all. That means they’ll have the equivalent of about 10% of the usual teaching force to handle students directly. You can bet we’re still talking about 200-250 students per “teacher” in an environment that has so little potential for learning they might as well stay home. But of course Beutner won’t do that, since that would put pressure on him from the hordes of angry parents to settle the strike on reasonable terms rather than trying to hold out and force his will on teachers.
It’s all about the safety and wellbeing of the students? Where did the scabs come from? Are they fingerprinted and have background checks been done by law enforcement? Or were they hired the way Pearson hires test scorers — with adds on Craigslist for high school graduates who may or may not have criminal records including child abuse?
Also, hiring scabs when there is a union is certainly illegal. Add it to the list of complaints to PERB about Beutner’s shady tactics. This guy is a walking lawsuit magnet.
Please disregard my comment. I wrote hastily, and didn’t realize the scabs will be administrators. However, in California, teaching credentials expire if one spends five or more years out of the classroom, so there’s that.
Wait a minute. I take back that take back. The article said there was a rumor they were hiring at a rapid rate and paying $500 a day to cross the picket line. Those aren’t administrators. My question stands. There is a teacher shortage. Where are they finding these people?
(It would be a good thing if the district took a bunch of administrators out of superfluous testing and data collection, and put them to work teaching to reduce class size.)
“Where are they finding these people?”
For $500 a day? Anywhere, since this means $5K during the 10-day strike. My son worked in Alaska for 6 weeks, 16hrs/day, 7 days a week to get this kind of money.
The better question is why are they more willing to pay the $500/day to these people instead of spending money on schools and teachers? The total will be at least 400x$500×10=$2 million.
Anyone still remember their own school days when they had a sub? With a few exceptions, it was a free day at best. WW3 at worst. And those were generally qualified and experienced subs. I don’t want to know what it’s going to be like with 400 warm bodies pulled off the streets acting as subs.
In impact, it’ll look like a charter school in Ohio or Michigan.
Also worth noting that when we had subs when I was a kid, it was because one teacher was out. There were plenty of other regular teachers in the building who would stick their noses in pretty often and keep tabs. Imagine a school building with not one regular teacher on duty.
It doesn’t matter if the subs are professionals or not, because each will have to take care of 1500 students.
I wonder if this will work with 1500 students
Great listening, thanks, SDP.
Just wondering if the charter teachers utla represent will support the strike? Aren’t some of these charters at co locations?
The answer to your question is that they will support the strike verbally, and by wearing red shirts to work. They will not be picketing, but we don’t expect them to. There is no hostility between our groups, but we tend to act like the other doesn’t exist most of the time (ignore each other, for the most part.)
“We believe that it is illegal for the district to hire people outside our bargaining unit to teach in LAUSD classrooms.”
Someone tell UTLA that these corporate minion pirates out to swallow the public schools and turn them into cancerous cash cows breaks the law all the time just like THEIR US president has done most if not all of his life.
DT is their president. DT is not the president of all the people.
It’s good to see Beutner occupied with something other than portfoliorizing the district. Let’s keep keeping him busy.
“Let’s keep keeping him busy.”
Yea, if all the custodians walk out with the teachers, we could keep him busy cleaning toilets.
The “scabs” will be pre-approved substitute teachers who are already on the District’s sub list.
I was a senior in high school back in 1989 (when UTLA had its last strike) and this looks like it will be the same:
Students will be placed in auditoriums for the entirety of the day, supervised by a handful of administrators and scabs. No teaching will go on and about 10% of the students will show.
The strike starts on the 10th (a Thursday) and will go at least until the 18th…I can’t see it being any shorter than that. My guess is that it will last two full weeks.
“it is even more irresponsible to think that 400 substitutes can educate more than 600,000 students,””
That’s 1500 students for each educator. Good luck with that.
A “philanthropist” and investment banker running the second largest public school system in America (with no educational experience, save for his mother, a school teacher). What could go wrong?
Reformers like Beutner and Duncan sometimes have close relatives (their mother, for example) who were teachers. Apparently they learn whatever they need to know by osmosis. Or mothers’ milk.