San Francisco schools will again be closed Thursday as the teachers’ strike continues, according to the San Francisco Unified School District.
After 11 months of bargaining attempts between SFUSD and the United Educators of San Francisco union for a contract, teachers resorted to going on strike Monday as the parties could not come to a full agreement. The strike has forced school closures for the district’s roughly 50,000 students and marks the city’s first teacher walkout in 47 years.
Earlier Wednesday, hundreds of teachers and supporters formed a human banner at Ocean Beach, spelling out “Strike” and “For our students” as negotiations continued.
“We’re here today to make a statement that we are not giving up on our demands, which is to have stable, safe and fully staffed schools all across our school district,” said Claire Wernecke, a second-grade teacher at Monroe Elementary School, in an interview.
While progress has been made in the past week in certain areas of the contract, disagreements on health care coverage for dependents, salary raises and staffing in special education programs have yet to be resolved.
In a morning briefing, Superintendent Maria Su provided some updates. She accused UESF of not acting with urgency to reach a deal.
“We are here. We are ready. We want to get this done now,” Su said. “We need UESF to return to the table and engage with a real sense of urgency.”
She said that on Tuesday at noon, the district put forward a proposal. Updates to their previous proposal included a slight increase in the percentage of health care coverage.
The union delivered a counteroffer to the district’s proposal around 8:30 p.m. Then, when district bargainers tried to present another counter-offer to the union at 10 p.m., they were advised that the union had left for the night, according to Su.
…we are not giving up on our demands, which is to have stable, safe and fully staffed schools all across our school district.
Claire Wernecke, second-grade teacher
“We need UESF to join us so that we can sign this agreement today and get our kids back into the classroom,” Su said. “There is no time to lose. We all have to come together. We need to reach an agreement now.”
Leslie Hu, UESF’s secretary, criticized Su’s assertion that the union is not acting with urgency. She said that the union has been trying to reach a deal for nearly a year.
“We’ve been urgent about this all along, and it’s only in the last couple days that we’ve actually seen any movement,” Hu said in an interview. “We are ready to go back into our classroom, and that’s where we want to be. We don’t want to be out here.”
During Tuesday’s bargaining talks, Mayor Daniel Lurie and state Superintendent Tony Thurmond were present.
“They can and they need to get this done,” Lurie said in a statement on social media Tuesday evening. “Getting our schools open is the top priority and we can do that while supporting our educators and keeping the school district on the path to fiscal stability.”
SFUSD has said that it is facing a projected $100 million deficit next year, limiting the district’s ability to take on more costs.
However, union leaders say the district has enough money. SF Propel, a progressive policy organization, conducted an analysis of SFUSD’s budget and found that it has a $429 reserve fund that can be tapped into.
As of Tuesday, UESF is demanding an 8% salary increase for teachers, while SFUSD has proposed a 6% increase over two years. Additionally, UESF wants health care plans for teachers to include full coverage for dependents. SFUSD had moved from its previous offer of covering 75% of health care premiums up to 80%.