I’ve been a public educator for 27 years working most of my career in the SUHSD. I work at Southwest Middle School located just 5 minutes from the San Diego international border.
My school is approximately 90% Hispanic and could be described as the epicenter for “disadvantaged” students. Still, it’s a centerpiece for extreme cultural beauty and expression. Before the pandemic, Southwest Middle School students were reading on average at a third -grade level. Less than one in five students met the California proficiency standards in mathematics.
Although California public schools have not been state tested during the past two years due to the pandemic, Dr. Morphew, Dean of Education for John Hopkins School of Education, estimates that the learning loss for disadvantaged students to be 9 – 11 months since schools were closed last March. I regularly teach classes where more than 35% of my students do not attend their virtual lessons. On test days, I sometimes have 50% of students that refuse to log in. For the students that do log in, many will not answer questions when called upon. This problem is further exuberated by the high percentage of special ed students that are placed into my classes. Furthermore, teachers in my district are forbidden to require students to turn their videos on to verify their presence. Parents that I talk with are disappointed with their children’s learning loss and failing grades but feel powerless to do anything about it. The vast majority of parents want their children to return to a brick and mortar school. They see firsthand the devastating effects of the almost one-year quarantine has had on their children’s lives including anxiety, depression, sedentary lifestyle, lack of motivation and overall compounded trauma.
Recently, the new director of the Center for Disease Control Dr. Richelle Walensky said that, “There is increasing data to suggest that schools can safely reopen, and that safe reopening does not suggest that teachers need to be vaccinated.” Dr. Anthony Fauci also backs the CDC recommendation and President Biden’s plan to get all K-8 students back in school within his first 100 days. Even the President of the American Academy of Pediatrics – Lee Savio Beers, M.D., stated that, “Children absolutely need to return to in-school learning for their healthy development and well-being, and so safety in schools and in the community must be a priority.” Furthermore, Governor Newsome’s four children all attend a private school where they offer in person learning. The Governor has spoken about how his younger children had a difficult time learning remotely. Governor Newsome has the financial resources to make a choice for his children, whereas the parents in my community and many communities throughout California are “forced to accept” what the leadership and teacher unions have deemed is best for their children. Even the governor’s latest effort to give public schools an additional 2 billion dollars to open schools safely was shot down with pressure by the largest school districts and the teachers union.
Teachers may believe they’re essential workers but through their actions, they do not place themselves within the same category of healthcare, police, fire, retail, food production, construction, and transportation workers. Certainty, teachers would be the first to “cry foul” if first responders did not show up to their house in an emergency, unable to buy groceries, hire a plumber or make a run to the local donut shop. The party line is that “everyone else” needs to take the risk, but not me.
I’m a believer in teachers unions and am grateful when my union helped defend me against some gorilla-covert style administrators who abused their positional power. I’m disappointed, but not surprised that the teacher’s union has placed teachers in a “special” category of essential workers. Teachers like me make decisions based on facts and evidence. Yet, they disregard what the top medical organizations in the U.S. are saying about what’s best for children and our country. I recently attended a union Zoom meeting where the teachers openly enjoy venting and complaining about the idea of returning back to school. Many of those same teachers will talk about how they feel “so sorry” for the kids and all the problems that they are experiencing during a school faculty meeting, yet the tenor of their voices are far more “militant” during a union meeting. It was sad but somewhat comical listening to teachers who are so out of touch with reality say things like
“I can’t return back to school because I am watching my two kids at home.” Another teacher went further and said, “I have two kids also and they have allergies, so I can’t even take them to a childcare center, therefore I can’t return back to school. Most just talked about not risking their health. I shared some of these stories with my wife who works as a nurse at one of the highest Covid acute care centers in the county. She just laughed and said that her colleagues somehow find a way to make it work – like most people have to do.
One thing that is often not discussed is that the majority of school employees are working part time and receiving full time pay. Few want to talk about this reality, but the truth is that school employees are enjoying their extended vacation and most “adore” working part time from home. With powerful unions to protect their interest (not the kids of course), they will milk it out, not returning to their schools until “possibly” in the fall, with most supporting the idea that they cannot safely return until that time.
Although some smaller school districts are making plans to return students to their schools, the largest school districts in the state remain paralyzed to do almost anything. LA Unified with pressure from its powerful teacher’s union has stated that there are no plans to open schools anytime soon. San Francisco Board of Education has prioritized renaming 44 schools like George Washington, Paul Revere and Abraham Lincoln because they bear the names of historical figures that “they” believe are linked to racism and oppression. The board feels that this “nonsense” is pressingly more important than implementing a “real and working” plan to gets its students and teachers back in the classroom. Even more comical, the City of San Francisco is currently suing its own school district to gets it schools open. Currently, the Sweetwater Union High School District, one of the largest school districts in San Diego County, has hashed out a “Mickey Mouse” deal with the teacher’s union where only 10% of students will return part time, sometime this spring with hybrid instruction. SUHSD teachers have also demanded that they will “voluntary” return to their campuses and that they will need to wait 8 weeks “after” they have received the vaccine before “possibly” returning to campus this fall.
Hopefully, the voters will take note of how school districts and its teachers did not step up when their community’s parents and children needed them the most. The voters have every right not to approve the next school district bond and to pressure the legislature not to raise educational funding so that teachers cannot receive a future raise.
Keith Ballard resides in Chula Vista.
