The official confirmation came after CEA members were seen leaving the meeting at the Greater Columbus Convention Center carrying signs that read “On strike” or similar language. The nearly 4,500-member union — which represents teachers, librarians, nurses, counselors, psychologists and other education professionals — met for more than three hours at the convention center to vote.
Previous coverage of the CEA vote:
Members of the Columbus Education Association are inside the Greater Columbus Convention Center to vote on whether to go on strike against Columbus City Schools. The doors closed shortly after 7 p.m. with the nearly 4,500-member union, which represents teachers, librarians, nurses, counselors, psychologists and other education professionals, inside. The vote will take several hours, the CEA says, and the result likely won’t be known until early Monday. If a strike is approved, union members will begin picketing late Monday morning outside schools where they would normally come to work for teacher preparation days. The first day of school for Columbus City School students is Wednesday. (Woodcrest Elementary School, the district’s only year-round school, returned to classes on July 27.) Columbus Schools Where can Columbus City Schools students get their lunches if the teachers are on strike?
Failure to negotiate between schools and Columbus Education Association
The Columbus City Schools Board of Education requested two bargaining sessions last week, but both meetings between the board and the union with a federal mediator ended without an agreement. Thursday’s meeting, the 22nd bargaining session, lasted 12 hours and the board made another final offer that would hire 25 additional full-time school nurses, behavior specialists, school psychologists and speech pathologists in the 2024 and 2025 fiscal years. teachers an extra day of programming in 2024 and 2025; and would commit to having CEA “at the table to address equity-based staffing.” Earlier in the negotiations, the CEA had sought an 8 percent raise at each step of the pay scale for 2022-23, 2023-24 and 2024-25, according to a copy of the unfair labor practice charge filed by the school board against the union on 3 August and was acquired by The Dispatch. CEA-Board Negotiations What’s the disconnect in contract talks between Columbus City Schools and the teachers union? The school board said its initial counteroffer on May 23 was a 2.5 percent raise in each salary bracket for 2022-23, 2023-24 and 2024-25, according to the complaint. The board said its “final offer” at the time of the termination was a 3 percent increase in each salary step for 2022-23 and a $2,000 retention bonus to be paid over the next two years, according to the complaint. The board’s final offer Thursday still included the 3 percent pay raise. “By the end of this three-year contract, a teacher who last school year earned the district’s average salary of $74,000 will earn more than $91,000 – a 23 percent increase since the start of the contract,” said Board President Jennifer Adair . Beginning teachers would also earn more than $50,000 in the first year of the contract, according to the district. The final offer would also give teachers a day dedicated to planning, with students out of school, for each of the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years, according to the district. The Columbus Education Association is starting its voting Members of the Columbus Education Association filed a petition at the Greater Columbus Convention Center to vote on whether to go on strike against Columbus City Schools on Sunday, August 21st. Courtney Hergesheimer, The Columbus Dispatch
What is the Columbus Education Association asking for?
In addition to functional heating ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) systems in schools, CEA previously called for smaller class sizes. full-time art, music and physical education teachers; more planning time for teachers. a cap on the number of class periods per day; and “other working conditions that recruit and retain the best teachers for students.” Earlier this month, CEA filed its required formal notice with the State Labor Relations Board of its intent to strike and picket if a new contract is not reached. The district responded to the HVAC issue by saying it is updating HVAC systems in 13 school buildings this summer using $35.6 million in federal Elementary and Secondary Education Emergency Funds created due to the COVID-19 pandemic. While work to update the HVAC systems will be completed in seven of those buildings in time for the scheduled start of classes, work in another six buildings will not be completed until September. In addition, two other buildings — Columbus Alternative High School and Hubbard Elementary School — will have to wait until the start of the 2023-2024 school year to get building-wide air conditioning. Mifflin Middle School is another school without air conditioning throughout the building. But because a new middle school may be built on the Mifflin Middle School site, according to the district’s proposed master facilities plan, Columbus City Schools doesn’t appear ready to invest in a new HVAC upgrade to the existing building’s entire building.
How would a teacher strike in Colombo affect the first day of school?
If union members vote to strike and stay on the picket line Wednesday, the state’s largest district of nearly 47,000 students plans to start the school year remotely — a move that has drawn criticism from some Columbus City Schools parents who worry that many students did not. are working well remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown. The district said it will transition to “synchronous and asynchronous distance learning” and district buildings will be closed to students and community members, according to information on the district’s website. However, 25 school sites will offer free lunch and breakfast meals to students in containers. “The District Administration will send out correspondence to parents and students regarding the procedures for starting the distance learning program prior to the first day of school,” according to the district. Students will be required to attend school via distance learning if there is a strike on the first scheduled day of classes. Columbus City Schools has 600 substitutes who will be given the curriculum to teach remotely, said Columbus City Schools spokeswoman Jacqueline Bryant. The last time Columbus City Schools went on strike was in 1975. Teacher strikes are a tool used as a last resort, said Ohio Federation of Educators President Melissa Cropper. “A walkout allows us to gather our collective voices to say that these issues are extremely critical to us and to our students and to the community in which we live, and we are willing to take these steps to ensure that the issues that are being considered,” he said. COVID-19 has given people a different expectation of what teaching and learning conditions can look like, he said. “If I can learn in my air-conditioned home in front of my computer instead of going to an overcrowded classroom that doesn’t have proper ventilation or heating or cooling, how can you tell me you value education and send me to a place like that?” he said. Cropper.
Other Greater Columbus School Districts that have recently had walkouts
Gahanna-Jefferson Schools went on strike for four days in 2020, the most recent district in Greater Columbus to go on strike. The contract that ended the strike gave teachers a 2.25 percent base pay increase, and the controversial classroom cameras cited as a reason for the work stoppage were still being used, though less often than originally discussed. Teachers in Reynoldsburg schools went on strike for 21 days in 2014. The strike ended with a new contract but did not include caps on class sizes. The contract read: “The parties agree to inspirational goals of 25 students per classroom in grades K-4 and 32 students per classroom in grades 5-8 and 35 in grades 9-12. The board’s original proposal eliminated step raises and scheduled salary increases, basing compensation on teachers’ classroom performance, student scores on state tests and scores under Ohio’s new teacher evaluation system. It also eliminated group health insurance in favor of cash payments to buy policies through the new Affordable Care Act. REA challenged the terms of the contract, rejecting value-based compensation and asking for firm caps on class sizes and more planning time. The union also filed an unfair labor practice complaint against the district, arguing that details of the proposed contract should not have been posted online. [email protected] @megankhenry
