School Beat: Cultivating and Keeping Our Teachers

In San Francisco, not only is the work itself strenuous, but the task of making a living in this increasingly expensive city makes the job almost a luxury available only to those who have another income that can help make ends meet.

Last year we avoided a strike on the part of the teachers by negotiating a contract that stretched back a few years into the past but unfortunately only covered up to 2007. In true whiplash fashion, negotiations for the next contract phase had to start almost immediately thereafter. Those negotiations continue and will be something the new superintendent, whoever that turns out to be, has to take a lead in. A strike vote may happen this summer, indicating that those discussions are ratcheting up.

The issues in these negotiations revolve as they must around compensation and working conditions. While San Francisco may have a particularly trying set of cost-of-living factors to contend with, the overall difficulty of creating teaching positions to which top-notch individuals will be attracted and want to stay in is one that has been facing all districts nationally and certainly our state and city are no exception.

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