School Beat: A Contract for Teachers

It is long overdue that the union demand that the state legislature raise, not lower, the taxes on the rich, commonly known as the progressive income tax, that the pay for teachers, a job that requires a college degree, start at $80,000 a year, that the state minimum wage be $20 per hour, that a statewide healthcare system, including medical and dental, should be paid for with our tax dollars, and available to anyone who needs it free of charge; that all schools at all levels provide free breakfast and lunch to everyone at the school, both students and staff, that all schools at all levels be as good as Lowell High School, the minimum that a school should be, and that in San Francisco, the private school status of Lowell High School, with its high school admissions test, be eliminated. The teachers union, like all other unions, are completely supportive of the Democratic Party, which is in control of the legislature, and should tell that party that this is the minimum acceptable standard. After all, one needs about $120,000 to buy a home in San Francisco, so the $20 per hour (about $40,000 a year) and the $80,000 a year are bare minumum standards. The teachers union also needs to be more active in demanding higher standards at all schools at all levels. Lowell High School is simply what all schools should be and are in the wealthy suburbs. Every single year, we read the test scores for all grades 1 through 12, and every year, the results are the same: The rich children's schools have high test scores and the poor children's schools have poor test scores. There is now no reason for any tests as the results are predictable. We also must ask, why are there safety problems in the schools? Why do the teachers need phones and first aid kits in every classroom? Part of the answer is that the educational standards are not high in the workingclass schools and thus there are problems. Another major problem is serious hunger on the part of workingclass children, making it impossible for them to learn. It is also overdue that the teachers' union go on strike as the school year is soon ended. Otherwise, they will have to wait until September, and if they must wait, they should go on strike the first day of school. When they go on strike, they should stay on strike until all of the above demands are met. We can be sure that even if the scabs show up, most of the children will not cross the picketline and there will certainly be no serious teaching. It is also long overdue that the teachers union stop supporting the death penalty, anti-education Democrats, no different from the Republicans. When I heard about the strike vote, which they openly stated was a leverage tool, I asked how soon the sellout contract would be signed, because that is the usual procedure. The schools have been the same for over 50 years. How many more decades of this insulting theft of our tax dollars, known as the rotten school system, will be tolerated by labor?

One major point left out above: All of the school board members voting to hire scabs are Democrats. Only 1 Democrat, Eric Mar, and the 2 Green Party members voted against hiring scabs. The Democratic Party is just as much a union-busting capitalist party as is the Republican Party and it is thus criminal that any labor union, including the teacher's union, give any money or endorsements to any Democrat.