What you missed in media coverage of the Oakland teachers' strike | Tim Talk | Tim Hunt | DanvilleSanRamon.com |

Local Blogs

Tim Talk

By Tim Hunt

E-mail Tim Hunt

About this blog: I am a native of Alameda County, grew up in Pleasanton and currently live in the house I grew up in that is more than 100 years old. I spent 39 years in the daily newspaper business and wrote a column for more than 25 years in add...  (More)

View all posts from Tim Hunt

What you missed in media coverage of the Oakland teachers' strike

Uploaded: Feb 26, 2019
Looking at the East Bay Times’ coverage of the Oakland teachers strike, I am amazed at the lack of depth.
The first two days, the main story on the front page carried five bylines. There were lots of comments from striking teachers, parents and the obligatory comment from the district. Coverage described the issues as pay, class size and more counselors and support staff. The district is offering an 8 ½ percent raise over four years, while teachers are demanding 12 percent over three years.

Nowhere to be found were the following facts:

• Teachers’ salaries range from about $46,500 to $83,700 plus fully paid health, dental and vision benefits. The health benefits alone, for a family are $1,667/month.
• Class sizes in Oakland average 23.6, about two students lower than the county average.
• The district receives $15,337 per student, about 125 percent of the statewide average of $12,229.
• The student population is challenging with 15,600 student learning English and about 28,200 receiving free or reduced-price lunch. The enrollment is about 35,000 students.
• The state funding formula that former Gov. Jerry Brown pushed through the Legislature in 2012 allocated additional resources to districts such as Oakland that are charged with educating disadvantaged students. It’s working in terms of resources—what’s lacking is management and oversight by the administration and the school trustees.

Last year, the Alameda County Grand Jury criticized the Oakland district for running consistent deficits. The report said that the district has run between $20 million and $30 million in debt for the past 15 years while suffering very high turnover in both teaching staff and superintendents (five in nine years). The district, given steadily increasing pension costs, is facing major deficits in the next couple of years without major changes—it’s wrestling to cut between $20-$30 million in the next fiscal year.

The problem in Oakland, one that home-grown Superintendent Kyla Johnson-Trammell acknowledges, is that as enrollment has shrunk the district has not closed schools.
The Grand Jury report pointed out that enrollment has plunged from 54,000 to 37,000 (now 35,000) and there’s been no adjustment in the number of schools open. The district is now engaged in that process with the expected controversy from parents and students wanting to keep their neighborhood schools.

Oakland is running 87 schools weekly with an average enrollment of 412 students—remember that Pleasanton elementary schools are targeted at 650 kids with the middle schools at more than 1,000 and the high schools at more than 2,000.

The Fremont district, by contrast, has 35,000 students served by 42 schools.

Bottom line: the district likely has the resources to pay the teachers more and potentially hire more staff, but it must close many schools and consolidate sites. Each site can cost $750,000 to operate annually for administrators and support staff and utilities and maintenance.

Closing unnecessary sites and selling off the land would open up capital money to invest in other sites (proceeds from sales should only be used for capital projects, not ongoing salary expenses).




Democracy.
What is it worth to you?

Comments

Posted by Tom, a resident of Castlewood,
on Feb 28, 2019 at 10:01 am

Thanks for shedding more factual light on the Oakland strike. It helps that we now have additional information that otherwise may have been ignored or discounted by the usual media outlets to which we have access.


Posted by Alfred, a resident of Danville,
on Mar 1, 2019 at 10:18 am

The parents in Oakland are making a huge mistake in keeping their children home from school during the strike. Federal government money directly to the local school districts is based on attendance, so the parents are essentially helping to bankrupt their own schools by keeping their children home. Is the teachers union doing to reimburse their schools for the hundreds of thousands of dollars they are losing in Federal income due to the parents listening to them and keeping their kids home during the strike? Of course, as the teachers union simply wants what is best for the teachers, not the students or the parents.


Posted by Alfred, a resident of Danville,
on Mar 1, 2019 at 10:20 am

Typo, meant of course not.


Posted by DKHSK, a resident of Bridle Creek,
on Mar 2, 2019 at 9:09 am

DKHSK is a registered user.

Closing schools mean that you actually have to do something efficient.

Government does not do efficiency...EVER. There's not enough opportunity for graft in it.




Posted by alicetaylor12, a resident of Blackhawk,
on Mar 5, 2019 at 7:07 pm

alicetaylor12 is a registered user.

I would like more information about this, because it is very nice., Thanks for sharing.

http://catmario.games


Posted by Boulder Tree Services, a resident of Avila,
on Mar 13, 2019 at 6:52 am

No doubt The information presented is quite useful. By using this I think all can prevent major breakdown.


Posted by all elite wrestling roster, a resident of Walnut Creek,
on Mar 27, 2019 at 9:28 pm

Thanks for this info


Follow this blogger.
Sign up to be notified of new posts by this blogger.

Email:

SUBMIT

Post a comment

Sorry, but further commenting on this topic has been closed.

Stay informed.

Get the day's top headlines from DanvilleSanRamon.com sent to your inbox in the Express newsletter.

Burning just one "old style" light bulb can cost $150 or more per year
By Sherry Listgarten | 12 comments | 3,225 views

Premiere! “I Do I Don’t: How to build a better marriage” – Here, a page/weekday
By Chandrama Anderson | 0 comments | 1,542 views

Community foundations want to help local journalism survive
By Tim Hunt | 21 comments | 1,126 views