Oakland teachers strike to raise some of the state’s lowest salaries

Oakland Unified teachers picket outside West Oakland Middle School on May 4, 2023.

Credit: Andrew Reed / EdSource

Markedly higher pay tops an ambitious list of contract demands by Oakland teachers who hit the picket lines early Thursday, impacting more than 34,000 students.

Although the negotiations between the district and the union are getting closer on salary, they remain far apart, sources say.

On Monday the district proposed a new salary schedule that would give TK-12 teachers varying pay increases depending on their experience and education level, as well as an ongoing 10% raise retroactive to November of last year, and a one-time $5,000 bonus. According to the district, first-year teachers would see their pay increase from $52,905 this school year to $63,604 next school year, with most teachers receiving at least a 13% salary increase.

An EdSource analysis shows that Oakland has among the lowest-paid mid-career teachers statewide. Of the state’s 22 largest school districts that filed teacher pay data with the state, Oakland ranks 20 in actual pay and 22 in pay adjusted for local cost of living. Three did not file. Among the largest districts, the highest pay for mid-career teachers is Garden Grove in Orange County at nearly $103,000.

In the San Francisco/East Bay region, of the 55 districts with more than 1,000 students that filed pay data, Oakland ranks 54th in salaries, according to the EdSource analysis, which compared teachers with similar levels of experience. Five districts did not file. The highest-paying district for mid-career teachers is Hillsborough Elementary in San Mateo County at nearly $117,000.

Pay raises aren’t all teachers want, said David McKay, teacher and union bargaining team member. They also want facility improvements, shared decision-making at district community schools, increased investments in historically Black schools and more support for students and teachers.

Oakland Unified and the Oakland Education Association, its teachers union, have been negotiating a new three-year contract since October. The teachers union initially asked for a 22.9% pay raise for the teachers, counselors, psychologists, social workers and librarians that it represents, but has since revised its proposal. The raise would have brought district pay for teachers to the median compensation of all teachers in Alameda County, taking into account health and welfare benefits, McKay said.

A 22.9% raise would have brought district salaries from last to 13th place among the 22 largest districts that provided pay data to the state, the EdSource analysis shows. Like many districts, raises in Oakland Unified have not kept up with the cost of inflation.

The union’s new counterproposal agrees to the 10% retroactive pay raise and to restructuring the pay schedule, as long as it is for all employees and not just K-12 teachers. It wants a $10,000 one-time retention bonus for teachers to return to the district next school year and $10,000 added to each step on the salary schedule, split over two years, McKay said.

The salary schedule revisions would take away “dead zones” or steps that don’t include pay increases and would allow teachers to reach the top step of pay sooner, union officials said. Currently, some steps don’t include a pay raise, resulting in some teachers going without a step-related pay raise for several years, said Samia Khattab, a teacher librarian at Franklin Elementary School and a union bargaining team member.

Despite ongoing bargaining, prospects of avoiding a work stoppage appeared dim late Wednesday. Even a visit from state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, who tried to broker an agreement Monday and Tuesday, didn’t break the stalemate. With only hours to go, negotiations were proceeding slowly, according to union representatives.

By morning, with no deal on the table, union members began picketing outside 80 Oakland Unified schools and the district central office. A noon rally was set for Frank Ogawa Plaza.

Oakland Unified central office staff, principals and support staff will be at schools to work with students, according to the district. Students are expected to attend school, but will be given excused absence if they do not.

Both the union and district said they will continue to negotiate.

“While we do not know how long the strike will last, we continue to bargain with OEA in an effort to reach an agreement,” said the district in a press release. “The end of the school year is always filled with milestone events for our students, so we want to ensure regular school resumes as soon as possible.

“Our goal was and still is to bargain a contract that will help the Oakland Unified recruit and retain good teachers and provide our 35,000 students with much-needed services,” said union President Ismael Armendariz.  “We’re not going to just go along to get along. If the district won’t respect and fulfill the urgent needs of students and teachers they should expect resistance. They got it.”

The strike would follow six months of tense negotiations over pay raises for teachers and a list of what the union describes as “common good” items, such as improved environmental health in classrooms, increased school safety and culturally relevant curriculum.

“Our membership is organized,” Khattab said Wednesday morning. “Our membership is ready to fight for safe, stable and racially just community schools, including proposals on smaller class sizes, an increase in the number of nurses, counselors and secondary school librarians and common good proposals.”

Charity Balona, a seventh-grade teacher at Melrose Leadership Academy, says she’d much rather be in her classroom helping prepare students for a class presentation to parents scheduled for next week or taking part in end-of-the-year festivities with her class than on the picket line.

“It’s so unfortunate that the district doesn’t take action to compensate teachers and meet common good needs for students unless we push it to this level,” Balona said.

An email from the district to the community called for negotiations to continue without a strike: “Our children’s education does not need to be interrupted by negotiations with our union, especially given the major offer the district made on Monday,” said the district statement. “We are committed to continuing to work with our labor leaders to discuss their salaries and support services for our students without the need for a strike. Let’s not interrupt our students’ learning.

“Following all the turmoil and disruption of COVID, the idea that our children might be out of school yet again while both sides work to reach an agreement only harms our students and families,” stated the district. “The adults need to be adults, so that students can be students. Let’s ask our bargaining units to have these discussions at the negotiating table and not on the sidewalks — while our children are out of school.”

Discontent over salaries has been an ongoing issue with district educators, who are paid some of the lowest salaries in the region. Last year teachers were paid between $51,905 and $97,980 depending on their seniority and education level.

The high cost of living in the Bay Area, paired with tough working conditions and low pay, has many teachers leaving for positions in other districts, McKay said. The flow of teachers out of Oakland has been going on since at least 2007, when he started with the district, he said.

“I remember when I was hired,” McKay said. “People from my credentialing program in Hayward would apply to Dublin and get $20,000 more right off the bat. Pay has always been an issue. Inflation has wiped out some of the raises we got from the 2019 negotiations that led to a strike.”

Pay increases were also central to similar strikes in 1986, 1996 and 2019, as well as an unauthorized one-day wildcat strike in March. Teachers also held a one-day strike in 2022 to protest school closures.

Balona, a single mother who lives in Oakland, says she manages on her salary, but barely. She has been in the district since 2007.

“It’s such a struggle,” she said. “ I’m barely able to scrape by. I think to myself, ‘Why am I scraping by? I could move to Hayward and make thousands more.’ I love our school and love our community, and love teaching. I feel highly invested in our community and the work we are doing.”

The district has become a “steppingstone” for new teachers, who move to other districts after gaining a few years of experience, she said.

“Year after year we lose teachers because they can’t afford to live in Oakland,” she said. “Because we have so many new teachers, the district puts a lot of money into consults to perform teacher preparation and professional development.”

The constant onboarding and training of new teachers is exhausting for other staff, she said.

The high turnover rate has resulted in many under-prepared teachers in classrooms working on emergency-style credentials. An EdSource analysis of 2020-21 data found that the district had the lowest number of teachers, 57%, assigned to classrooms they are credentialed to teach, compared with other districts with more than 10,000 students.

Critics and researchers agree that high teacher turnover impacts learning. Oakland’s scores on standardized tests lag behind the state average. Just over 35% of the district’s students met or exceeded standards in English language arts, compared with the state average of 47.6% in 2022. There was a similar gap in math, with 25.9% of Oakland students meeting or exceeding standards in math, compared with 33.4% of the state’s students.