San Andreas, CA…Today 138 teachers in the Calaveras Unified School District (CUSD) announced that they will go on strike. The Calaveras Unified Educators’ Association (CUEA) will go out on strike Thursday, October 19, 2017, over unresolved disputes concerning class sizes, school safety issues and professional pay.

“We don’t want to strike, but we will for our kids,” said CUEA President Lorraine Angel. “We wanted to settle our contract dispute, but this district has unfortunately made clear that students are not a top priority. Teachers feel differently. CUEA teachers are standing up for our students. We are going on strike because that is the only option we have left to save our schools.”

Teachers will start removing personal items from classrooms tomorrow in preparation for Thursday’s strike.

“What’s truly tragic is that the district can more than afford our proposals,” Angel noted.

CUEA and CUSD have been negotiating since March of 2016. In May of 2017, an independent state-appointed chairperson oversaw a hearing to review the contract negotiations. As a result, on June 6, 2017, the impartial chair made very specific recommendations that include class size reduction, the development of a joint safety committee that would allow for the monitoring of district-wide safety issues and creation of school safety plans, and salary raises of 4% in 2016-17 and 2.5% in 2017-18. Regrettably, the district rejected the independent chair’s compromise proposals.

The chair also noted that the district never claimed it could not afford the CUEA proposals, stating in part, “the district is not claiming an inability to pay defense.” The recommendation was based on the district’s increasing state funding and its growing reserve that are over $4.8 million or over 16% of the total budget. In the last two years alone, CUSD has increased its reserves by $1.8 million. The current CUEA proposal of an increase of 2% keeps CUSD teachers well under-paid when compared to surrounding and similar size school districts, including Mark Twain Elementary and Amador County Unified School Districts.

“The inability to keep parity means we are losing students to nearby districts and we are losing our educators that leave for better paying jobs. CUSD needs to save our schools by investing in our kids and not the reserve,” Angel stated.

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The Calaveras Unified Educators’ Association is an affiliate of the 325,000-member California Teachers Association is affiliated with the 3 million-member National Education Association.