by Marcy WinogradPre-Strike Community Support-Let's Go!Let's Organize Community Support for Striking LAUSD Teachers!Show up on Thursday, Friday and Monday: 7 am-8am, at your neighborhood LAUSD school (I'll be at Venice HS, 13000 Venice Blvd., in front--meet me there) to show pre-strike and strike support for our 34,000 public school teachers and support staff.Directory to LAUSD SchoolsTeachers are fighting for lower class size (now over 40 in some classes), more nurses on site every day (80% of the schools reportedly have no full time nurse), more counselors (some have over 700 students on their case load!) and librarians (who now run back and forth between schools). Teachers are also asking for pay increases (3% at first, followed by another 3%) not tied to cuts in health benefits for new teachers.The District says it can't afford to adequately staff our schools, but LAUSD's reserves total almost $2-billion.I'll have signs and flyers at Venice Hs or you can download this sign and bring it or show up with your own organization's banner. (FYI ... Strike support at Venice HS will be headquartered at the Venice Alumni House, 2435 Walgrove Ave.)It looks as though teachers may or may not (operative words) strike Thursday (still in court fighting District attempts to stop the strike), but if it's not Thursday or Friday then probably Monday, Jan. 14th. Regardless, the key to a successful teachers' strike is widespread community support, so let's get out there Thursday, Friday and Monday morning, Jan. 10, 11th, 14th, wave signs of solidarity and make some noise!If you prefer to go to your neighborhood school, organize a contingent of community friends to show up with banners and signs and write and deliver a letter to the principal expressing your support. Show up before school or at the end of the school day when you can talk to parents. Principals have been told to notify the superintendent of the level of community support--so you matter big time in this effort to not only improve conditions for teachers and students but to save public education from the claws of privatizers!That's right. LAUSD's superintendent, a former investment banker, wants to break up the district into over 30 mini-districts, close lots of neighborhood schools and open charters, instead--then push and highlight the charters, publicly funded but privately operated--some by corporate chains), in student enrollment packets. This is called the portfolio plan and threatens to bankrupt LAUSD, which, according to United Teachers of Los Angeles, is already losing $600 million dollars a year to charters that don't pay their fare share of infrastructure maintenance costs.Read more about the privatization plan here.LAUSD is the second largest school district (600,000 students) right behind NYC, so what happens in L.A. will reverberate throughout the country.Who's schools?Our schools!In solidarity,Marcy Winograd (P.S. I'm supporting Jackie Goldberg for the LAUSD District 5 seat in the special election on March 5, 2019. Jackie will protect our schools!)
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