On Tuesday morning, members of the Portland Association of Teachers union and their supporters marched on strike for better teaching conditions and temporarily shut down the Burnside bridge.
The strike began three weeks ago, on November 1, which shuttered schools about 45,000 students in Oregon's largest district. The strike led to students missing their 11 days of class.
Oregon Teachers March on Strike
ANTIETAM, MD - JULY 04: Sarah Spall,5, looks over a stone wall at Burnside Bridge at the Antietam battlefield July 4, 2005 where General Robert E. Lee ended his first invasion of the North in September 1862 in Antietam, Marlyand. The battle claimed more than 23,000 men killed, wounded, and missing in one single day, September 17,1862, and led to Lincoln's issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation.The battle grounds that are within the "Journey Through Hallowed Ground" Corridor, which encompasses a 175-mile-long stretch of land from Gettysburg, PA to Monticello, VA, has been recognized by national historians as the region that holds more American history than any other place in the country. The land is imminently threatened by suburban sprawl, according to the recently released study by the National Trust for Historic Preservation in its annual list of America's most endangered historic places.
The union posted photos on their Facebook page, showing teachers sitting on the bridge dressed in blue clothes while holding banners calling for better pay and teaching conditions. At 7:30 am, the union called their supporters to gather in their headquarters roughly half a mile from the bridge before the strike started at 8:00 am.
The teachers and supporters stopped in the middle of the bridge for about 15 minutes and the bridge was already clear, and cars were already on the road by 9 am.
The teachers and the supporters have been bargaining about better pay, class sizes, and planning time for teachers on every strike that sometimes reached night time.
The union initially proposed limiting class sizes but now asked for salary raises for teachers whose class sizes surpass certain thresholds.
According to the US News, the union has recently discussed parent involvement in the strike in proposed committees to organize class sizes.
The union authorized the parents to be a part of committees that would determine whether students could be added to a class that had already reached the size threshold.
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School Board Member's Response to Teacher's Strike
The district said that parent involvement in the strike would violate students' privacy, and teachers, principals, and school administrators should handle such decisions.
The union said that the school board members responded to them on Monday morning and rejected an unsettled agreement. However, the board members argued that the claim was inaccurate but said they felt a deal was "very, very close."
The latest proposal was released on Monday and noted that the two sides have made some progress on salary negotiations.
The proposal decided to propose cost-of-living adjustments, which would increase the teachers' salary by roughly 13% over three years, bringing it closer to the approximately 20% pay increase over three years that the union had asked for from the very beginning of their strike.
In the 2023 salary report, the average salary of teachers in Oregon was $58,644, but the range mainly falls between $49,030 and $71,507.
According to The Beacon, the strike on public schools in Portland has reached its fourth week. Eighty-one schools have been shut down, and over 40,000 Portland students have been out of school since November 1.
Jeffery Meiser, a political science professor with an 11-year-old son in fifth grade, said, "Each minute you're in class, there's a lot of prep that goes into that."
The professors in schools were continuously facing the challenge of staying prepared for their classes while taking care of their children all day.
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