{"id":3970,"date":"2019-02-19T09:52:58","date_gmt":"2019-02-19T14:52:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/?p=3970"},"modified":"2019-02-19T09:54:33","modified_gmt":"2019-02-19T14:54:33","slug":"west-virginia-teachers-strike-over-retaliatory-privatization","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/?p=3970","title":{"rendered":"West Virginia Teachers Strike Over Retaliatory Privatization"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Teachers in West Virginia went on strike today.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The reason?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Retaliatory privatization.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Awp54VNoJqY\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Last year, state legislative leaders were embarrassed when teachers stood up to threats of firing and won their pay increase.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Teachers 1. Legislature 0.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This year, to retaliate for that embarrassment, those same legislative leaders want to privatize state teacher jobs with charter schools and push public schools teachers to the brink.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cCharter school lobbyists have run roughshod over the Capitol for the last two weeks,\u201d Spring Mills High School teacher Jessica Salfia told <em>This Week in Morgan County\u2019s Russell Mokhiber.<\/em> \u201cAnd this morning at the hearing, we were given 70 seconds a piece to testify.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWe are seeing a push to dismantle already struggling public schools,\u201d Salfia said. \u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s frustrating. Teachers do the work they do because they are called to it. The pay is not good. The hours are long. It\u2019s hard. It\u2019s emotionally hard. It\u2019s labor intensive. I am exhausted at the end of a school week, both mentally and emotionally, every week.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cPeople don\u2019t go into this work because they know they are going to make a ton of money, or that it\u2019s going to be easy. It\u2019s not going to be easy. Summers off are not summers off. They go into it because they believe in it. This is work that you do because you believe in it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThe outcry we are seeing from public teachers across the state is because this great work they believe in, the calling they have, is essentially being attacked.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Salfia traveled earlier this month from the Eastern Panhandle to Charleston to testify before the House of Delegates.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cProponents of some of these legislative measures will say are about \u2018choice\u2019 and creating \u2018competition\u2019 for our public schools,\u201d Salfia told the House of Delegates. \u201cBut for educators like me for whom teaching is a calling, the implication that any struggle or inadequacies our schools or students might be experiencing \u2013 is simply because I\u2019m not working hard enough \u2013 because I don\u2019t have enough competition is frankly insulting.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI can also tell you privatization of public education is not the answer,\u201d Salfia said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cCharter schools are for profit institutions. And the idea that education can be run by business\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">should terrify us all. Because we aren\u2019t dealing with product, we\u2019re dealing with children. All\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">over this country charters schools have closed suddenly some mid-year because they were\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">underperforming. This is the danger of having a CEO instead of a principal or a teacher \u2013 <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the bottom line is not the well-being of our students or communities, but profit margins and\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">success rate.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 2015 the <em>Akron-Beacon Journal<\/em> cited that Ohio charter schools \u201cmisspend public money nearly four times often than any other type of tax payer funded agency.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Los Angeles teachers just went on strike because charter schools had bled their system to the point that average class size was 45 students per class, and there is currently a moratorium on the creation of new charters in that district.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWe all see this for what it is,\u201d Salfia said. \u201cNot reform, but unconstitutional retaliation. Last year after the work stoppage, my school lost almost half its Math Department to Maryland schools \u2013 highly qualified teachers who taught AP courses. Teachers who I respect as colleagues and value as friends. These teachers left not just because of the difference in pay scales, but this\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">legislature\u2019s action conveyed blatant disregard and disrespect for public educators and public\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">education in this state.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cSchool privatization if it\u2019s allowed to pass sends this message all over again. I have already had brilliant, qualified teachers tell me, \u2018if they bring in charters, that\u2019s it for me. I\u2019m going to Maryland where I know they value what I do.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThis fight is not about budgets or reform,\u201d Salfia said. \u201cIt\u2019s about what we value as educators and as West Virginians.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cTeachers and schools need support. We need specialized, content specific training and\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">professional development. We need school counselors. We need school nurses. We need to\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">address the mental health crisis in our communities and schools. We need parent volunteers\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and community collaborations. We need smaller class sizes and time. Time to plan, time to\u00a0<\/span>collaborate, and time to meet with students and parents.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWhat we don\u2019t need is to turn our school system into a for profit system. What we don\u2019t need is the funneling of public money in the creation of charter schools. What we don\u2019t need are\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">legislators who care more about PAC money and corporate donors than our school and\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">students. So I ask today, that as you listen this morning and tonight to the concerns of\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">teachers from all over this state about our fears and about the crisis in our schools, that you\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">listen not as republicans or as democrats, but as West Virginians. Because education should\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">not be about profits or politics.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Teachers in West Virginia went on strike today. The reason? Retaliatory privatization. Last year, state legislative leaders were embarrassed when teachers stood up to threats of firing and won their pay increase. Teachers 1. Legislature 0. This year, to retaliate &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/?p=3970\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3970"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3970\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3972,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3970\/revisions\/3972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}