Albany teachers one step closer to possible strike; District officials stress mediation efforts

Greater Albany Public Schools (GAPS) teachers are one step closer to a possible strike.

The Greater Albany Education Association announced Friday it will hold its first strike authorization vote in decades after the district “failed to agree on necessary school safety measures.”

“Our students deserve better,” Jenn Stadstad, a physical education teacher at Kalapui High School, said in a recent press release. Stadstad taught in the district for 26 years and was a student at Kalapua during the last strike nearly 40 years ago.

“Severe staffing shortages in our classrooms across the district, including their failure to adequately resource and support students with serious behavioral needs, have created a crisis environment that has made school violence a daily occurrence in our district,” she said. Problems with student behavior have become more frequent. national crisis after the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I am voting to go on strike because every student deserves to be safe when they leave for school in the morning.”

The Greater Albany Education Association, or GAEA, represents about 600 licensed educators, including teachers and counselors, in the central Willamette Valley city south of Salem. The district had approximately 8,780 students enrolled in the 2023-2024 school year, according to the latest available state data.

The union claims district officials are refusing to provide students with special behavioral needs or individualized education programs (IEPs) the same level of educational support that almost every other district in the state provides.

“We do not want Albany students to continue to experience lower standards of support and more dangerous conditions than students elsewhere in our state,” Dana Lovejoy, president of the teachers union, said in a press release. “Greater Albany teachers are united and ready to strike for the safety and future of our students.”

Union leaders said they have been negotiating the contract with the district for the past eight months. They argue that the district has yet to take any meaningful steps to address critical student safety issues or improve student support standards that are “lagging behind other Oregon districts.”

But district leaders say the union’s move to strike is premature and a sign of bad faith negotiations.

The union sought mediation in August and both parties met for mediation sessions in September and October, according to the county. On October 4, ahead of a meeting scheduled for October 8, GAEA declared a deadlock.

“Typically,” Superintendent Andy Gardner said, “districts and unions work through multiple mediation sessions.”

On October 11, he explained, GAEA submitted a final proposal to begin the 30-day cooling-off period. required by the statewhich will last until November 10.

The proposal would entail more than $60 million in new costs for the county, including an approximately 25 percent increase in the cost of living and a monthly increase in county insurance premiums of more than $400, Gardner said.

Gardner said GAPS coverage is already “among the highest among comparable districts.” He also argues that the union’s final offer remains “exactly what was originally proposed on May 15 regarding compensation.”

Two more mediation sessions are scheduled for October 25 and November 4 during the cooling-off period.

On Thursday, the day before the next mediation session, teachers are scheduled to begin voting on whether to authorize the strike. They have until Tuesday, October 29th to weigh in.

“(The union) acted as expeditiously as possible on the legal measures outlined in its negotiations with government officials,” Gardner wrote in a statement to reporters. “Even a casual observer can see from the timeline that they are conscientiously rushing through the negotiation stages.”

If union members vote in favor of the permit, union leaders will still have to serve 10 days’ notice after the vote before a strike can begin.

This is the first Greater Albany teachers strike since 1987, according to the union. Albany has the potential to hold the first teacher strike in Oregon since the Portland Teachers Association went on strike almost a year ago. Salem-Kaiser narrowly escaped a strike in March.

“We ask all teachers in the district to carefully consider the haste of these steps and the ultimate impact of their actions on communities, families and, most importantly, their students,” Gardner said. “Portland Public Schools learned last year that there are no winners at the end of this process.”

“(GAPS) has already publicly stated its intention to focus on behavioral support processes at the next mediation meeting,” he added, “and we hope that GAEA will also be ready to go.”

Gardner said Monday that discipline and student behavior supports, special education and safety were discussed at the Oct. 8 mediation session and were also the subject of Monday’s small group discussion.

Beaverton School District earlier this month asked the state to mediate contract negotiations with the teachers union. According to the Oregon Education Association, 49 union locals across the state currently have open contracts.

Read a breakdown of the two sides’ proposals and more information about county negotiations website And trade union website.