Teachers to announce demands

#RedForEd movement will seek officials’ ears at rally today at Capitol

Organizers of Arizona Educators United, the grassroots group that launched Arizona’s #RedForEd movement, plan to announce their demands of Gov. Doug Ducey and the Legislature at a rally today at the Capitol.

Over the past month, thousands of frustrated Arizona educators have publicly — and often spontaneously — protested their low pay and low state education funding and quietly discussed whether to take escalated action, such as a strike.

Organizers said teachers have no immediate plans to strike. The possibility of a work stoppage would depend on how the governor and state legislators respond to their demands for pay and school funding, as well as the level of support among educators, they said.

They said they planned to organize several teacher “walk-ins” similar to Monday’s Chandler Unified School District rally in the days and weeks after today’s 4 p.m. rally. The walk-ins will not disrupt school operations.

Noah Karvelis, a Tolleson music teacher and Arizona Educators United organizer, told reporters Monday that Arizona educators are “in a desperate state.”

“Our backs are against the wall, and change needs to happen,” Karvelis said. “We don’t want to go on strike, but if that’s what it ultimately takes, I think everybody here is prepared to essentially do that. We will continue to escalate actions because we need to see change.”

Arizona’s #RedForEd movement was inspired in part by teachers in West Virginia who went on strike for nine days and successfully negotiated 5 percent raises.

Organizers in the past few weeks have tried to mobilize teachers in ways similar to the movements in West Virginia and Oklahoma, where educators are threatening to strike starting April 2.

Since the start, Arizona educators have discussed among themselves the possibility of a statewide walkout or strike.

Teachers’ responses have varied. On social media, several have expressed support or interest; others have raised concerns about how it would affect their jobs. And many others said they would be able to decide once they knew what they’d be asking of state leaders.

In a Facebook video to Arizona Educators United members, organizer Dylan Wegela, a teacher in the Cartwright School District, said the demands that will be announced today are “obtainable” and will not disappoint educators.

He said teachers would vote on whether they approve the demands after they are announced, adding that the stakes are high for the educators’ movement.

“These are not soft demands,” Wegela said in the video. “We are not taking this lightly that this may be our one chance. This is the one time in the last 20 years that teachers have really had some momentum going with everyone together to try to get a solution to the problems that we have.”

Karvelis added Monday that educators did not expect state leaders to respond to their demands enthusiastically.

“We’re not foolishly optimistic. We know it’s going to take a lot of work,” Karvelis said.

Organizers reaffirmed their stance on no immediate escalated action after the teacher sick-out March 21 that closed nine schools in the Pendergast Elementary School District.

Any widespread action needs to be well-thought out, coordinated to include schools across the state and supported by parents and school administrators, organizers said.

The #RedForEd movement started in early March when a group of educators created a private Facebook group — which now has 37,000 members — to organize a statewide silent demonstration.

Since then, teachers have protested outside a Phoenix radio station that featured Ducey as a guest and several times at the Capitol.

The Pendergast sick-out, which inconvenienced parents of thousands of schoolchildren, was the first action of its kind. Two Pendergast teachers independently and spontaneously organized the sick-out after venting about their usual frustrations while on a Dutch Bros. Coffee run the day before.

Pendergast administrators and Arizona Educators United supported the teachers’ sick-out.

Spokesmen for Ducey’s office have said little publicly about this month’s teacher protests, although they have reiterated that the governor is doing everything he can to boost school funding and teacher pay,

The governor’s spokesmen point to Ducey’s budget proposal that would include $400 million in additional education funding. This figure includes money for capital costs, the second half of a promised 2 percent teacher pay increase and $116 million, or about 30 percent of the pie, in funding for inflation and growth that the state is required to fund.

Ducey supported the approval of Proposition 123, a 2016 ballot measure that settled a longstanding inflationfunding school lawsuit for 70 cents on the dollar. On Monday, a federal judge ruled that that the settlement was illegal and Arizona may have to repay at least $344 million to the state land trust.

The governor on Monday also signed legislation that extends, through 2041, an education sales tax that brings about $667 million a year to Arizona schools.

The law does not raise tax rates, nor does it give schools any more money than what they’re currently receiving. Lawmakers fast-tracked the legislation last week after more than a month of inaction.

Karvelis and others in support of the teacher protest movement say these efforts don’t go far enough to meaningfully address the state’s teacher crisis.

Arizona consistently ranks at or near the bottom nationally in teacher pay. Education funding has not fully rebounded since the recession.