Teachers, district agree to distance learning contract
Nearly two weeks after school started, the school district and the teachers union announced they ratified an agreement for what distance learning will look like for the school year.
“While we do not always agree on the details, both OEA and OUSD are passionate about serving Oakland’s students and families,” said Superintendent Kyla JohnsonTrammell and Oakland Education Association President Keith Brown in a joint statement.
Under the agreement, high school and middle school teachers will be teaching live at least 2.5 hours a day, with another two to 3.5 hours of online instruction that is not live. The amount of live teaching time is less for younger students, ranging from one hour and 30 minutes for kindergartners to two hours for those in fourth and fifth grades.
Live instruction times will be less on Wednesdays. Traditionally, Wednesdays are shorter days for students to allow professional development for teachers.
In a joint statement released Sunday night by the Oakland Unified School District and the teachers union, it said the agreement puts health and safety as priorities and calls for a “rigorous learning experience” during the COVID-19 pandemic as children are not yet being returned to their seats in the classrooms.
The plan for online learning went into effect Monday.
The two sides could not reach an agreement before the start of school on Aug. 10. The union wanted more flexibility in terms of scheduling, while the district had proposed more live instruction time for teachers.
According to the memorandum of understanding, classroom teachers are required to work just over six hours (370 minutes) a day, but will not be required to schedule any live instruction time before 9 a.m. or after 3:15 p.m. The remainder of the teacher’s workday, outside the required minimum times, will be f lexible.
Senate Bill 98, which passed this spring, requires three hours and 50 minutes a day for instruction in first through third grades and four hours for fourth through 12th grades. The Legislature did not distinguish between live interaction, including small group discussions and teacher’s lessons, and students’ independent work.
Weekly small group instruction also will be a districtwide priority, according to the agreement.
In the first two weeks of school, under the union’s plan called “Strong Start” there was supposed to be at least one hour of daily live interaction between teachers and students; four hours daily of teacherled professional development and prep time; and two hours of mandatory virtual training for teachers within the two-week period from Aug. 10-21.