The first district in the Portland area on the Oregon side of the Columbia River to carry out reopening plans after the rules changed last month is facing resistance from its local teachers’ union. The Lake Oswego school district announced plans last week to start reopening schools for its youngest students from a month from today. LOEA’s resistance follows a message last week to Governor Kate Brown of teacher union leaders in Oregon’s five largest districts.
Health researchers said that students – mainly children up to the third grade – are at a relatively low risk. As Oregon has tracked the virus in institutions, from nursing homes to day care centers, it has found cases in dozens of schools offering personal instruction, but not in numbers large enough to suggest that schools are significant sources of transmission.
The first presumed case of coronavirus in Oregon was diagnosed in an employee of Forest Hills Elementary in Lake Oswego.
Meerah Powell / OPB
The Lake Oswego Education Association, the local union representing 440 teachers, counselors and other educators, issued a statement on Monday detonating the change, entitled “Lake Oswego teachers do not want to die or kill their families.” In the LOEA message, the union said it surveyed its members and found that 76% “are opposed to returning until the vaccine is available or until the district uses health indicators to decide when to reopen.” The union said its survey revealed that only 11% of members “were eager to go back to school”.
Local President Kelly Fitzsimmons said that on the one hand, “teachers want to be in the classroom. Teachers miss their children. ”But at the same time, she said that teachers have serious concerns about being exposed to COVID-19, as the number of cases and the death count continue to increase.
“We heard from educators who care for elderly parents, who have health problems that make them vulnerable. Some are on the verge of panic, about to give up, ”said Fitzsimmons.
A Lake Oswego school official was the first person in Oregon identified with COVID-19 last winter.
Lake Oswego district officials defended the decision to reopen in a message on Monday. He said that union leaders were consulted last year and that the district is working within the guidelines of the agreement.
“During September and October, the district and association leadership representing teachers, counselors and experts met weekly to develop a new agreement (MOU) for Hybrid Learning, which included the agreement that teachers would return to classroom school when allowed by the state, ”LOSD’s director of communications, Mary Kay Larson, said in a statement emailed to OPB.
The message said that union leaders were notified of the planned return to hybrid learning on January 4.
The district’s message suggests that top officials agree with the union on the importance of vaccines for teachers.
“Superintendent Dr. [Lora] de la Cruz has met with the governor virtually to personally defend school personnel climbing the vaccine distribution list and is collaborating with school districts in Clackamas County and public health to streamline the distribution of the vaccine to school personnel. ” , said the message.
Elsewhere in Oregon, school officials in Bend-La Pine and Redmond announced plans to resume face-to-face education in the coming weeks. In Southwest Washington, the school districts of Evergreen and Vancouver plan to increase personal learning as well.