The Los Angeles Unified School District just doused the flames from its recent strike by reaching a contract agreement, but conflict with labor leaders was reignited this week when the school board unanimously approved new school day calendars without engaging in labor negotiations.
On Thursday, March 30, United Teachers Los Angeles, the union representing 35,000 teachers, filed an fiery unfair labor practice charge with the California Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) and requested that the district rescind the new academic calendars immediately.
The district maintains that it is not required to engage in bargaining with UTLA while creating its 2023 to 2026 academic calendars, because they did not alter the number of instructional days or hours.
The biggest change in the calendars is the board’s decision to shorten the students’ winter break from three weeks to two, to help low-income families who lack childcare options during LAUSD’s unusually long winter break. At the same time, the board extended summer vacation by a week.
Labor leaders were invited to take part in discussions about the calendars before the board’s March 27 vote to approve them.
This did little to dim the anger of the teachers union, which maintains that the district acted illegally.
“UTLA is angry and dismayed, but unfortunately not surprised, that LAUSD has chosen this crucial moment in our bargaining process to violate state law by bypassing negotiations and unilaterally changing the UTLA work calendar,” wrote UTLA leaders in a March 30 letter to Superintendent Alberto Carvalho. “You, the ostensible leader of LAUSD, have essentially thrown gasoline on a fire.”
UTLA is still engaged in labor contract negotiations with the district. The labor contract agreement reached last week, after a rare strike that closed the schools for 3-days, pertains only to the 30,000 members of SEIU Local 99, which represents bus drivers, custodians, special education assistants,…
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