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Jenise Porter, 1st Vice Chair, LD9
It’s long been an article of faith that teachers don’t vote, though it’s hard to find statistics to either support or refute that (we checked with the NEA and AFT). With any luck, the RedforEd movement will change that and launch thousands of Arizona educators into a new calling as activists.
A teacher friend told me that she’d discovered she has a voice and can use it. Another posted that she had called a legislative office for the first time, and that she and many colleagues had registered for Request to Speak, the legislature’s online comments portal. Multiply that by thousands and you’re looking at a mighty force for change.
RedforEd’s April 25-May 4 walkout won historic concessions from Arizona’s Republican legislature, flooding the state Capitol in sea of red. Thousands more, who couldn’t make it to Phoenix, lined busy Tucson streets, waving at drivers who enthusiastically honked and waved back in support. A movement was born.
I stood with some 300 public-education supporters on the corner of Broadway and Country Club on the 25th and at the Capitol the next day with 50,000 others. Democratic Reps. Pam Powers Hannley and Randy Friese, and Sen. Steve Farley, kept constituents updated with their social-media posts. The extraordinary turnout drew national media attention, which showed the country that Arizona educators meant business.
There is much to celebrate in this new-found activism on the part of many teachers, parents and community members. However, I believe that the really hard work is just beginning. I quote from a Sunnyside teacher who is not new to activism: “Gov. Ducey’s raise for teachers is NOT a 20% raise and it won’t be a 9% raise next year….the 9% next year is only for the teacher of record. Districts will divide this 9% and give raises to all school employees because that’s what we’ve been fighting for and that’s the right thing to do.
“These are the employees Ducey doesn’t think deserve a raise: art, music, and PE teachers, counselors, nurses, instructional coaches, psychologists, special education resource teachers, speech/language pathologists, gifted program teachers, IT technicians, campus security, crossing guards, custodians, cafeteria workers, secretaries, office assistants, and instructional assistants. By the time we get our “raise” it might be 2-4% if we’re lucky. The other 10% promised over the following 2 years is not guaranteed and based on Ducey’s track record won’t happen if he’s re-elected. Teachers [and everyone else] who live in TUSD boundaries will see a 9% increase in their property tax to pay for the “teacher raises.” Ducey’s great plan is to fund the “raises” on the backs of people in one of the poorest districts in the state. In Sunnyside, our health insurance is going up as much as 8% and the deductibles are increasing.
“MOST EDUCATORS IN AZ WILL NOT BE SEEING A RAISE NEXT YEAR AND SOME WILL HAVE LESS MONEY IN THEIR POCKETS THAN THIS YEAR! I’ve lost count of the number of years this has happened to us. And we should be thankful and re-elect Ducey???
“On top of that, educators are now forced to get the Invest In Ed Act [which raises income taxes on the state’s wealthiest earners] on the ballot in November to make up part of the $1.1B in cuts to public education funding over the last 10 years. So we’ll be spending weekends begging registered voters to sign a petition because our [Republican] governor and [Republican] legislature refuse to find guaranteed sustainable funds for us and our students.’’
We must continue to educate our friends and family members, and yes, those people whose doors we knock on in the coming months, that Ducey is not the education governor, that the Koch-funded ads on television are lies, and that We Will Remember in November-#RedforEd.
See the Voices of Education website if you can donate to classified employees who have lost pay that they will not recoup. http://voicesforeducation.org/
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