After nine months of bargaining, negotiations between Oakland Unified School District and its teachers\u2019 union have stalled, and independent mediators have been brought in to find common ground.\u00a0<\/p>\n
This week, the Oakland Education Association and OUSD bargaining teams met in mediation for two days, moderated by a state-appointed third party. As they made no progress, the next step is fact-finding, said Kampala Taiz-Rancifer, the president of OEA.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Facing a difficult financial picture, OUSD\u2019s latest wage proposal<\/a> \u2014 made in November \u2014 offers no raise to the teachers union.<\/p>\n \u201cThis position is not a reflection of the value the district places on its educators, but rather a necessary step to ensure compliance with state fiscal standards, avoid deficit spending, and preserve long-term financial stability,\u201d the proposal said.\u00a0<\/p>\n John Sasaki, OUSD\u2019s director of communications, declined to comment on negotiations.<\/p>\n OEA has more than 2,600 members, including teachers, counselors, nurses, psychologists, social workers, and teacher librarians working in Oakland schools. The union\u2019s most recent wage offer<\/a>, brought forward during mediation, requests a 14% raise over two years, with those at the top of the salary scale earning a higher bump this year.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIn our last bargaining cycle, we focused on our newest educators and some in the middle,\u201d Taiz-Rancifer told The Oaklandside. \u201cThe veteran teachers didn\u2019t really make much movement. They\u2019re at the bottom of pay in the Bay Area<\/a> and so what happens is, folks will, at the end of their careers, start moving to other districts because they want to retire with a higher amount of pay.\u201d<\/p>\n During the fact-finding process, which could take weeks, the state Public Employee Relations Board appoints a fact-finder to gather data and information from each side and issue a report with their findings and recommendations, to inform further negotiations. If the two sides still can\u2019t come to an agreement, the union could take other actions, including a strike.\u00a0<\/p>\n This year, teacher unions around the state are rallying behind the California Teachers Association\u2019s \u201cWe Can\u2019t Wait\u201d campaign<\/a>, which demands fully staffed schools, smaller class sizes, and wages that match the cost of living. Oakland is one of 14 school districts in California that are currently at an impasse, EdSource<\/a> reported this week.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe are leading a historic wave of resistance to demand safe staffing, affordable health care, and student-centered budgets, and local chapters are organizing to strike if needed,\u201d David Goldberg, president of the California Teachers Association, told the outlet.<\/p>\n In West Contra Costa County Unified, educators returned to work last week after a four-day strike<\/a>. Their new contract earns them an 8% raise.\u00a0<\/p>\n In Oakland, the school board recently moved forward with a plan to reduce next year\u2019s budget by $102 million<\/a>, more than 11% of its current general fund spending, which will severely limit the district\u2019s ability to offer raises or other benefits. Alysse Castro, the Alameda County superintendent of schools, has told district officials<\/a> that OUSD cannot offer raises without corresponding tradeoffs.\u00a0<\/p>\n Taiz-Rancifer, the OEA president, thinks those tradeoffs can be made.<\/p>\n \u201cI think they have to look at their spending,\u201d Taiz-Rancifer told The Oaklandside. \u201cI think we\u2019ve got to stop prioritizing the contracts and high-priced consultants and really start prioritizing our children.\u201d<\/p>\n OEA\u2019s last strike was in 2023<\/a>, lasting seven days, over an unfair labor practice charge against OUSD. The agreement that followed that strike resulted in a 10% across-the-board raise, plus increases to starting pay for early career educators. That contract expired in June 2025. OEA and OUSD also settled several \u201ccommon good\u201d proposals<\/a> relating to support for Black students, unhoused students, and community schools.\u00a0<\/p>\n Earlier this year, OEA had planned another unfair labor practice strike<\/a>, claiming that the district had withheld financial information about the budget cuts that the board approved last year. After a late-night bargaining session, the union called off the strike<\/a>. OEA also held a one-day strike in 2022 to protest school closures<\/a>.<\/p>\n “*” indicates required fields<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After nine months of bargaining, negotiations between Oakland Unified School District and its teachers\u2019 union have stalled, and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":100390,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[143,37806,145,144,3272,54734],"class_list":["post-100389","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-education-association","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news","tag-oakland-unified-school-district","tag-ousd-union-negotiations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100389","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100389"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100389\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100389"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100389"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100389"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}