California’s Teachers Unions Are Still Fighting to Keep Children at Home

Despite billions in additional funding and assurances from the CDC and Anthony Fauci that schools can operate safely in person, the unions are holding out for 100 percent vaccination and lower transmission rates.

Full text and links: https://reason.com/video/2021/03/04/californias-teachers-unions-are-still-fighting-to-keep-children-at-home/
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A majority of California's K-12 schools have been closed for in-person instruction for an entire year. During this time, the federal government has given California schools about $8 billion to retrofit buildings for better ventilation, to stock up on masks and sanitation gear, to create rapid COVID testing procedures, and to reconfigure classrooms to maintain more distance between students.

Even California Governor Gavin Newsom, who has overseen one of the strictest lockdowns in the nation, says it's time for schools to re-open for in-person instruction—now.

"If everybody has to be vaccinated we might as well just tell people the truth," Newsom said during an online symposium with school administrators. "There will be no in-person instruction in the state of California."

The state government has also earmarked an additional $2 billion for school districts willing to re-open K-2 classrooms by the end of March. That's still not enough to appease California teachers unions, many of which continue to oppose in-person instruction despite a growing scientific consensus that it can be done safely.  

"If you condition funding on the reopening of schools," said United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) President Cecily Myart-Cruz on the union's YouTube channel, "that money will only go to white and wealthier schools that do not have the transmission rates that low-income black and brown communities do." UTLA didn't respond to Reason's interview requests. 

California's resistance to re-opening is part of a national movement, backed by organized labor, to keep American school children at home until all teachers, staff, and—in some people's opinion—even students are offered the chance to be fully vaccinated. It's a requirement that many scientists say is far too stringent. Continuing to keep schools closed, they argue, poses a bigger risk to children. 

Produced by Zach Weissmueller. Graphics by Paul Detrick. 

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