Search: Oakland Unified School District

“On behalf of our 60,000 members across Northern California, including classified staff working hand in hand with educators at Oakland Unified School District, SEIU 1021 expresses our full solidarity with the Oakland Education Association strike. 

**FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 12/30/23**

Contact: Jennie Smith-Camejo, jennie.smith-camejo@seiu1021.org, (510) 710-0201

Statement from SEIU 1021 President Theresa Rutherford: “Late Wednesday, the Alameda County Registrar of Voters announced that SEIU 1021’s endorsed candidate for Oakland Unified School District Board of Education District 4, Mike Hutchinson, is the legitimate winner of that race. 

KTVU: Parents still occupying Oakland elementary school after confrontation with guards

For more than two months, a coalition of parents, students, and community members have been engaged in a nonviolent sit-in occupation to save Oakland’s Parker Elementary. On Thursday, the Oakland Unified School District deployed a private security team to forcefully and violently remove the protestors.

Members of SEIU 1021’s Oakland Unified School District chapter headed to Sacramento last Tuesday, May 17, along with members of Oakland Education Association, community allies, and union members from other school districts, including Vallejo, Inglewood, and South Monterey County. They had a very specific mission: advocating for state assemblymembers to support Assembly Bills 1912 and 1614.

Big thanks to everyone who voted to ratify our tentative agreement! We are excited to report back that the TA was ratified unanimously. That’s right–you voted by 100% to ratify!

That means that once the OUSD Board of Education and Alameda County Office of Education approve the TA in the coming weeks, this will become our new contract.

After months of negotiating, the SEIU 1021 Oakland Unified School District bargaining team has pushed through unprecedented adversity and reached a tentative agreement for a strong two-year contract with OUSD management. The TA is particularly notable given the challenges of the last year, including the extra workload and stressors that COVID has brought, talk of school closures, impending layoffs, the threat of a state takeover, and economic inflation.

The tentative agreement, which will go to a ratification vote of the membership later in March, includes:

Despite the challenges of the current year–with all the extra workload and stressors that COVID has brought, struggling with school closures, impending layoffs, the threat of a state takeover, and economic inflation–your bargaining team has shined through unprecedented adversity and reached a tentative agreement with OUSD management. 

Your bargaining team was committed to the negotiations process and sacrificed countless hours away from our families to fight for fair wages and improved working conditions for our members. 

Oakland Unified School District is trying to close as many as 14 schools in Black and brown communities. Hundreds of union members, parents, students, and community members came out Friday afternoon to protest the school closures, and SEIU 1021 OUSD Chapter Vice President Donneva Reid addressed the crowd.

The OUSD Board of Education is holding a special meeting TOMORROW, Tues., Feb. 8, starting at 5pm, at which they will be voting on the school closures.