School staff danced in the street to the off-kilter rhythm of a cowbell. Umbrellas flipped and blew into fences. A normally taciturn teacher grabbed a bullhorn and urged passing cars to honk or at least acknowledge his presence. Fold-out tables sagged under the weight of donated donut boxes and coffee carriers. People laughed, took selfies, and sheltered one another from the rain. A group of more than 100 teachers and school staff picketed, chanted, and marched in front of an almost entirely empty school.
Welcome to the strike.
I am a social studies teacher at Woodrow Wilson High School, and I, along with more than 70 other teachers and coordinators, spent Tuesday morning on the picket line in solidarity with 46 of our colleagues from SEIU and in support of contract demands that would benefit our entire school communities—staff, teachers, and, most importantly, students.
We were among over 60,000 teachers and school staff who went on strike across LAUSD’s 1,000-plus campuses. LAUSD decided to cancel classes before the strike, affecting more than 420,000 students across the second-largest district in the country and unintentionally enrolling them in a real-life crash course on civics, justice, and labor organizing.