Education
The Oakland Museum of California reopened May 1 after a two-year, $58 million renovation—the first major renovation since it was founded in 1969. The art and history galleries have both been remodeled and reinstalled with new artifacts, arrangements, themes and interactive exhibits.
A majority of Oakland’s 2,339 teachers and 38,826 students were expected to be out today due to the strike but district spokesperson Troy Flint said he didn’t expect to have final numbers until Monday. Teachers’ complaint is that they have not received a raise since 2003, and despite two years of contract negotiations with the district, will not be offered a raise for the 2010-2011 school year either.
Amidst crippling budget cuts and an impending strike, Oakland Technical High School continues to struggle with another longstanding issue: its cavernous achievement gap.
A majority of the Oakland Unified School District’s close to 2,400 teachers are expected to participate in a one day strike Thursday. School will be in session anyway. Though the district began hiring “emergency temporary teachers” close to a month ago, only 300 such teachers have been cleared to work tomorrow, according to OUSD spokesperson Troy Flint.
Michael Moore, the Oakland Athletic League’s commissioner, is in charge of one of the oldest high school sports organizations in the state—but it’s also the smallest, and under pressure to combine with larger sections. The league’s future was in doubt until Moore came along and could still face more questions about its status—but Moore wants to keep the league independent.
Over one hundred students and parents gathered for the conference that was a collaboration between the Criminal Justice Department at Merritt College and the Oakland Police Activities League (PAL), a non-profit organization that aims to forge a relationship between kids and cops.
The Oakland Unified School District announced Thursday at a press conference that the school board voted unanimously last night to impose the teacher contract that is their “last, best and final offer.”
At a campaign event at Redwood Heights Elementary, Oakland mayoral candidate Jean Quan sought to position herself as the “education candidate” and discussed the upcoming Oakland teachers’ strike.
Thirty-five people showed up at Wednesday night’s school board meeting in downtown Oakland to speak on non-agenda items—a significant turnout given that there was no union-organized rally or charter school petition on the agenda.