by Howard Blume, LA Times/LA Now | http://lat.ms/nxNlkk
Photo: Occupy LAUSD supporters rally outside L.A. Unified headquarters. Credit: Christina House / For The Times
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October 18, 2011 | 10:08 pm - About 200 protesters gathered near downtown Tuesday to link the nationwide Occupy Wall Street-inspired protests to budgets cuts and layoffs in the Los Angeles Unified School District.
“Occupy LAUSD” participants took on the district, education philanthropists and charter schools as well as giving voice to familiar themes such as opposing corporate greed and inequality. Many of the demonstrators had marched from the main Occupy L.A. campsite around City Hall, more than a mile away.
English teacher Greta Enszer spoke at the school board meeting going on inside district headquarters and then addressed the crowd outside in similar terms.
“This is not OK to lay off permanent teachers,” she told the school board. “This [job] is not a stepping stone to me. This is my profession. My students are very important to me.”
Enszer is working as a long-term substitute teacher at her former school, West Adams Preparatory High School, while she hopes to be hired back.
Outside the Beaudry Avenue building, just west of downtown, adult education teacher Matthew Kogan criticized a status quo in which, he said, rich philanthropists such as Eli Broad and Bill Gates have more power than parents with children in schools. The name of each philanthropist elicited boos.
Independently operated charter schools, most of which are non-union, also took a pummeling.
The demonstration was not sanctioned by the teachers union, United Teachers Los Angeles, but it included scores of teachers. Many accused L.A. Unified of holding onto funds that could be used to hire back laid off teachers.
L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy blamed UTLA for the protest.
“I wish UTLA could shift its energy from protest as the norm to negotiation for reform,” he said in a statement. He also objected to linking the leadership of L.A. Unified with Wall Street.
“Occupy LAUSD is both misinformed and contrary to the spirit and intent of Occupy Wall Street, Occupy L.A., and the other laudable movements for economic justice that have sprung up around the country and the world over the last month,” he said. “It is an insult for these protesters to equate a school district that during the past four years has experienced a $2 billion loss of dollars in state and federal funding, with policies and institutions that have systematically hurt the poor and middle class.”
Deasy’s positions had support from a coalition of parents and organizations -- including one funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation -- that called at Tuesday’s meeting for a quick resolution to contract negotiations between L.A. Unified and the teachers union.
This group -- which includes the local United Way, the Urban League, Alliance for a Better Community and the Gates-supported Communities for Teaching Excellence -- advocated positions similar to those supported by Deasy in contract negotiations. A primary demand was to adopt a “mutual consent” hiring policy, under which schools would not be forced to fill vacancies with teachers displaced from other schools.
Union officials have said such a change could fatally undermine important job protections for all teachers.
At times, the protest outside and the coalition of community groups inside had the look of independent proxies for the two sides of the contract talks.
But veteran substitute teacher Neil Chertcoff implored rally participants not to let politicians, unions or any special interest co-opt the energy and message. And he also wanted them to spread the word.
“Let them know that you’re part of a movement and you’re not going to take it anymore,” Chertcoff said.
Students visit Occupy L.A. for lesson in democracy
-- Matt Stevens /LA Times/LA Now | http://lat.ms/r935OB
Photo: Nathaniel "Nat" Stern, 11, who attends the private Sequoyah school in Pasadena, visited Occupy L.A. on Tuesday as part of a field trip to City Hall. Credit: Matt Stevens / Los Angeles Times
October 18, 2011 | 3:50 pm - About 30 schoolchildren took a field trip Tuesday afternoon – not to the aquarium – but rather to City Hall, the epicenter of Occupy Los Angeles.
The fifth- through eighth-grade students from Sequoyah, a private school in Pasadena, munched on their lunches while protesters engaged them in discourse about how democracy works.
That was the purpose behind the field trip, said language arts and social studies teacher Susanna Barkataki, whose class also sat in on a City Council meeting and will soon hear a "tea party" member speak.
Full coverage: Occupy protests
"My goal as a teacher, regardless of my own personal beliefs, is to expose the students to as many viewpoints as possible," Barkataki said as she watched her students explore the Occupy L.A. encampment. "We're here to get first-hand experience."
The idea for the field trip sprouted when one of Barkataki's former colleagues visited the Occupy L.A. site and suggested that students come too. With eight adult supervisors, the students took the Gold Line into downtown and distributed hydration drinks to protesters when they arrived. They went inside City Hall and listened to the council discuss whether to boycott conferences held in Arizona, then they took a tour of the Occupy L.A. grounds before sitting down to lunch.
Avery Tyler, 12, said she was initially scared of the sprawling tents, but her perspective quickly changed.
"People care so much about this, they come down here and stay here," she said. "One guy was talking to us and he said we're all doing this for the future children. That really made me feel proud."
As the group migrated down the street after lunch, some students snickered as they passed signs with explicit language. But they soon arrived at what protester Uri Emmanuel Daniels called the "unofficial art department," where the students set to work making signs with buckets of markers. Daniels facilitated the sign-making and urged students to "never stop asking questions," as they drew on butcher paper and poster board.
"We want them to accomplish a project that shows that they were here," the 21-year-old Daniels said. "This is history."
Seventh-grader Piper Lewis was one of a handful of junior high students who joined Barkataki's class on their trip. The 12-year-old spent several minutes etching out a message in red pen on the group's largest banner, titled, "Sequoyah School Pasadena."
"This shows that people can come together and do anything," Lewis said. "I'm so glad I came."
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