On Monday, Detroit public school teachers went on a massive sick-out in protest of being informed that the Detroit school district will not be able to pay them after the end of June. There are 2,600 school teachers in 97 public schools in the Detroit district and nearly all look to be closed on Monday.
This will place nearly 50,000 school aged children somewhere else with parents and guardians scrambling to accommodate the teachers’ protest. Many parents will likely have to take the day off from work to care for their children who will not attend school on Monday. The sick out by the teachers was ordered by their union, the Detroit Federation of Teachers.
The union wants the state government of Michigan to release money so that the teachers will be paid over the two months that they don’t work over the summer. This is the second time that the school teachers of Detroit have gone on strike this school year. During that first sick-out strike, the school teacher were striking for better pay and a better teacher to student ratio in the crowded classrooms as well as for better overall working conditions.
Aside from the teachers not being paid for July and August, the absence of funding also means no summer school and other school related activities as well as the possible discontinuing of special needs programs that are in place all year round. The Michigan legislature recently allotted and additional $50 million to the Detroit school system to keep the doors open and the teachers paid until the end of June.
The union expects to hold another district wide meeting on Tuesday and is urging its members to make calls to state politicians on this day off from work. The union claims that the city is locking the teachers out and denying the children of Detroit their potential as well as not paying a teacher a day’s pay for a day’s work. The union didn’t talk about their day’s pay argument for July and August.
The teachers went with this sick-out strategy because strikes by school teachers are illegal in Michigan.
PHOTO SOURCE: WILX-TV / Detroit