Dear Sac City Families,

We are in the midst of an unprecedented situation as a result of the recent strike. While Sac City Unified has experienced limited work stoppages before, the 8-day strike that forced schools to close resulted in SCUSD students losing more than 2,400 minutes of instructional time.  This follows two years in which students lost significant time in the classroom due to COVID.  For many of our staff, the strike also created financial and retirement-related impacts.  For our district, the strike exposed us to millions of dollars in penalties because we will not meet the minimum days and minutes of instruction required by the California Department of Education.

Since the end of the strike, Sac City Unified has been working to reach agreements with our labor partners that will allow us to make up for the lost instructional time our students deserve.

Sac City Unified has passed three proposals to the Sacramento City Teachers Association (SCTA) that include sensible solutions to each of the areas outlined above.  We have met regularly with SCTA to discuss our proposals, including meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday of this week. 

While there appears to be general agreement for extending remaining minimum school days and adding more days of instruction, there remains differences in how to implement these changes in ways that best serve the needs of our students.

PROPOSALS

The district is committed to achieving solutions that are student centric. Each of our proposals to SCTA has included provisions designed to ensure that students will get quality instruction provided by their teachers to make up for the learning time lost during the strike.

Here is what we have proposed:
 

• Extend all remaining minimum days by one hour, including June 16, 2022.
• Make June 17, 2022 a regular day of instruction.
• Add five regular instruction days to the academic calendar for June 20-24, 2022.
• Ensure that we can provide a safe learning environment for students who attend school by allowing no more than 20% of certificated staff to use approved leaves of absence between June 16-24, 2022. 

MITIGATING STAFFING CHALLENGES

Asking that our staff report to work on the instructional days that we owe our students is necessary to provide a safe learning environment and will ensure that our students receive a meaningful learning experience at school.  Without limits on staff use of personal days off, especially at a time in which substitute teachers are extremely limited, the district could face situations where staffing levels are not sufficient to serve our students across all of our schools. This would only worsen the effect of the staffing challenges that were the basis for the strike.

OTHER FISCAL AND RETIREMENT  IMPACTS

Sac City is aware that staff may experience financial consequences as a result of the eight day strike.  Staff may not receive pay for the days they participated in the strike, and for some that could have a corresponding impact on retirement benefits.  The California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) suggests SCTA work a full school calendar in order to receive credit for a full year of service toward retirement.  The district hopes to reach agreements with our labor partners that will both provide students with the learning time they deserve and mitigate financial impacts to our staff.  We have worked closely with CalSTRS over the course of the last week to make sure our proposals would allow staff to make up lost work days and not lose credit towards their retirement benefits.  

PROPOSED RESOLUTION

The district’s proposals are reasonable and are consistent with the expectations of fiscally responsible organizations.  Reaching an agreement would help all parties move beyond this chapter in our history with reasons to be encouraged about the future:

• Students would benefit from the learning time they deserve.  
• Our schools would have sufficient staff to operate safely and provide the additional learning time that is meaningful and productive.
• SCTA members would keep salaries that would otherwise be forfeited for not working during the strike. 
• Teachers’ retirement benefits would be protected by ensuring they work enough days to receive credit toward a full year of service in CalSTRS.  

SCUSD stands ready to resolve this issue quickly by focusing on the needs of our students who deserve to be front and center in this matter.