“EVEN THOUGH THEY SAID closing schools was going to save us money, it didn’t,” says CTAB President Hermann. “The talking points of the school closures saving the district money, really didn’t happen.”

The school district in North San Jose heated up last school year with a consolidation process that saw the school board approve closing three schools, upending their community and putting students at risk. Hermann says the staffing in Special Education environments and the facilities themselves are inadequate and unsafe, causing ongoing concerns for eloping students with special needs. Meanwhile, class sizes are increasing and demands on educators are growing, yet Hermann says 60% of his members can’t afford a one-bedroom apartment in Silicon Valley.

The situation is causing ongoing educator churn, where annual turnover has more than tripled since 2020. The district’s approach at the table during their current bargain isn’t helping matters, with admin failing to provide the necessary resources to recruit and retain educators.

President Joe Hermann speaks to the school board about their bargaining goals.

“Right now, everything they’re saying at the table is ‘no.’ No to health care, no to safe classrooms, no to fair wage increases — everything is no,” Hermann says. “We want to be innovative and be able to attract students and families to our schools. That’s going to be tougher and tougher to do with less resources.”

If Prop. 55 were to expire, Berryessa Union School District would lose $2.1 million in funding, which Hermann says would directly impact the quality of education for all Berryessa students.

“It’s going to be tough to keep those lower class sizes and keep caseloads low, which means that our members are going to have to do even more work than they already have on their plates,” Hermann says. “To be the fourth-largest economy in the world and see how we fund our schools in California is depressing. We need to tax the rich equitably so that we can fully fund our schools — not have to go to voters every few years to ask for more.”

CTAB has been organizing to fight back and fight forward in our union’s We Can’t Wait campaign — building structures in their local to communicate and mobilize members and focusing on transparency so all members are in the know. Hermann says they began organizing these structures for their current bargain and will lean into them when the Prop. 55 extension campaign moves forward. They’ve been holding structure tests to assess their strength, with more than 80% of members signing a petition in support of their collective bargaining goals and more than 60% of members participating in group photos/posters to present to the school board. Hermann says the goal is to get more people involved in their shared struggles.

“We’re having people come together. Our speech language pathologists had an issue, we held a meeting with all of them. Since we’re a collective bargaining unit, let’s collectively work toward the goals we want,” Hermann says. “Since the Prop. 55 extension is definitely for all of us, we need to build that capacity and come together like never before.”