Today's OEA Fall/Winter 2020

A PUBLICATION FOR MEMBERS OF THE OREGON EDUCATION ASSOCIATION

TODAY’S

OEA REFLECTIONS ON THE FIGHT FOR RACIAL JUSTICE MERCEDES N. MUÑOZ

2020 OREGON TEACHER OF THE YEAR

FALL/WINTER 2020 | VOLUME 95 : NUMBER 1

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OEA FOUNDATION

Contents VOLUME 95 . ISSUE NO. 1

Features

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On the Cover

22 / Reflections on the fight for racial justice

The lived experiences of OEA members of color deserve to be heard and elevated in our union's day-to-day work. Two OEA members of color share how a powerful summer of racial justice work and the ongoing Black Lives Matter movement has transformed their return to teaching this fall, and their own lives.

By Mercedes N. Muñoz and Ethelyn Tumalad

In-Depth

14 / foundation of support

OEA members impacted by devastating wildfires find relief through their union.

By Rylee Ahnen

16 / Leaving home

Douglas High School re-opens despite state COVID-19 re-opening guidance, forcing this teacher to leave the job she loves.

By Kati Parazoo

18 / putting on new shoes

In the aftermath of COVID-19 school closures and uncharted territory for educators and students, education support professionals (ESPs) are taking on brand-new challenges this fall.

By Milana Grant

30 / It's too soon

Springfield’s (brief) decision to bring back K-3 students is met with a lot of mixed emotions.

By Meg Krugel

ON THE COVER: Franklin High School’s Mercedes Muñoz, Oregon’s Teacher of the Year, works on her front porch. PhotO by THOMAS Patterson

Credits: Thomas Patterson

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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TODAY’S

Contents VOLUME 95 . ISSUE NO. 1

Departments

OEA

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE OREGON EDUCATION ASSOCIATION FALL/WINTER 2020 VOLUME 95 : ISSUE NO. 1

OFFICE HEADQUARTERS 6900 SW Atlanta Street Portland, OR 97223 Phone: 503.684.3300 FAX: 503.684.8063 www.oregoned.org PUBLISHERS John Larson, President Jim Fotter, Executive Director EDITOR Meg Krugel

President’s Column

05 / Standing together

By John Larson, OEA President

Newsflash

07 / OEA joins state education leaders in support of Black Lives Matter 08/ NEA provides resilience seminar for ESPs Teaching & Learning

10 / Oregon Licensure in the Age of COVID 19 11 / still staying involved Politics & You

12 / Education Policy, Budgets on the Table OEA Choice Trust

13 / Inspiring Schools to Create Healthy Workplaces for All Staff On the Web

34 / Facing Challenges? We got you

PRODUCTION ASSISTANT Milana Grant CONTRIBUTORS Milana Grant, Rylee Ahnen, Laurie Wimmer, Teresa Ferrer, Thomas Patterson To submit a story idea for publication in Today’s OEA magazine, email editor Meg Krugel at meg.krugel@oregoned.org PRINTER Morel Ink, Portland, OR TODAY’S OEA (ISSN #0030-4689) is published two times a year (November and April) as a benefit of membership ($6.50 of dues) by the Oregon Education Association, 6900 SW Atlanta Street, Portland OR 97223-2513. Non-member subscription rate is $5 per year. Periodicals postage paid at Portland, OR. POSTMASTER Send address corrections to: Oregon Education Association Membership Processing 6900 SW Atlanta Street Portland, OR 97223-2513 DESIGN AND PRODUCTION Francesca Genovese-Finch

President’s Message John Larson OEA President

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s I talk to members across the state about their experiences during the spring and fall of 2020, one thing is certain: OEA members are working harder than ever to provide a quality education to all students. I am so proud to lead an organization with members who are so dedicated to the health and well-being of students.

Like most people, educators have been severely impacted

by COVID-19. OEA members have been reduced in hours and some have had their jobs eliminated due to the closure of school buildings. Others have resigned rather than risk their health and that of their loved ones by returning to their buildings. Students are also feeling the impact. Each day I hear from members how difficult it can be to connect with every student and make sure they have what they need to be successful. What I have not heard, however, is anyone giving up trying. While we navigate our way through this pandemic, it is more important than ever we stand together to protect the health and safety of students and staff.

OEA is doing just that. During the summer, OEA advocated for strict methods for return to school, and now Oregon has some of the strictest reopening metrics in the nation. Now, as pressure to reopen buildings intensifies, OEA continues to advocate with the Oregon Department of Education (ODE) and the Governor’s office for strict adherence to the metrics they set.

As if transitioning to a completely different modality of education were not enough, the tragic deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery have shone a bright light on the racial inequality extant in our society, and, as educators, has forced us to take a hard look at our role in addressing it in the school system. Multiple studies, including one published by the National Academy of Sciences, reveal “in comparison with white Americans, black Americans exhibit poorer educational outcomes across a range of metrics.” These metrics include disparate discipline, future employment, and involvement in the criminal justice system. As a union we can no longer turn a blind eye to the systemic inequities in the education system. As OEA leans into its equity stance, I recognize the conversations will not be easy and will often cause discomfort and even anger. Still, for the sake of our students, it is important we continue to highlight and work to

change the inequities inherent in the system. As teacher Ethelyn Tumalad puts it in her article in this issue, “All lives will matter when Black Lives Matter.”

Our country is more starkly divided over nearly every issue than at any time I can remember during my lifetime. Educators are certainly not immune to these divisions, but now, more than ever, it is important to stand together to do what is right for our schools and for our students. I’m confident that together, we’ll continue to make powerful strides for our students and communities this year.

AS A UNION WE CAN NO LONGER TURN A BLIND EYE TO THE SYSTEMIC INEQUITIES IN THE EDUCATION SYSTEM. Credit: Meg Krugel

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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EdNews Beaverton schools set policies for sharing Pride, Black Lives Matter imagery in classrooms

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ducators and students alike have become more involved than ever in the socio-political sphere during the past year.

While several districts around the state have prohibited educators from sharing their personal opinions on political and social issues, Beaverton has set a precedent for inclusion and discourse around topics that affect both students and educators.

Pride flags and Black Lives Matter signage have been specifically allowed in the district’s summary, released September 30, both in physical and virtual classrooms. As the November Elections draw close, the district has also allowed educators and students to wear clothing or accessories that endorse particular candidates, but political signage is not permitted in classrooms, virtual or otherwise.

Any signs, clothing, or accessories that promote exclusion (such as “Build the Wall”) have been expressly prohibited, while other phrases like “All Lives Matter” are discouraged and the district has asked staff not to display things that contradict the inclusive message behind the Black Lives Matter movement.

OEA joins state education leaders in support of Black Lives Matter

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joint letter signed by OEA, Oregon State Board of Education, the Oregon Department of Education (ODE), the Coalition of Oregon School Administrators (COSA), the Oregon School Boards Association (OSBA), the Oregon School Employees Association (OSEA), the Oregon School Activities Association (OSAA), the Oregon Association of Education Service Districts (OAESD), and the Oregon Association of Student Councils (OASC) announcing our shared commitment to racial justice was released on Oct. 15, 2020. OEA’s stance on Black Lives Matter can be characterized by this excerpt from the Oct. 15 letter: “We fully support Black Lives Matter as a civil rights movement that aims to combat racism and support Black individuals. We stand beside Black Lives Matter, as a statement of social justice and an affirmation of the value and worth of Black people. We can acknowledge that many people have misunderstood or been misinformed about the origin and expression that Black Lives Matter. The need to affirm the Black Lives Matter is rooted in the history and current experiences that have intentionally marginalized Black lives and bodies.”

The full letter can be viewed at www.oregoned.org/black-lives-matter.

Credits: Above: Courtney Ahn Design; Right: istockphoto.com

COVID-19 in Oregon Schools: By the numbers

43,793

Oregon's number of total confirmed cases

46,000

The number of students who have received some in-person instruction

25

The highest number of schools with reported COVID-19 cases in one week in October

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The highest number of infected students and staff in one week in October TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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EdNews SAMSUNG STEM CONTEST OFFERS PRIZES FOR INNOVATIVE STUDENT IDEAS » Classrooms might look a lot different this year, but good ideas can come from anywhere! The Samsung “Solve for Tomorrow” contest asks students to come up with creative solutions for issues or problems in their local communities. The winner of First Place will receive $100,000 in classroom tech and supplies for their school! You don’t have to be a STEM teacher to apply for your students, but the project does need to have a STEM focus and must have a clearly defined impact on the community.

The deadline to submit applications is December 13, 2020. Visit https://www.samsung.com/us/solvefortomorrow/ for more details and to apply.

NEA provides resilience seminar for ESPs

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OREGON LAUNCHES EDUCATION SUPPORT PROFESSIONAL OF THE YEAR AWARD

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he Oregon Teacher of the Year program has been recognizing the achievements and contributions of our state’s greatest teachers for 75 years. With the passing of House Bill 2964 in May 2019, Oregon Education Support Professionals (ESPs) are finally receiving some well-deserved recognition of their own.

Our schools would not function without the support of our instructional assistants, food service workers, transportation providers, clerical and custodial staff. The success of our students depends on their hard work and dedication to public education.

At the 2017 OEA Representative Assembly, our members voted in favor of New Business Item 16, which asked that OEA research the necessary steps to create a statewide ESP award, akin to the Teacher of the Year Award.

Our Government Relations team spent two

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TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

years coordinating with state lawmakers to help craft a bill to accomplish this goal, which was passed unanimously by The Oregon House of Representatives last year.

The winner of the award will receive a $5,000 prize, along with opportunities for speaking engagements at statewide events.

On the official nominations launch day, ODE Director Colt Gill expressed a great appreciation for Oregon’s ESPs: “Day in and day out, online or in-person, Oregon students benefit enormously from the support and commitment of Education Support Professionals. From direct support for students to helping teachers prepare materials for lessons, ESP’s fill countless, critical roles that ensure our education systems reach every student.”

Nominations are open until January 3, 2021. To submit a nomination, visit www. oregonteacheroftheyear.org/nominate-esp/.

he COVID-19 pandemic has caused a massive shift in the duties and expectations of ESPs, exacerbating feelings of underappreciation that many ESPs already feel within their working environments.

Many are experiencing anxiety, fear, and frustration with the lack of communication they receive from their district leadership.

In September, NEA partnered with Yale University’s Center for Emotional Intelligence to host a webinar to provide social and emotional learning (SEL) techniques exclusively for Education Support Professionals. Tools and tips, such as developing self-awareness in order to recognize emotions, and nurturing a growth mindset were facilitated by Chris Cipriano, the Director of Yale’s CEI. Over 1,500 ESPs attended the live webinar, but NEA has made it available as a recorded session. Visit www.nea. org/resource-library/esp-webinarrecordings to access this and other great ESP resources!

EdNews LOOKING FOR STUDENT LOAN DEBT RELIEF? » The NEA Student Debt Navigator, powered by Savi, is an easy, interactive tool that helps you find the student loan forgiveness programs and repayment plans for which you qualify. “We designed the platform to cut through the confusion and anxiety around student debt. We wanted people to understand all their options—including potential forgiveness—and then make it really easy to enroll and stay up to date," says Savi co-founder Tobin VanOstern. Learn more: www.neamb.com/products/nea-student-debt-navigator.

MISSING TESTING DATA OPENS DIALOGUE ABOUT STATEWIDE TESTING REFORMS

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The Oregon DOC ousts community college-led adult-education programs

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iting cost-cutting as a major factor in the decision, the Oregon Department of Corrections has severed ties with six community colleges who have delivered high school-equivalency or GED programs to adult inmates for nearly fifteen years.

The current partnership with Oregon’s community college system has been incredibly successful. Oregon has the fourth highest pass rate in the country for adult inmates who have entered a GED program.

The DOC has tried to take on adult-education programs in-house before, from 2003 – 2006. Completion rates plummeted, costing the state additional resources. During that time period, the Oregon State Penitentiary only completed 14 GEDs total.

OEA President John Larson voiced opposition to this decision in this statement: “The DOC’s recent proposal to end this critical relationship threatens years of progress that have been made at our correctional facilities and will leave adult learners behind.”

Credits: Thomas Patterson

he Oregon Department of Education (ODE) released the annual district and school report cards in midOctober, but among the key performance indicators that were absent from the “ata-glance” reports due to school closures were Smarter Balanced test scores. As schools shuttered abruptly in March to prevent the spread of COVID-19, many students were unable to sit for statewide exams.

Educators and parents have long criticized Smarter Balanced due to the time and effort spent preparing students for the exam, which many have said would be better spent on engaging students in core

curriculum. OEA has also opposed the weight assigned to statewide summative testing, detailed in our report “New Path for Oregon: System of Assessment to Support Student Learning”.

ODE Director Colt Gill says that the emphasis on summative testing has been “quietly reduced” in favor of more individualized assessments that are currently being used by teachers in virtual classrooms.

He also points out that state money has gone directly to these kinds of teacher-led assessments rather than on facilitating Smarter Balanced Assessments. “I think this is a tremendous opportunity for that,” Gill says.

Online charter school enrollment is up, but graduation rates remain abysmally low

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hile a large majority of schools remain closed across the country, many parents are choosing to enroll their students in full-time online charter schools.

Oregon is no outlier; nearly 30 districts around the state have reached their 3 percent cap on online charter enrollment. But how do these virtual schools stack up against brick-and-mortar public education institutions?

According to a study conducted by Education Week Research Center in 2019, only 37 percent of online charter high schools nationwide had graduation rates above 50 percent. Nationally, there are around 160 virtual charter schools providing education to upwards of 30,000 high school seniors. In some states, not one program has a graduation rate above 50 percent.

Of Oregon’s three largest and most established online charter schools, only one has consistently graduated more than half of its high school seniors over the last five years.

Only

37%

of online charter high schools nationwide had graduation rates above

50%

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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Teaching & Learning

Oregon Licensure in the Age of COVID-19

BY TERESA FERRER / OEA Staff Liaison to TSPC, Center for Great Public Schools

“WHAT LIES BEHIND US AND WHAT LIES IN FRONT OF US…ARE BUT TINY MATTERS AS COMPARED TO WHAT LIES WITHIN US.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

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et me begin with congratulations to each and every Oregon educator. Despite all that is “behind us or in front of us,” every day, and in every large and small way, you continue to lead with and strive for your true center: the care and keeping of your students and the profession of teaching.

Your voice may sometimes feel silenced but the collective power of what you know and what you advocate for is making a difference in many ways… especially during these times that necessitate a grounding in reality. And, as you demonstrated so boldly in your “Red for Ed” campaign of 2019, no one in the system or profession is closer to the reality of what students need than YOU. The best statewide or local policy and guidance knows that when allowed to focus on what you need to do for your students and profession, Oregon educators will consistently (and even despite all odds) deliver the best of what lies within them.

The Teachers Standards and Practices Commission (TSPC), led by a group whose majority are working licensed educators, has developed emergency provisions that offers a reprieve for educators who are struggling to complete their Continuing Professional Development requirements.

Currently anyone who is renewing their license and their licensure cycle in 2020, has 12 fewer PDUs (Professional Development Units) to complete (63 PDUs for three-year license renewal or 113 PDUs for five-year license renewal). OEA has proposed that TSPC expand and extend this provision for anyone who is renewing with 10

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

a cycle that includes BOTH this year and the remainder of the ’20-’21 school year.

TSPC will be considering this and other provisions that allow teachers to focus on meeting the many challenges of COVID-19 schooling. Stay tuned to OEA announcements about any forthcoming changes and/or sign up for emails of TSPC updates on their website.

Likewise, waiver requests due to COVID-19 restrictions and realities are accepted from Oregon educators who are unable to complete licensure requirements to move out of provisional license status.

For detailed description of these emergency provisions, please refer to this TSPC notice: oregon.gov/tspc/covid19/Pages/ covid19.aspx.

If you ever need to know more about the latest developments in Oregon licensure or have questions that apply specifically to you and your license, OEA offers you four options from which to choose: n OEA Licensure Workshops

Find and register for scheduled virtual workshops here: oregoned.org/events/ n Email Teresa Ferrer at teresa.ferrer@oregoned.org n Phone Teresa Ferrer at 503-495-2108 n 1-1 ZOOM Licensure Consultation with Teresa Ferrer: Find and register for an open slot here: oregoned.org/memberresources/professional-learning/licensureevaluation

In August 2020, TSPC approved a suite of emergency provisions called Flexibility with Fidelity that maps out in clearly and strictly defined ways, under COVID-19 and

the ’20-’21 school year specifically, that licensed educators could be allowed (without a License for Conditional Assignment: LCA or a Restricted License) to teach a subject for which they are not endorsed.

OEA and TSPC lobbied heavily to assure the focus would be on “fidelity over flexibility” but, as you can all imagine, there was pressure to give equal if not more focus on ‘flexibility over fidelity”.

The positive aspect of these rules is that it creates a scaffolded way for a district to be accountable to find and place those educators who are most qualified and interested in a mis-assignment but the most dangerous part of these provisions is that, when implemented in bad faith, it could adversely affect anyone who is not voluntarily being mis-assigned. The one-pager with details of these provisions accompanies this article (find "Background on TSPC Temporary Rules for Flexibility with Fidelity for Mis-Assignments" on the OEA website). Make sure that you also create hyperlinks to the three documents that this one-pager references.

As in all things, Oregon educators step up to learn the facts and assert their voice.

They appeal to the truth of what students need and the best ways to provide those needs. Exercise your natural inclination to get the best information and answers to your questions. With all that surrounds you, go within. Choose any of the four options above for elevating your ability to navigate any licensure issue and do what you do best: centering the care and keeping of your students and the profession of teaching.

Inside OEA

Still Staying Involved OEA-Retired celebrates 35 years of continuing to make a difference in public education

BY RAY JOHNSON / OEA-Retired

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ith OEA providing much assistance, five Oregon retired educators formed NEA-Retired-Oregon— name changed to OEA-retired in 2009—in November of 1985. Consequently, even with COVID-19 continuing to wreak havoc on its usual group activities, OEA-Retired will be spending part of this year celebrating its formation 35 years ago.

To guide the new organization, Bylaws were adopted that aim to benefit its members and public education, by supporting these key priorities: n State and national legislation and activities designed to maintain and guarantee such retirement programs as Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and Public Employees Retirement System. n Legislation and activities that support children and public education at local, state, and national levels. n Activities and social programs that contribute to the enjoyment of living and participation with others.

Over the years, as the number of its members increased, full representation in OEA was granted that included delegates at Representative Assembly, a retired director position on the OEA Board, a position on the Legislative Advisory Council and appointments to many other committees and task forces.

One of its proudest achievements over the years has been an amazing bookcollection activity that has resulted in more than 16,000 books being given to school-age children. Even active OEA members have assisted in this endeavor.

OEA-Retired has been engaged many times over several years with several attempts by the state legislature to change PERS benefits, including the resultant court cases. One OEA-Retired member was even a plaintiff in one case. Eventually, the Credits: Dan Domenigoni

OEA-Retired is #RedForEd too! Retired members join tens of thousands of educators and community allies to rally for school funding on the Oregon State Capitol steps in 2018.

state Supreme Court has ruled every time that received benefits are a contract and cannot be changed once a person retires.

The retirees’ group was heavily involved in the recent successful passage of the Student Success Act by the state legislature in 2019. Members participated in rallies, phone calling, letter writing, lobbying and much more to help achieve this legislation.

The group sponsors regional activities scattered around the state that include coffees, monthly luncheons, not-back-toschool picnics in the fall, tours, speakers, etc., the formation of local chapters and an annual Fall Conference and spring Annual Assembly. Starting in 2011 in partnership with a travel agency, a tour program has been beefed up from one tour a year to now sponsoring four—two in North America and two internationally.

The motto of OEA-Retired—Stay Involved. Stay Invigorated. Stay In

Touch—was adopted in 2011 and guides the officers and the 50-member Board of Directors in its deliberations.

So as not to lose information about OEARetired, its history was first published in 2000 that covered the first 17 years.

A History Task Force was formed in the Fall of 2016 to bring the history up-todate. After extensive research into the files of OEA-Retired, including numerous minutes, letters, and newsletters, and additional information provided by former OEA-Retired presidents, the Task Force wrote an updated history. This 2020 version is kept updated each year with an addendum, and a new 20-page booklet will be published to help celebrate the 35th anniversary.

Since its inception, OEA-Retired has been affiliated with its parent organizations, National Education Association-Retired, OEA and NEA. TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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Politics & You

Education Policy, Budgets on the Table When Lawmakers Return in '21

BY LAURIE WIMMER / OEA Government Relations Consultant

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regon’s 81st Legislative Session opens on Monday, Feb. 1, 2021 on the heels of a global pandemic, a lockdowninduced economic recession, ongoing struggles for racial justice, a punishing wildfire season, and a presidential election year unlike any other.

As always, your Government Relations team will be working to ensure that public education, from pre-school through postsecondary, emerges unscathed from a session of budget cutting and policy threats.

Going into the session, uncertainty is the watchword. Will the public and their representatives be able to meet with lawmakers face to face, or will the session be a virtual one, as several interim special sessions have been? Will the quarterly economic and revenue forecasts continue to reflect a climb out of recession, or will Oregon’s revenue picture remain grim?

Will the newly elected legislature stay on the job, or will there be more walkouts like the three damaging ones in 2019 and 2020? At this writing, we cannot say, though legislative committees are trying to plan for every possibility, including another winter surge in COVID-19 cases, which could make “comprehensive distance legislating” — another type of “CDL” — all the more likely.

What we do know is that this 160-day session, spanning February 1 to July 11, will address key issues: funding, the revenue to pay for critical services, online education, meaningful equity policy, and education workforce concerns. Your team will keep you apprised of those ideas affecting you and your students as we work through the 3,000-some bills that will be introduced.

And whether the state capitol in Salem opens its doors to safe access or whether your voice will come through Zoomed-in testimony and emailed letters, it is safe to say that we will need you to engage in your 12

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

government’s deliberations.

OEA will be introducing several pieces of legislation to improve our public education system and the lives of our students.

For instance, we will ask the legislature to double the poverty weight in the school funding formula so that districts are better able to help our students with the greatest challenges to be successful. In addition to fighting for adequate funding, we will also pursue revenue solutions to ensure that Oregon has the resources it needs to help all our people whose struggles have been exacerbated by 2020’s many challenges.

And, we are again working on a suite of bills with a coalition of partners to help make our communities safer through gun violence prevention strategies.

Also on the agenda will be legislation to control class size, to address PERS, to ensure appropriate assessment for all students, and to make other educational improvements.

Virtual charter school operators will

likely make a strong push to further privatize public education by raising or eliminating the 3 percent cap on student exodus from their resident districts to these for-profit operations. Your team will be working to educate legislators about the serious educational equity concerns, performance problems, and financial issues of for-profit “machine learning”. We welcome your help to outline the various reasons that vast expansion of enrollment in these outfits is a bad plan. (For more on this topic, listen to OEA President John Larson discuss online education on KOPB Radio’s “Think Out Loud” show: https://www.opb.org/article/2020/09/29/ pandemic-drives-new-interest-in-onlinecharter-schools/.)

Follow the session as it progresses by visiting the OEA website and sign up for the Politics & You newsletter. Feel free to reach out to your Government Relations Team, too, at gr@oregoned.org.

Tending to Wellness Inspiring Schools to Create Healthy Workplaces for All Staff

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ecause of the uncertain and stressful nature of education right now, we certainly do not have to tell you that now more than ever tending to your health and well-being is essential. Finding ways to care for your physical, emotional, and social wellbeing can be challenging, and this struggle can lead to lower self-confidence, greater frustrations and exhaustion and eventually burnout.

OEA Choice Trust operates with the belief that no matter their role, all school employees should have the support they need to be physically, mentally and emotionally well.

Healthy worksites reduce employees’ stress, boost energy and morale, and promote better balance in life – a win for educators, staff, administrators and students.

To this end, OEA Choice Trust has focused on promoting the overall well-being and resilience of Oregon educators and staff — needed more now than ever before. Fostering well-being and resilience is imperative in creating a positive, caring and healthy environment where educators, students and families are engaged and work together to meet the daily demands of education.

OEA Choice Trust’s school employee health, well-being and resilience model is a holistic approach that recognizes the dynamic interaction between individuals and the places where they live, work and play. From the Trust’s perspective, “individuals are better able to put health promoting behaviors and resilience skills into action when their workplaces practices and social norms collectively create the opportunities to be healthy, safe, supported, engaged and challenging.”

A key strategy to achieve OEA Choice Trust’s vision is grant making — public school districts, ESDs and community colleges can apply for grants of $100,000 to be used over a 5-year period to create employee wellness programs. These grants have been used to improve the health and well-being of all school employees. The next School Employee Wellness Grant opportunity is just around the corner with grant applications due April 2021. For more information, please contact Asta Garmon at asta@oeachoice.com Credits: Thomas Patterson

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EA Choice Trust encourages you and your colleagues to make your self-care a priority, which in turn can provide a protective cushion when life gets tough. Doing so will enable you to better cope with stress and nurture positive connections with your colleagues, friends, and families. To help you get started, the following are proven steps to support your self-care journey from Francoise Mathieu’s recent TEDx talk. n Take Stock: What’s draining you?

Identify the main drains on your energy – relationships, environment, body, mind, spirit and work. What gets in my way of making changes to protect my health? n Identify your warning signs: When I’m overwhelmed – what does it feel and look like? What are your physical and emotional warning signs? Learning your top three warning signs can help you catch things early before you become too depleted. n Pick your battles at work: The field of education is complex and often under-resourced. Some of us deal with these realities more successfully than others. If you work with colleagues that are frequently negative or engage in naysaying, consider making more strategic alliances at work. Venting occasionally is fine, daily gripe sessions are unhealthy and not constructive. n Develop a community of support: Research shows that social support is one of the best strategies to address exhaustion and burnout.

Who do you spend time with at home and work? Can they be there to help you stay on target with your self-care goals?

– Consider finding some compassion buddies to help keep each other accountable for our self and collective care.

n Reassess where you are at regularly:

Start where you are ready to make change. Start small and find ways to integrate self-care into your day. Take gentle stock weekly; practice selfcompassion, grace and celebrate!

Below are some of OEA Choice Trust’s favorite resources and strategies to help you take active steps to maintain your social and emotional well-being at work and home. These resources can be used individually or consider how to use them with colleagues to create community support for each other’s self-care and wellbeing. For example, Elena Aguilar’s book, Onward: Emotional Resilience for Educators can be read on your own or create a book club with fellow staff to learn and use her strategies together. Another idea is to watch Shawn Achor’s Ted Talk, The Happy Secret to Better Work and couple this with a “21 days of Gratitude Challenge” to boost the emotional well-being of your colleagues.

To find more ideas and resources to bring collective care and wellness to your workplace, visit OEA Choice Trust’s website at https://oeachoice.com/schoolemployee-health-and-wellbeing/ Featured resources include: n The Blueprint for School Employee Wellness n A Resource Library with activities, resources, books and Ted Talks that support a wholistic approach to health and well-being n Monthly Blogs TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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FOUNDATION OF SUPPORT

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he Friday going into Labor Day weekend, weather forecasters in Oregon were nervous. A hot and dry summer had resulted in several small wildfires springing to life across the state and the predictions for an unprecedented wind event had the potential to turn those small fires into destructive inferno.

That’s exactly what happened. Coupled with low humidity, wind gusts reaching speeds as high as 40 miles per hour tore through the state – and the wildfires that had been smoldering for weeks quickly became a blaze that claimed at least nine lives, thousands of homes and physical structures, and over one million acres of land.

The wildfires were indiscriminate, upending the lives of tens of thousands of individuals who were forced to evacuate their homes in order to move to safer ground. As Oregon firefighters continue to battle the blazes and bring them more and more under control, many cities and towns are now faced with the monumental task of rebuilding their communities, and many OEA members and their students have been left wondering how 14

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they’re going to manage to return their lives to some sense of normalcy.

THE OEA FOUNDATION

As students and educators have struggled in the wake of the disaster, our union has come together to support members and students who need help the most.

One resource that has served as a lifeline for our students is the OEA Foundation.

Established in 1995 through the charitable contributions of OEA members, the foundation has offered financial support to students in need for 25 years. As the toll of the wildfires continued to mount, the OEA Foundation opened grant applications so members could apply for wildfire relief for their students. As of this article’s writing, the OEA Foundation has been able to award over $53,000 in fire-related grants to hundreds of Oregon students.

Foundation grants have been used to help students meet a wide range of needs as families cope with staggering losses as a result of the wildfires. After fleeing for their lives, some families returned to

homes that had suffered extensive smoke damage or to find rotten food in their refrigerator. OEA Foundation grants were able to help those families begin the process of restocking their pantries. These grants have been especially important for students from families whose immigration status makes accessing government support difficult or impossible.

OEA Vice President Reed Scott-Schwalbach points to the special nature of the applications to support neurodiverse students.

“For students on the autism spectrum, the quick nature of the evacuation has been particularly difficult,” said Scott-Schwalbach.

“Familiar comfort items had to be abandoned, leaving students dealing with both a new environment and a lack of tools to help process the changes. OEA Foundation grants have been able to help those families replace those sensory items that are so critical for our students on the autism spectrum.”

OEA RELIEF FUND

Our union family has always made sure that we would be able to help one another

A black cloud of smoke rolls straight toward Sheldon Lesire's home in the Silverton area.

OEA members impacted by devastating wildfires find relief through their union during difficult times, and that’s why, decades ago, our members created the OEA Relief Fund. The OEA Relief Fund was established to support members during strikes, school closures and lockouts, and in the event of natural disasters. And now, after generations of member support, the Relief Fund is self-supporting and managed by a committee of OEA members.

Over Labor Day weekend, as the Oregon wildfires began to grow in size and impact, the Relief Fund opened applications for all members who had experienced a financial hardship caused by the wildfires.

For Sheldon Lesire, an OEA member and special education teacher at Silver Crest Elementary in Silverton, wildfires came within miles of the elementary school and nearly all of the school’s students were placed under a level 3 evacuation order. As the fires moved closer and closer to Sheldon’s home he and his family were placed under a level 2 evacuation order, and the smoke from the nearby fires quickly began to blanket the air — dramatically impacting the air quality for the community.

Credit: Sheldon Lesire

AS THE TOLL OF THE WILDFIRES CONTINUED TO MOUNT, THE OEA FOUNDATION OPENED GRANT APPLICATIONS SO MEMBERS COULD APPLY FOR WILDFIRE RELIEF FOR THEIR STUDENTS. AS OF THIS ARTICLE’S WRITING, THE OEA FOUNDATION HAS BEEN ABLE TO AWARD OVER $53,000 IN FIRERELATED GRANTS TO HUNDREDS OF OREGON STUDENTS. As the air quality continued to decline, Lesire and his wife grew concerned for their daughter’s health, fearful that her past history with respiratory issues would become a problem for her if they remained in the area. The family made the decision to evacuate for several days, moving to an area further away from the fires where

BY RYLEE AHNEN

the air quality wouldn’t pose such a large concern. “We were just going to suck it up,” said Lesire about the unexpected cost. “It wasn’t going to be awesome, but we just felt like we had to do it.”

When OEA sent out applications for the Relief Fund grants, Lesire applied.

“I did the application online; it took less than five minutes.” Within days, Lesire’s application was approved. “It was a huge, huge, weight off of our shoulders.” At the time of writing, the OEA Relief Fund had distributed $48,604.28 in grants to 94 member educators who had been impacted by the wildfires.

“It has been really nice to have our local association and OEA at large very much have our backs,” said Lesire. “Something like this Relief Fund, that’s huge. Everything’s a mess. It feels like everything is a mess and everything is broken. Not all of our online stuff works. This is hard for everyone — parents, teachers, students, everybody. But this is one tangible thing that OEA was able to take off of our plate.

That’s huge, and it was very welcomed.”

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Leaving Home Douglas High School re-opens despite state COVID-19 guidance, forcing this teacher to leave the job she loves.

BY KATI PARAZOO, TEACHER, DOUGLAS HIGH SCHOOL ON OCT. 6, 2020, I submitted my resignation letter to Douglas High School, about a month after the school board announced its plans to open the high school in a hybrid model, ultimately exposing all teachers and staff to COVID-19. I pleaded a case with our School Board against opening Douglas High School, citing Douglas County’s recent spike in COVID-19 cases, which meant we no longer met the 10 cases/100,000 population requirement to open. That did not deter our school board and administration from continuing with their plans to bring students back to in-person learning.

Ultimately, I weighed my options and the impact on my family if I went back to Douglas High School, knowing that the board and administration did not have my best interest in mind. I felt that they had misrepresented information to ODE and Governor Brown to be granted an exception that they did not meet. I was sick, physically, and emotionally, from the interactions with school board members where they berated teachers, threatened budget cuts and job loss for teachers that tried to stop in-person learning. Rather than attempt to pursue leave options, I chose to resign and to walk away from the school district that had meant so much to me as a student, teacher, and community member of Winston-Dillard for most of my life.

Editor's Update: On Oct. 19, Douglas High School announced a student had tested positive for COVID-19. Multiple teachers called in sick, leaving the school no other option but to close its doors the next day. The following is a letter Parazoo prepared for her former principal and superintendent, announcing her decision to leave her position.

2021 OEA/NEA POSITIONS OPEN FOR NOMINATION & ELECTION “I started preschool at Douglas High School when I was 4. I went from Kindergarten through Senior year in the Winston-Dillard School district. I was a 4.0 student, varsity athlete, all-state softball player, ASB president, and leader in NHS and Spanish club. The friendships and memories that I made in this school are innumerable.

I went to the University of Oregon where I earned a BA in Spanish. I went to college for a term in Oviedo, Spain and I’ve traveled to many countries in my short 31 years on this earth.

No place felt more like home to me than returning as a Spanish teacher in 2018 and replacing my own Spanish teacher, Mrs. New. I received “New Teacher of the Year” in 2018-2019 and soon was leading the Student Body and the NHS clubs in addition to coaching softball, raising two toddlers, and helping my husband run his business. During this year I completed my master’s degree in Secondary Education with a 3.94 GPA. I spoke at the Winston First Citizens banquet to honor the new members, as a previously recognized Student First Citizen, too. I was busy, but I loved investing in the school that built me.

I was influential in helping with the G.O. bond that passed at our school, and I drove students around to distribute flyers throughout the community after school. I chaperoned dances, cooked BBQ at homecoming, helped my classes organize food drives and blood drives and I did this while taking time away from my own family. I believed in Douglas High School with every ounce of my being.

This year has been difficult. Teachers banded together to fight for face-to-face CDL rather than third-party courses that were boring and dated. We planned, prepped, set up extra monitors and video cameras so that we could teach students in the best way we knew how to- with our voices.

This week Douglas High School opened outside of state guidance. They fought and pleaded a case based on misperceptions and false information. School board members threatened and berated teachers, and the community bashed them for wanting to keep our students and their own families safe. We asked for a plan. We asked that our district communicate this plan early to allow all stakeholders time to prepare. We asked to consider the risk that opening would have when our Covid-19 cases are rising, flu season is approaching, our building is poorly ventilated and under construction. We wanted them to plan for Thanksgiving gatherings and Christmas break travel.

Instead, our district met with the ODE and pleaded for exemption from the rules. We don’t meet the exemption numbers either. They threatened teachers that if they didn’t show up to school, they would lose their jobs. And they put many teachers in an uncomfortable position to either risk their own safety or to risk their jobs and their livelihood. You showed the teachers that you didn’t care what their thoughts were.

Here’s what they didn’t consider: I will not stand for this irresponsible and inconsiderate action. It is a slap in the face of a person who has invested the better part of her life building up a school. I will stand with my convictions, and I will focus on rebuilding myself to a point where I’m emotionally stable enough to fight this and the injustices throughout our district again. I pray that the opening is successful and that students and families remain healthy, but I fear for the worst. Our community does not have the means to fight this virus like the elite in our country. Many people live below the poverty line and will not receive the medical attention necessary to defeat Covid-19. They are raised by grandparents or older parents, and many are worried.

At the end of the day, I didn’t lose Douglas High School. Douglas High School lost me.

Thank you for allowing me to work with our future leaders. The students are and have always been the best part of teaching. I hope you keep them safe.”

Credits: Kati Parazoo

The following positions are open for nomination for the 2021 elections: Elected at OEA RA: n OEA President: 1 position for a 2-year term n OEA Vice President: 1 position for a 2-year term n NEA Director: 1 position for a 3-yr term (term begins September 1, 2021) n Education Support Professional Director: 1 position for a 3-yr term Elected by Mail Ballot: State Delegates to the NEA RA: 13 positions: n Region I: Six (6) positions for a 3-year term; n Region II: Four (4) positions for a 3-year term; n Region III: Three (3) positions for a 3-year term.

(The number of delegates per region may be adjusted as the number of members within the region dictates as indicated by the JanuaryFebruary NEA membership report.)

OEA Board of Directors: 9 positions for 3-year terms in Board Districts: n 03b (Salem-Keizer EA) n 04 (Three Rivers Education Council) n 05 (Eugene UniServ Council) n 07 (Cascade UniServ Council) n 10a (Portland A.T.) n 14 (East Multnomah County UniServ Council) n 17a (Santiam UniServ Council) n 18 (Mt. Hood UniServ Council) n 26a (Three Valley UniServ Council) 1 positions for a 2-year term in Board District: n 26b (Three Valley UniServ Council)

1 positions for a 1-year term in Board Districts: n 20b (Metro SE UniServ Council)

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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PUTTING ON NEW SHOES In the aftermath of COVID-19 school closures and uncharted territory for educators and students, education support professionals (ESPs) are taking on brand-new challenges this fall.

BY MILANA GRANT • PHOTOS BY THOMAS PATTERSON

O

ne year ago, a typical workday in the life of Title I Reading Specialist Laura Warren looked like this: Six students at a time would file into her classroom, stop at the taped line in front of her workstation, and wait for their turn to be seated at the crescent-shaped table, where they would spend 30 minutes working on phonics lessons with their beloved Mrs. Warren. They would use magnetic letter tablets to build words together, sand boxes for letter recognition, and animal puppets to learn letter sounds. These tools are all part of Warren’s multi-sensory approach to remedial literacy at Lebanon’s Riverview Elementary School.

On March 13, Oregon schools were abruptly shuttered to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Warren’s students went home that Friday afternoon, and that’s the last time she saw them in person.

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TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

Deidre Shaughnessy is a school bus driver who is now providing childcare and assisting students with virtual learning at the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Santiam in Lebanon.

Credits: Thomas Patterson

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Warren, who helms the Lebanon Education Support Professionals’ Association (LESPA) as President, was at a loss. Not only did she have to quickly switch gears to figure out how to continue to do her own job in a distance-only setting, but to somehow lead her fellow ESPs through this seemingly insurmountable crisis.

Without a physical classroom, a cafeteria, or students needing transportation to and from school, many ESPs felt uncertainty and fear about the fate of their jobs. As their leader, Warren felt personally responsible for ensuring that anyone who wanted to work would have a place in the district. “To be honest, there were rumors that some of my ESPs would be laid off. I just couldn’t let that happen, so I made a huge list of ideas for ways we could plug people into other jobs so that I could keep them employed,” she says.

As a member of the Bargaining Team who had fought tirelessly and won a great contract for LESPA only last year, Warren knew that taking on an entirely new job classification would be a tough pill to swallow for some of her members. “I had a conversation with the general membership and let them know that they would most likely be asked to do something outside of their job classifications, and that they should do it if they were able, because I was trying to save jobs.” And, though not a single ESP from her district was laid off, the summer did not come without losses to their numbers.

“I had 18 people resign this summer, not even counting those who are retiring. 18 people who have just decided not to return. I have never seen that before. In a normal year, we might lose 5 or 6 people, and that's including retirees,” she says.

This mass exodus of support staff at the end of the school year sent Warren into overdrive to make certain that her members would have a better sense of job security going into the fall. One way that she was able to do that was to lobby the district to provide childcare for all district employees. This helped staff twofold: Educators who were also parents would now have access to childcare during working hours, and those whose jobs were non-compulsory due to continued building closures would have work to do, although in a completely new capacity for some.

Deidre Shaughnessy, a bus driver in the Lebanon School District for two years, is one such employee who has found herself learning a new set of job skills on the fly. After spending the end of the last school year and most of the summer delivering meals to students and families across the district, Shaughnessy, was uncertain about what the fall would mean for her livelihood. “I work full time at my part time job normally. We work our [scheduled hours] but there was always extra work that we all signed up for, like field trips and sports events. When the pandemic hit, we lost all of those opportunities,” says Shaughnessy. With only a few delivery routes to spread between all the bus drivers in the district, hours were reduced drastically, and many drivers had already been reassigned to other worksites for the fall. Though the district had done its best to provide other options for work, the lack of information and constantly shifting guidelines left her feeling uneasy.

“Nobody knew what was going on, everything kept changing so close to the start of the school year,” Shaughnessy says. One of her biggest concerns was for her students, who she had grown accustomed to seeing every day. As a bus driver, she has unique insight 20

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

In order to preserve jobs for her fellow ESP members, Instructional Assistant Laura Warren worked diligently to find new positions throughout the district.

into what’s happening in the homes of her students and feels a personal responsibility for their safety and emotional wellbeing.

“I worried a lot for them because some kids want to be the last one off the bus. They don't like being at home and you can tell. I wondered if they were OK, because we don't see them everyday anymore, and it really troubled me.”

When the opportunity to work with students again was presented, Shaughnessy jumped at the chance. She is currently providing childcare to the children of district employees at the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Santiam, which has been a haven for students since school closures began. Her cohort of fourth-grade students look to her for help navigating their virtual classrooms, a task that does not come without a learning curve of its own.

“There are always going to be difficulties with so much going on at once. There are a lot of children trying to log on to the internet at the same time so there's bottlenecking and kids are constantly being kicked off,” she says.

Personal Care Assistant Kari Carver can also attest to the difficulty of learning new technology in such a short amount of time.

For the last several years, Carver has supported a Life Skills classroom, working with students who have special needs. The academic and physical needs of her students vary widely, and most of them require one-on-one assistance or very small group instruction.

The quick transition to distance learning last March was a jarring experience for Carver. With no formal guidelines to begin with, she found herself struggling to gain her footing as classes shifted to a computer screen. “I felt like I was just floundering. I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do. Our teachers were still trying to figure it out, so we logged into Zoom and tried to help as best we could,” Carver says.

But for her Life Skills students who need extra support, connecting through a screen proved to be next to impossible at times. Few of her students were logging in with any regularity, and there was nothing she could do about it. “It’s really sad. We really want to be back in a classroom with our kids. I know their physical needs are being met Credit: Meg Krugel

at home but I'm not sure about their academic or emotional needs.”

This year, Carver is working as an Instructional Assistant for the Math Department at her school. Part of her new job description includes proctoring statewide assessments, which are replete with technology challenges and mandatory regulations. She monitors 15-20 students at once, a major shift from the small group instruction she was used to, making sure that they are following the state-sanctioned rules for testing. Even with the extensive training she received, things don’t always go according to plan. “This morning, not all of my students were able to log into the STAR test platform, and we couldn’t get it figured out. We had to tell them to come back for the second session, which meant my afternoon testing session was much fuller,” says Carver.

Even with the constant challenge of new technology, ever-changing guidelines from the state, and the sadness she feels at not being able to see her students in person, Carver says she is grateful to still be employed and looking forward to using her new skills to improve upon her practice when she is able to return to school. “I think that some of the skills I’m learning are going to really help once I get back into the classroom, especially using computers to help our students with communication.”

Laura Warren “I FEEL SO SUPPORTED made sure that all ESPs in the district AND SO VALUED. I AM who would be faTRULY HAPPY WITH cilitating distance MY JOB AND THE learning had the tools and training PEOPLE I WORK WITH that they needed AND I CAN'T SAY I'VE to be successful EVER FELT THAT WAY in their new jobs.

BEFORE.” “We’ve worked with the district to Deidre Shaughnessy provide Chromebooks to our ESPs if they need one. Our Tech Department has installed mobile cameras for those who needed a better camera, and set everyone up with Zoom accounts,” says Warren. She also led extensive training on how to use the video conferencing software, as many of her members had never used it in a professional setting before. “I have some members who are doing instruction for the first time, or proctoring STAR testing. And they were really frightened at first, but I think everyone is feeling much more confident now. ” Being connected with her colleagues and supervisors during this time has made all the difference to Deidre Shaughnessy, who acknowledges that having a support system at work is something worth cherishing. “I feel so supported and so valued. I am truly happy with my job and the people I work with and I can't say I've ever felt that way before.”

Lebanon ESPs are anxiously awaiting the day that they’ll be able to return to their classrooms, cafeterias, school buses, and buildings, but for now they will keep doing their best to provide the best education experience possible for their students.

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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W Black Lives Matter and Lessons on Being Confined or Free

BY MERCEDES N. MUÑOZ

2020 OREGON TEACHER OF THE YEAR 22

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

W

hen asked to write about how the BLM movement has transformed, enriched, and challenged me as an educator of color this year; I was initially stumped. I grew up with my Grandmother's wisdom both prodding and cradling me. She pushed me to learn about the historical contributions of my ancestors. I was encouraged at age 8 to write speeches about George Washington Carver, Shirley Chisolm, and Benjamin Banneker. I was given the poetry of Nikki Giovanni, Maya Angelou, and Paul Laurence Dunbar. In my hometown of Oakland, I learned of the Black Panther Party and their legacy of creating free meals for kids, which is now a component of public school services. I saw everyday people who contributed to the tapestry of living, breathing, walking history. From the school bus driver, to the postal workers who delivered our mail, to Mayor Lionel Wilson who was the first Black elected to the position, serving from 1971 to 1991. All of this is to say, I understood that Black lives mattered because they were the lives shaping my own.

Upon moving to Oregon in the late 80s, I began to feel a shift. My first school experience in Portland was when I was sat in the back of the classroom next to the ferret cages. My peers sat two by two in desk pairs. That kind of stinging rejection let me know that I was not being ostracized for being a Californian. There was something more sinister at work. I began to sense that my person did not hold as much value. Years later, during my first year of teaching, I can recall incidents of parents walking into the classroom and saying, “Excuse me. We´re looking for a teacher.” The visible shock when sitting down with me for their child's IEP meeting was not lost on me. I have bitten back tears of frustration after finding racist notes left on my desk by educational assistants. Reading the handwritten words, “Coffle, slave quarters, and mistress”, and knowing the message was to regulate me to the former history of my ancestors, rather than welcoming me into a new future. I have had to summon the deep dignity of my elders, in order to show up and teach after witnessing the videos of men like Erik Garner and Philando Castille take their last breaths.

This past spring, I had to again find the inner strength to lead equity meetings, while grieving the losses of Ahmaud Arbery and George Floyd. I remember being so upset that I could not just lay down and cry. That for a few moments, I did not want to be seen as a teacher-leader, or as the Oregon Teacher of the Year 2020, but rather as a Black woman, whose life mattered, and her tears. And yet, it was in the midst of this epic and ongoing crisis that I have seen a glimmer of hope. On our second to the last meeting of our virtual school year, I shared a reflection lesson with my students. I shared a picture of a young Black male standing in the middle of the street.

He was clothed in full graduation regalia, while the city loomed in the background. The students first shared their initial impressions of the scene. I witnessed their deep critical thinking come Credit: Thomas Patterson

alive. They made connections to their own thoughts, feelings, and concerns. After some writing time, they came back to the discussion.

One white male student said, “Mrs. Muñoz, this really bothers me.

I understand why people are protesting. I understand why they are upset. I do not know what to do and it makes me feel guilty.” We did a connection activity and made some links to historical context and precipitating events. We talked about what it means to be a bystander, and ally, an accomplice, or an interrupter. We discussed how guilt and shame keep us stuck, but how the alternative is to be transparent, to be information-seeking, and to express our wonderings as means to connect us, rather than to create distance.

In that 93 minute lesson, I felt freer than I have ever felt in a classroom. In those moments, this student was finding his own way, and it opened up space for other members of the learning community to share their reflections. We did not walk away more divided. We were inextricably connected to our humanity. That is the work of the Black Lives Matter movement. It is not a political agenda. It is a movement of awakening. It is a time where we are being asked to search our hearts and determine how certain social constructs are divisive and restrictive of human experience. To say “Black Lives Matter” is to acknowledge that all life is sacred, and no amount of melanin or lack thereof should nullify or restrict this basic human right, to live.

In the words of Toni Morrison, “If you're going to hold someone down you're going to have to hold on by the other end of the chain.

You are confined by your own repression.” Some of us are catching up to this message. We are doing the work and are somewhere in the continuum. However, educators have a responsibility to up their learning curve and do so quickly. We are being entrusted with shaping the minds of the next generation. We will either work to upend racist policies, structures, and supremacist ideals, or we will be confined by our chains. In our future, I would truly rather see us each free.

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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Birthing Hashtags

BY MERCEDES N. MUÑOZ

5 pm and events are set in motion On aisle 9 is the frozen foods The windows frosted, touching the glass Did you consider Haagen Daz or Ben and Jerry's?

Cherry Garcia or Double Belgian Chocolate?

Did you forego your guts warning about the lactose?

At 7 pm did you slide into your comfy slippers?

While loosening your neck-tie?

Letting your head fall back in a momentary lapse, sighing with relief…

Did you cry out or sink back finally free From terror crouching at your door, Did your blood coagulate in the bowl, Where sugar and chocolate essence once co-mingled in harmony? #Botham Jean New job, new life Did your resume include Whodini acts, Like killing yourself while handcuffed? #Sandra Bland Selling pre-rolls, Who doesn't hustle to feed a family of 6?

You couldn't breathe either. #Eric Garner The sidewalk where you were ordered to walk.

Must´ve been taking up too much space, In the street, with your friend, at 18, In 2014 on Canfield Drive.

Plantation names. And white overseers. #Michael Brown Crying for your mother, With knees to neck. Pinned. 8 minutes. 46 seconds.

Over 8 minutes of consistent, hateful pressure.

Forgery absolves your murderer, With gleeful eyes and a smirk. #George Floyd Almost 26. A morning run.

Nikes or Adidas? Didn´t matter.

No such thing as the wrong shoe, Just color. Too early for the candles Or the dawn to hide your blood. #Ahmaud Arbery

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TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

Replica airsoft gun. Didn't you know at 12?

Count them, 12--that play rifles are for White boys, who go on hunting trips, With fathers and grandfathers?

Not reserved for kids in Ohio, Cleveland Where Bone Thugs sing in harmony, over dead boys laying in the grass. #Tamir Rice Speaking of music, That bass was knocking, rattling windows And the strange cages of white men Who are entitled, to shut you up.

You couldn't hear the bullets, but we know you felt them. #Michael Dunn Police vans break ribs and Cause internal bruising all by themselves.

Not one billy club or fist. Not one breaking of rank and file.

Just one coma and a broken spine.

No officer or van, guilty of the crime. #Freddie Gray These chronicles A memorial incomplete This confetti of hashtags Continues reigning down On our necks.

Our necks, Swan-like, Resistive, Magical, Beautiful, Dangling, It is the necks, that cause so much trouble They hold the head with pride.

Despite this evil Despite this hatred Despite ropes twisting around them Despite knees next to them Despite debauchery These necks that hold the stress These necks that carry sensations These necks...

421 years of pressure On our collective necks,

The poison in our water The blood in our veins The nightly pillows tear-stained We are in constant opposition Opposing a world that stands upon our necks Wondering why we sputter and cough Unable to breathe--The fault lines we stand on The earth quaking beneath us There is no scale high enough To measure the ripples, ricochets, reverbing Thousands of tiny cuts.

Prick the soul.

This.

Is.

A bleed out.

We do not deserve to die.

Not #Trayvon, carrying skittles, donning a grey hoodie (street thug) Not #Philando Castille riding with his girlfriend and baby (he was carrying) Not #Kendra James, for driving (she was going to drag the officer)

Not at your whims or fancies Under the guise of your authorities Not because you fear for your life Not because you are protecting your neighborhood Not because you are suspicious Not because you feel threatened Not because you have hatred Not because you want justice Not because you made a mistake Not because you couldn't stop your friend Not because you didn't pull the trigger Not because you don't feel a part of a collective Not because you are silent Not because you feel powerless Not because you don't feel you experience privilege Not because you are fragile Not because you claim no connection with your ancestors Not because you cannot see it Not because you did not watch the videos Not because you need more time Not because you need to weigh the evidence Not because you aren't sure if we deserved it Blackness can not be the cause, reason, and excuse for our deaths.

Legacies are inherited.

Last night another hashtag was birthed.

Who will stop their re-creation?

Not #Sean Bell, for celebrating his pending nuptials (he was the member of a gang) Not #Jason Washington, Navy Veteran breaking up a fight (he had a gun Not #Breonna Taylor, for sleeping (wrong house) We do not deserve to die these deaths.

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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Defining Moments

BY ETHELYN TUMALAD

EARLY CAREER EDUCATOR, NORTH CLACKAMAS SCHOOL DISTRICT

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A

ny teacher would be proud to see the sight I beheld on that sunny day in June of 2020: every Black student that had passed through my classroom doors for the past three years had one fist raised up in the air, chanting at the top of their lungs, “We gon’ be alright!,” “This is America!,” “No justice, no peace!,” and “Black Lives Matter!” As I walked with two other teachers beside me, the visual presence of all our students shook me to my core and overwhelmed me with pride.

I never thought I would see this scene play out in the sleepy suburb and predominantly white Happy Valley. The Happy Valley Youth Walk was a grassroots event that Clackamas High School alumni Monnie Spears-Rogers organized through social media and quickly grew to be a march of over a thousand people. One thousand community members walked three miles from Clackamas High School to City Hall. There were speakers of all ages, including North Clackamas School District’s own board member Libra Forde, asking the whole community to come together and acknowledge what all of the Black students have been asking at our schools for years: that Black Lives Matter.

First Year Teaching

I consider myself a very privileged early educator. Not only do I teach AVID, I also teach 10th and 11th grade English Language Arts. When I got hired at Clackamas High School, I was given two things that not many first year teachers are given: agency and support. I had full control of my curriculum as long as it hit ODE ELA standards, and I selected the pre-approved texts from the library collection. I work with an amazing English department, administration, instructional coach, and school community that openly says: “CHS values every student and every identity. As such, racist, sexist, homophobic, or otherwise offensive language/behavior is not tolerated here at Clackamas High School.” There was an equity committee that created whole-school lessons to improve school climate and culture. North Clackamas School District touts an equity lens, so it makes sense, right?

My first year of teaching was one of the hardest years of my life.

Not just because of the challenges of being a first-year teacher (the onboarding, creating curriculum, finding your teaching community and mentors), but I explicitly created a decolonized curriculum. Boy, was I scared the first year I taught my curriculum. I purposefully centered either authors of color or issues of race. And this was not easy considering the canon that I had to choose from: we started with justice and law in To Kill a Mockingbird, then decolonization in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, then a unit on bilingualism and the power of language, and we ended the school year with a unit I created called “From Harlem to Hip-Hop: Poetic Justice.” I dove headfirst into that pool of difficult conversations without even checking the temperature of the water. One of the toughest conversations that I had in class was with a White, male Credit: Thomas Patterson

student whose father is a well-respected police officer. We were ending my unit reading To Kill a Mockingbird and he confronted me in front of the whole class.

“Ms Tumalad, do you not like the police?”

“What makes you say that?”

“Because, we are reading something with Black Lives Matter. Does that mean you hate police?”

“Absolutely not. I have many loved ones who serve. My brotherin-law is in law enforcement. My father served in the military for more than 20 years. I think that it’s not...so cut and dry. What we need to do is look at the world around us and be critical of the systems that we are in. I think that I can still love my brother-in-law and my father but be critical of systems...right?”

“Yeah...You’re right.”

His face was thoughtful and inquisitive...that light bulb had gone off. That ‘Ah-ha’ moment that teachers see when critical thinking happens. But I was still afraid to say it. It’s my first year teaching and was I really going to say those words in front of all my students? Black Lives Matter?

We end To Kill a Mockingbird with watching the Netflix documentary “13th” by Ava Duvernay and reading the introduction to Mychal Denzel Smith’s Invisible Man, Got the Whole World Watching: A Young Black Man’s Education. We read the introduction together slowly, a memoir about the author’s life and his lived experience the moment upon hearing about the death of Trayvon Martin. We dissect the piece and what it means. I ask the questions: What stories does the author talk about when it comes to White Supremacy? How does Trayvon Martin become a symbol? For what? What do Black boys ‘absorb’? What does the author mean by this? And most importantly, How does this essay connect with To Kill a Mockingbird? Each year the answers become more nuanced and sophomores dive deeper into systemic racism and White supremacy. And each year since that awkward conversation, students have craved to continue reading Denzel Smith’s memoir.

My journey as a non-Black person of color has been an interesting one, and one that I am open about with students. To lead students to talk about identity and race can be difficult when you have not done the work internally yourself. As a first generation, immigrant, non-Black POC who grew up in a small town that was 80 percent white, I did not have a Black educator until I reached college. It was not until I travelled back home to The Philippines as an adult did my identity solidify: I am an Asian Pacific Islander. I TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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am Filipino, I am Brown, and I am Asian. And what does this mean as an educator?

My answer came in the form of community. Coming from a collectivist culture, I need community in order to survive. Unfortunately, as a first-year teacher, my school district did not have an official mentorship program. I sought mentorship out purposefully and one of the greatest assets my district has is an affinity group for educators of color. I met the Black leaders, mentors, and veterans from my district (shout out to Desi Nicodemus and Robert Blake) and other districts (you’re my girl, Katherine Watkins). There is power in being unapologetic and authentic outside of dominant White culture, especially with other educators of color.

My first year teaching as a non-Black educator of color came with many stumbling blocks. As the year passed, I learned how to navigate discussions about race more freely, I received support from the NCSD Educators of Color Affinity Group, and with the help of some brave students, started Clackamas High School’s first Asian Student Union. By contrast, I remember never saying the words Black Lives Matter. They fumbled in my mouth and instead I tried my hardest to act them, instead of saying them.

Fourth Year Teaching

Now I’m entering my fourth year — I still consider myself new but there’s a bit more strength in how I teach what’s deeply close to my heart. I am happy to report that each year, the conversations have gotten easier. My units have changed and fluctuated since my first year, and I am proudly an early career educator who is still learning.

I’ve learned that to be an educator who honors Black Lives is to be an anti-racist educator. I am not the perfect educator and I am still in the first years of teaching. But I know this: All lives will matter when Black Lives Matter. And in order for this to happen, we as educators must disrupt the Eurocentric, colonial, White supremacist systems and narratives that our students are taught. We have to look at our curriculum, our grading systems, our disciplinary actions. We have to believe that it’s a space where we can help students form acts of liberation and not a place they memorize random facts. We must believe that blackness isn’t a barrier. Believe that kids want to learn and be authentically themselves - whatever form they come in. Believe that in order to learn, students must first know they matter.

Last year, I had a conversation with a Black student that I will never forget. He sat there next to me while I was helping him with his project on community and Hansberry’s “Raisin in the Sun.” He looked around the classroom at his classmates and then said to me, “Ms Tumalad, how does it feel to know that your classroom is one of the only places in the school that minority students are the majority...and they feel safe?”

I had to stop myself from telling him not to call himself a minority. Nothing about him and his peers are minor, nothing at all.

Instead of ‘correcting’ him I smile and respond, “It feels amazing. If I can give you one thing...at least it’s this space. In our school, in our district, in our country...it’s the least that I can give you.”

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I saw this same exact Black student at the Happy Valley March this June, marching with all of his friends, his fist held up high.

There’s a sense of urgency when you see your own students with their fists raised in the air walking side by side in confidence about social justice. The summer of Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd, and Breonna Taylor was the summer I heard my Black students the loudest because I wanted to listen. I learned to hand the microphone over. That’s what you need to do as a non-Black educator: you must listen. I listened in June when my students turned in their final podcasts and they told stories of Ahmaud Arbery and Kendrick Johnson. I listened when these students gathered over the summer to create a coalition for all of the affinity groups in order to create change at Clackamas High School. I listened this September, when they started a Black Woman-Led Black Lives March. And I listened when, for their final AVID Senior project, these same students asked to lead a table talk on race.

This year I received a Black Lives Matter poster in the mail from my union, the Oregon Education Association. The first thing that I did was walk right into my empty classroom and put up the poster that OEA sent. The beautiful image and words are clearly visible behind me when I teach Synchronous Learning: Black Lives Matter.

Perspectives from our Students What should Oregon schools be doing for Black students?

School is supposed to be a safe space where students feel welcomed and receive the utmost support from faculty members and their peers. With everything that is occurring in our world right now it's imperative to understand and hold the hands of all Black students. Like many other students of different races it’s already a challenge to navigate through our society. Just imagine how difficult it is for Black youth to maneuver through spaces that aren’t meant for them in the first place. Before anything teachers need to check their assumptions and bias. Instead of going straight to disciplining my Black friends, please try to understand our actions first instead of jumping to conclusions. Please ask yourself ‘why did I react this way?’ And we can work together to resolve the issues.

The first step schools in Oregon need to take, is teach real Black history. Although slavery and the Civil Rights Movement is a large part of American history, we are more than our struggles. I believe all schools should implement curriculums specifically for African studies making sure educators cover Black history across the diaspora. To realize Black history is not just about defeat, to decolonize Black history is to also teach about our heros, the Patrice Lumumbas, Wangari Maathais, and the Nelson Mandelas of Black history. Teach about the triumphs of Black people, to dissect ancestral cultures and traditions, and how we came to be.

-JEMIMA KONDE, 17

What do you wish to see your high school do for Black students?

In the wake of BLM becoming more mainstream, as well as anti-racism movements becoming more prevalent, you’d think that in school (being that it is a place where our minds are the most challenged) we’d be learning a more diverse curriculum. This moment in time is the perfect opportunity for the school to show up for us Black students. I can’t think of a time when pushing, learning, anything Black and being there for us Black students is more mainstream. Typically, our month is February and this is the perfect time to push a new curriculum and be more modern throughout the year. Sure we’ve all spent 12 years learning about Civil Rights and MLK and if your school was spicy enough perhaps Malcom X, but it's gotten old. One thing I’ve noticed about our history is that the man that controls the pen that writes always seems to white out his sins. This is all over our history curriculum.

I’m calling for a change especially in terms of Black history. Sure it was interesting then and in elementary school but why don’t we learn about African history? We should learn more about world history, more than just wars. There should be a class for more than just learning about old White men. That’s basically every history class we have. We spend the years in school idolizing Whiteness.

There’s Black kids growing up who learn about Whiteness and they end up hating themselves, and as a Black student at a PWI, I want my fellow students to know that there is more to my ethnic history aside from slavery and Civil Rights. I want there to be a more enriched and challenging story to tell about my people. I want my fellow scholars to know that we were people just like you or me before we were slaves, and that the story of Black people doesn’t begin with slavery.

One thing that Clackamas High School has done for me that has shown what their equity policy is supposed to stand for has been the Black Student Union chapter at the school. It has provided me with the safe space where my Blackness is not seen as a trend, weapon, or a disadvantage. It has truly allowed me to grow so much as a student, a person, and a young Black male in a state and community where people that look like me don't grow intellectually. However Clackamas High School although taking steps in the right direction, continually fails me and Black colleagues each and every year.

Another way Clackamas High school could support Black students is by pushing for more Black teachers. Imagine going to school for 12 years and having someone that doesn't look like you tell you the watered down version of your own history. It doesn't sound right, does it? That's because it's not. Now with more Black teachers in classrooms I know that personally I’d feel more comfortable and safe as I should at school. I’d feel as if the environment I’m in is one for learning and not for being an outcast.

I know having more Black teachers for Black students would promote the overall tranquility and well being of Black students.

One more way Clackamas High School could help me and other Black students is allowing us to be ourselves. I feel like on more than one occasion I’ve been asked to do some things or not do some things so that another White student would feel more comfortable, and not to say school shouldn’t be comfortable for all, but who is to Credit: Ethelyn Tumalad

Xavier Feaster-Rivera and Jemima Konde, students at Clackamas High School.

say that I shouldn’t be able to express myself through what I wear or rather what I say in terms of what's been culturally appropriate for me and other Black students. I feel like more often than not the comfort of White students is considered before the feelings of Black students are considered at Clackamas High School in racial incidents. This results in most racial incidents being brushed aside and now genuine anti racism efforts that were promised to me as a NCSD student are pursued.

In conclusion I’ve seen much and done much in my time as a student at Clackamas High School. I've seen admin brush racial incidents aside simply because a student might have a lot to lose, and I've also seen the admin take meaningful steps to try to adhere to their equity policy. Overall I feel like the pursuit of a safe and racism free learning environment has been placed in the hands of us, the Black students at CHS. I’ve been able to help pursue that dream with my work in BSU which I helped find about three years ago with some of the other Black students. Since its establishment I know that Clackamas has become safer for Black students, however overall I know there is still a lot of work to be done before the dream is achieved, and the equity promise for students of any color or ethnicity that we see so much of is actually achieved.

-XAVIER FEASTER-RIVERA, 17 TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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Springfield’s (brief) decision to bring back K-3 students is met with a lot of mixed emotions

BY MEG KRUGEL

Six days. That’s all the time Springfield teacher Anne Goff had

with her incoming Kindergarten class face-to-face last month before a COVID-19 surge in Lane County altered everything. Her Kindergarten students had begun their school year in her classroom the week of Sept. 21, and metrics were released the day after school began that showed positivity rates had climbed higher than in-person teaching would have normally allowed. Because the district had already opened, Springfield K-3 classrooms could continue hosting in-person classes until the next round of metrics came out. Not surprisingly, the metrics the following Monday had nearly doubled in positive cases; that evening, teachers were told that the district was returning K-3 students to Comprehensive Distance Learning by the end of the week. The next day, Goff scrambled to get learning packets made for her students, knowing it'd be the last time she'd see them in person for a long while.

Six days of making a face-to-face connection with an eager bunch of five-year-olds. Six days of setting the stage for what is surely going to be a tumultuous year of yoyo-ing between two models of learning that both carry their own hurdles. This abrupt move to close Springfield schools during the second week of school was coupled with devastating levels of unhealthy wildfire smoke that had already forced the district to delay opening schools a week or more.

Springfield — like districts across Oregon — was off to a rocky start.

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“We’re not saying we don’t want to be with kids – we do, very much – but we know it’s just not safe yet. We need a better plan and we need more time.”

Heather St. Louis, Springfield kindergarten teacher

Aly Nestler's classroom was set up to accommodate social distancing for her third graders, but a whiplash opening and then closing of in-person learning meant students never actually walked through her doors this fall.

In early August, Springfield Public Schools announced that they had met the metrics to re-open for Kindergarten through third grade to return to in-person, making them the first and only district in Oregon with more than 10,000 students to decide to reopen the doors to grades K-3 (4th and above would continue to be online at least through the end of the calendar year). Educators in Springfield held a lot of mixed emotions about the decision. At first, Anne Goff was relieved. The former President of Springfield Education Association (SEA) was returning to the classroom after seven years of being in a full-time release role.

“I was completely torn. My first thought was ‘oh good.’ I don't want to teach online. I have no technology skills. I am a dinosaur.

I hate technology and I don't think five and six-year-olds learn well in an online environment. But a few days passed, and there’s just become more and more evidence that, yes, children do get this disease.

Yes, there’s been between 200 and 300 children who have died from this disease. So, it really changed my mind — as much as I don’t want to teach online, it is not safe for children and families and even myself… it’s not safe for any of us to be in the building,” Goff says.

Upsides and Downsides

Her fears were felt widely across the district, so much that when the decision to reopen was announced, SEA members bolted into action with an “It’s Too Soon” campaign. Members organized a car parade around downtown Springfield on the first of September, as well as a letter writing campaign directed at the Springfield School Credits: Heather St. Louis, Aly Nestler, Anne Goff

Anne Goff's Kindergarten classroom leaves a small remnant that kids did, at one point, spend their day in this space, albeit just for a week.

Board and upper administration. “Our signs said things like, ‘If it’s not safe for all grades, then it’s not safe for K-3,” says Springfield Kindergarten teacher Heather St. Louis. “We’re not saying we don’t want to be with kids — we do, very much – but we know it’s just not safe yet. We need a better plan and we need more time.”

St. Louis has been teaching in Springfield for four years at Riverbend Elementary School. Last March, when schools had to abruptly close their doors to children, St. Louis mourned the loss of time with TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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her students. “Thinking back to that time, I remember feeling like I was grieving the end of the school year… even though I got to see my students every day on the computer, and we had built a relationship over the months we’d had together. But springtime in Kindergarten is such a special time — they’ve learned how to be students and are ready for so many more in-depth experiences. I was really sad to lose that because it’s kind of the prize at the end of the race,” she says.

This year, St. Louis was offered a Kindergarten teaching position at SPS Online, the district’s fully online (and now largest) elementary school. Teachers in the district who identified as highrisk for COVID-19 were allowed to join a lottery for SPS Online teaching positions, and St. Louis was fortunate to be one of the few who were offered a spot at the online school. Families were given the option to enroll their student in SPS Online if they wanted to guarantee a full year of distance/virtual learning (whereas keeping a student enrolled in their traditional school could mean a return to the classroom if the positive COVID-19 testing metrics dropped low enough). Enrollment numbers for SPS Online have continued to climb upward this Fall — as of press time, SPS Online was serving 972 elementary school students across the district.

For St. Louis, who serves as the building representative for SEA members working through SPS Online, the climbing enrollment numbers are not surprising, especially with the district’s haphazard beginning to the school year — families are looking for any semblance of stability. But, the numbers are also resulting in enormous class sizes for St. Louis and her SPS Online teaching colleagues.

“Our class sizes are much larger than our building colleagues — for example, I have 37 kindergarteners. My Riverbend colleagues have large class sizes for the district and they currently have 16 students.

There’s a big difference in equity there,” she says.

She says the glaring class size discrepancies wouldn’t have mattered quite as much if SPS Online had continued to operate with a self-paced, asynchronous model of teaching, as they have in prior years. Instead, the online school decided last month to align the curriculum with what’s being taught this year in all of the district’s elementary schools, which means there are points in the day where St. Louis and other SPS Online teachers are delivering synchronous instruction like their ‘in-building’ colleagues who are delivering Comprehensive Distance Learning (CDL).

“I love seeing my students face-to-face every day, but we’re doing this curriculum with double and triple the students (as those teaching through CDL), without a dedicated office staff. That starts to build up and you just get buried in a lot of administrative stuff, rather than planning and prepping for your students. When you have 40-plus students, and new ones are being added every day… you can imagine what that’s like,” she says.

St. Louis doesn’t take the position for granted, however, knowing she was one of the lucky few to have been drawn for a SPS Online teaching position. Her colleagues across the district are mixed in their reactions to being back in-building, first with the decision to bring back K-3, and even now, as they’re all teaching virtually in empty classrooms across the district.

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Above: Scenes from an "It's Too Soon" car parade around downtown Springfield, urging the district to delay in-person opening to K-3 students.

“Students who are coming to us have been very highly impacted by a variety of situations, even in the best of circumstances... just as all of us have been."

Below: Heather St. Louis greets her 37+ SPS Online kindergarten students each morning from her dining room table.

Aly Nestler, Springfield 3rd grade teacher

Tricky Protocols

Aly Nestler, a 3rd grade teacher at Springfield’s Yolanda Elementary School, knows the struggle hits at all levels. Because the district had planned for a staggered start of K-3 (with third graders returning not until the first week of October), Nestler had been preparing her classroom for in-person instruction up until the day it was announced the district was moving to CDL. “Educators, and particularly early childhood educators, are going to the be first people to emphasize that inperson instruction is vital for our youngest learners, and our district leaders understand that. They really want to get kids back in school, not only for educational purposes but because they want to be providing meals for students, they want to be providing a safe space for students, and they know our families are really struggling with childcare, or need to work outside the home. These are all really challenging experiences for people with a lot of competing interests,” Nestler says.

But as teachers are being asked to come back into buildings, the conversation must also shift to include the health and safety of the staff who walk those hallways. Nestler says that over the summer, the district added additional safety measurers into the building to prevent the transmission of Coronavirus, including more hand sanitizing stations and air purifiers in every building. “They’ve given us these added measures of precaution, and yet we still don’t have enough staff to help monitor students and help them keep their masks on; we don’t have enough time between passing periods to actually use the hand sanitizing stations. We see all of the issues with the actual implementation of these protocols, and we worry that we might not have the resources, the training, or have had the time to truly understand how to do this appropriately. There’s lots of fairly basic logistical questions that are still unanswered,” Nestler says.

As educators know, each school had to submit a building blueprint to the Oregon Department of Education over the summer about their re-opening protocols. “Those plans look really good on paper.

But we’re going to be spending our days with really young kids and are responsible for their care; what do you do when you have a Kindergartener who needs help zipping their jacket or tying their shoes or getting a band-aid put on their knee? Even in providing fairly Credits: Karen Babcock, Aly Nestler, Heather St. Louis

basic care, we’ll be putting ourselves at higher risk,” Nestler says.

Three weeks now into the school year, and it’s really anybody’s guess how the rest of the year will unfold for educators in Springfield and across the state. Every teacher’s reality is slightly different from the next, but amidst the chaos, there are moments of sweetness and light. For St. Louis, who’s teaching from her dining room table, this comes with the opening chime she dings over the Zoom screen to get the attention of her nearly 40 Kindergarten students.

“The kids are delightful. When I’m with them, that part is familiar and wonderful. I love that part. It is different building that sense of community [online], but I'm trying to just translate what I would usually do at the beginning of year to this format,” St. Louis says. “I pull out my Pokeball filled with questions to ask during our morning meeting, I sing and do a lot of sign language. Even if they're on mute, I just make it very clear that I'm watching their lips move and I'm watching their faces. I have them do a lot of response with their hands. That’s just my little bag of tricks… I'm trying to just keep it like I would in the classroom.”

For Anne Goff, the daunting proposition of bringing tiny Kindergarteners into a highly controlled classroom space turned out to be much more joyous than she ever thought possible.

“I was truly trepidatious going back into the classroom — I thought it was going to be awful for children. I was worried they were going to feel like they were being punished because they had to stay in this little bubble of space and couldn’t really talk or play with their friends. [Before the year began] I said to my daughter, ‘I just may have to retire because this feels like I'm punishing children and I just I can't do it’,” she remembers.

But to her surprise, “instead it was quite joyful. They had a good time. At the end of my second day, one of my students told her mom she loved Kindergarten more than the Ferris wheel.”

Those six days serve as the capstone beginning to Goff’s sunset year of teaching. “I really wanted to end it in Kindergarten, which is where I started 33 years ago. This is certainly not what I expected, but being with kids is what makes all of the difficulties and the changes worth it.”

TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020

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On the Web » grow.oregoned.org

Feeling challenged? Time to Grow!

W

e know educators are facing many challenges this fall.

Some of these challenges existed before COVID-19 but many are new: learning management system changes, overwhelming technology tool choices, knowing how to best build community and engage students online, virtual communication with families, as well as an increase in stress and trauma for both students and educators.

To support educators facing these challenges, OEA is offering high-quality professional learning opportunitie to address both technology and trauma through its new site, grow.oregoned.org.

These professional development opportunities can benefit educators at all levels who are engaging in comprehensive distance learning, hybrid models, and in-person instruction across the state. All of these opportunities are free as a benefit of your membership.

Regardless of previous experience with technology or how much time you have in your schedule to devote to professional development, OEA’s Center for Great Public Schools is here for you.

OEA has opportunities that range in length from 90 minutes to 9 weeks (and longer). Some opportunities are entirely independent (self-paced modules) and some are delivered in a learning community facilitated by a member leader (virtual learning communities). Some opportunities are for those who are new to technology and others offer a deeper dive for educators who consider themselves more tech-savvy.

New virtual learning communities focused on traumainformed pedagogy will also be happening all year long, starting this fall. Becoming a Trauma Aware Educator covers historical and

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community trauma, the impacts of trauma on students and staff, and understanding the prevalence of trauma. In Becoming a Trauma Responsive Educator, members will learn about the impact of stress and trauma on the brain, the foundations of trauma-informed behavior prevention and intervention, and addressing student stress.

Looking for even more resources? Read our Going the Distance blog which features member stories about distance learning, view traumainformed pedagogy recorded webinars or recorded distance learning show and tell episodes, or consult the curated resources on our website for both K-12 and community college educators.

All OEA professional learning opportunities can be found at grow.oregoned.org. Take a moment to check — Kim Read, OEA Center for Great Public Schools

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