A Los Angeles Teachers Union private Facebook group is warning its members not to post spring break pictures after they voted to remain closed to in-person learning, according to a report by Newsweek.
“Members of the United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) union were told to avoid sharing images of vacations in a leaked private Facebook group to avoid controversy with parents,” the report noted.
The Facebook post stated, “Friendly reminder: If you are planning any trips for Spring Break, please keep that off of Social Media. It is hard to argue that it is unsafe for in-person instruction if parents and the public see vacation photos and international travel,” one of the group’s members posted to the others.
California Governor Gavin Newsom announced last week the state plans to provide billions of dollars in aid to make schools safe for returning to campus. The teachers’ union has still refused to return to in-person learning until their demands are met.
“The union is demanding that all teachers and school staff be vaccinated before they return to in-person instruction. It also does not want campuses to reopen until Los Angeles County moves out of the ‘purple’ tier,” Deadline reported. “Union officials argue that while the countywide transmission rate has dropped below the 25 per 100,000 residents threshold, many neighborhoods the LAUSD serves are lower-income, and have rates that are three times as high as more affluent communities.”
The Los Angeles United School District plans to have student in classrooms in April.
The teachers’ union group clearly seeks to avoid the negative publicity a teacher on the Chicago union’s executive board received after posting photos of her Puerto Rican beach vacation on Instagram as reported by the Daily Wire and other outlets.
“We have the whole pool to ourselves,” the teacher captioned one shot. “Then, we are going to old San Juan to get some yummy seafood mofongo. We have an entire Airbnb house to ourselves. I’m here with my friend who also had covid.”
When teachers are taking beach vacations at the same time they complain schools are unsafe, the hypocrisy is clear. California has held some of most strict lockdown policies in the nation throughout the pandemic. Parents have had enough.
Students in next door Arizona all the way to sunny Florida have been in classrooms for months without COVID-19 spikes. It’s not about a pandemic shutting down Los Angeles schools; it’s about its leftist teachers’ union.
At what point do schools give the teachers’ union an ultimatum and require them to return to schools or be replaced? If the NFL could recruit replacements back during its player strike of 1987, maybe California schools should consider the same.
The problem is not with school safety or parents who fear to send their children back to campus. It’s time for Americans to get back to educating our next generation before they fall further behind from the effects of the pandemic.
