Detroit schools closed due to sickouts

More than 80 Detroit schools will be closed Wednesday due to high teacher absences, according to the school system’s website.

And Detroit Public Schools expected the staff to take advantage of the spotlight, listing five schools as closed as early as Tuesday and warning that many more could be coming.

Since the beginning of January, teachers and teacher organizations have been posting photos on social media sites about the appalling conditions they say exist in many Detroit schools.

“We’re doing it for the children”, Marietta Elliott, a special education teacher at Robeson/Malcolm X Academy, told BuzzFeed News.

“I feel like if this is the only way that someone will at least listen to all the atrocities that are going on in [Detroit Public Schools], then I support the teachers 100%”, said Jeffrey Gisstennar, president of a parents group for one of the city’s high schools.

CNN reported the protest aligns with President Barack Obama’s visit Wednesday, when he met with Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan and celebrated the revival of the city’s automobile industry. “What makes me fighting mad is that your child, who I call ‘one of my kids, ‘ is learning in an environment that is in total chaos”.

Winter wind cuts through some of the classrooms either because the windows are broken or because broken boilers force teachers to open windows to prevent temperatures from rising to 90 degrees, according to the Detroit Free Press.

“It’s because of the lack of respect that has been displayed toward teachers in this district, the hazardous working conditions, oversize classes, lost preparation periods, decrease in pay, increase in health care cost, uncertainty of their future”, she said. In 2009, the first unelected emergency manager, Robert Bobb, was appointed to run the city’s schools, which were burdened by a $259 million budget deficit and declining enrollment.

The Detroit News reports that teachers on Wednesday also plan to hold a noon rally and vote on an ongoing program of calling in sick until their demands are met.

While the “sick” teachers have many grievances, the exact solution to the sickout crisis isn’t clear. Earley was previously the emergency manager in Flint, an hour north of Detroit.

Earley has said he was not responsible for the decision, only for implementing it after it was approved.

The Republican governor says he wants the current $1,100 per student being spent to service debt to be shifted to give classroom teachers the resources they need.

Disgruntled Detroit educators have stepped up efforts to protest Gov. Rick Snyder’s plans for the district, its ramshackle finances, their low pay, dilapidated buildings and overcrowded classrooms.