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Roosevelt educators Leah LaVelle, left, and Katie O’Malley.

On a late Friday afternoon in early March Luis Salas, a first-year math teacher at Roosevelt IB Middle School in San Diego, was called into the principal’s office and told that he’d received a layoff notice. Salas, a member of San Diego Education Association (SDEA), went home afterward to let his wife know and ponder his future.

By the time he came back to campus on Monday, the news was out. Roosevelt eighth grade English teacher and SDEA member Leah LaVelle asked him and Spencer Fowler,
the other Roosevelt educator who had been pink-slipped, if it was okay if she and a few of her students took actions to try to save their jobs.

“Students were mad,” recalled Salas. “Their attitude was ‘you belong to our community and we’re going to fight for you.’”

“Spencer and Luis are beloved by students,” said LaVelle, who teaches a year-round community project connected to Roosevelt being an International Baccalaureate school; project students identify local, national or world issues and investigate solutions. “Three of my students in the project are leaders on campus, so we met to brainstorm what we could do.”

Spencer Fowler speaks to the media at the March 26 rally.

LaVelle coordinated with Roosevelt site rep Katie O’Malley. She contacted students’ parents, who were all supportive. “We decided we’d do a change.org petition. We got permission to take photos of other students expressing how they felt about Spencer and Luis being laid off and posted to social media. I talked to a few teachers on March 11 to organize a one-mile march from school to the next district board meeting on March 26. We made flyers for the march and papered the neighborhoods.”

“Kids on a bus got off to join us, parents pulled up in their cars, elementary school kids joined us. By the time we reached the rally, we made up half of the crowd.”

— Leah LaVelle, San Diego Education Association

The march coincided with an SDEA rally outside the board meeting to demand that educator layoffs be rescinded district-wide.* On March 26, Roosevelt students, educators, parents and community members held signs, led chants and marched down a busy street.

Spencer Fowler, second from right, marches to district headquarters with Roosevelt Middle School educators, students, parents and community members.

“Kids on a bus got off to join us, parents pulled up in their cars, elementary school kids joined us,” LaVelle said. “By the time we reached the rally, we made up half of the crowd.” Fowler, a seventh grade English teacher and SDEA member, spoke to news media at the rally about the impact of receiving a layoff notice. “I was devastated. This is my community. I work at my community school, I live in [nearby] North Park. To get that [pink slip] was devastating.”

In addition, one of LaVelle’s students was interviewed by several news outlets.

Earlier that week, Roosevelt educators and the principal held a community and parent mixer and invited board member Richard Barrera, with whom students had built a relationship.

“Katie O’Malley talked to Barrera and brought him over to Spencer,” said LaVelle. “We asked him why our teachers are being laid off. Our students care about them, these young men are role models.”

To the Roosevelt community’s relief, pink slips for both Fowler and Salas were later rescinded. LaVelle likes to think it was because of their collective actions. “I want that to be a win for the students,” she said.

Luis Salas was one of multiple educators featured in SDEA’s campaign to keep educators’ jobs.

Salas is grateful to fellow educators, students, the community — and his union. “Our union fights for our rights.”

*A total of 226 SDEA members were issued pink slips. The March 26 rally and other actions by SDEA and allies pushed the district to rescind almost all layoffs by mid-May. SDEA leadership continues to fight to keep all educators’ jobs.

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