Activism

Citing COVID Safety Needs, Oakland High Teachers Limit Encounters with Students

According to Le’Lani Walker, a senior at OHS, teachers explained the work to rule action to students shortly before it began. Although she felt it was “kind of frustrating” when she needed a little extra help with chemistry, she “sees the bigger picture” and feels that the action will help students in the long run.

Published

4 years ago

January 24, 2022

Oakland Post

Many teachers at Oakland High School have decided to refuse to do any work not stipulated in their contract in a labor action aimed at securing better COVID safety measures from the Oakland Unified School District. Photo of Oakland High School by Zack Haber on September 13, 2021.

By Zack Haber

Due to concerns about COVID safety issues, many teachers at Oakland High School have been engaging in ‘work to rule,’ a labor action tactic where workers only do the tasks specified in their contract, since January 6.

“It means is we don’t do anything extra,” said Cole Margen who teaches history at the school.

Teachers at Oakland High have been keeping their doors closed to students before and after school, as well as during lunch and their lesson planning periods.

According to David Byrd, a music teacher and union site representative at Oakland High, over 40 teachers out of 89 in the school have come to meetings related to the action and have committed to ‘work to rule,’ but he suspects more teachers are involved. Throughout the school, teachers have hung flyers on their doors indicating their support that say “To encourage greater COVID safety on our site this teacher is working to rule!”

Typically, most teachers at Oakland High School (OHS) would welcome students into their classroom for extra academic help and/or to socialize during non-classroom hours, even though their contract doesn’t require them to do so. English Immersion teacher Miles Murray thinks this extra work’s absence immediately becomes noticeable.

“There are extra hours we’re expected to work, and must work, in order to keep the school functioning,” said Murray. “We need to remind the public of that.”

While teachers interviewed for this article mentioned a variety of improved COVID safety measures they’d like to see OUSD implementing at OHS, they all stressed their demand for a safer environment for students to eat lunch, including more tables for the large cafeteria and more outdoor dining facilities. They report that the lack of spaces to eat safely and comfortably has forced students to eat in unsafe places, like the hallways.

“When I do work to rule and hold the line by saying ‘you can’t lunch in my classroom,’” said English teacher Marika Iyer, “I hope to make it clear to the admin, district and the community that these are not safe conditions.”

Oakland students also want safer options for eating lunch.

“I’m not sure where to go and I don’t feel like there’s anywhere safe to eat,” said Trey Shanklin, an OHS senior. “If OUSD provided more outside eating options I would definitely be eating outside more than inside.”

In an e-mail to The Oakland Post, OUSD director of communications John Sasaki stated that the district had built “covered outdoor structures at numerous schools since the fall,” and that they plan to continue to do so, but supply chain issues have slowed the process at some schools.

“Whenever [the materials] come in, our staff quickly gets them installed,” he wrote. “That will happen soon at Oakland High School.”

But until the facilities are installed at their school, OHS teachers say they plan to continue to work to rule.

In the meantime, the Omicron surge has affected OHS and other district schools. Murray, who was quarantining when he did his interview for this article due to becoming sick with the virus, said that in the days before his isolation period started, about a third of his students were out for reasons related to COVID-19.

A “no-go” list sent from OHS administrators to staff shows that between January 3 and 12, over 325 of the school’s approximately 1,550 students were absent at some point, usually multiple days, due to testing positive for COVID or COVID related quarantining.

OUSD’s data shows that, across the district, about 1,550 combined students and staff tested positive for COVID during the first two weeks back from school after winter break out of a total population of about 39,000.

As COVID cases have surged since coming back from break, students and staff at various OUSD schools have engaged in a variety of actions that they’ve labeled sickouts, strikes, and/or boycotts, that have involved them not coming to school out of protest.

These actions have been neither sanctioned nor denounced by Oakland Education Association, the teachers’ union for OUSD. A teacher-led sickout action for better COVID safety measures announced on January 6 and executed on January 7 caused a dozen schools to effectively close for a day.

According to music teacher David Byrd, OHS teachers were inspired when they heard about the January 6 sickout but since their school has many newly hired teachers, they felt an action involving teachers calling in sick en masse could be too risky for those who weren’t tenured to want to engage in.

“We said we’re acting in solidarity, and we support these other sites,” said Byrd. “But how can we expect these new teachers to put so much on the line so quickly?”

OHS teachers were successful in getting both long-term and new teachers on board for the action. One non-tenured OHS teacher who asked not to be named due to fearing that speaking to media might make it less likely they get rehired next year, said they were participating because it showed the unpaid work teachers do and the unsafe conditions students and staff eat lunch in.

“I feel safe participating in the action because of the solidarity shared by my fellow staff,” they said. “Almost all doors now have the work-to-rule sign posted on them, so I am much less likely of being singled out.”

Byrd described work to rule as an easy action to start with and that he hoped it could unify the staff for more actions down the line. Murray feels work to rule has been effective and is putting the staff in a good position to consider more radical actions.

“Now everyone is activated on our campus and looking for the next action,” he said.

“I strongly support it,” Walker said. “The fact that they’re doing everything within their power to get the attention of the district to address COVID safety issues is comforting.”

OHS students like Shanklin and Walker have been organizing their own actions and have been in communication with teachers about them. When the students did a sickout action on January 13 to demand better COVID safety measures such as more outdoor spaces to eat and twice weekly PCR and rapid tests, they asked OHS staff to join them.

“If you are able to participate,” students wrote in their letter. “Please call in sick, stay home, and send a message updating families about our demands and current events.”

The day before the sickout, Oakland High’s administration sent a message to parents asking them to keep their children at home during the sickout day, and that students wouldn’t be “adversely affected for not attending school” that day. Byrd and history teacher Cole Margen, who were on campus that day said the vast majority of students weren’t present. Substitute teacher request logs show 52 teachers were absent from school that day.

On Tuesday, January 18, OHS students again engaged in a boycott for the same demands as their January 13 sickout. This time students across the district also did not attend school.

The petition for the January 18 boycott that has over 1200 student signatures from over 20 schools, states “If these demands are not met, we will be striking by not attending school. We will be striking until we get what we need to be safe.”

While The Oakland Post was unable to get official numbers for absent students across the district during the boycott, six different OHS teachers estimated that between a third and just over half of the students at their site were absent on January 18 and 19.

To support the student boycott, teachers at three OUSD schools — Bridges Academy, Acorn Woodland Elementary School and United for Success Academy — all engaged in a sickout action that shut down their campuses on January 18. Murray thinks students and staff are increasingly coming together to demand better COVID safety measures from OUSD.

“It feels like there’s momentum across the whole district,” he said.

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At the event, 16 entities signed the EIP pledge, vowing to take steps to increase public contracting opportunities in their spheres for small and historically underutilized businesses. The pledge signees included Hub International, the Port of San Francisco, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, California High-Speed Rail Authority, the Port of Oakland, Robert Graham of Webcor Builders, Holder Construction, the Weitz Company, Sky Blue Builders, Hornblower, Swinerton, Luster National, Talson Solutions, Center for Community Wealth Building, and the Construction Contractors Alliance.

Published

1 week ago

June 24, 2026

Oakland Post

Toks Omishakin, secretary of the California State Transportation Agency, was one of the speakers at the event. Photo by Shellee Fisher Photography and Design.

By Calvin Naito, Special to The Post

On June 4, a national nonprofit named the Equity in Infrastructure Project (EIP) – which aims to increase public construction contracting opportunities for small and historically underutilized businesses – held a day-long event in downtown San Francisco to rally supporters and build momentum to its cause.

It was attended by more than 100 individuals from public agencies, private firms, and other organizations committed to increasing contracting opportunities with governmental agencies, thereby creating more competition and lowering public costs.

The EIP event was held the Hyatt Regency San Francisco in conjunction with BuildIT, which aims to increase contracting opportunities for LGBT-owned businesses.

At the event, 16 entities signed the EIP pledge, vowing to take steps to increase public contracting opportunities in their spheres for small and historically underutilized businesses.

The pledge signees included Hub International, the Port of San Francisco, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, California High-Speed Rail Authority, the Port of Oakland, Robert Graham of Webcor Builders, Holder Construction, the Weitz Company, Sky Blue Builders, Hornblower, Swinerton, Luster National, Talson Solutions, Center for Community Wealth Building, and the Construction Contractors Alliance.

Following the workshop, BuildIT hosted a VIP evening reception honoring EIP, whose principals – Phil Washington, John Procari, and Rick Jacobs – accepted the award.

The event also set in motion the coalition’s efforts to implement recommendations from EIP’s “Procurement for Prosperity: A Playbook.”

The Playbook is a practical guide for public agency leaders and procurement and contracting practitioners to grow the capacity of small and first-time contractors, strengthen competition, and deliver better value for taxpayers.

Toks Omishakin, Secretary of the California State Transportation Agency (CalSTA), a long-time EIP supporter, also told attendees, “This is about commitment. This has been a life’s work. This is a tailwind moment.”

The event’s presenting sponsor was Hub International, one of the largest insurance brokerages in the nation, which was joined by partners Travelers Insurance and the State Compensation Insurance Fund.

After the pledge-signing ceremony, attendees participated in a workshop in which they examined the policies, practices, and programs needed to meet EIP goals, learned from practitioners, and identified next steps toward utilizing the Playbook.

Ingrid Meriwether, formerly of Merriwether & Williams Insurance Services (MWIS) and current president of Hub International’s Aligned Risk Management, MWIS, described the hard-fought lessons she and her MWIS team have learned over the last three decades administering contractor development programs (CDPs) for the City and County of San Francisco, Alameda County, City of Los Angeles, LA Metro, and other municipalities.

The CDPs help small and local construction firms win public infrastructure contracts with these government agencies. The program provides bonding assistance, contract financing, technical support, training, and other services to underrepresented businesses funded by public agencies who seek greater contracting participation with these firms.

Merriwether said programs like these “break down systemic barriers, create greater fairness, and save taxpayers money by enabling more competition. The contractor development programs have, cumulatively, over two decades, helped contractors access over $1 billion in bonding, supporting over $380 million in awarded contracts, and maintaining a loss ratio 250 times lower than the industry average – while saving participating municipalities more than $27 million in contracting costs as a result of enabling more competition.”

Rick Jacobs, EIP co-founder and co-chair urged attendees make plans to meet again in the near future “to continue building on this work, share progress on organizational commitments, and discuss how we can collectively advance the goals of the EIP pledge.”

For more information on the EIP and to access a copy of the Playbook, go online to https://equityininfrastructure.org/

Calvin Naito is communications manager for Equity in Infrastructure Project.

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Oakland Museum Presents Landmark Retrospective Celebrating Beloved Bay Area Artist Mildred Howard

“Poetics of Memory” coincides with a year of major recognition for Howard. In 2026, she received the California Arts Council’s 50th Anniversary Award, honoring artists whose work has shaped California’s cultural and civic life, as well as the Museum of the African Diaspora’s Artist Impact Award. In 2025, she was awarded a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship in recognition of her transformative contributions to American cultural life.

Published

1 week ago

June 24, 2026

Oakland Post

Mildred Howard. Photo by Christine Cueto for the Oakland Museum of California, 2025.

Special to The Post

The Oakland Museum of California (OMCA) opened “Mildred Howard: Poetics of Memory,” the first major museum survey of Bay Area artist Mildred Howard, on June 12.

The exhibition spans five decades of Howard’s influential work, bringing together immersive installations, found-object sculptures, archival materials, and new commissions that explore memory, identity, and power in American life.

Howard was born in San Francisco in 1945 and raised in the East Bay, where she went on to study Afro-Haitian dance, make and sell clothing, and experiment with collage and sculpture.

Her multimedia art practice emerged from these experiences, later becoming associated with West Coast conceptual art, San Francisco funk, and a vibrant community of artists like Oliver Jackson, Betye Saar, and Raymond Saunders. Since the 1970s, she has used found materials and family stories to explore memory—both individual and collective.

At OMCA, visitors enter “Poetics of Memory” through a series of intimate galleries featuring Howard’s early mixed-media pieces and sculptures, along with a large video projection of a number of her public artworks.

Together, they emphasize Howard’s interest in everyday objects as powerful carriers of individual and shared stories. Highlights include collages that remix images of the artist herself; found-object sculptures like The History of the United States with a few Parts Missing (2007) that address omissions in dominant narratives; and public works like “Locks and Keys for Harry Bridges” (2001) that transform urban space into a meditation on access and labor.

This culminates in a richly detailed “studio” environment, where works in progress, archival exhibition flyers, historic photographs of Howard and her community, postcards from fellow artists, and other materials offer insight into her creative process and daily life.

The exhibition then opens into a high-ceilinged, dramatically lit space that brings together Howard’s signature immersive installations. On one end, “Crossings” (1997/2026) – a field of hundreds of ceramic eggs leading to an ornate mirror – suggests cycles of birth, motherhood, and transition, while drawing on the emotional echoes of the Middle Passage. On the other end, “Blackbird in a Red Sky” (a.k.a. “Fall of the Blood House”) (2002) – a red glass shack bordered by a pond – also uses reflection and transparency to draw viewers into the work and prompt consideration of themes of identity and home.

Howard’s newest video installation, “Moving Stills” (2026), repurposes never-before-seen family footage she took as a teenager on a train trip to the American South. Projected onto cascading layers of translucent fabric that stretch across an entire gallery wall, the piece immerses viewers in a layered meditation on memory, migration, and time.

The “Mildred Howard: Poetics of Memory” exhibit will be on display through Oct. 11 at the Oakland Museum of California, 1000 Oak St., Oakland, CA 94612. Museum hours are Wednesday through Sunday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., with extended hours on Fridays to 9 p.m.

This story is sourced from the Oakland Museum of California press office.

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Stop the Hate Symposium Brings Oakland Together Through Dialogue, Partnership, and Community Healing

More than a meeting and panel discussion, the annual symposium serves as a powerful example of what can happen when neighbors, community leaders, and organizations choose conversation over division, and unity over silence.

Published

1 week ago

June 24, 2026

Oakland Post

Speakers and guests at the annual ‘Stop the Hate Symposium posed with Oakland Chinatown Improvement Council ambassadors. Photo by Marcus Calloway.

By Dr. Maritony Jones, Special to The Post

With the purpose of creating safer, stronger, and more inclusive communities, and in partnership with the Oakland Private Industry Council and other community organizations, the Oakland Chinatown Improvement Council (OCIC) hosted the ‘Stop the Hate Symposium’ on June 13 at the Oakland Asian Cultural Center.

The free event featured keynote speakers, breakout sessions, cultural programming, creating a space where people from many backgrounds sat together with a shared purpose.

The turnout itself reflected the urgency and importance of the topic. The room was packed with community members eager not only to listen, but also to participate. Throughout the event, speakers shared data, personal experiences, research, and practical solutions designed to address hate, violence, social inequity, and community safety.

The keynote panel featured respected leaders and advocates, including Ray Bobbitt, founder of the African American Sports & Entertainment Group (AASEG); Ryan Takemiya from RAMA; Caheri Gutierrez from the Unity Council; honorary guest speaker Oakland City Councilmember at-Large Rowena Brown and City Councilmember Charlene Wang; representatives for Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee and U.S. Rep. Lateefah Simon, with Gia Vang of NBC serving as moderator.

The symposium also offered multiple breakout sessions that addressed issues affecting communities across Oakland and Alameda County:

Session 1, 2, 3: Building Safer and More Inclusive Communities, led by Pastor Raymond Lankfort, CEO of Oakland Private Industry Council (OPIC), Jessica Kang, research manager for Stop AAPI Hate, Kara Guerra of The Unity Council, and Gabriela delaRiva of the Spanish Speaking Citizens Foundation
Session 4: Talk Story: Collective Healing and Relationship Repair, presented by Ryan Takemiya, executive director of RAMA
Session 5: Sexual Violence Prevention, presented by Tunisia Owens, interim deputy director of Realized Potential
Session 6: Violent Attacks on Teens, presented by MaryAnn Alvarado, program manager of Youth Alive

Every session contributed to an important truth: meaningful change begins within communities, through honest dialogue and a willingness to work together.

One of the strongest themes to emerge from the day was the need to create more conversations and stronger partnerships—not just during times of crisis, but consistently and intentionally. Relationships among organizations, neighborhoods, and community leaders often operate behind the scenes but are not always highlighted or celebrated.

Bobbitt spoke powerfully about this issue, noting that partnerships and relationships often go unrecognized despite being essential to community progress. He pointed to examples such as the partnership between OPIC and OCHIC, emphasizing that these collaborations deserve more visibility, investment, and expansion.

Perhaps his most memorable message resonated deeply throughout the room. Bobbitt explained that when a grandparent is attacked or harmed, the impact extends beyond race or ethnicity because today’s families and communities are increasingly multicultural and interconnected.

“We are not going to see our grandparents as just Latino, Asian, Caucasian, or African American,” he shared in essence. “We are going to see them simply as our grandparents.”

Those words reflected the heart of the symposium. Hate may target one group, but pain and loss are felt by everyone. Likewise, healing and progress are shared responsibilities.

For more information about the Stop The Hate Program visit the website: https://www.oaklandchinatownchamber.org/stop-the-hate (or) https://oaklandpic.or