Sacramento Schools On Brink Of Potential Strike

SACRAMENTO (CBS13) — Teachers are threatening to strike, leaving some parents wondering if their children will be the ones missing school because of a work stoppage.

Therese Jasperson has three children in the Sacramento City Unified School District.

"Will there be instruction on campus," Therese Jasperson said. "Who will be teaching the students?"

The Jaspersons are waiting on word from the Sacramento City Teachers Association on whether they will strike, and what it will mean for them.

"The teachers are going to be on strike, and the substitutes are going to be on strike," Jasperson said. "And so the question is well then whats happening at school?"

The sprawling SCUSD has 77 campuses; 2,200 teachers; and 43,000 students.

The teachers union bargaining team met at their headquarters on Monday.

Teachers expect to announce Thursday whether they will strike and when.

"Yes it may be more than one day," union spokeswoman Nikki Milevsky said. "It really depends on how quickly the district figures out that they need to prioritize our classrooms."

The district has put an emergency replacement teacher application on its website, offering $500 a day if there is a strike.

"It may be that we have to increase some of the class sizes," SCUSD President Jay Hansen said. "It may be in an unlikely circumstance that a school would have to be closed for a day."

Schools closing is a worst-case strike scenario.

"You know, as a mother, if it's just going to be babysitting at the school, then I'd rather keep my children at home," Jasperson said.

The last strike at the Sacramento City Unified School District was in 1989.