One-Day Teachers’ Strike Cripples Anaheim Schools : Cypress Hardest Hit in Walkout

A one-day strike by teachers in the 20,000-student Anaheim Union High School District crippled intermediate and high instruction from Anaheim to Cypress today as 77% of teachers and 46% of students stayed away from class, according to district figures.

District administrators dispatched about 600 substitute teachers to its 21 campuses, where 665 regularly assigned teachers failed to appear in the district’s first strike in its history.

On high school campuses in particular, student attendance was low, and it dwindled even further as the day progressed.

A district spokesman assured parents that students were being properly supervised.

Hardest hit was Cypress High School, where only six of the usual 56-teacher staff arrived for work, district officials reported. Only 431 of 1,019 students were on campus for first-period roll call. And by 11:15 a.m., about half of those students had left.

At Western High School in Anaheim, about 200 students walked off campus during second period, some of them carrying homemade signs supporting the teachers’ strike on the statewide “Day of the Teacher.”

“They’ll probably suspend us, but they can’t suspend everybody,” said Ginny Hard, a 16-year-old junior.

Mood of Pickets Cheerful

The mood on the picket lines was cheerful as teachers reveled in the strike turnout. About 82% of teachers belonging to the Anaheim Secondary Teachers Assn. had voted to strike for one day after salary negotiations with the district administration reached an impasse. An estimated 87% stayed away from their jobs today.

Teachers have worked without a contract since August and are demanding guaranteed pay raises. District officials say more than a decade of shrinking enrollment and rising costs have led to budget deficits, making them unable to guarantee raises.

“This is the first time we’ve ever had a strike, and you have an overwhelming participation,” said Leonard Lahtinen, president of the teachers union. “It should send a message to the district.”

“Any strike is a setback,” Assistant Supt. LeRoy Kellogg said. “There is no winner.”

At Orangeview Junior High School in Anaheim, designated as a staging area for dispatching substitute teachers, district officials had four school buses standing by to ferry replacements to their campuses if they were uneasy about crossing picket lines. But by the time classes began, none had been used.

Security Guards Hired

Security guards were also hired to stand by in parking lots in case there were confrontations. School administrators stood just inside school boundaries at some schools to watch for trouble, but none was reported during the morning.

Teachers carried picket signs and occasionally cheered and shouted at substitute teachers. They were greeted by students on the way to school, many of whom shouted encouragement to the strikers.

The district’s Board of Trustees had voted to dock absent teachers today’s wages unless they could document illness. They also threatened to consider absent students as truant. At Western High School, administrators were videotaping students as they walked off campus, a student reported.

Times staff writer Steve Emmons contributed to this article.