Teacher Strike’s End Brings Joy and Relief to City Schoolyards

After nine days of chaos on campus, the news that the Los Angeles teachers strike was ending hit Rosalva Romero like a report card crammed with A+’s.

“We used to hate our teachers,” said the 18-year-old John Marshall High School senior Thursday. “But after two weeks of this, now I love them.”

Similar reactions of relief and joy could be heard from students, teachers, parents and administrators in schoolyards across the city.

At the Union Avenue Elementary School near downtown, teacher Dan Garrett rushed back from the union ratification vote to inform his fifth-grade students of the positive results. “I’m so happy,” declared Garrett, as his charges applauded. “I just want to be with them.”

At the Winnetka Elementary School in the west San Fernando Valley, a “Love Luncheon” was scheduled for next week to hail the return of striking faculty members. “We miss our teachers and we want them back,” Principal Jean Lau said.

At Commonwealth Avenue Elementary School in the Mid-City area, 7-year-old Joel Torres told his mother, “Oh, Mommy, you have to buy me some flowers or a present so I can give it to my teacher tomorrow.”

Sure, some striking teachers expressed dismay Thursday that the ratified pact did not give them all that they wanted. And some school administrators voiced fears about the way returning strikers would treat colleagues who had crossed the picket line. Then there were many youngsters who had mixed emotions about having to do homework again.

All in all, though, Thursday was a happy day because of the prospect that the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second largest, would no longer be in disarray.

‘Some Fences to Mend’

“It’s terrific, it will be nice to have the teachers back,” said Ivanhoe Elementary School Principal Martha Powell. “There will definitely be some fences to mend, but I would say they are minimal.”

“Thank God,” said teacher’s aide Veronique Hinestrosa, who walked past her mother each morning on the picket line outside Union Avenue Elementary. “It was hard because my mom is a teacher at this school and it was hard being called a scab at home also.”

“Parents are relieved that the process of educating our youth can now resume,” said Artis Slipsager, president of the PTA’s San Fernando Valley district. “The parents join the students in welcoming the teachers back into the classroom.”

With the strike over, a flurry of logistical issues must now be addressed in the district’s schools.

‘Not Like a Faucet’

Teachers who worked rather than walked will have to consider how to bring absent students up to speed without slowing the learning of those who have been in regular attendance. And teachers whose students have been taught by replacements must determine how to evaluate any work that was assigned during their absence.

“It’s not like a faucet,” said Warren Mason, a dean and half-time algebra teacher at Taft High School in Woodland Hills. “You can’t just turn it on and off.”

Other tough chores remain. Schools where summer sessions are planned have little time to register students and schedule classes and teachers. And details for year-end activities, such as graduation and award ceremonies, remain to be worked out.

Walkout Tumult

Such problems, however, seem trivial compared to the tumult that marked the walkout.

At John Marshall High on Thursday, students scratched their heads at the senselessness of the makeshift school program. Foreign language students, for example, were herded into a single classroom in what sounded like a latter-day version of the Tower of Babel.

“We had French, Latin, German and Spanish, in all levels, together,” Romero said. “There was no teaching going on.”

Thomas Starr King Junior High eighth-grader Sam Yi, for one, was ambivalent about the strike coming to an end.

“These days have been so much fun,” said Yi, who skipped school Wednesday to catch a midday showing of “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.” “But we didn’t get our grades or learn anything, either.”

Contributing to this article was Times staff writer Hector Tobar.

RELATED STORY: Part I, Page 1