Story and photos by Pete Shaw The nearly 4,500 members of the Portland Association of Teachers (PAT) walked out on strike on November 1. Classroom teachers from the district’s 81 schools came together with students, parents, and other supporters in the community to demand the Portland Public Schools (PPS) administration show respect for them and…
Story by Pete Shaw The students at Ockley Green Middle School are getting an education. Fresh off Spring break, a crowd of over 200 students and parents gathered outside Ockley Green Middle School on the morning of Monday, April 2 in support of social studies teacher Chris Riser. He was placed on leave last month…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw A community group based in North Portland has filed a complaint with the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights declaring that Portland Public Schools (PPS) “approved a discriminatory plan for the major remodel of a high school in a lower-income, minority white neighborhood of Portland, Oregon.” The…
Story by Pete Shaw The Portland Public Schools Board of Education received a lesson from the students it is supposed to serve on Monday night: we are people, not commodities, and we demand that our education serve us. It was a lesson for which most of the Board did not care. The students were part…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw As the Portland Public Schools (PPS) Board of Education–with the notable exception of Board member Steve Buel–tries to ram a contract down the throats of the teachers, the students have a message for them: teachers’ working conditions are our learning conditions. The recent push for school reform, at least…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw Standing in solidarity with Seattle’s Garfield High School teachers and all instructors in the Seattle Public Schools who have refused to administer Washington’s Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) Test, a crowd of 30 Portland Public Schools (PPS) students and about 5 parents gathered in front of PPS headquarters on February…
by Adam Sanchez. Nicole Bowmer contributed to this article. Oregon teachers are valiantly resisting an unprecedented attack on their schools and unions. Over the last month, teachers in four Oregon school districts have voted to go on strike, while other locals face painful budget cuts that will have a devastating effect on our schools. As…
Vargus Pike When not enough money for education becomes too much for people to bear, they form organizations like UPSET (Underfunded Parents, Students, Educators Together). In three short weeks UPSET has grown from just an idea to a collaboration between concerned students, parents, teachers, and community members that organized over one thousand people for a…
This story is part of our feature about the many protest events on May 1, 2012. Visit the feature page to see more. by Vargus Pike Since the Great Recession began as a result of the avarice and criminal behavior exhibited by those in the banking and mortgage sectors, one of the vital segments of…
This story is part of our feature about the many protest events on May 1, 2012. Visit the feature page to see more. by Rochelle The day began new–new blood infused into the Occupy Movement in the form of student protests outside of Portland Public School headquarters to highlight the financial inequities compromising youth education.…
