Some of Ashley’s Work

https://oaklandside.org/author/ashley-mcbride/

Twitter @ashleynmcb

Welcome back to the Teach 4 Justice Podcast.

This is episode 11. We recorded this episode in November 2022. I am a public school teacher on Fall Break and am grateful and excited to present our guest Ashley McBride.

In spending this year tracking issues in Education I regularly came across a very small list of local Education Reporters using social media and their local new sites to shine a light on the school district in their city.

Regular listeners will remember we spoke to Cole from Twin Cities Citizens report who elaborated on Teacher Strikes and District issues in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area.

Ashley covers Oakland Unified School District in Oakland California and

this is a District that had one heck of a year

but as you listen to our episode you’ll learn from Ashley that this year was years in the making. OUSD has recently been through multiple superintendents, budget crises, and a 2019 teacher strike.

This year they went through announced school closures, two teachers protesting with a hunger strike in response, campus gun violence, and an intense school board election that recently wrapped up.

The entire time I found Ashley’s coverage to be thorough, well researched, honest, and presented through multiple perspectives without bias. A lingering question for me is how widely consumed has it been? Do people in other parts of the country know what is going on in Oakland? Did the teacher hunger strike for example make national news? If not, Why not?