On April 19, the majority of Arizona teachers involved in the grassroots Red for Ed movement voted to support a statewide teacher walkout. This week on Monday through Wednesday teachers held walk-ins before school while districts prepared and many announced plans to cancel school. As teachers prepare to start their walkout Thursday, here are some of the faces of Red for Ed at downtown Phoenix schools
Anthony Pietrangeli
Principal
Kenilworth Elementary School
Pietrangeli joined his fellow supporters at the walk-in Wednesday by emceeing the event and welcoming students and parents as they approached the campus for the school day ahead.
“The Red For Ed walk-in is an opportunity to celebrate the hard work that the teachers and everybody in the school, whatever you want to define as an educator, and what they’re doing to help kids think and learn every day,” Pietrangeli said.
Pietrangeli said it’s a daily emotional battle for educators because they build relationships with their students and when they can’t provide the necessary tools needed for them to succeed, it becomes a heartbreak.
“The struggles are every day, something new,” Pietrangeli said. “If we talk about the teachers, their funding situation causes them to maybe leave the industry, the career, the calling that put them into the classrooms. They just can’t afford to continue to do that and live.”
Pietrangeli said he hopes Arizona finds a way to provide some help.
“That’s what we’re asking for,” he said. “We need help to help the students be better than we were or we are.”
RELATED: Kenilworth School participates in statewide Red for Ed walk-ins
Pamela Simon
Bioscience High School
11th-grade Humanities
Simon has been teaching at Bioscience High School since 2016.
Her involvement in Red for Ed stems from her passion for education in Arizona. She said investing in students and their education is investing in the future.
“We need the community to understand that this isn’t about teacher wages,” Simon said. “That’s why when I make signs, I focus on how this isn’t about teachers. It’s about classrooms and students and funding and investment.”
Previously, she said she taught at schools where she said she was one of the few teachers who had experience in classroom management and was successful in keeping students engaged in lessons.
Simon hopes that Red for Ed will provide sufficient funding so students are able to have access to all the technology and resources they need to ensure a quality education. She also hopes all students will be provided with qualified teachers who want to invest in the quality of their students’ education.
“Tiny increases in pay isn’t going to solve the problem,” Simon said. “If I made $5,000 more, that doesn’t change the fact that freshmen show up to our classrooms who can’t read.”
Molly Martin
First Grade Teacher and Arizona Educator’s United site liasion
Kenilworth Elementary School
Martin, like many other teachers or administrators in the Red for Ed movement, hopes for school funding increases.
Martin said by participating in the walk-in they’re spreading the word and educating the community on the importance of education funding.
“By walking in, we’re walking into work at our scheduled time, but we’re showing we’re united in solidarity,” Martin said.
“Our classrooms are bursting at the seams,” Martin said. “We’re struggling with lack of staff, we’re struggling with lack of resources and what’s happening is it’s hurting the kids and Arizona can do better. We can do better.”
Nadia Smith
Bioscience High School
11th-grade Anatomy, Physiology and Epidemiology
Smith has been a teacher for 27 years and says one of the biggest struggles teachers face is their income. She said teachers often have to pay out-of-pocket to fund their classrooms with the resources students need, making already tight salaries stretch thin.
She also said having smaller class sizes would allow teachers to better educate their students.
“A lot of the focus is being drawn away from public schools, but there are so many kids who are at public schools who are losing out because they aren’t getting the (proper) funding,” Smith said. “They’re getting these larger class sizes and they aren’t getting the attention they need from the teachers, because the teachers are babysitting the large class size.”
Bioscience High School has approximately 350 students total, so teachers are able to provide them with engagement and opportunities in the community, Smith said. She believes that having smaller class sizes allows them to provide students with these experiences.
“This is a whole complex situation we’re in,” Smith said. “It’s not just about teacher pay. We’re out here just to support public education.”
Contact the reporters at smedwar7@asu.edu and Abigail.Spong@asu.edu.
Sara Edwards was the executive editor of Downtown Devil. She is a graduate student at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication. Sara has additional bylines in Phoenix New Times, West Valley View, L.A. Downtown News and Boardwalk Times.
Sara is also the co-secretary for the Multicultural Student Journalists Coalition.
