It might not occur for class conscious readers in the United States to turn their eyes to the South on May Day. After all, these states tend to have the lowest unionization rates, and North Carolina and South Carolina outlaw public sector collective bargaining entirely, while many other southern states have extremely limited collective bargaining rights.

But today, teachers from all across North Carolina are calling out to drive to the state capital for a massive “Kids Over Corporations” day of action. The number of callouts has overwhelmed the substitute teacher pool, forcing at least thirteen counties to cancel class for the day due to lack of coverage. In Wake County (home to Raleigh, where the rally is being held), most teachers already had a professional development day and so demand for substitute teachers was lower, but enough teachers in alternative-schedule schools called out (and enough substitute teachers refused to pick up work) that the school board was forced to cancel class anyway.

The day of action is organized by the North Carolina Association of Educators (NCAE), which organizes teachers despite the prohibition on collective bargaining. The last mass teachers’ rallies in North Carolina were in 2018 and 2019, during the red state teachers’ strike wave. Teachers are especially fired up this year because the state budget is nearly a year overdue, resulting in no raises and no funding increases for their schools.

Teachers will first gather for a rally on the state capital mall, march through downtown, and then split up for regional meetings in the afternoon, using the gathering as an important cross-school organizing opportunity before reconvening for a closing rally later in the day.

Demands include significant increases to school funding and teacher salaries, ending private school vouchers and planned corporate tax cuts in the state, repealing the ban on collective bargaining, and passing fair redistricting laws to protect voting rights. (North Carolina is a highly gerrymandered purple state, in recent years resulting in a Republican supermajority in the state legislature despite electing Democratic governors for the past three terms.)

While readers may be more familiar with the Chicago Teachers Union’s negotiated May Day compromise where teachers will teach “civic action” lessons in the morning and then take an approved field trip to the May Day rally (with future May Days being designated professional development days in order to avoid disruption), North Carolina teachers in over a dozen counties are successfully shutting it down entirely, an important lesson that power comes from the workers, with or without a collective bargaining agreement, and with or without the consent and approval of the bosses and their politicians.

The post North Carolina Teachers Plan Statewide Sickout, Schools Closed in At Least Thirteen Counties appeared first on Left Voice.

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