Mimi’s Nightmare: Charter School fails, union workers step up

AFSCME Members Help “Bring Our Babies Home”

BY KATHY MALONE

OAPSE members canvass students displaced when a charter school shut down just before the school year started. (Credit: Photo by Kathy Malone)

COLUMBUS, Ohio – When Lois Carson, president of the AFSCME-affiliate Columbus School Employees Association (CSEA/OAPSE Local 4), heard the news that a charter school had abruptly closed and left 300 students without a school to call home, she knew her union sisters and brothers would want to pull out all the stops to bring those students back to Columbus City Schools.

“After I saw the news, I immediately texted our superintendent and told him that we had to come up with a plan to bring our babies home,” said Carson. “Those are our students, and they belong in our schools. That’s when we came up with the ‘Bring Our Babies Home’ plan to convince parents to give Columbus City Schools another try.”

A team of CSEA members set up a headquarters at the Maynard Avenue Baptist Church, the place of worship for Betty Simmons-Talley, a long-time CSEA and OAPSE leader, who is on the OAPSE Executive Board.

“I live right across the street from the church, and this neighborhood has a lot of students who have been displaced because of the closing of the charter school,” said Simmons-Talley. “From here, we could reach a lot of families and talk to them about the value of our public schools and give them information about how to return to our schools.”

During the first day of outreach, the group knocked on 82 doors. In addition, six families stopped by the church to get information about re-enrolling their children in Columbus City Schools.

CSEA is the union for 2,700 Columbus school employees in 11 local unions who work as bus drivers, intervention aides, instructional assistants and special needs instructional assistants, secretaries, custodians, food service workers, librarians, grounds and maintenance, truck drivers and mechanics.

“We are the ones who work directly with the kids every day, and we see first-hand how important a good education is to their futures,” said Carson. “The charter school left these kids and their families in a horrible situation, so we stepped in to bring them back where they belong – Columbus City Schools.”

Ethel Dyer, a retiree and former custodian and president of Local 101, said OAPSE will continue talking to parents about coming back to public schools.

“Our public schools are valuable partners in our communities,” said Dyer. “You won’t find a public school just closing the day before school is supposed to start and stranding 300 kids. We will be here for these families and all the families in Columbus City Schools.”