AUSTIN, Texas – The beginning of the school year, August 18, is rapidly approaching, but the teacher union for Austin Independent School District wants to put the brakes on it. 

What You Need To Know

  • AISD school year set to start August 18

  • Union for teachers wants date pushed to September 7

  • Also calling for criteria to be met before in-person school resumes

Online learning is slated to begin August 18 but Education Austin, fearing the spread of the novel coronavirus, wants that date pushed to September 8 for all AISD schools. It’s just one of the demands the union has made.

In addition, Education Austin doesn’t want schools top open and in-person learning to begin until there is a decline in new cases of the virus for a minimum of 14 days, a positive test rate of less than 5 percent, and a transmission rate of less than 1 percent.

The union is further calling for a minimum of nine weeks of online education, weekly COVID-19 updates from the district, the establishment of a COVID-19 task force, a written safety plan for the reopening of schools and a guarantee of 100 percent pay, no layoffs and no furloughs for all AISD employees.

Education Austin joins numerous unions located across the country in calling for school to be delayed. In some instances, teachers who are being made to return to the classroom have created wills or have updated them. Whether district leaders will acquiesce to any of the union's demands remains to be seen. 

You can read the complete list of Education Austin’s demands here.