EAST ORANGE, NJ October 21-23- “We declare justice to keep all teachers, social workers, and counselors. We need to take a stand to avoid cutting the staff that truly care about us everyday. We do not deserve to experience this. We are the future of East Orange…We must unite all together. Just imagine all of us taking a stand,” these are the words three courageous 4th graders delivered to a room with hundreds of multiracial students and parents fighting back against the East Orange Board of Education’s firing of 93 Black and Latin education workers a mere few months into the school year. This is on top of education workers having their salary level frozen for the past three years. Members of Progressive Labor Party (PLP) spoke out at the recent school board and town council meetings, fighting within these meetings to show the connection between this local fight and looming war and fascism.
Linking the cutbacks to the war budget is an important lesson, but we as communists must win workers and students to see that the ultimate goal is to eliminate capitalism and replace it with a world run by the working class - communism. This reform struggle is also an opening for the working class to realize their power when fighting collectively, as well as teach us the roles that the politicians and union leaders play in trying to keep us passive.
Greater war and fascism means money for genocide - not for students
These cutbacks are just part of a growing attack on workers to accept less as the U.S. ruling class prepares for World War III. Using a $25 million deficit as an excuse for the layoffs, East Orange’s newly hired Superintendent, Dr. Christopher Irving, has used the threat of a “state takeover” of the district if education workers don’t play along. It is the state of N.J. consistently underfunding the East Orange school district that put them in this mess to begin with!
At the recent Board of Education meeting, one teacher boldly pointed out that there's money being given to Israel’s genocide, while not funding education. Since October 7 of last year the U.S. has sent at least $17.9 billion to Israel, not even taking into consideration additional U.S. military spending considered “essential” (PBS, 10/7). This teacher continued, “manipulating staff that is already overworked and children who already need more resources to sacrifice more, and do more with less because the budget money has disappeared, shows us you are the local foot soldiers of a national government who continues to fund genocide from Palestine to Haiti instead of funding our schools.” The room erupted in applause.
Grounded in the knowledge that money will always be there when it comes to protecting the interests of the capitalists, workers refused to buy into excuses and proposed “solutions.” Instead, workers are beginning to understand that for capitalists funding a genocidal war to protect oil profits is more important than educating working class children.
They want us pacified? We say fight back!
After the cutbacks were announced, the union leadership sent a memo to tell workers to keep working, trying to suppress the rage felt by workers and students. These union hacks want to stop an organized mass movement that wins workers and students to save workers and students. Their fear mongering was an attempt to keep workers disorganized and keep them from seeing that they can fight back against the bosses’ laws. That was how an illegal three-day strike by teachers in Massachusetts got a 60 percent wage jump for lower-paid instructional assistants (EdWeek, March 16, 2023).
Despite the union and local leaders' attempts, many workers organized a mass sick-out and protested at the board meetings. This response from a worker embodied the instinct of the masses toward these cowards,
I have come to the sobering fact that there is no help on the way…There is no help to calm my anxiety and fear about whether my job is suddenly going to change overnight. Unless we save ourselves, I will continue to work 3 jobs and suffer from stress-inducing insomnia for 10 months out of every year. You play with our emotions, guilting us at times to continue to come to work without a contract [for 3 years] , day in and day out for the sake of the children…but it can no longer be at the expense of our mental health, our children, and our families.
From the masses to the masses: Communist leadership blossoms
When a worker became aware of this attack, they decided to look to a friend for support. The comrade, and member of PLP, saw this as an opportunity to strengthen their bond and fight alongside the district worker.
During the initial school board meeting, racist police tried to invoke fear by escorting the comrade out of the meeting after their speech, and asked questions because they distributed CHALLENGE.
This attack did not stop members of the PLP. We saw this as a key moment to bring more comrades and members of our base to the next city council meeting .We distributed CHALLENGE, and worked collectively to create a leaflet connecting the attacks to sharpening war and fascism. Workers attending the board meeting eagerly took our leaflets. It was clear that many of them were being exposed to communist politics for the first time. We look forward to joining them as future actions are being planned.
Even though this struggle is in its early phases, we were able to win the confidence of our base by showing that there is safety in numbers and that we fight back like our lives depend on it.
