Starting Wednesday, September 14, there will be no classes for high school students in the Philadelphia Archdiocese until the teachers strike is over.
There is one exception -- Archbishop Wood -- is in session only on Wednesday due to make up for last week's severe weather day.
"My daughter is a freshman here so she's just starting, so she's not getting a very good experience for her first year in high school," said Velma Few, a Hallahan high parent.
More than 16,000 students are affected. Administrators handled orientation and some standardized testing last week. But the Archdiocese decided on Tuesday that classes cannot continue without the teachers. About 700 educators from 17 different schools are on strike. The union says teachers want more respect and guaranteed job protection.
"When you're not dealing with something that's not just salary and benefits, you're dealing with philosophical difference, it's not really something that, you know, is easily resolved, " said Mike Sabatino, a teacher at Roman Catholic high.
The Association of Catholic Teachers is in week two of their strike. Salary increases of 14.5 percent over three years and improved working conditions are high on the teachers' list of demands.
"None of us really wants to be out here," Sabatino said. "We'd rather be in school. We'd rather be teaching the kids. It's kind of unfair that they've had to go through all this of bringing the kids just to kind of, for the show of it."
And so would students. To show their opposition to the strike, Cardinal O'Hara High School students in Delaware County will rally on Thursday. They planned the anti-strike rally on Facebook.
The union says there are still 100 outstanding issues to negotiate, but that teachers would be willing to go back to class if the Archdiocese agrees to mediation. At this point, the answer is no.
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Negotiating teams from both sides met last Thursday and Friday and again on Monday. Right now, one parent sums up the one thing everyone seems to agree on:
"They need to hurry up and come to some sort of agreement."
Students will have to make up any days they miss during the strike.
Frustrated parents set up a Facebook page called Catholic Parents Respond on Wednesday to share information and points of view.
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