How to survive covering a teachers strike

An education editor’s recommendations, among them the importance of being ever-vigilant against spin and getting home cell phone numbers ahead of time.  

 

By Rob Manning, Oregon Public Broadcasting

In case you hadn’t noticed, teacher strikes are back. 

This past fall, Portland teachers went out on a strike that canceled 11 school days and stretched the capacity, knowledge, and patience of my team in unprecedented ways.

The Newton, Mass. teachers were the latest — the fifth recent strike in the state. 

As an education editor, teachers strikes are something you may be called on to cover. 

As with anything, there are better and worse ways to go about it. 

 

The strike stretched the capacity, knowledge, and patience of my team in unprecedented ways.

 

Here are six things I wish I’d known beforehand and would recommend to my fellow education journalists: 

1. Be Skeptical 

There was a remarkable lack of candor and clarity during the Portland teachers strike from both district officials and union leadership.  

For example, the teachers’ union presented budget numbers that were later revealed to be greatly inflated. The school district’s messaging often lacked detail, avoided answering questions directly and seemed more focused on scoring points with the public than transparently sharing information. 

Currying public favor was a huge goal for both teachers and administrators, so it became routine for us to get slanted information – data, dollar figures, what policy language means, what was said during negotiations. 

Be skeptical of ALL of it from the start. Or be prepared to have to correct your coverage at some point down the line.

 

There was a remarkable lack of candor and clarity.  

 

2. This could last a while. 

The Portland strike came after two strikes that lasted a week or less in nearby Southwest Washington. I was optimistic that the Portland strike would also be brief. 

It was not brief. We had a pretty good plan for daily coverage for the first week or so, and a few enterprise ideas that panned out well. 

For instance, we had our Southwest Washington reporter report on lessons learned from that area’s strikes, and we had our general assignment features reporter spend a day with a picketing teacher.

But after that first round of enterprise stories had been published, our daily staff was getting worn out, and the strike was grinding on. 

I wish we had brainstormed more ideas and more consistently brought in other reporters throughout the long strike. 

 

I wish we had brainstormed more ideas and more consistently brought in other reporters.

 

3. Build yourself a strike team. 

Not just because the strike will last a while – but because it’s a complicated story that requires thinking quickly, broadly and deeply.

You can’t — and shouldn’t — try to do it alone. 

Line up freelancers. Warn GA reporters that this will be a big story that they’ll need to help with. Buy coffee for your politics reporters (I still owe them), because these stories are political. 

For example, one of our politics reporters let readers and listeners know that the Oregon Legislature wasn’t coming to the rescue with funding for the state’s largest district. 

As a radio station, we also leaned hard on our daily talk show – which helped a ton. 

 

You can’t — and shouldn’t — try to do it alone. 

 

4. Sleep when the baby sleeps. 

Often with education coverage, news happens at predictable times. You can plan ahead. You know what’s coming, when. 

That is not the case with strikes. Strike news happens late at night, early in the morning, or on weekends.

For example, when teachers and administrators reached the all-important tentative agreement, it happened over Thanksgiving weekend. Yes, ugh. 

To the extent possible, find out when the two sides are actually talking and working toward a deal. When they’re not – rest. 

And to the extent that you can pre-write context sections for the eventual “strike settled” story, do that. When the deal is announced, your audience will want to know right away – and it’ll help you (as it always does) to have some of this work done ahead of time. 

 

Find out when the two sides are actually talking and working toward a deal. 

 

5. Prepare to reach sources. 

If teachers are telling you there might be a strike, expect one. 

Redouble your efforts to get phone numbers for teachers (who won’t email back from their official district emails during the strike) and for parents (who you may not see at all once a strike turns their lives upside down). 

Remember that not every teacher, parent or community member will feel the same, so having numerous sources will make your reporting more representative and more accurate. 

In our reporting, it became clear that support among parents was wearing thin the longer the strike dragged on – though in a union-friendly town like Portland, those could still be difficult interviews to get.

Having those contacts ahead of time will make reporting easier once the picket lines form.   

 

Having those contacts ahead of time will make reporting easier once the picket lines form.   

 

6. Expect a bigger audience. 

Of course, we write every story with attention to details, getting facts right and including all the relevant context we can think of.

But your reporting during a strike will be under an intense microscope by both sides, their allies, and lots of readers who are just plain mad at the whole situation. 

For example, the story posted above with parents got pushback from union supporters. The story with the teachers’ union financial claims was met with skepticism on the district side. 

Our readership jumped during the strike – and so did the emails and comments we received. That’s a good thing. And a challenge.

And in a way, it shouldn’t change anything we do. 

 

Your reporting during a strike will be under an intense microscope.

 

If there’s a last point, as an editor and a collaborator by nature, remember to prioritize making time to communicate and coordinate with your colleagues. The few minutes I would spend chatting with our photo editor to make sure she knew where the rallies were and where bargaining was taking place was well worth it. Having a few minutes to chat with producers of our daily talk show, to advise on guests — and to find out what they’re doing so our reporters don’t have to — was invaluable. 

There’s too much going on to waste time, and if your newsroom is anything like mine, you’ve got colleagues willing to help. Work with them! 

Rob Manning is an award-winning former education reporter and current news editor at Oregon Public Broadcasting with oversight of reporters covering education and business. You can follow him at @RManning47. 

Previous pieces about covering strikes from The Grade

Lessons from Portland (2023)

A more inclusive approach to covering school shutdowns (Los Angeles)

Cover teachers unions like you cover school districts (Mike Antonucci)

What really happened in Chicago? (2022)

New York City 1968 was a community insurrection, not a teachers strike (2018)