Kent School district is seeing its first strike this Thursday, days before school begins.
A raise in pay isn't the main issue, cutting down the growing class sizes and spending more time with students was, according to teacher's union, Kent Education Association (KEA).
After negotiations and mediation, more than 86% of Kent teachers voted to strike at Wednesday nights meeting. 1,500 of 1,800 KEA members are reported to have been present during the meeting. Many teachers will stay home instead of preparing their classrooms.
Kent Education Association proposes using part of $21 million reserve money to fund reducing class sizes.
The Kent School district website stated that there was an enrollment of 26,342 pupils in the 2008-2009 school yearand that their proposal does not increase class size.
The district further stated that reducing a class by a single pupil would cost the district $2.7 million. Also, that the $21 million in question was the fund balance, not fund reserve, and kent school district policy requires a 5% reserve.
The fund balance also is appropriated for inventory (food storage) , outstanding purchase orders, projects in proccess, unemployment insurance, and workman's compensation.
These figures have been contested by the KEA.
More to come as information and negotiation continue to grow and take place.
Official word comes from http://www.kent.k12.wa.us/KSD/CR/Budget/budget_negotiations/budget_negotiations/budget_negotiations/html/
and
http://kenteducationassociation.wordpress.com/
is a member of the 
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