(OAKLAND, Calif.) — Teachers in Oakland, California, will be going on a one-day strike Friday to protest school closures the district has planned for this year and next year. A teachers’ union said the Oakland Unified School District is going back on a 2019 agreement with the closures.

The Oakland Education Association, a union made up of nearly 3,000 educators including teachers, counselors and social workers, said the school district and the union made an agreement to end a strike in 2019 which requires the district to engage in at least one year of community engagement and engagement with stakeholders before any school is considered for closure.

“The district ignored that agreement. And early this year, the majority school board hastily passed a resolution to close three schools for this year, the 2022 school year. And they have voted to close seven schools for the 2022 – 2023 school year,” Keith Brown, the president of the Oakland Education Association, told ABC News.

The district says this agreement did not happen, according to a letter that Superintendent Kyla Johnson-Trammell sent to the community.

“As for the statement that the District previously bargained the issue of school consolidations as part of the negotiations to end the February 2019 strike, it is demonstrably untrue: The list of negotiated items, as delineated in the fact finding report, leading up to the 2019 strike does not include school consolidations,” the letter said.

According to Brown, the district currently has 85 schools. The closures will impact thousands of students, he said.

“Closing schools hurts families and it hurts neighborhoods,” Brown said.

The district called the strike “illegal” in the letter it sent out, saying OEA can not strike on the basis of an unfair labor charge it has brought against the school district over school closures because there has not been a final ruling on the charge.

“The District is pursuing all legal means to prevent this action from happening. We are hoping that OEA will change course, but we are also putting plans in place in case the strike occurs,” Johnson-Trammell said in the letter.

She added, “We respect the rights to collectively bargain, protest, and disagree with District decisions. But it must be done within the bounds of the law. We have and will continue to strongly urge OEA to reconsider its illegal activity.”

The district asked parents not to send their kids to school due to the anticipated absences.

Brown said closing schools puts a burden on families to find means for transportation to find schools outside of their neighborhoods.

“There’s a recent Stanford study that shows that closing schools impacts black students and accelerates gentrification in communities of color,” Brown said, citing a study released by the Stanford Graduate School of Education on March 28.

The district argues that school closures will save money, Brown said. “But studies have shown that school closures [do] not save a significant amount of money for school districts,” he said. “The district claims that there’s a budget shortfall and there’s no choice but to close schools. But there’s always a choice and we must make a choice for for our students.”

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(WASHINGTON) — Trevor Reed’s time inside a Russian prison may be over, but his parents said they are still concerned about his well-being and his long road to recovery.

Hours after Reed was released from a Russian prison as part of an international prisoner exchange, the former Marine’s parents spoke with ABC News’ Anchor David Muir and said they are relieved that his nearly three-year captivity has come to an end.

However, Joey and Paula Reed said they are very concerned about their son’s physical and mental recovery.

“Trevor left here, young, virile, in good shape, good condition. And he’s not, he’s not coming home that way. So that’s our concern about his health.” Joey Reed told Muir during an interview on “World News Tonight” Wednesday.

The parents lobbied for years for the U.S. to negotiate for their son’s release, going as far as to personally plead with President Joe Biden to act. On Wednesday, their requests were fulfilled.

Reed was exchanged for Russian pilot Konstantin Yaroshenko, a convicted drug trafficker, Russian officials said.

“Today, we welcome home Trevor Reed and celebrate his return to the family that missed him dearly,” Biden said in a statement. “Trevor, a former U.S. Marine, is free from Russian detention. I heard in the voices of Trevor’s parents how much they’ve worried about his health and missed his presence. And I was delighted to be able to share with them the good news about Trevor’s freedom.”

Reed’s ordeal started in 2019 when he was visiting his girlfriend in Moscow. The 30-year-old was arrested after Russian authorities alleged Reed grabbed the wheel of a police car and assaulted a police officer while drunk.

Reed denied the allegations and maintained his innocence. The U.S. government also denied the allegations.

One year later, Reed was sentenced to nine years in a Russian penal colony. After several appeals, Reed was moved from a prison in Moscow to a remote prison colony.

In November 2021, Reed went on a hunger strike, according to his girlfriend. He was reportedly kept in solitary confinement for three months before the hunger strike, according to his family.

On March 30, the Reeds protested outside the White House asking for an audience with President Biden.

Biden did meet with the family after their demonstration and the couple told ABC News they felt the president was mindful of their requests.

On Wednesday video and photos of Reed being escorted out of prison and into a plane were released.

The Reeds said they cried when viewing that footage of their son, who they said looked weak and had trouble walking.

“He looked like he could hardly walk, he looked like he’d been walking shackled,” Joey Reed said.

The family said their priority is to ensure their son regains his health.

“He just looked terrible to us,” Paula Reed said.

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(BELLE GLADE, Fla.) — A Florida teen is celebrating and sharing her advice for other students after getting accepted to not just one or even 10 colleges, but 72 of them.

Ja’Leaha Thornton of Belle Glade, Florida, told “Good Morning America” that she began applying to 90 colleges and universities in early September 2021 and has since received acceptance letters from 72 schools and counting.

“I know the process of applying could be kind of overwhelming to many, and instead of stressing myself out, I decided to make it a competition … and see how many I can actually get into,” the 18-year-old told “GMA.” “I wanted to broaden my horizons and explore some different schools outside of my state.”

The teen used the Common Black College Application and the Common App to submit applications to multiple colleges simultaneously.

“At most, I spent $20 because I did the Black Common App and also the Common App, and I was able to use my fee waivers,” she said.

Thornton said she was eyeing several colleges and in the beginning, Howard University in Washington, D.C., was her dream school. But in the end, she chose to attend Xavier University of Louisiana, another historically Black university in New Orleans.

“I was nervous about opening the letter because like, this is one of the top schools, and I already made a mistake with sending the wrong college essay. And when I opened the letter and actually got accepted, I was like, ‘Wow, like this is options for me now. I’m not only considering Howard or UF, I have this school and I have options.’ So it was very exciting,” Thornton recalled.

For other students who are just beginning to embark on their application process, Thornton said they shouldn’t hold themselves back in any way.

“Shoot beyond the sky, because it’s a world out there, and it has so much for us to explore, so don’t limit ourselves,” she said.

“Go beyond what’s in front of you and don’t take advantage of time. Use your resources and your opportunity.”

The high school senior at Glades Central Community High School will be her class’s valedictorian when she graduates on May 24 and plans on majoring in pre-medical psychology and minoring in chemistry. She also hopes to study abroad in Asia and go to medical school after college.

Thornton said she’s interested in pursuing a career in forensic psychiatry. “At first, I was looking into becoming a child psychiatrist … but the more I looked into it, I became more interested in working with the people who have committed crimes and trying to get them back on the right track, studying their stories and seeing how we can apply that to life,” she said.

As her high school career winds down, Thornton said she’s grateful for all the support she’s received both in the last four years and throughout her life so far.

“I just wanted to make sure I give special shoutouts to my family, especially my mom, my great grandmother, my grandmother and my uncle. They have been the solid foundation for me. I believe in the saying ‘It takes a village to build a child,’ and that was my village.”

“Also my school family, my guidance counselor, my teachers and my friends. Pretty much everybody that helped me through the journey,” she added. “I’m just excited for the next steps of my life.”

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