Teachers, AUSD headed for mediation

By Michael Chaldu · Wed Mar 04 2026

Amid pay dispute, some educators have bone to pick with board member's social media post

ATASCADERO — The pay dispute between Atascadero Unified School District and its teachers was front and center again at the district's March 3 Board of Trustees meeting, mainly during Oral Communication.

This time, the discussion included an email over the weekend from AUSD Superintendent Dr. Tom Bennett concerning the district negotiation, which announced that talks have reached an impasse and would be going to mediation.

"After several meetings, ADTA [Atascadero District Teachers Association] announced that the teams have reached an impasse," Bennett's March 1 email read. "As a result, the State has appointed a mediator, and both teams will participate in mediation beginning March 10."

As stated in previous meetings, AUSD teachers are displeased at not being offered a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) raise, although teachers in neighboring districts, such as Lucia Mar, are getting the 2% COLA offered by the state.

Bennett's email continued, "We recognize that our educators are facing real financial pressures and increasing professional demands. We are committed to pursuing meaningful compensation and enhanced benefits, including additional healthcare support.

"At the same time, we must carefully consider the broader financial picture to ensure that any agreement we reach is responsible and sustainable, not just this year, but in the years ahead."

While Bennett's email itself was generally well-received by some of the public speakers, and ADTA President Andrew Weatherly, a board member's social media post in response to the email drew objections from many who spoke.

In a Facebook post that contained a screenshot of Bennett's email, Trustee Rebekah Koznek criticized the negotiating tactics of the California Teacher Association, with which the ADTA is affiliated — though she was not directly named by commentators as the board member with a controversial social media post.

"As someone who has consistently sought good-faith collaboration with our local labor partners, I am deeply disappointed that they continue to follow the California Teachers Association’s playbook of forcing impasse and threatening strikes instead of prioritizing productive negotiations," Koznek's post said.

The post then went on to say the CTA "operates as a political machine, closely aligned with our governor, and actively pressures its members to support liberal Democrats whose policies often undermine working-class families and local communities. That kind of top-down political influence does not serve our students, our district, or the hardworking employees these unions claim to represent."

ADTA President Andrew Weatherly commented on the mediation, saying, "we strive to work on the community part, as well as collaboration and transparency, we're in a process that's very natural, and it's beneficial that we do that." However, after praising Bennett's email as "respectful," he called the resulting social media post "slanderous to the [CTA]. We truly do want to work from the bottom up and have that communication, and personal attacks are not needed."

In Open Communication with the Public, other district teachers touched upon the post.

Joe'l Mueller, a teacher at Santa Margarita Elementary School, spoke on behalf of that school's teachers as a "unified collective."

"We entered this profession to educate and support students, not to engage in political rhetoric," Mueller said. "For that reason, we were deeply troubled by the recent social media post made by one of our board members. Publicly politicizing what is fundamentally an economic and contractual issue was inappropriate and unnecessarily divisive."

Mueller continued, "The suggestion that requesting a fair portion of COLA somehow undermines working-class families or the broader community is misguided. We are the working-class families."

The social media post was not the only issue brought up: Public speakers touched on volunteer coaches not being able to cover their classroom responsibilities when traveling with teams, the difficulty of drawing young teachers to the district, and teachers having to work with classes of 30 or more students.

Bennett thanked the speakers for their thoughts and said, "I want to ensure we partner together on this. There's a lot happening, and I'm doing my best to meet it head on, and I'm looking forward to mediation on the 10th."

In other business, the board approved the awarding of a contract to Diani Building Corp. for work on the AHS Entry Security Improvement Projects and the cost of $1,111,670 for it.

The board also passed an item to engage an auditor for services for the next three fiscal years (2025-26, 2026-27, 2027-28) with Assistant Superintendent, Business Services Kendyl Darnell saying the district would continue to use the Eide Bailey firm. Also passed were three Human Resources items: The Non Re-Election of Probationary Employees, hire a candidate for Speech-Language Pathology Board, and a Student Teacher/Intern Agreement with Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego.

The Board of Trustees meets next on Tuesday, March 17, with open session starting at 7 p.m.