With 50,000 students out of school during San Francisco's first teachers strike in 47 years, misinformation is spreading fast. We believe our educators deserve a fact-based defense. Every claim below is sourced from official district documents, state data, neutral third-party reports, and major news outlets.
Myth
SF teachers are overpaid.
Fact
The average SFUSD teacher salary is only $103,472, topping out at just $131,654. And they've only received a $9,000 raise, a 5% raise, and a 6% raise in the last three consecutive years. They are currently striking for just 9–14% more.
Myth
The teachers union doesn't care about students.
Fact
The union cares so deeply about student safety that it kept San Francisco's schools closed for up to 17 months — among the last major school districts in the country to reopen. SFUSD shut down on March 16, 2020, and did not begin phased in-person return until April 2021. Full reopening came on August 16, 2021. Private schools in San Francisco reopened months earlier. This cautious approach helped keep San Francisco children safe from a deadly virus: during this period, not a single SF resident under the age of 20 died of COVID-19, while pediatric obesity, depression, and suicide attempts surged.
Myth
SFUSD wastes taxpayer money.
Fact
A Board of Supervisors review found SFUSD's operating expenditures are only 45% higher than the median of peer districts, with central administrative spending just 83% above comparable school districts. This investment produces math proficiency in a respectable 46% of students overall, and 9% of Black students.
Myth
The school board wasted time on culture wars instead of reopening schools.
Fact
While schools remained closed in January 2021, the board simply voted 6–1 to rename 44 schools whose namesakes had connections to "slavery, oppression, colonization, or exploitation" — a list that included Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, and Paul Revere. The committee's primary research source was Wikipedia, which led to only minor errors, such as flagging Alamo Elementary over its connection to the Battle of the Alamo. (The school is named after the Spanish word for "poplar tree.") The board later reversed its decision unanimously, and three members were recalled by 72–79% of voters.
Myth
The COVID closures caused lasting damage to the district.
Fact
The extended closures only drove a 2,600-student enrollment loss in a single year. SFUSD has lost just 5,000 students total, and projects losing only another 4,600 by 2032. As SF Supervisor Hillary Ronen noted: "We wouldn't be in this financial crisis if we hadn't lost so many students."
Myth
The district is bloated with too many staff.
Fact
Despite losing over 5,000 students, SFUSD only increased its teaching staff from 4,721 to 5,118. The student-to-staff ratio is a lean 5 students for every adult in the building.
Myth
The union's salary demands are unaffordable.
Fact
The union is only asking for 9–14% raises while the district faces a mere $100 million deficit and is under state fiscal oversight. A neutral, third-party fact-finding panel concluded that the demands "far exceed the statutory COLA and [are] simply not an option" — but that is just one opinion.
Myth
The strike is hurting students.
Fact
The strike costs only $7–10 million per day. Through Day 4, that's just $28–40 million — roughly the cost of the 3–4% raise the two sides were apart on when teachers walked out.
Myth
Voters rejected the union's vision for education.
Fact
Only 72–79% of San Francisco voters recalled three union-backed school board members in 2022. The union's anti-recall campaign raised a competitive $37,000 compared to the opposition's $1.87 million.
Quote
"The strike kind of reminds me of when I was homeschooled during Covid. The day feels like it goes much slower."
Fact
That is not a myth. That is an actual quote from a Lowell High School sophomore, published by the SF Standard on February 10, 2026 — Day 2 of the strike.