“Teachers and educators in this district are taking their own personal-leave days to join their colleagues,” Wilcox said in a press release. “As of late this afternoon, the current count of teacher and staff absences is approximately 2,000, the majority of which do not have subs. It is important to note that this does not include normal sick days. We expect the number to increase as the day of the rally gets closer, and we don’t have substitute-teacher capacity to cover all of the requests. I can’t guarantee we’ll be able to open all schools on May 16 with the staff needed to maintain student safety – so we’ve decided to make it an optional teacher workday.”