Recall Petition Update: SEA Members Across the District Are Speaking

SEA members continue to sign the recall petition and call for Ibijoke Idowu to resign as SEA President. We will continue collecting signatures while taking the formal steps necessary to invoke the recall process under SEA Bylaw 3.5.1(b).

We also want to extend a tremendous thank you to SEA members across Seattle Public Schools who have stepped forward. The verified recall-election requests we have received represent dozens of schools, worksites, and districtwide departments across SPS. They come from elementary, middle, and high schools and include classroom and special education teachers, instructional assistants and paraprofessionals, occupational and physical therapists, school psychologists, speech-language pathologists, social workers, nurses, librarians, interventionists, substitutes, office staff, and other SEA-represented educators.

That breadth matters. This is not one school, one job classification, or one small group within SEA. Members with different professional roles and experiences from across our district are independently putting their names behind the same explicit request: that SEA conduct a recall election concerning its president. Every person completing the verification form expressly affirms that they are a bona fide active SEA member and explicitly requests a recall election pursuant to Bylaw 3.5.1(b).

On August 2, we formally requested that SEA provide the current number of bona fide active members and the corresponding 10% signature threshold required for recall. After several follow-ups, Transitional Executive Director Greg Alarid confirmed on August 7 that our request had been provided to the SEA Board of Directors. As of August 10, we are still awaiting the Board's response.

Because members need this information to exercise their recall rights, on August 6 we also submitted a formal Washington Public Records Act request to Seattle Public Schools seeking records sufficient to establish the number of SPS employees for whom the district deducted and/or remitted SEA membership dues during May, June, and July 2026, including the most recent payroll period.

We are not requesting SEA's membership list. We are requesting the official membership count and a reasonable process through which petition signatures can be verified against SEA's records while protecting members' personal information.

We will continue collecting signatures. We will continue requesting Ibijoke Idowu's resignation. And if she chooses not to resign, SEA members deserve the opportunity provided by our bylaws to decide.

Thank you to every SEA member who has signed, verified, shared the petition, spoken with colleagues, or simply refused to remain silent. This effort belongs to members across our union.