ALL PHOTOS ON THIS PAGE/SARAH-JI RHEE, LOVE+STRUGGLE PHOTOS
CHICAGO, IL — The 11 day Chicago teachers and support staff strike is over. From the outset, the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) announced they struck over the lack of basic resources for their students.
For example: “Half of our building does not have heat,” said a south side teacher. “I wish someone from the city would come and see a kid having a seizure on the floor, and the students having to deal with it themselves, because there’s not a nurse,” said a North side teacher.
The CTU struck against a government of vultures that attacked the needs of the teachers and children. Chicago Public SchooBy Lew Rosenbaumls (CPS) and real estate developers had robbed resources from the schools and the school communities.
Case in point: The last two days of the strike, teachers rallied at “Lincoln Yards” and “The 78,” two luxury residential, technological, and commercial parks, that were given $2 billion in tax increment financing from funds earmarked to go to schools, libraries and other public institutions.
In a contentious House of Delegates meeting, the CTU approved the tentative agreement by a 60% to 40% majority, and sent the agreement to the members for ratification. “Applause was loud on both sides. Many people wanted to keep fighting, but it seemed slightly more wereThe 11 day Chicago teachers and support staff strike is over. From the outset, the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) announced they struck over the lack of basic resources for their ready to declare victory and accept the deal,” said delegate Anthony Lawrence on Facebook.
The wins in the contract were substantive but modest. For example, it will take the full five years of the contract to get one school nurse and social worker in every school. There is now a possible enforcement mechanism in place to guarantee CPS adheres to its own class size standards (but class size numbers remained the same). CPS agreed to hire staff for “supportive services” for 17,000 CPS children who are homeless. CPS also agreed to create a joint committee of Union and School Board representatives to determine how to spend $35 million each year on the 120 schools which they determine are most in need of supplementary resources.
“The fight is not over for CTU,” said Francie McGowan Conway. “The work of transforming public education is a long term struggle. We all risked a lot on this strike and many (myself included) were ready to risk more, but there’s no telling what would have happened. We were facing losing our health care and having a suit filed against our union in which our leaders could have been jailed and our union fined into bankruptcy.”
Just the nature of the strike—not just for the homeless students, but for teachers and support staff unable to meet the cost of housing—set this strike apart from others. The CTU went on the offensive, striking not just for wages, but for what the school community needs. This strike asked the question, what would a new America envision for its children? The thousands who rallied in the streets of Chicago over those 11 days are hungry to achieve that vision. That is a real victory today.
Lew Rosenbaum is a retired teacher who writes on education issues.
