Chicago, IL – Around 80 educators, firefighters and community members gathered on Monday, March 24, to demand decent contracts for the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) Local 1 and the Chicago Fire Fighters Union Local 2. The members of both unions have been working under expired contracts; the teachers for eight months and the firefighters for over three and a half years.

The “Rally for Our Contracts” began with speeches in front of the Chicago Fire Department’s Engine 103 Station in the city’s Near West Side. Patrick Cleary, president of Fire Fighters Local 2, emphasized the need for facilities updates in both Chicago Public Schools and the Chicago Fire Department. “[Since] 1987 that thing hasn’t changed,” Cleary said, pointing to the station behind him. “They’re finally putting in female accommodations in 2025.”

CTU President Stacy Davis Gates followed this with a call for contracts that place the city’s essential workers and their working conditions “not last on the priority list but first on the priority list.” After the rally at the station, participants lined up behind a fire engine and marched toward the nearby Whitney M. Young Magnet High School, operated by Chicago Public Schools. They emphasized the critical services that both union’s workers provide the city, with signs reading, “We put out fires every day!” and “Take care of the people who take care of Chicago!”

These messages echoed an earlier joint statement of Friday, March 21, in which the unions emphasized the indispensability of their work for people of Chicago, calling for the city to respond with the “security of a contract” as well as the “resources and staffing they need to adequately serve the public.”

Both unions attribute delays in negotiations to the proper city officials not attending bargaining sessions. “They don’t send the decision-makers to negotiations,” Cleary said during a joint press conference by the two unions on Friday, March 21. “If you’re not the decision-maker, you shouldn’t be in the room then.”

With negotiations stalled, Cleary says the department is short-staffed and working with outdated equipment that poses safety concerns. Furthermore, the contract expiration means firefighters have not won a pay raise in over four years.

Meanwhile, the CTU has criticized the chief executive officer of Chicago Public Schools (CPS), Pedro Martinez, for “chronic absenteeism.” Martinez has not attended a single bargaining session since they began eleven months ago, in April 2024. Martinez further stalled negotiations by filing a restraining order to prevent CTU from negotiating directly with the board of education in December 2024. While CTU has made progress at the bargaining table with Martinez’s team at CPS, when it comes to closing the deal, Stacy Davis Gates said, “We have to find someone.”

With CTU having secured hundreds of items, the final sticking points are changes to make the teacher evaluation system more equitable, pay raises for veteran teachers, and 20 minutes of increased continuous prep time for elementary teachers, after Rahm Emanuel’s administration reduced this time by 30 minutes in 2012.

#ChicagoIL #IL #Labor #CTU

Chicago, IL – A flood of red shirts washed into the downtown headquarters of Chicago Public Schools (CPS) on Thursday afternoon, March 20, during the March Board of Education meeting. Members of the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) gathered to demand the settlement of their contract after nearly a year of negotiations.

CTU has already published three pages of contract demands on which they have won tentative agreements. The new contract will require greater investment in public education, which depends on a budget amendment that would allow the school district to cover the additional costs incurred by the new contract as well as pension payments for teachers and paraprofessionals.

Bargaining is currently stalled on a handful of points. These include smaller class sizes, higher pay for veteran teachers and paraprofessionals, more elementary school prep time, and reducing inequality in the teacher evaluation system.

“I want to thank the negotiations team for working very hard. We are extremely, extremely close to a settlement,” Chicago School Board President Sean Harden said while explaining that the budget amendment, originally up for a vote at Thursday's meeting, was withdrawn from the agenda to give CTU and CPS more time to reach an agreement.

The major stumbling block in negotiations has been Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez, who stormed out of a meeting with CTU leadership and Mayor Brandon Johnson on Wednesday afternoon. Martinez has not attended a single bargaining session since they began last April, but he has stalled negotiations by filing a temporary restraining order to prevent CTU from negotiating directly with the school board and by proposing a budget which made no provisions for increased pay or any other item in the contract.

“For Pedro to decide that he doesn’t want to invest in our future after we’ve worked hard for years and paid our dues, after we’ve done our work making schools open on time, to say we don’t deserve a pension is a slap in the face,” Christel Williams, the recording secretary of CTU and a school clerk, said at a press conference before the meeting. Williams was speaking specifically about paraprofessionals and school related personnel, who are often treated as a second tier by CPS.

“As Trump and Musk bring chaos into our school system, we need a contract and we need it today,” Williams added.

“This board can work together with us to secure the most transformative contract in the history of Chicago Public Schools,” Vicki Kurzydlo, a 31-year veteran educator, emphasized the issues of veteran teacher pay and elementary school prep time.

“Teachers in my building are routinely robbed of their prep time,” elementary school music teacher Kathryn Zamarron said during public comments section of the boad meeting. CTU is demanding 20 additional minutes of prep time for teachers. This is a step towards bringing back 30 minutes of prep time lost under Rahm Emanuel’s administration.

“This system only works because of our free labor,” Zamarron continued. After giving her comment, Zamarron returned to grading her student’s work. She was joined at the podium by dozens of CTU members who also came to the meeting after working in a school system damaged by decades of local and federal defunding of public education.

“In these times of a massive assault on public education by Donald Trump and the oligarchs, we need the highest quality, strongest and most engaging community schools,” said Marc Kaplan, an organizer with Northside Action for Justice, who stressed the importance of a transformative local contract in light of intensifying federal attacks on public education.

Minutes before Kaplan spoke, Trump signed an executive order to dismantle the Department of Education. If the order is successfully carried out, schools around the country will be without funding for special education and other crucial programs.

Since Trump's election in November, CTU has uplifted their contract demands as a “forcefield” around Chicago designed to protect the city's students. One win in their 2019 contract, keeping schools as sanctuary spaces, has already successfully defended children from federal agents who attempted to enter Hamline elementary in January.

The next day’s negotiations saw a counteroffer from CPS which did not offer continuous prep time, pushing a settlement back by at least another day.

On Friday afternoon, March 21, CTU held a joint press conference with the firefighter’s union, which has been stalled for three years in negotiations, to demand the settlement of both contracts. The joint conference is an example of the solidarity CTU is building not only to settle its contract, but also to galvanize labor and the people’s movements in united action against Trump’s agenda.

“Since 2012, Chicago has been a place of resistance,” CTU president Stacy Davis Gates said at the Friday press conference, citing Rahm Emanuel’s massive school closing campaign which shut down 50 schools in 2013. “If anyone in this country wants to know how to resist the tyranny of people who want to privatize and close off opportunities, you can come to Chicago.”

#ChicagoIL #IL #Labor #CTU #Teachers #Contract

Chicago, IL - To honor International Women’s Day, on March 9, Freedom Road Socialist Organization hosted a film screening of Si Se Puede a documentary on the 1985 Watsonville, California strike, followed by a panel discussion with activists in the Black liberation, immigrant rights and labor movements.

The documentary tells the story of a successful 18-month strike of over 1000 food processing workers by Chicanas and Mexicanas, backed up by the Chicano movement across the country.

The event was well attended by a diverse crowd of over 50 community members and activists from various sections of the people’s movement including Arab, Latino, Black and white workers and students.

The Watsonville strike was sustained for 18 months because of the unity of the workers and the support of the community for their struggle. The company hoped that their coziness with the sellout union officials would make the workers give up, but the unity of the rank-and-file workers and support from the community carried them through to victory.

Two of the panelists picked up on the struggle against sell-out trade union bureaucrats in Watsonville and recognized this obstacle from their own struggles. 

Chanel Crittenden of the Labor Committee of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression put it, “This was a resistance led by the rank-and-file members of the union,” and that we should follow their example of unity when the capitalists attempt to undermine our unity with strategic attacks on older workers, or on healthcare benefits.

Eliza Schultz shared her experience as a UPS worker in the Teamsters in 2018 when the sellout leaders forced them to accept a contract that had been voted down. The union members who fought for a better contract were then joined by more members to defeat the sellout officers a few years later.

Vicky Lugo of El Consejo del Resistencia in defensa del Inmigrante (Resistance Council to Defend Immigrants), when she saw the Watsonville strikers having to stand up to the police, recalled her experiences organizing and winning permits for the street vendors in the Pilsen and Little Village communities in Chicago.

Another point underlined by Schultz was, “Unity is an idea built around an act.” The workers with many years of seniority revolted against the lowering of wages and cutting of benefits; younger workers were drawn in, and following that, the community rallied around them. The unity that resulted was how the strike was sustained for 18 months.

Crittenden compared the ironclad unity demonstrated by the workers in the documentary to the Chicago Teachers Union standing with their students against ICE, rallying the community with them and showing that it takes numbers to force the capitalist class to reckon with our demands.

Vicky Lugo recognized the people are scared, but they are not so scared they won’t fight back. She called for those in attendance to support a week of action beginning on May Day, including marches and boycotts, and led by their coalition of over 50 organizations.

Inspired by the women in the film, Crittenden stated, “Women didn’t fight for their right to work; Black women have always worked and want our work to be recognized. The capitalists will recognize the strength in our numbers and we can make shit happen.”

#ChicagoIL #IWD #UPS #CTU #ICE #CAARPR #Teamsters #SiSePuede #ChicanoLiberation

Chicago, IL – The congregants at Healing Temple Church on Chicago’s West Side welcomed veteran community organizers to a rally against attacks on their beloved city, on March 1.

150 people came to the church to defend Mayor Brandon Johnson, who, along with several other progressive mayors has been called to testify before racist Republicans in Congress. This is a continuation of the Trump agenda's attacks on Chicago for being a progressive city with strong movement forces.

Billed as a “Sendoff rally for Mayor Johnson,” when the mayor entered the church, it was clear this was a crowd of his supporters.

The crowd raised the roof with a chant made famous in the 1960s on the West Side by Fred Hampton, the chairman of the Illinois Black Panther Party: “all power to the people!” During the 60s, this slogan meant that Black people, Chicanos, Puerto Ricans, Native Americans, and the working class in the U.S. are the people, in struggle against the tiny minority referred to today as the billionaires.

Start of a new movement?

Jitu Brown, a new member of the first elected school board in Chicago history, was early among the speakers at the rally. He framed the advances in the history and current characteristics of the struggle here.

A veteran of the Kenwood-Oakland Community Organization (KOCO), Brown is perhaps most well-known for the 34 day Dyett High School Hunger Strike to stop the closing of schools in Black communities during the Rahm Emanuel administration.

Brown reminded us that the ruling class has closed over 160 schools in the Chicago Public Schools system, stating, “They didn’t want to improve public education: they wanted to remove Chicago as a Soul City.” A soul city refers to a city that is a majority Black. In the year 2000, 54% of Chicago public school students were Black. Today only 35% are Black. 47% are Latino, and 70% are low income.

The Dyett Hunger Strike took place in 2015, following Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s closing 50 schools in 2013, mostly in Black neighborhoods.

Standing against anti-immigrant attacks

Brown added, “Today a lot of the energy is anti-immigrant.” From his history being schooled by the Black power movement, he said, “We will not support the oppression of any people.”

Speaking of the history of the Black community struggle for good public schools, Brown went after Brandon Johnson’s enemies, stating, “A lot of the negativity that you are hearing about our mayor are from those people who have been using the city of Chicago as a pig’s trough for decades.”

“It is time for the city to do right by Black and brown people. We’re sitting in a city that has never had an elected school board, now with one.”

“We are in a city that has had privatizers running the city, and through our collective work, we put one of our own on the Fifth Floor.” The fifth floor of City Hall is where the mayor’s office is located.

Referring to Mayor Johnson’s appearance before the Republican-dominated Congress, Brown said, “This is just a little pit stop to let the world know we are building a better Chicago.”

“No matter how loud they bark, they are not going to disrupt what we call the soul of Chicago.”

Mayor Johnson: “Beauty of liberation”

Johnson took the pulpit as the crowd roared support. After speaking about the Republicans he will face in Washington, he said, “It’s important that we honor those that had enough foresight to put measures in place to ensure that the voices of marginalized people would never be squashed by the federal government or law enforcement. There was a brother by the name of James Montgomery, the first Black corporate counsel in Chicago history. He was also the legal counsel for the Black Panther Party.”

The mayor went on to say that “James Montgomery sent a note to Mayor Harold Washington that we should not allow federal agents to run through our city. Nor should we allow them to force local law enforcement to do their job.”

“They understood how the brutality of law enforcement could harm people. Whether you are undocumented or a descendant of slaves, James Montgomery understood that we cannot allow the federal government to suppress or oppress our people.”

Johnson closed his remarks with this: “We’re going to make sure that the roar that comes out of Chicago ignites a movement across America and across the globe. No matter where you’re from, you get to have the beauty of liberation in the city of Chicago.”

“We fight for working people! Are you with me, Chicago?”

The people united can never be defeated

Frank Chapman of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression (CAARPR), the lead organizer of the rally, spoke after Mayor Johnson.

“If you consider yourself a Black freedom fighter, engaged in the struggle for the liberation of our people, you cannot be guilty of hating on the immigrants. You cannot fall for the seeds of division planted by Trump and his reactionary minions, that somehow, some way, poor people coming from the south of our borders, seeking asylum; poor people seeking freedom from terror in their own lands, encouraged and supported by our government; that somehow this poses a problem for Black people.”

“This doesn’t pose a problem for us! We got a problem with the same people they have a problem with. We stand united with these people because we share a common oppressor: the billionaires that have always used the tool of racism to divide and conquer.”

Chapman called for support of the Sanctuary City laws that prohibit local law enforcement from engaging in immigration enforcement. “We reject the ideas that immigrants are criminals and deporting them would take the crime rate down.”

“What would take the crime rate down is to deport Trump!”

Black/Latino coalition

About one quarter of the crowd in the church were Latino activists and community members from the nearby Chicano/Mexicano neighborhoods. Alderman Byron Sigcho-Lopez was one of the Latino activists who joined the rally, representing the 25th Ward of neighborhoods like Pilsen and Little Village on the Lower West side of Chicago.

Sigcho-Lopez explained, “Chicago is a target. Trump targets us for deportations, but Chicago is also our hope.”

As his three small children gathered around him, Sigcho-Lopez said, “This is why we fight for the quality public education that all our children deserve.”

Sigcho-Lopez called for unity of all working people – Black, Latino, Asian and white – against attacks on immigrants and against the closing of public schools and unionized charter schools like Acero. In addition, last week ICE seized a father dropping off his children at Acero.

What do these two movements of resistance have in common? Sigcho-Lopez said, “The billionaires in DC and the billionaires in Chicago don’t have enough, so they take from the poor.”

“When we see parents being grabbed from their communities, we have to stand for the dignity of our people.”

“There’s no place I would rather be than Chicago, the city of Rudy Lozano and Mayor Harold Washington!” Sigcho-Lopez referred to union organizer and Chicano community leader Rudy Lozano, who supported the election of Harold Washington in 1983. This created for the first time a Black and Latino coalition, making possible the defeat of the white racist Democratic Party and election of Washington, Chicago’s first Black mayor.

Chicago Alliance: On to Washington

In support of Mayor Johnson when he appears before the racist Republicans in Congress, Chapman announced, “Black History Month is over, but Black history is still going on, and we’re going to make some today. On the 5th, we’re going to Washington, DC to support our mayor and our city.”

Sigcho-Lopez gave special mention to the role played by CAARPR in organizing the rally. Crystal Gardner, one of the West Side organizers, also said afterward about this rally, “A big shout out to the Chicago Alliance for having the blueprint, vision, mission and base to activate spaces and communities. This is only the beginning, and I look forward to many more!”

#ChicagoIL #IL #OppressedNationalities #AfricanAmerican #ImmigrantRights #BrandonJohnson #CAARPR #NAARPR #CTU

Chicago, IL – The streets of Little Village in Chicago were filled with the sounds of drums and voices, February 8, as a crowd of 1500 people of all ages moved through this historic Mexicano/Chicano neighborhood.

Marchers representing a coalition of 30 organizations came together in response to the call by the Legalization for All Network for national days of action to stop the attacks on immigrants.

Angel Naranjos, a student from the University of Illinois – Chicago who grew up in Little Village, opened the rally on behalf of the Immigrant Rights Working Committee of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression (CAARPR).

Naranjos stated, “We’re gathered here today to protest the attacks on people who only came here searching for a better life. We’re witnessing some of the broadest attacks on immigrants in our lifetimes. People who are here to work are being attacked by a racist, reactionary Republican administration. It’s up to us to build a visible and powerful resistance. It’s up to us to show that when we get into the streets, when we fight, we can win.”

“We are an army”

Kobi Guillory of CAARPR and the Chicago Teachers Union spoke of growing up in South Africa, stating, “The racism that made Black people poor in South Africa, that keeps them poor is the same racism against Black people in Englewood, and the same racism I see targeting people right here in Little Village.”

Guillory also said about this movement against the attacks from the White House, “We are an army. If any one of us is attacked, all of us are going to fight back!”

Other organizations in the protest included Chicago Community and Workers Rights; Familia Latina Unida; Kabataan Alliance, a new network of Filipino organizations to fight Trump; Freedom Road Socialist Organization; and Students for a Democratic Society – UIC. With Aldermen Mike Rodriguez (22nd Ward) and Byron Sigcho Lopez (25th Ward), everyone came together for visible resistance to the Trump attacks on Chicago and its immigrant community.

Chicago singled out by Trump

Trump has singled out Chicago and Mayor Brandon Johnson because of the strength of the movement in this city. Trump’s “Border Czar” Tom Homan has even complained that ICE has been unable to terrorize the community here because the people in Chicago are organized and know their rights.

But the limited attacks here and numerous attacks across the country are still traumatic. Dr. Mercedes Martinez of the League of United Latin American Citizens explained the psychological impact of separation of families, stating, “The inhumane treatment of our people is absolutely devastating. It will cause lifelong problems. The abandonment, the separation, causes anxiety.”

“White supremacists erase the true history of the U.S.”

Nazek Sankari of the US Palestinian Community Network, a familiar figure from leading many scores of protests in Chicago against the Zionist genocide in Gaza since October 2023, also spoke.

Sankari stated, “These last 19 days, there has been a slew of executive orders targeting immigrants, refugees, LGBTQ community and women. This is an attempt by these bigoted white supremacists to erase the true history of the U.S., founded on genocide.

“These same white supremacist forces are waging a genocide on Gaza. One executive order even threatens to deport the brave international students who participated in the student uprisings in solidarity with the Palestinian people last spring.”

“This is our land. We’re ready to struggle!”

Four buses of immigrant workers and their families came from the Casa DuPage Workers Center in the west suburbs to join the march, with many banners, bullhorns and drums. Cristobal Cavazos of Casa DuPage said of this movement, “We have a new consciousness. We have new self-respect and dignity. We’re workers. We’re replacing the chip that we’re illegals, that we’re criminals, that we don’t belong here.”

Cavazos continued, “This is our land. We’re ready to struggle!”

#ChicagoIL #IL #ImmigrantRights #Trump #Deportations #NAARPR #CAARPR #USPCN #CTU #L4A

Chicago, IL – On January 20, the day of Donald Trump’s inauguration and Martin Luther King Day, members of the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) joined over 80 organizations to protest Trump’s plans for mass deportations.

2500 protesters gathered in Chicago’s Federal Plaza, bundled to protect themselves from frigid temperatures with below zero windchill. Chants included, “When immigrants’ rights are under attack, what do we do? Stand up, fight back!”

Dr. Diane Castro, 18 year veteran teacher and chair of CTU’s Early Childhood Committee, tied the fight for immigrant rights with the union’s ongoing contract campaign. Contract negotiations between CTU and Chicago Public Schools have now extended more than six months beyond the expiration of the prior contract in June 2024, in part due to delays from Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez.

Castro stated, “We are fighting for a contract that protects the rights of the educators, students and families from Project 2025, and that includes strengthened language for LGBTQIA students and sanctuary schools.”

Castro’s statements reflect years of efforts from CTU’s leadership and rank and file to organize themselves against deportations and other threats towards immigrant students and families. For example, the contract won by CTU in 2019 states that “except by a court order, CPS shall not disclose to ICE any information regarding the immigration status of any CPS student.”

More recently, the CTU has ramped up education on immigrant defense for its members and communities with a Sanctuary Series that began in December and will run until February. The series includes “Know Your Rights” and sanctuary schools trainings. Previous sessions in January and February have been attended by hundreds of teachers and parents.

Such measures go towards the goal of CTU President Stacy Davis Gates and the union to create a “force field around our school communities” against Project 2025. The union has pressed for an urgent resolution to the contract issue given Trump’s agenda.

In addition to the contact campaign and internal education, CTU leaders recently spoke out alongside immigrant rights organizations such as Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (ICIRR) to defend Chicago’s status as a sanctuary city.

An ordinance was recently drafted for the city council floor by Alderpersons Raymond Lopez and Silvana Tabares that, if passed, would have allowed Chicago police to aid Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in certain deportation cases. After protest from immigrant rights groups, progressive aldermen such as Jessie Fuentes and Byron Sigcho Lopez, and progressive leaders such as those in CTU, the council denied the ordinance from coming up for discussion in a vote of 39-11.

Despite threats from Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, that ICE raids would begin in Chicago on day one, the city has not yet seen any raids as of Wednesday.

“We showed that Chicago is going to unite and fight back for immigrants and all oppressed communities,” said Kobi Guillory, a member of CTU and co-chair of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression (CAARPR), one of the convening organizations of the January 20 protest.

The call for solidarity across Chicago’s communities was repeated throughout the protest. As Dr. Diane Castro said, “I remind you that we have done this before, and we will survive it again, but only if we stand together.”

#ChicagoIL #IL #Labor #ImmigrantRights #Trump #CTU #ICIRR #Feature

Chicago, IL – Negative wind chill could not keep the Coalition to Stop the Trump Agenda from mobilizing 2500 people to Federal Plaza in downtown Chicago to protest the inauguration of Donald Trump.

In the cold midday sun, protesters rallied at the Plaza, marched to Trump Tower, and then rallied a second time there – all to mark a new phase of struggle that will see the social justice movement face grave dangers in the agenda of Donald Trump and his fellow Republicans.

Over 80 organizations are members of the Coalition to Stop the Trump Agenda. They are united around the demands to fight the racist and reactionary Republican agenda; defend and expand immigrant rights; stand with Palestine; defend the right to unionize and strike; stop police crimes; defend women’s LGBTQ and reproductive rights, and defend education and academic freedom.

A number of the forces organizing today’s action led last year’s March on the DNC, including the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression (CAARPR), U.S. Palestinian Community Network (USPCN), Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), and Anti-War Committee. As in the case of the March on the DNC, the coalition is broad, containing forces from across the movement, including those in immigrant rights, Palestinian rights, Black liberation, labor, and more.

A plurality of march attendees were Latino immigrants, including three busloads of immigrant workers from the suburban DuPage County organization, Worker Center of Immigrant Solidarity.

The involvement of immigrant rights groups like Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (ICIRR) and Mijente is important, especially since the Trump administration’s very first attacks in the U.S. will likely be directed against immigrants.

“We came here in spite of everything, we have paid our taxes, we’ve built our families here, our kids were born here, and we’re not going anywhere!” said Martín Unzueta, executive director and founder of Chicago Community & Worker’s Rights and spokesperson for Mijente.

Other immigrant organizations mobilized as well, including the HANA Center, a Korean American immigrant justice organization; and Anakbayan, a youth organization fighting for Filipino rights and liberation.

In addition to immigrant rights groups, some of the Palestinian rights organizations that led 16 months’ worth of protests against the Israeli/U.S. genocide on Gaza, including USPCN and Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) – Chicago, took part in the march.

With a ceasefire in Gaza reached just last week, Palestinian rights groups have emphasized that such a victory was only the result of fierce resistance on the part of the Palestinian people and their allies across the world, and not the benevolence of Trump, Biden, Blinken, or any other figure in Washington.

“This achievement only belongs to the steadfast Palestinian resistance and the people of Gaza,” said Noura Ebrahim, USPCN member and co-founder of Boycott Divestment Sanctions – Chicago.

Also protesting Trump were Black liberation organizations like CAARPR, Black Lives Matter Chicago, GoodKids MadCity, Chicago Torture Justice Center, and more.

The involvement of Black liberation organizations is also important, given that Trump’s previous presidency saw Black people in the U.S. experience further economic degradation, the intensification of police repression (such as the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor), and more mass incarceration of Black communities. Trump will seek to continue that trend in his second term, though the resistance, as last time, will be fierce.

“We cannot allow Trump to carry out mass deportations of immigrants. If they come after them today, they’ll come after the rest of us tomorrow,” said Frank Chapman, field director of CAARPR and executive director of the National Alliance.

To mark Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Daryle Brown, a minister at the historic Trinity United Church of Christ greeted the rally with a prayer.

Organized labor is also an essential element of the coalition, with the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) and CTU’s Black Caucus, United Auto Workers Local 2320, and United Electrical Workers – Western Region among the endorsers of the rally. Many of their rank-and-file members were in attendance.

“Fighting for the rights of oppressed people is not new in Chicago! We stand united here,” said Dr. Diane Castro of CTU.

Other organizations in the Coalition to Stop the Trump Agenda include Anti-War Action Network, Community Renewal Society, Arab American Action Network, United Working Families 50th Ward and others.

#ChicagoIL #IL #PeoplesStruggles #ImmigrantRights #InJusticeSystem #AntiWarMovement #Palestine #CTU #Trump #J20 #Feature

Chicago, IL – On the snowy Thursday evening of November 21, the chambers of the Chicago Temple were heated up by the fighting spirits of over 1500 school staff, students and community members. The rally was organized by the Chicago Teachers Union to demand the settlement of its contract with Chicago Public Schools, which is made more urgent by Trump's intentions to dismantle the federal Department of Education.

“We need leadership of Chicago Public Schools who will protect us from Trump and his troops,” declared CTU President Stacy Davis Gates.

Four months after the expiration of the 2019 contract, CPS, under the leadership of CEO Pedro Martinez, has refused to budge on many of CTU’s contract proposals which would defend Chicago’s public schools from Trump's racist, bigoted and anti-education agenda.

“We need this contract before January 20 so we can protect our local communities from federal attacks,” said Corey Blake, a music teacher and co-chair of CTU’s LGBTQIA+ Committee.

Speakers also connected Trump's policies to the decades long neoliberal campaign to defund public schools all over the country, which has manifested in hundreds of school closures in Chicago since 2000.

“If Trump succeeds, many more schools will have to close,” said Angelica Jaurez, a parent at Fuentes Elementary School.

In October, Acero Charter Schools announced plans to close seven of its campuses, including Fuentes, by the end of the school year, a decision which would leave 2000 students and 200 teachers without a school.

The instability and lack of accountability of charter schools like Acero is the future envisioned by Trump and others who want to dismantle the public school system. In opposition are CTU and its contract demands, which Southside high school student organizer Catelyn Savado described as “a love letter to the people of Chicago.”

CTU brought 750 proposals to the bargaining table in April on issues ranging from raises that keep up with inflation, to restorative justice and improving school buildings. Neoliberal politicians and corporate media have criticized the contract proposals for demanding too much money from the city. CPS CEO Pedro Martinez sent a mass email on the day of the rally complaining about the increases to the school budget that the contract proposals would necessitate.

CTU responded by explaining how negotiations have advanced beyond Martinez's description, which they referred to as “a reckless PR stunt” in a statement released on Friday, and speakers at the Thursday rally argued that the contract proposals simply address the needs of Chicago's children.

6th Ward Alderman William Hall outlined the contradiction between the budgetary priorities of the Chicago neoliberal establishment and the needs of the people, stating, “We have $1.5 billion for prisons, yet we still can't find $1 billion to educate our children.”

Speakers also highlighted previous contract victories that CTU won through militant action, including air conditioning in schools, smaller class sizes, and sanctuary schools for immigrant families. While the CTU has an ally rather than an enemy in the mayor’s office for the first time in decades, they are still facing neoliberal politicians, CPS bureaucracy and millions of corporate dollars organized through right-wing groups like the Illinois Policy Institute and the Illinois Network of Charter Schools.

“Be encouraged when they send millions of dollars to beat you because they're scared of you,” Teachers Pension Fund Trustee Quentin Washington said about the $6 million spent by INCS and similar organizations on the November 5 school board elections. Despite being vastly outspent, candidates supported by the CTU-led Our Schools Coalition won four of ten elected positions as opposed to three won by charter school interests.

“Republicans, right wingers, and neoliberals do not get to win,” Savado said. “One thing we have that they don't have is people power!”

“From Gaza to Little Village to Altgeld and all over the country, the children are all ours, every single one of them, and it is our duty to fight for all of them,” said music teacher Kathryn Zamarrón, describing the need for solidarity between local, national and international struggles.

“The call to action is not just to tweet or cry and hug about it. The call to action is solidarity,” said Davis Gates, summing up the fighting unity between the many diverse communities represented by the rally’s speakers and crowd.

After the rally, the union members and supporters marched several blocks to Federal Plaza. Chants demanding a fair contract and calling for Pedro Martinez to “get out the way” echoed through the downtown streets.

CTU aims to settle this contract using tactics of militance and solidarity, and wants it done before Trump's inauguration on January 20, a day which will see protests in Washington DC, Chicago and around the U.S.

#ChicagoIL #ChicagoTeachersUnion #CTU #CPS #UnionPower #LaborRights #Trump #Feature

Chicago, IL - On November 13, 1800 members of the Illinois Nurses Association (INA) went on strike against University of Illinois Health for continuing to refuse to negotiate a decent contract. Since June, the union has had 47 bargaining sessionswith UI Health, to no avail. In August, a week-long strike was held, but this did not stop management’s greed. The union wasleft with no choice but to go on an open-ended strike.

The workers are striking for higher wages, safety for nurses (and by extension, their patients), as well as family leave that lasts at least 12 weeks. UI Health has offered a measly 2% pay increase.

On the cold November day, 500 nurses and supporters ralliedoutside of the UI Specialty Care Building. They picketed, marched, chanted and listened to speeches starting at 7 a.m. When the overnight shift of nurses began to walk out of the UI Hospital, the waiting strikers broke out in cheers and applause.

Kathy Bollinger of the Illinois Nurses Association stated, “Who always has time for a break? Management! But do we have time to pump breast milk to feed our children? No! I had to switch to formula at just four months!”

Many drivers came by honking their horns to express solidarity. Supporters joining the rally and picket line included workers from other unions, such as at UPS, postal service workers, workers from the Chicago Transit Authority.

Jackson Potter, of the Chicago Teachers Union stated, “Who would we be as educators and nurses if we didn’t fight for other people to have those things?”

Joe Iosbaker, a retired member of the Service Employees International Union Local 73, spoke about the 2020 strike in the depths of the COVID pandemic. 4000 members of Local 73 joined 1300 INA members for nine days until management caved in. Iosbaker read the names of nurses Joyce Pacubas Le Blanc, Maria Lopez, and surgical technician Juan Martinez, all of whom died of COVID in May 2020. “Management told our members not to wear masks unless they were in a COVID ward, because it would scare the patients. They failed to protect us because they don’t care about us except to make profits!”

At midday, strikers started marching to the Dorin Forum one mile away on the east side of campus, and they kept the militancy up the entire time. People were chanting “No contract, no peace!” and “If we don’t get it, shut it down!”

For about an hour, nurses protested outside the Forum buildingwhere the board of trustees were meeting.

They then marched back to the west side of campus, where the negotiators came out to tell the strikers that the turnout is making management start to finally bend to the will of the workers.

One striker said, “I’m out here striking with the nurses, showing solidarity with my coworkers and my friends, fighting for a safe contract for us and the patients.” He continued, “We’re the ones who take care of this hospital and take care of the patients, and they’ll hear us loud and clear.”

“We’re fighting against workplace violence, we’re fighting for comparable wages to help us keep up with inflation, and we’re also fighting for patient safety,” said another striker.

The picket lines will continue every day and support from students and community is essential and helpful.

#ChicagoIL #INA #IllinoisNursesAssociation #UofIHealth #Nurses #Strike #CTU #SEIU #Feature

Chicago, IL – The resignation of the entire Chicago Board of Education on October 4 exemplifies a new phase of the fight for Chicago's public schools. Current contract negotiations are happening with a mayor who is a former teacher and Chicago Teachers Union organizer, and amidst school board elections coming up on November 5, both of which are unprecedented in Chicago's history. The Black and brown and working-class people of the city have an opportunity to undo the damage done to the public school system by decades of systematic defunding under neoliberal mayors, and to take further steps towards community control of the schools.

“None of the members leaving the current board planned to continue onto the hybrid board, and none are running for election,” the outgoing board said in a joint statement with Mayor Brandon Johnson. “With the unprecedented increase in board membership, transitioning new members now will allow them time to orient and gain critical experience prior to welcoming additional elected and appointed members in 2025.”

The statement also highlighted areas of agreement between the outgoing board and the mayor, such as “shifting away from inequitable student-based budgeting, completing the change to a school safety model that does not rely on school resource officers and focusing on black student success.”

The main point of contention between Johnson and the school board is the job of CPS CEO Pedro Martinez. CTU Vice President Jackson Potter referred to Martinez as a “Lightfoot leftover” not simply because he was appointed by previous Mayor Lori Lightfoot, but mainly due to his commitment to neoliberal budget cutting policies typical of Lightfoot and every other Chicago Mayor since Harold Washington. His proposed budget for 2025, approved by the outgoing board, made no provisions for raises, new positions, programs, and other features of the new contract.

With federal COVID relief funds drying up in 2025 and the city already in a $500 million deficit, funding for schools is a complicated question, but there are clear differences between those who prioritize fully-funded schools and those who don't.

Johnson and the CTU have proposed various sources of funding including tax increment financing (TIF) development funds, short term loans, taxing “not for profit” university hospitals with billions of dollars in their endowment, and money from the state of Illinois. Martinez on the other hand favors layoffs and budget cuts to cover the deficit.

For decades, Chicago mayors have also preferred cuts and layoffs. From when career privatizer Paul Vallas was appointed by Mayor Richard M Daley as the first CEO of CPS in 1995, Chicago saw hundreds of schools closed and thousands of teachers laid off. Despite these cuts, neoliberal mayors still took out short-term loans which created the budget deficit inherited by Johnson.

The ire aimed at Johnson over his approach to the school board and budget is therefore not about loans or stability, as the same groups that are attacking him over education had no issues with loans or personnel changes under previous mayors. The agenda of groups like the Illinois Policy Institute and the Illinois Network of Charter Schools is to gut the public education system and replace public schools with charter schools, which are ultimately accountable to shareholders and not the students and communities they are supposed to serve.

The Illinois Network of Charter Schools has pumped money into the campaigns of pro-charter school board candidates to oppose candidates endorsed by the CTU and allied organizations; those candidates include longtime defenders of public schools such as Aaron Jitu Brown and Reverend Robert Jones, who both joined a 34-day hunger strike to save Dyett High School from closure in 2013.

With election day less than three weeks away, the CTU is once again at the front lines of a fight between corporate power and people power. If candidates like Brown and Jones win, these historic elections will move Chicago towards a fully-funded school system where decision making power is in the hands of teachers, parent, and students, rather than corporations that own charter schools.

#ChicagoIL #IL #Labor #CTU #PublicSchools #Feature

Chicago IL – On June 7, the last day of the Chicago Public Schools 2023-24 calendar, over 300 paraprofessionals and school related personnel and teachers were laid off due to budget cuts.

Members of the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) attended the board of education meeting on Thursday June 27, to demand an end to layoffs as a part of the broader demand for fully staffed, fully funded schools. They explained the devastating effects these layoffs have on school staff and on students. The union is currently in contract negotiations with Chicago Public Schools, which is led by CEO Pedro Martinez.

“CEO Martinez ought to be ashamed of himself. We’re talking about 330 people who are connected to thousands of Black and brown families,” said CTU Recording Secretary Christel Williams Hayes at a press conference before the meeting.

“I do not understand how these budget cuts were made. Make it make sense. How will you make sure students will feel comfortable in their buildings without these veterans in their schools?” asked Sandra Lockhart, an instructional assistant who was laid off after 20 years of working at the same school. Lockhart is one of many paraprofessionals and school related personnel (PSRPs) laid off after serving their communities for decades. Many of these educators are breadwinners who cannot easily commute to other neighborhoods and acclimate to new schools.

“Why are you cutting off vital services? Why are you cutting one on one attention in oversized classrooms? The support of counselors, justice coordinators and people who protect student safety? You are cutting the backbone of our schools,” declared CTU organizer Tanille Evans.

“I’ve constantly advocated for our students who administrators see as criminals. I fight for them to be seen as human beings,” said Edward Ward, a restorative justice coordinator who was laid off for the second year in a row.

“The work I do, the work we do, we are not disposable. At the end of the day, it’s the students who suffer,” Ward added.

Chicago Public Schools (CPS) CEO Pedro Martinez and members of the board of education admitted during the meeting that Chicago's schools are struggling to adequately serve Black and brown children, and that the numbers of disabled, homeless and newly immigrated students have increased by thousands. The board, however, did not discuss or respond to questions about layoffs.

CTU members exposed the hypocrisy of a school district that claims to aim for equity also laying off overwhelmingly Black and brown staff who are crucial to the achievement of Chicago’s majority Black and brown students.

“You can’t say that we are moving in a direction that honors the voices of young people, then cut 20 restorative justice coordinators,” said CTU President Stacy Davis Gates. “85% of PSRPs are Black and brown women. Their work is often made invisible, but when the schools open we won’t see invisible work, we’ll see schools falling apart.”

“Budgets are moral documents, and there are things in this budget that do not compute,” CTU Vice President Jackson Potter stated in the board meeting. Potter pointed to years of financial mismanagement by previous elected officials such as former mayor Rahm Emanuel and Governor Bruce Rauner, which left CPS in a $400 million budget deficit after the end of federal COVID funding, as the reason why layoffs occur.

“Those bad actors must be called out and held accountable, pushed to renegotiate, and pay back revenue that translates to things like libraries and librarians,” Potter explained.

The current CTU contract, won in 2019 after a strike during the administration of then-Mayor Lori Lightfoot, expires on June 30. At this moment, with former teacher and CTU organizer Brandon Johnson as mayor, the union has, according to their communications department, “an opportunity for transformative change that can genuinely address the segregation, privatization, and budget cuts that have harmed Chicago students for so long.”

However, the Chicago Teachers Union still expects a struggle against “bad actors.” It’s public statement concluded: “We still have to grapple with a stubborn bureaucracy, inadequate state funding, and wealthy corporations funding Trump and the Illinois Policy Institute in order to pay fewer taxes and defund public education. Easy or not, we will set a new standard for public schools in Chicago.”

#ChicagoIL #IL #Labor #CTU #teachers #layoffs

On multiple occasions the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) – representing the educators – requested to continue negotiations in good faith. However, Urban Prep management did not agree to meet again until 5:30 p.m. on Monday, June 7, after the strike was already underway.

The educators and Urban Prep management went on to bargain late into Monday night, but Urban Prep refused to compromise on several of the central issues that matter to the educators and students. No deal was reached and the strike continues.

One important sticking point is Urban Prep’s refusing to put students’ special education rights into the labor contract, where they would be enforceable. Management is also demanding an extended period to fire educators even if the educator is highly qualified. Urban Prep charter schools are well known to have a dangerously high turnover of educators.

The CEO of Urban Prep makes nearly as much money for overseeing three charter schools as the Chicago Public Schools CEO makes to oversee more than 500 Chicago public schools. The CTU is calling the question on this abuse of public monies.

In addition, CTU says Urban Prep has a long history of resorting to the use of payday loan terms and ‘sales of future receivables’ contracts with merchant cash advance organizations to finance school operations. It is otherwise unheard of for public schools to enter into these sorts of shady contracts because they come with shockingly high interest rates over time at the public’s and students’ expense. In fact, Urban Prep has paid more than $1.6 million to merchant cash advance businesses.

Urban Prep also received $3 million in forgivable COVID PPP loans, yet the teachers say they see no evidence that those funds have made it to the classroom or been used for education.

The strike is ongoing as public pressure grows on Urban Prep and its CEO.

#ChicagoIL #teachers #strike #Strikes #TeachersUnions #CTU #charterSchools #ChicagoTeachersUnion

The Urban Prep teachers have been in contract negotiations for more than 30 months. They are fighting for more support for special education students and more classroom resources, among other things. The teachers at Urban Prep are some of the lowest-paid teachers int the Chicago charter schools. Yet they pay the highest health care costs in that grouping. In fact, the teachers’ starting pay is more than $11,000 below what public school teachers get in Chicago. This results in very high turnover rates which create dangerous instability for the schools, where the students are overwhelmingly young Black males.

Chris Beahrend is the chair of CTU’s charter division and says, “Urban Prep has the resources to do right by our students and the educators who serve them – and we will strike if we must to move those resources into our schools.” He went on to say, “Urban Prep students deserve the special education services that are mandated by federal law, and our school communities deserve the resources our young people need.”

While a strike date remains to be set, a unanimous strike vote is a rare occurrence and signals that they teachers are ready to strike and will continue to fight for their students and their educators. This is a developing story and Fight Back! will continue to report new developments as they occur.

#ChicagoIL #PeoplesStruggles #TeachersUnions #CTU

Mayor Lightfoot has continued to hold off on vaccinating Chicago residents aged 16 and over despite the fact that the state of Illinois has opened up vaccine eligibility to those residents. People in that age group are currently being found to be the most significant cause of spread of the virus. National health experts are calling for states and cities to hold off on opening schools, bars, restaurants and other similar places right now due to the recent uptick in cases as well, as the more contagious UK variant has now been found to be the main variant found in the United States.

The Chicago Teachers Union is demanding that the Chicago Public School system modify schedules for high schools to lessen unnecessary contact and limit the number of people in buildings to minimize COVID spread. The union also says that each Wednesday, high schools should be conducted remotely to provide teachers with additional prep time, which is in desperately short supply, and that teachers and other educators who are in higher risk categories, or have family members who are, should be given access to remote teaching opportunities or else paid leave. In addition, they say that the school system should vaccinate high school students and family members who are high risk, which would be permitted by Illinois current eligibility guidelines.

#ChicagoIL #PeoplesStruggles #TeachersUnions #CTU #COVID19

Chicago, IL – Students in Chicago Public Schools (CPS) stayed home and learned remotely again on Thursday, January 28. The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) continued to demand that any return to in-person learning be done in a safe way. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot had ordered all teachers back to the classroom on Wednesday the 27th but was forced to backtrack and tell parents to keep their kids home again Thursday.

CPS has been demanding that 80% of school staff return in person and has refused to allow accommodations for staff who live in households with people who are in high-risk categories according to the Centers for Disease Control. CPS has also refused to provide weekly testing for unvaccinated staff and students at schools. In binding arbitration on October 2, CPS was ordered to allow school clerks and technology coordinators to work remotely, but the school system has yet to comply with that order.

The Chicago Teachers Union is seeking a health metric based on CDC guidance, a phased reopening, access to vaccinations for educators, and enforceable safety standards in school buildings, which have struggled to meet even basic needs for PPE, adequate ventilation and clean facilities. Because Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s CPS team has refused to offer vaccinations to educators before ordering them into school buildings, and has not been willing to agree to a phased-in resumption of in-person learning, the Chicago Teachers Union has now publicly called for mediation to resolve the impasse.

The teachers say that they continue to teach and want to continue to teach safely. To that end, their union has proposed critical precautions necessary for a safe return to in-person learning, but all of those precautions have been rejected by the Board of Education.

CTU President Jesse Sharkey said, “We are willing to keep teaching, but CPS has said they will lock us out. We are willing to keep negotiating, but CPS has refused to back down from insisting that 80% of educators and support staff return on February 1 to serve fewer than 20% of the students. Another 10,000 of our members became eligible for vaccinations on January 25. We can make schools safe with a phased reopening and enhanced COVID-19 testing for members of school communities.”

“It’s obvious to everyone but CPS and the mayor that parents aren’t sending their children back because they do not believe schools are safe or that COVID is under control,” said CTU Vice President Stacy Davis Gates. “This is especially true for Black and brown families. CPS does not need 80% of educators back in school to serve 19% of students. This makes no sense in a pandemic that continues to infect one in eight people in many of the Black and brown Chicago neighborhoods that have already shouldered a disproportionate burden of COVID disease and death. Our families want safety. Our educators want safety, yet CPS continues to refuse to negotiate an agreement that builds in that safety, and instead, has threatened to lock out tens of thousands of educators who have a right to safe workplaces to educate our schoolchildren.”

Only 19% of eligible students returned to pre-K and special education cluster programs on January 11, and in some cases teachers are being told to come in to schools in which not one family has opted in to the hybrid model in person learning, which shows that there is broad agreement in the community that the current CPS plan is not safe.

#ChicagoIL #PeoplesStruggles #teachers #union #TeachersUnions #CTU #pandemic #COVID

The two-member majority of the IELRB, Lara Shayne and Gilbert O’Brien, did so on the narrow grounds that they believe a full evidentiary trial is needed to determine whether Chicago Public Schools (CPS) is obligated under a provision of state law that only applies to Chicago Public Schools – Section 4.5 of the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Act – to bargain with the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) about its decision to resume in-person learning during the pandemic.

The trial on the complaint the IELRB has issued against CPS over its refusal to bargain is currently scheduled before an administrative law judge on January 26. The CTU is seeking to have that trial date moved up, before CPS’ mandatory return date for pre-kindergarten and special education cluster students, who CPS is seeking to force back into unsafe buildings on January 4.

The union expects CPS to oppose an expedited hearing. Without that ruling, by January 4, CPS could be allowed to put people in danger with its unilateral plan, even as the district plan could be declared illegal after the fact, making the remedy for the legal violation meaningless.

“In that case, all options will be on the table for the CTU to enforce our rights and protect the health, safety and livelihoods of students, educators and their families,” CTU President Jesse Sharkey said.

#ChicagoIL #PeoplesStruggles #CTU

Here are the facts of the matter. A group of teachers who are also members of the CTU put together a delegation to visit with leaders of Venezuela’s labor movement and with community activists. It was a self-organized, non-governmental, person-to-person visit. They traveled on their own dime, collecting some of the needed travel funds from other progressives. While in Venezuela and since their return, they have talked plainly about what they saw and heard. Venezuelan trade unionists, community leaders and the government are trying to push back against the economic chaos that is being conjured into being by the Trump administration.

No reasonable person can find anything objectional here. International solidarity and unity among trade unionists is a good thing. It is a plus for us in the labor movement. For working people there is the well-known adage that there is strength in numbers. Why wouldn’t we want to unite the many to defeat the few?

Newspapers like the Chicago Tribune have developed a narrative that is a smorgasbord of stupidity, casting hard facts as topics of the debate. The teachers who went to Venezuela speak about the criminality of the Trump administration’s sanctions. These sanctions are keeping food and medicine from the people of Venezuela. The same administration that puts kid in cages along the border with Mexico are now trying to starve an entire country for taking the path of their own choosing. Once again, the anti-union, right-wing press has got the story wrong.

One dimension of these attacks is the group of sore losers who were overwhelmingly defeated in the last CTU leadership elections, and who having been trying to make up for their small numbers and lack of a positive program by striking a shrill cadence. At the end of day, it is nothing more than hot air.

Every progressive in labor who wants a union movement that is broadminded and militant should stand with these Chicago teachers. A lot of people think about doing the right thing, but these teachers up and did it. They organized themselves, and they traveled, and they told the truth about what they saw. More power to them – the labor movement is a better place because of their courage and clarity.

#ChicagoIL #PeoplesStruggles #ChicagoTeachersUnion #PoliticalRepression #TeachersUnions #CTU

The contested election underscores the internal democracy inside the CTU, in which debates about the direction and functioning of the union took place in school meetings across the city, in member forums on the internet, and in the union’s governing body, the House of Delegates.

Re-elected CTU President Jesse Sharkey, who took over from Karen Lewis when she retired for health reasons in September, made the following statement in the wake of the announcement of election results:

“I am proud of our union and honored to be elected as president. I commit to do everything in my power to advance the cause of our public schools, and our members who work in those schools. Since coming into office with Karen Lewis in 2010, we have done our utmost to build a strong, democratic movement for educational justice – the CTU sees dignity and respect on the job as going hand in hand with social, racial, and economic justice for our students, and we are committed to fight for the rights of every member and every student in Chicago.

“Over the past several years, we have witnessed the deepest cuts and worst fiscal austerity measures since the state takeover of CPS in 1979-80. As a result of the hard work by teachers, students, and parents our schools have made some gains, despite the financial hardships. However, conditions in the classrooms have reached a breaking point – with school-based budgeting disasters, unsanitary conditions, critical staffing shortages, a full-blown legal crisis surrounding special education, insufficient supports for student trauma, the precipitous decline of Black and veteran educators in the classroom, and the list goes on. A typical school in Chicago has a school nurse just one day a week.

“This must change. The CTU will work to dramatically improve the conditions in our schools and usher in an elected, representative school board. The new CTU contract provides an important opportunity to enshrine key improvements in a legally binding form. We hope that the new mayor makes good on her promises to transform our public schools. If she does, she will find us to be a steadfast ally. If she does not, she will find us to be an implacable foe.”

#ChicagoIL #PeoplesStruggles #union #TeachersUnions #CTU #CORE

The contested election underscores the internal democracy inside the CTU, in which debates about the direction and functioning of the union took place in school meetings across the city, in member forums on the internet, and in the union’s governing body, the House of Delegates.

Re-elected CTU President Jesse Sharkey, who took over from Karen Lewis when she retired for health reasons in September, made the following statement in the wake of the announcement of election results:

“I am proud of our union and honored to be elected as president. I commit to do everything in my power to advance the cause of our public schools, and our members who work in those schools. Since coming into office with Karen Lewis in 2010, we have done our utmost to build a strong, democratic movement for educational justice – the CTU sees dignity and respect on the job as going hand in hand with social, racial, and economic justice for our students, and we are committed to fight for the rights of every member and every student in Chicago.

“Over the past several years, we have witnessed the deepest cuts and worst fiscal austerity measures since the state takeover of CPS in 1979-80. As a result of the hard work by teachers, students, and parents our schools have made some gains, despite the financial hardships. However, conditions in the classrooms have reached a breaking point – with school-based budgeting disasters, unsanitary conditions, critical staffing shortages, a full-blown legal crisis surrounding special education, insufficient supports for student trauma, the precipitous decline of Black and veteran educators in the classroom, and the list goes on. A typical school in Chicago has a school nurse just one day a week.

“This must change. The CTU will work to dramatically improve the conditions in our schools and usher in an elected, representative school board. The new CTU contract provides an important opportunity to enshrine key improvements in a legally binding form. We hope that the new mayor makes good on her promises to transform our public schools. If she does, she will find us to be a steadfast ally. If she does not, she will find us to be an implacable foe.”

#ChicagoIL #PeoplesStruggles #union #TeachersUnions #CTU #CORE

Chicago, IL – Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) educators at four CICS schools struck for the third day, February 7, with management dug in on exchanging wage parity with CPS educators for higher caseloads for counselors and social workers, larger class sizes with no enforcement language, and no written guarantee not to cut student services or resources. Management wants to increase the student-to-counselor/social worker ratio, which is already well over nationally recommended ratios, giving management the wiggle room to lay off some frontline staff.

CICS still refuses to dip into $36 million in public education funds it has siphoned out of classrooms. Up to 30% of the public funds CICS receives are deflected into inflated management fees, redundant bureaucracies and 'reserves.'

Educators have refused to trade raises for larger class sizes or reductions in student services.

On Wednesday, CICS sent at least eight corporate staff to bust legal picket lines at Wrightwood and Ellison, including Chief of Strategy & Portfolio Christine Leung, who earns $140,000 per year, Director of Network Policy Yesica Rufino-Perez, who earns $100,000 a year, and Chief of Network Services Kathleen Clark, who earns more than $140,000. One CICS corporate employee urged police to threaten to arrest all strikers if even one spoke to parents.

“Those are really pricey union busters,” said Northtown teacher Jen Conant, who heads up the CTU bargaining team. Management has told parents that children will be punished for unexcused absences (false) and that school was open for instruction (even though 'instructors' are on the picket line, not in school teaching) to try to get children across the picket lines. CICS also for the first time posted security staff at Wrightwood, beginning on the first day of the strike. “That's an awful use of public education dollars that could instead be used to settle the strike and preserve student services,” said Conant.

#ChicagoIL #PeoplesStruggles #teachers #Strikes #CTU #charterSchools