Morning Chicago Teachers Strike News and Commentary 9-12-12
by Eric W. Dolan
Union delegate Darryl Reed explained Monday that the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) began their strike on Monday to prevent teachers from being unjustly fired. “We’ve been saying all along that the [Chicago Public School system] did not think that we were this strong, did not think that...
by dianerav
This is my analysis of the strike, posted on the website of the New York Review of Books.
by dianerav
I was on an NPR show called “To the Point” today, where a panel debated the teachers’ strike. The discussion of the strike begins 24 minutes into the show.
Other panelists included Juan Jose Gonzalez, the Chicago director of Stand for Children, who opposed the union; Timothy Knowles of the University of Chicago, who advised Mayor Rahm Emanuel; Rick Perlstein, author; and me.
It was a spirited discussion, to say the least.
by Fred Klonsky
Tim Furman asks forgiveness for the framing of his video work. But what is missing in the frame is made up by the message: These north suburban teachers in Niles West Local 1274 have the Local #1′s back.
by Fred Klonsky
[CHORUS]
Homey I was taught by a Chicago teacher!
Chicago teacher, Chicago teacher!
I learned to read and write from a Chicago teacher,
So I’m inspired by the fight from our Chicago teachers!
[RODSTARZ VERSE]
The teachers are tired, the students dumbfounded,
the budgets get cut so classes are overcrowded.
by David Dayen
AFT President, Randi Weingarten (Wikipedia)
AFT President Randi Weingarten’s
op-ed for USA Today makes the overlooked point that Chicago teachers are striking, not necessarily for better pay as it has been claimed in most of the traditional media (complete with haughty stories about those
lucky duckie rich teachers), but for better schools.
The issues that teachers are fighting for go to the heart of improving Chicago’s public schools. Chicago has had 15 years of mayoral control, and it hasn’t helped improve our schools. Today,
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is negotiating with striking teachers, who are a key part of his — and the president's — constituency. Meanwhile, he's tasked with raising money for Priorities USA Action, the superPAC supporting President Obama. It seems that this election season, Emanuel has his hands full and his feet on a high wire.
At the center of the Chicago teachers' strike are Mayor Rahm Emanuel and the head of the teachers' union, Karen Lewis. To learn more about Lewis and the relationship between the teachers' union and the mayor's office, Audie Cornish talks to Joel Hood, education reporter at the Chicago Tribune.
by Fred Klonsky
Far-right activists as well as even a few mainstream journalists have made wild claims about how much Chicago’s teachers earn. Nightline’s Terry Moran even claimed that the Chicago Teachers Union is doing “much damage” to the profession by striking, and then went on to say that teachers in the city earn an average of $74,000.
That just isn’t true. To fact check this claim, I went to the best source available to the public: the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). The BLS has data from May 2011 for the Chicago metropolitan
by dianerav
An article that appeared in “In These Times” describes the school where Mayor Rahm Emanuel sends his children. It is the University of Chicago Lab School. President Obama chose it for his girls when he lived in Chicago. Arne Duncan is a graduate.
It is a wonderful progressive school, originally founded by John Dewey. It has small classes, a broad and rich curriculum, wonderful facilities, a beautiful library, seven full-time arts teachers for a student body of 1,700 students, and a lovely campus.
This is from the article:
by Dave Johnson
Teachers in Chicago are on strike. You will hear from the usual anti-government, anti-union crowd that this is another instance of greedy public employees trying to get more money, but that is just wrong and here's why.
The teachers say they are fighting for smaller class sizes, investments in neighborhood schools and additionalservices for students -- fighting for the tools they need to succeed. For so long school districts have been cutting budgets and then blaming the teachers when the students don't do as well.
Chicago teachers have been in negotiations since late 2011, fighting for many important things including art and music classes, playgrounds, libraries (160 schools in Chicago have no libraries and the city has cut back on
by Fred Klonsky
Following the morning picket lines, the CTU dispersed the afternoon rallies to Chicago’s neighborhoods today.
One at Dyett High School on the south side at 51st and King.
One on the south west side at Kelly High School, Archer and California.
And one on the west side on Marshall High School, Kedzie and Jackson. That’s where I went.
Thousands marched just a few blocks from where the Reverend Martin Luther King lived during his Chicago open housing campaign in 1966.
It's day three of the Chicago teachers strike, and now the teachers union and school system management are agreed that a contract agreement is
not imminent. With the strike looking likely to continue, the SEIU local that represents custodians in some of the city's schools has
filed a strike notice so that janitors can honor teachers' picket lines.
Management's strategy, as displayed in every public statement school system representatives make, is to simply try to make the teachers look recalcitrant and selfish—the unelected school board president described negotiations as "silly season," saying it's "time to get serious," both insults to teachers giving up their paychecks precisely because this is so serious. The union's description of negotiations was
a little different:
THEIR FIGHT IS OUR FIGHT!
Find Out How You Can Help Teachers As Strike Enters 3rd Day |
|
TOP 5 WAYS YOU CAN HELP: |
1. Volunteer at Strike Headquarters with the Chicago Teachers Solidarity Campaign!
Volunteers are currently needed from 8:00am-11am and 11am-3pm.
Contact Luke at 872-223-8415 to volunteer.
Sign up to receive text messages from CTSC by texting @ctsc2012 to 23559.
2. Can't make it to the headquarters or the daily rallies?
Help energize the teachers and volunteers by feeding them! Call Promo's Pizza at 312-243-1052 (preferably not during rush hours 11:45-1:15) to donate funds to send pizza, pasta, and salad to strike headquarters. Just like in Madison last year, donations have been coming in from across the country!
3. Show your Solidarity!
-Pick up window and yard signs to show solidarity at your home and purchase a Chicago Teachers Solidarity Campaign t-shirt at 300 S. Ashland. Wear your shirt or other red clothing to show solidarity with teachers. Proceeds go to the CTSC.
4. Attend daily pickets rallies and marches with striking teachers to show solidarity.
-Join teachers picketing CPS each morning at 125 S. Clark Street
-Support your community school teachers by joining their daily picket 6:30am-10:30am.
Find out more info on marches
5. Call Mayor Emanuel and CPS CEO Brizardexpressing your support for small class sizes, resources like libraries and arts for all schools, and a fair contract for teachers.
Mayor Emanuel: 312-744-330
CEO Brizard: 773-553-1500
|
|
|
|
Action Now President Michelle Young Speaks Out For Teachers;
Members Join Huge Rally!
 On the morning of September 10, 2012, the first day of the Chicago teacher's strike, Action Now President Michelle Young spoke at a press conference held by the Grassroots Collaborative outside of CPS Headquarters to voice community support for striking Chicago public school teachers. Later in the day, Action Now members joined ten of thousands of others in a massive rally to support Chicago teachers that were striking for a fair contract and better schools!
Below is Michelle's speech, which expresses why Action Now sees the Chicago teachers' fight as a fight for us all:
 |
| Amazing rally on Monday! |
"Good morning, my name is Michelle Young and I am the President of Action Now, Vice President of the LSC at May Elementary and a proud parent of a student in Chicago Public Schools. I stand in solidarity with the Chicago Teachers Union because I understand that they are fighting for my children, plain and simple. Yes, the strike may be disruptive, but we have to interrupt this unfair system in order to fight for justice and the schools our children deserve.
 The truth is, CPS's policies disrupt the education process more than anything else! On Mayor Emanuel's watch CPS has starved schools for resources, leaving 160 without libraries, and many schools with large class sizes, no air-conditioning and no wrap-around services. How can our children learn under those conditions?! What kind of world-class city allows this to happen?! The Board says it  can't afford to give teachers a raise or to give our schools the resources they need. That is a bold faced lie, because they seemed to be able to find $25 million to spend on a "strike contingency plan" and $70 million on charter schools. It is clear to me that MY child is not high on their priority list.
Enough with the disrespect! The Chicago Board of Education needs to stop ignoring the voices of parents, students and teachers! I fully support the Chicago Teacher's Union and stand with them as they stand up for what is right. I'll see you on the picket lines!"
Links to good articles covering the strike:
Click here to see short videos of Michelle Young's speech on FOX News and the Associated Press! |
|
|
by dianerav
By Randi Weingarten
Updated 14h 14m ago
I've spent a lot of time talking to Chicago's teachers. What they want more than anything are the tools and conditions to do their jobs and help all students succeed.
By Scott Olson, Getty Images
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, addresses a rally in Chicago on Tuesday.
By Scott Olson, Getty Images
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, addresses a rally in Chicago on Tuesday.
Sponsored Links
Mayor Rahm Emanuel came into office wanting to make major changes in Chicago's schools, and he wanted to do it quickly. For reform to work, changes must be done collaboratively and correctly, not just quickly. Chicago's teachers want to be treated as equal partners in this effort.
The issues that teachers are fighting for go to the heart of improving Chicago's public schools. Chicago has had 15 years of mayoral control, and it hasn't helped improve our schools. Today, 42% of neighborhood elementary schools are not funded for a full-time art or music
by Anthony Cody
Follow me on
Twitter at @AnthonyCody
The strike by Chicago teachers is reminding all of us of the reason we have unions, and the reason why they are so feared and hated by those who are in command. The ability of these 29,000 teachers to act as one, to withhold their labor, gives them a power far mightier than the sum of their parts. So long as they stay unified, and have the support of parents in their community and others across the nation, they will prevail.
Unions don't just exist to handle grievances and negotiate contracts. Unions are here to give members leverage. The strength of that leverage depends on our capacity and willingness to strike. Over the past two decades, as
by Fred Klonsky
Click on drawing to enlarge.
by Dean Baker
Since the Chicago school teachers went out on strike Monday, many political figures have tried to convince the public that their $70,000 average annual pay is excessive. This is peculiar, since many of the same people had been arguing that the families earning over $250,000, who would be subject to higher tax rates under President Obama’s tax proposal, are actually part of the struggling middle class. They now want to convince us that a household with two Chicago public school teachers, who together earn less than 60 percent of President Obama’s cutoff, have more money than they should.
Anyhow, if we want to assess whether someone is getting too much money, we always have to ask the follow-up question, compared to what? Here are a few comparisons that I have found useful.
Source: Author’s calculations, see text.
The first comparison number is the annualized pay that Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel got for a 14-month
stint as a director at Freddie Mac. President Clinton appointed him as a director shortly after he left the
by By MONICA DAVEY and STEVEN YACCINO
Negotiations are to begin late Wednesday morning, but there is no indication that a resolution is near.
by Kim Petersen
For anyone in doubt about the anti-progressivist agenda of president Barack Obama need one look further than the situation currently transpiring with education in Chicago where the teachers have gone
on strike?
Rahm Emanuel, Obama’s first chief of staff in the White House and now mayor of Chicago, is implementing a neoliberal model of education in a city that quintessentially captures Obama’s rightward orientation. After all, Chicago is Obama’s “
stomping grounds.” What happens in Chicago reflects on Obama whether he chooses to act, speak, or do nothing. Of course, sitting on the sidelines during an assault on working conditions for teachers is an option for Obama, but it is an option that reflects on Obama. Foremost, sitting silently on the sidelines is usually not an attribute that reflects well on people who pose as leaders because being on the sidelines is by
As a progressive, I continue to be frustrated with the ideological split in our country’s governing bodies that seems to be preventing them from addressing key issues that will help us move forward as a society. But as not a particularly partisan one, I always try to appreciate the positions and underlying world view of more conservative comrades on the other side of our current dysfunctional divide.
