Not a good look for the Mayor. A summer full of shooting and killing and now the first teacher's strike in 25 years, in the country’s third-largest public school system.
More than 26,000 teachers and support staff began hitting the picket lines Monday morning, while the school district and parents made plans for keeping students safe and occupied during the day. Nearly 150 schools will be open for a half day, as will 60 churches. The Chicago Park District and the YMCA will offer day-camps.
CPS went into full-on strike mode Monday, enacting a plan to keep schools open from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. And after a violent Chicago summer, police Supt. Garry McCarthy said he’s “emptying our offices” to patrol the thousands of unsupervised kids on the streets.
After a weekend of unsuccessful 11th hour contract negotiations, the Chicago Teachers Union made good on its promise to walk out on more than 400,000 students at 675 schools. Issues preventing a deal Sunday night were health benefits, the teacher evaluation system and job security.
The strike follows more than a year of slow, contentious negotiations, after the school board unanimously voted last year to cancel teachers’ 4 percent pay hike in the final year of their contract. Source
CPS went into full-on strike mode Monday, enacting a plan to keep schools open from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. And after a violent Chicago summer, police Supt. Garry McCarthy said he’s “emptying our offices” to patrol the thousands of unsupervised kids on the streets.
After a weekend of unsuccessful 11th hour contract negotiations, the Chicago Teachers Union made good on its promise to walk out on more than 400,000 students at 675 schools. Issues preventing a deal Sunday night were health benefits, the teacher evaluation system and job security.
The strike follows more than a year of slow, contentious negotiations, after the school board unanimously voted last year to cancel teachers’ 4 percent pay hike in the final year of their contract. Source
13 comments:
I have been following this matter and I say GO Rahm!
Pay package being offered is significant.
Hope they don't cave too much on the recall rights.
Cannot have it both ways -- parents and community cannot demand school improvement but then tie administrators hands as to whom to retain and/or hire (rehire).
The Union guy sounds beat up. I guess Rahm must be giving em' hell.
-- Elaine Hopkins said:
About that Chicago teacher's strike...don't be duped!
PEORIA -- Trying to decide how to interpret the Chicago teacher's strike? Read this:
It's a stunning indictment of the Democratic party and its anti-teacher, anti-union stances.
It makes me wonder if some of my friends, who have abandoned the traditional political parties, are right.
It somewhat explains what Gov. Pat Quinn is thinking, as he attacks teacher pensions and retiree benefits. (Though he may be a dupe of House majority leader Madigan, who wants his daughter, Lisa Madigan, to be governor.)
I believe the national Democratic party has fallen into a Republican trap -- a clever way to alienate the party from its union base of voters and workers.
It's the old divide and conquer routine, spiced with liberal helpings of money, a/k/a bribes. (Rep. Jehan Gordon, D-Peoria, got $100,000 in contributions from one of these anti-teacher groups, and voted to gut teacher benefits.)
Smart local Democrats won't fall for this tactic -- mindful of the old axiom that 'all politics is local.'
I'll continue to support Obama as the lesser of evils, but if Quinn and the rest continue alienating their natural constituencies, they will learn a hard lesson come election time!
Rahm hasn't done squat for Chicago.
neither have the teachers
I think Elaine has a (several) point. The desire to get rid of bad teachers might just backfire--the bad administrators just might get rid of all the good (and definitely experienced) teachers. Remember money is the bottom line for these administrators--experienced teachers are expensive.
I am hearing that District 150 has just hired an extraordinary number of first-year teachers. They might be willing to change (because they don't have to change--all new) but they, also, might be too naive to know when they are being misled.
Chicago is full of Democratic crooks.
They turned down a 16% raise over the next four years?!
I hope Rahm takes a page out of Reagan's book. Fire 'em.
smart. let's fire all of them. i am sure that they will be so easy to replace. not!
Anon, the theory is that anybody can do the job of a Chicago teacher b/c the students do not pass the test now. Therefore the teachers are not doing the job, so we should fire them and bring in better teachers. But like the theory of socialism, there is one glaring hole. There are no unemployed excellent teachers. So the quality will go down, but it will cost less and we can speed faster towards privatizing education.
As I have said to many people the media is very quick to put teachers in a bad light. They are striking due to teacher evaluations and class size. I love how so many people think that anyone can walk into any classroom and teach. Good luck living in your dream world because most people would be crazy if they saw what I had to do everyday and put up with and most of which is not even from students. Teachers are expected to be parents, counselors, social workers, parenting coaches and much more. Some how we are supposed to teach and raise test scores but given very little if any support on how to do that. We are told just get it done and that is without supplies and even text books. Be careful how you judge.
I just finished watching Tony Danza on yesterday's "The View." His support of teachers (having just had his first teaching experience) was tremendous. He explained why the evaluation system is unfair--in support of Chicago teachers and all teachers. He has just wrote a book about teaching--apologizing to all his former teachers. By the way, he loved his teaching gig, but verbalized all the things we talk about on the blog about the stresses of teaching today, etc.
That would be has just "written" a book--too embarrassing for me to overlook. :)
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