Lewis writes: "As we continue to bargain in good faith, we stand in solidarity with parents, clergy and community-based organizations who are advocating for smaller class sizes, a better school day and an elected school board."
Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis, right, tells reporters at a news conference outside the union's headquarters that the city's 25,000 public school teachers will walk the picket line. (photo: Sitthixay Ditthavong/AP)
Why We're Striking in Chicago
11 September 12
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Teachers, paraprofessionals and school clinicians in Chicago have been without a labor agreement since June of this year. Following the inability of the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) and the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) to reach an agreement over benefits, the role of standardized tests in teacher evaluations, and physical improvements to schools that teachers say are harming both teacher and student performance, the CTU has announced that a city-wide stirke will begin today - the first teachers strike in 25 years. Pickets are expected at 675 schools and the Board of Education. The following are remarks from CTU President Karen Lewis.
egotiations have been intense but productive, however we have failed to reach an agreement that will prevent a labor strike. This is a difficult decision and one we hoped we could avoid. Throughout these negotiations have I remained hopeful but determined. We must do things differently in this city if we are to provide our students with the education they so rightfully deserve.
Talks have been productive in many areas. We have successfully won concessions for nursing mothers and have put more than 500 of our members back to work. We have restored some of the art, music, world language, technology and physical education classes to many of our students. The Board also agreed that we will now have textbooks on the first day of school rather than have our students and teachers wait up to six weeks before receiving instructional materials.
Recognizing the Board's fiscal woes, we are not far apart on compensation. However, we are apart on benefits. We want to maintain the existing health benefits.
Another concern is evaluation procedures. After the initial phase-in of the new evaluation system it could result in 6,000 teachers (or nearly 30 percent of our members) being discharged within one or two years. This is unacceptable. We are also concerned that too much of the new evaluations will be based on students' standardized test scores. This is no way to measure the effectiveness of an educator. Further there are too many factors beyond our control which impact how well some students perform on standardized tests such as poverty, exposure to violence, homelessness, hunger and other social issues beyond our control.
We want job security. Despite a new curriculum and new, stringent evaluation system, CPS proposes no increase (or even decreases) in teacher training. This is notable because our Union through our Quest Center is at the forefront teacher professional development in Illinois. We have been lauded by the District and our colleagues across the country for our extensive teacher training programs that helped emerging teachers strengthen their craft and increased the number of nationally board certified educators.
We are demanding a reasonable timetable for the installation of air-conditioning in student classrooms - a sweltering, 98-degree classroom is not a productive learning environment for children. This type of environment is unacceptable for our members and all school personnel. A lack of climate control is unacceptable to our parents.
As we continue to bargain in good faith, we stand in solidarity with parents, clergy and community-based organizations who are advocating for smaller class sizes, a better school day and an elected school board. Class size matters. It matters to parents. In the third largest school district in Illinois there are only 350 social workers-putting their caseloads at nearly 1,000 students each. We join them in their call for more social workers, counselors, audio/visual and hearing technicians and school nurses. Our children are exposed to unprecedented levels of neighborhood violence and other social issues, so the fight for wraparound services is critically important to all of us. Our members will continue to support this ground swell of parent activism and grassroots engagement on these issues. And we hope the Board will not shut these voices out.
While new Illinois law prohibits us from striking over the recall of laid-off teachers and compensation for a longer school year, we do not intend to sign an agreement until these matters are addressed.
Again, we are committed to staying at the table until a contract is place. However, in the morning no CTU member will be inside our schools. We will walk the picket lines. We will talk to parents. We will talk to clergy. We will talk to the community. We will talk to anyone who will listen-we demand a fair contract today, we demand a fair contract now. And, until there is one in place that our members accept, we will on the line.
We stand in solidarity with our brothers and sisters throughout the state and country who are currently bargaining for their own fair contracts. We stand with those who have already declared they too are prepared to strike, in the best interests of their students.
This announcement is made now so our parents and community are empowered with this knowledge and will know that schools will not open on tomorrow. Please seek alternative care for your children. And, we ask all of you to join us in our education justice fight-for a fair contract-and call on the mayor and CEO Brizard to settle this matter now. Thank you.
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In all of the cases I could find of cops being convicted and sent to prison for murder, the victim was white. But none of them were killed in prison.
Nobody will do any research on it, just keep on quoting Anderson Cooper and the grinning -- excuse me, GRIEVING -- parents about "Sandy Hook".
It's just sickening.
http://www.sandyhookjustice.com/
You can't rely on government officials or propaganda organs like CNN to be telling the truth since 9/11 and Saddam Hussein's WMDs. They have an agenda and it is not in the best interests of your liberty, truth, or justice to accept uncritically the version of events they are propagating.
My wife was a pediatric critical care nurse in Oakland, CA for almost 2 decades, and the thought of all those children, shot and bleeding out without any emergency medical professionals being permitted to try to save some is both heartbreaking and shocking.
Finally, more than an hour after police knew the shooter was dead, the Medical Examiner's Staff went in and simply declared each and every one of them dead.
The police knew the shooter was dead within 10 minutes of first arriving on the scene. The school was taken off lockdown and the children allegedly evacuated within a half hour. And yet, medical workers were not granted access.
That is troubling, especially to anyone who has experience in emergency medical care.
The police considered the scene secure enough to let hundreds of children walk down the halls, out of the building, through the parking lot and down the street, and yet refused to let medical staff in.
At the Aurora Theater scene, EMTs were allowed in even while the police were searching for the shooter's accomplice that many witness/survivo rs reported seeing.
For that matter, why are there no photos or videos of these hundreds of children walking to the Fire Station?
We all saw the one famous photo of a dozen or so kids in the parking lot, but that's all.
"Why do Americans always" believe whatever the corporate media tell them to believe?
Thank you!
I have another question. Why do so many of these comments sections have comment rating numbers that don't show how many pluses and minuses, but only the running total?
Totally ignoring the police gang murder of an innocent, unarmed man who was not breaking the law--and the fixed grand jury that refused to indict the killer cops.
And ignoring that raging injustice could set off extreme anger.
When the grand jury refused to act, I knew they were going to get cops hurt or killed. And they did.
Time to face the music. Bad cops have ignited national rage.
And NYPD and Giuliani, don't castigate the public or protestors as the enemy. You are just making the situation worse--and shredding any semblance of respect we once had for you.
fredboy, your posting is a good example of what our problem is in this country.In the 2nd paragraph you say he wasn't breaking te law but he had multiple priors for the same infraction...se lling loosies. And for the grand jury to act, they would had to find them at fault and they didn't.
Then you call it a raging injustice. Well if you start with that extreme anger, and the grand jury didn't, it follows that you would presume injustice and would only see what you wanted to see. And calling it racism stokes the flames even higher. I could ask why there isn't any uproar over Dillon Taylor, an unarmed white boy shot & killed by a black cop in Utah. That cop wasn't indicted either. The real problem isn't race but that we put guns in the hands of cops and depend on them to keep the law using their own judgement. You can mitigate this problem but it will not disappear because of the poor gun control in this country. And cops don't take chances. I remember a plumber being shot & killed by police when he crawled out from under a house where he was working. OOPS wrong guy.
My father fought against fascism in WWII. I'm sure as hell not going to start supporting it now.
Since there weren't, you're just hyping your fantasy.
These are not a "recent spate of killings." I find no evidence that the rate of police killing people (specifically black males) has increased this year. For some reason, the corporate media has made them "news" this year, and that is an interesting phenomena.
The Zimmerman case was not a police killing. Still, though many of us feel that the case was bungled, and justice was not served, there were not the types of protests you berate after the verdict.
I agree with your comments about actual trials but disagree that people would be satisfied with anything other than conviction. I brought up the Zimmerman case because protesters are still calling it no justice (as you just did). I'm not sure what you mean by "hyping my fantasy." All I said was that people are calling for justice but will not be satisfied with anything less than conviction and they should say what they mean.
That is hyping your fantasy.
They are trained to shot and kill. I think it is time to reevaluate that training along with teaching them not to draw their gun unnecessarily. If they are too scared to be in their assigned location without a gun in hand, they should not be cops.
The roots of the problems here go back generations, not months, and tracing those roots would take more time and space than is allowed here. It comes from the divisiveness inherent in the 'us versus them' that is the core of the issues at this time. And the disintegration of the application of the law even handedly to all citizens, regardless of color or economic status.
What most of the people are missing, who line up with the position that the police are justified in shooting blacks - or anyone, for that matter - when they are unarmed, is that they are afraid of the real possibility that if this 'us versus them' mentality continues, it will not neglect them, either. They won't be immune to such sanctioned violence. This is the potential end result of the degradation of our rights under the Constitution and Bill or Rights. These rights of citizens apply to all of us; white, black, anyone - or they can be abrogated at will by anyone who has been given the power to do so. As the police are who swore their oaths to 'defend and protect'; as the NSA, CIA, FBI, SCOTUS, Congress, and the Administration swore the same oaths.
This divisiveness enhanced by 'security' excuses that override the oaths, will destroy our democracy. Is doing so. Remember.
Wow. Ugly. But reality of history often looks that way when brought into the present.
And who was it that first said that those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it?
Any aliens who show up in invisible starships to assess humanity's suitability to be allowed out into the rest of the galaxy would most likely conclude that we should be contained on this one planet to see if we manage to avoid self-destructio n from sheer willful stupidity. That's assuming such aliens don't have a vested interest in helping us along to said self-destructio n. Who knows?
Also must cops are veterans taught to shoot first and think later in Basic Training video games