Chalkbeat

JB Pritzker’s education record earns him key reelection endorsement from Illinois teachers union

2026-08-17T22:44:20+00:00

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Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who is seeking reelection this November, received a key endorsement on his education policies from the state’s largest union this week.

Monday’s announcement marks the third time the Illinois Education Association, which represents more than 135,000 teachers, professors, and support staff statewide, has endorsed Pritzker for governor. The Illinois Federation of Teachers — the other statewide teachers union and the parent organization to the Chicago Teachers Union — has yet to make an endorsement in the race.

The IEA’s endorsement comes at an important crossroads for Pritzker, as two closely watched education issues loom over the final months of his second term.

“This governor is on the right side of history, which means a better future for public education in Illinois,” said IEA president Karl Goeke, citing Pritzker’s policies on minimum teacher salary raises, preventing book bans, and restricting cellphones in schools.

The first issue for Pritzker, who has championed public schools, is whether Illinois will opt into the Trump administration’s federal tax credit scholarship program by the end of the year. Starting in 2027, individuals can donate up to $1,700 to specific education nonprofits and be reimbursed by the federal government. Governors have the sole responsibility for deciding whether their states will participate, although their ability to mold programs to their liking seems increasingly unlikely.

Pritzker hasn’t indicated publicly whether Illinois will participate, although text messages obtained by the Chicago Tribune signaled he was wary of the program earlier this year. So far, Colorado Gov. Jared Polis is the only Democrat to have opted his state into the program, although a handful of other Democratic governors have said they intend to opt in.

The other problem facing Illinois’ governor is how to respond to the Chicago Board of Education’s demand for $150 million additional state dollars to fill the district’s budget deficit during the upcoming veto session. Chicago’s school board voted to pass a budget that assumes it will receive that funding last month, but the request faces an uphill battle to get approval from state lawmakers and Pritzker.

Pritzker’s name has also circulated in the past year as a possible contender in the 2028 presidential race. Education remains a core point of contention across the country, meaning Pritzker’s record on Illinois schools could wind up on the national stage.

Facing off against Pritzker in his bid for reelection is Darren Bailey, a former Republican state lawmaker. This is the second time voters will see this matchup on their ballots, as Pritzker handily defeated Bailey in 2022 to win his second term as governor.

This story has been updated to include mention of the Illinois Federation of Teachers.

Makiya Seminera is a reporter covering how the state and federal government affect education in Chicago and across Illinois. Contact Makiya at mseminera@chalkbeat.org.

Firms linked to 2 men convicted of public corruption have gotten campaign business from JB Pritzker and the CTU

2026-08-11T22:04:41+00:00

This story was originally published by the Illinois Answers Project.

Two political campaign firms with close ties to men with public corruption convictions have gotten business in recent years in Chicago and statewide political races, including the current, hotly contested race for Chicago School Board president and more than $1.5 million from Gov. JB Pritzker in his gubernatorial campaigns, records show.

In the governor’s campaigns, about $1.2 million went to a firm formed by a former Illinois Department of Children and Family Services deputy director, Bamani Obadele, who pleaded guilty in 2010 to a state contracting scheme under former Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Obadele was sentenced to six months in jail and ordered to repay more than $80,000.

Pritzker’s gubernatorial campaigns also spent more than $420,000 with the firm tied to Isaac “Ike” Carothers, a former Chicago City Council member who pleaded guilty in 2010 to taking $40,000 in home improvements from a developer who wanted to build homes in an industrial area in Carothers’ 29th Ward on the West Side.

In the school board race, the Chicago Teachers Union has spent more than $36,000 with the two firms and a company tied to a campaign worker, Karina Escobar-Perez, who pleaded guilty last year to forging signatures on campaign petitions in Indiana for the presidential race. The CTU work was for the campaign of Hilario Dominguez, whom the teachers union endorsed in June for school board president in a five-way race.

Dominguez’ campaign has reported $99,500 in contributions as of its latest filings, on Aug. 5. All of that was in-kind contributions from the CTU, and about one-third was to firms linked to Obadele, Carothers and Escobar-Perez.

The CTU’s political organization has used Carothers’ and Obadele’s firms in other school board races, and all three companies have done extensive work in other political races.

The Dominguez campaign did not respond to questions about the firms.

The governor’s campaign did not answer questions about Obadele’s and Carothers’ work but said: “The campaign hires consultants who are experienced and well-known organizers in their communities.”

A CTU spokesperson said the people and groups they contracted with as “vendors are the same as those hired by Gov. Pritzker, Rep. [Margaret] Croke, and numerous other candidates.” In her statement, she didn’t explain those choices, focusing instead on their endorsed candidates: “What voters should know about the candidates we are supporting is that they will be the fiercest advocates for Chicago’s children instead of administrators of unnecessary cuts to their education.”

Pritzker is seeking reelection this year, again running against Republican Darren Bailey, whom he defeated by more than 12 percentage points in 2022. In 2018, Pritzker defeated incumbent Gov. Bruce Rauner by more than 15 percentage points.

Pritzker, who was among contenders to be Kamala Harris’ 2024 vice presidential running mate, has been attending political events across the country amid speculation he might run for president in 2028.

Obadele is president and director of Goshen Impact Solutions, according to state records. He admitted in federal court that in 2004 and 2005, when he was at DCFS, he steered contractors working for the state agency to buy promotional items from a company he owned and overcharged them, using proceeds for personal expenses, including an all-expenses-paid vacation for himself and friends to Jamaica.

Separately, he admitted having generated business for a company whose board he sat on by telling DCFS contractors to hire the firm.

Records show Pritzker’s campaign paid Obadele’s firm more than $1 million during the 2022 election, though that spending appears to have escaped notice during the last election. So far, in the governor’s race, the campaign has spent $76,000 with the company, state records show.

Since 2015, just under half of all the state and local campaign cash that went to Obadele’s firm came from Pritzker’s campaign organization. Pritzker started using Obadele’s firm in 2022.

The CTU spent more than $16,000 with Obadele’s firm for work on behalf of Dominguez’s campaign. The union also gave his firm $5,250 for work related to Katherine Dunneback’s campaign in school board District 9b. The union endorsed Dunneback and a slate of other school board candidates in July.

In 2018, Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul came under scrutiny for spending $13,000 with Obadele for campaign work.

Obadele said his work on campaigns includes a variety of get-out-the-vote efforts across the South Side and elsewhere in Cook County. “I have done this the past 15 years with fidelity,” he wrote in response to questions.

In a written statement in response to questions, Obadele defended the work he’s done: “I’m neither ashamed nor proud of my past conviction. I paid my debt to society and have remained committed to pushing forward in a positive and impactful way. Since then, I have built and operated a successful professional business … This work has provided hundreds of individuals, including those who face barriers to employment. I stand for and believe in second chances and the importance of allowing people who have also paid their debt to society to receive the same opportunities I too was given.”

Obadele is also the “community and civic engagement director” for Acclivus Inc., a community health organization focused on violence prevention that has had dozens of state contracts in recent years worth more than $100 million, including $16 million in contracts for this fiscal year with the Illinois Department of Human Services and the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity.

Obadele said he doesn’t run Acclivus and that he’s proud to work there because of the anti-violence work it does in Chicago.

“My role there is to oversee community engagement and workforce development,” he wrote.

The governor’s office wouldn’t comment.

Sheila Regan, the chief operating officer for Acclivus, said, “It’s unclear what connection could be made between Obadele’s campaign work and Acclivus grants because there is no relationship between them.

“All state grants to Acclivus have been awarded in alignment with state law, primarily via competitive grant processes,” she said.

Obadele’s campaign business has also worked for Mayor Brandon Johnson, Ald. Pat Dowell, Rep. Kam Buckner, Croke and a Pritzker-backed group that campaigned unsuccessfully for a graduated income tax in 2020.

Another firm, Senior Wizdom Consulting (which is listed under various spellings in election records), is closely tied to Carothers and was paid more than $366,000 by Pritzker’s gubernatorial campaign in 2022 for “strategic field consulting” and has already made $55,000 for work done for the governor this year.

Carothers was indicted in 2009 over taking home improvements and sporting tickets from a developer who wanted to build homes at Galewood Yards, partly in Carothers’ ward. Carothers wore a wire to help the federal government in other investigations before being sentenced to 28 months in federal prison. He also admitted in his plea agreement that he took cash payments from two other individuals looking to develop property in his ward and another person who wanted to run carnivals there and needed city permits.

It appears that Pritzker is Carothers’ largest client for state and local campaign work, accounting for nearly half of all of Carothers’ campaign work in state disclosures since 2015, although a precise figure is difficult to determine given the various spellings of the company’s name.

Senior Wizdom also received $11,600 from the CTU to help the Dominguez campaign. As for CTU, records show the union paid Carothers’ firm at least $47,000 since 2023, including to work on Johnson’s mayoral campaign. It also paid Carothers’ firm $3,920 this summer to support Michilla Blaise, the CTU-endorsed candidate in the District 5b Chicago School Board race.

While dozens of Chicago City Council members have gone to prison, Carothers has the distinction of following in the footsteps of his father, former Ald. William Carothers, who also went to prison in a political corruption scandal.

Campaign records indicate Carothers has had dozens of other clients over that time as well, including former Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, state Senate President Don Harmon, D-Oak Park, and several Cook County judges.

Carothers could not be reached for comment.

A third consulting firm, Moving Forward Strategies, received $8,250 for work on Dominguez’ campaign. The union also reported $10,000 paid to the firm earlier this year. According to state records, the business is run by Escobar-Perez, a Chicago-area campaign operative.

In 2025, Escobar-Perez was charged with forging signatures on behalf of a 2024 presidential candidate named Dean Phillips in Indiana. She pleaded guilty to a felony for the forgeries and was sentenced to a year in prison and a year of probation. Escobar-Perez served one day in custody, and the prison sentence was suspended. Indiana court records show she owes more than $1,100 in fees and fines.

Escobar-Perez and two companies linked to her have taken in more than $400,000 for campaign-related work since 2020, most of which was from before she was charged. Since Escobar-Perez’ plea deal, the CTU has been one of Moving Forward Strategies’ largest clients.

Escobar-Perez did not return a written request for comment but told a police investigator she felt pressured to turn in the Indiana campaign petitions within a five-day deadline, according to a police report.

15 more Chicago campuses join Sustainable Community Schools program

2026-08-03T22:05:41+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools will open 15 more Sustainable Community Schools this upcoming school year, meaning roughly 10% of district schools will receive extra funding to partner with nonprofit organizations and provide wraparound support for students and families.

Mayor Brandon Johnson announced the expansion Monday morning at Malcolm X College, where he was joined by allied Chicago Board of Education members, Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates, and several educators whose schools are part of the program or are joining this year.

There are now 51 schools in the program, which CPS launched in 2018 with the CTU. A Chalkbeat analysis last year found the schools have mixed outcomes and have left millions of dollars unspent. The district’s contract with the union requires 70 schools to join the initiative by the end of its contract in 2028. Of the city’s roughly 630 public schools, which includes charters and others run by independent operators, 520 are run by the district.

Schools in the program receive $500,000 annually to work with a community-based organization and provide extra programming and support for students and parents, such as hiring more mental health professionals. Schools must apply to join.

Johnson said the expansion connects to his vision of creating more resources for communities, such as more affordable housing and “holistic solutions” to violence.

“This model provides more than an education,” he said. “It is the hub of wraparound, academic, and social support that’s extended to the entire community.”

The expansion is a sign that the “days of school closures, consolidation, and privatization has ended officially,” Johnson added — a potential nod to candidates for school board he doesn’t align with, who may be interested in closing schools in response to CPS’s dipping enrollment.

District officials, the union, and school leaders have described the program as a godsend for schools with lots of students from low-income families. The office that oversees the Sustainable Community Schools program is slated to spend about 57% more than it budgeted last year, from about $24.6 million to $38.6 million, according to the district’s latest budget book.

But since the program’s launch, schools and their partner organizations have left more than $6.6 million unspent, according to a Chalkbeat analysis last December. Chalkbeat also found that internal tensions and staff turnover sometimes strained partnerships between schools and nonprofit organizations.

Student outcomes are mixed. Schools that originally joined the program now have higher graduation rates than schools that didn’t get into the program. Suspensions dropped among all schools in the program, as they did at similar schools outside the program. But chronic absenteeism is higher, and enrollment is lower, at participating schools.

To combat some of these challenges, CPS changed how schools join the program, said Megan Hougard, chief of college and career success at CPS.

Previously, schools and organizations did not meet before schools applied, she said.

This year, CPS expanded the list of nonprofits that schools can partner with. Interested schools then met with the organizations, picked which one to work with, and applied together, Hougard said.

Now, she said, “there’s shared expectations, and then there’s just a checkpoint of, ‘Is this the right match?’”

One of the new schools in the program is Gage Park High School on the Southwest Side. Mike Norwood, a physical education teacher at Gage Parktold the crowd at Malcolm X that he “almost started crying” when his principal told him the 300-student school had been selected. He said the school has a strong environment but “needed a miracle” to help boost resources for its neediest students.

The opportunity will allow the school, which is partnering with the Southwest Organizing Project, to create more clubs and activities for kids, such as job training, he said.

“It takes a village to raise a child,” he said. “Now, it takes a school to raise a community.”

Becky Vevea contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools’ lunchroom staff move closer to strike

2026-07-30T23:21:56+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools’ lunchroom workers are taking steps toward a possible strike, their union announced Thursday.

Unite Here Local 1 delivered a letter to the school district Thursday asking to start a fact-finding process in its year-long contract negotiations. In that process, a fact-finder that’s a third party reviews each side’s argument and issues their findings. According to state law, school district workers can’t go on strike until at least 30 days after a fact-finding report has been publicly released.

The escalation comes as the school board is poised to vote on the district’s nearly $10 billion budget plan for the 2026-27 school year, which includes layoffs and other program cuts. Earlier this week, officials revised the plan to eliminate five furlough days for all staff.

A Chalkbeat analysis of the budget plan found lunchroom funds are poised to shrink slightly and some vacant lunchroom positions are set to be eliminated. Unite Here Local 1 represents roughly 1,800 lunch workers in CPS.

During remarks to the board on Thursday, Tawanda Murray, an executive board member of the union, highlighted a union survey of lunchroom workers last year that found 47% of respondents reported struggling to pay for housing, and 22% said their families rely on food pantries.

Last year, CPS reduced kitchen workers and told families that students would get more cold meals and simplified menus.

The union is pushing the district to raise pay for lunchroom workers to at least $40,000 annually and staff up school kitchens. In April, Chicago Police cited about two dozen lunchroom workers during a planned act of civil disobedience in order to raise awareness about its demands.

On Thursday, workers picketed outside of the Board of Education headquarters downtown in front of a giant inflatable rat, a longstanding feature of union rallies.

Jesse Hernandez, a cook at Columbia Explorers Academy, said he makes $24 an hour and has about $300 left in his paycheck after he pays his bills.

He said bartends on the weekends to make ends meet and wishes he had more time to spend with his grandchildren. He said he’s moving soon because he can’t afford his current apartment.

Hernandez said he’s prepared to go on strike in order to secure more pay for himself and his colleagues, adding that his coworkers who are lunchroom assistants are earning closer to $17 an hour.

“That’s why I’m here, fighting for them and for myself,” Hernandez said.

CPS did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Becky Vevea contributed reporting.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Union representing Chicago school support staff makes Board of Education endorsements

2026-07-23T21:03:39+00:00

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The union representing Chicago school support staff is splitting with the teachers union in its support of candidates in several key races, including school board president.

SEIU Illinois State Council announced Thursday morning its endorsing Jessica Biggs in the race to lead the first fully elected 21-member school board. The union already donated $10,000 to Biggs’ campaign last December. SEIU announced last week it would endorse more than a dozen candidates running as school board district representatives.

The SEIU’s endorsements diverge from the Chicago Teachers Union, which is backing their own political director Hilario Dominguez for school board president. That means two unions are backing opposing candidates in 10 school board races and are aligned on five.

The split between SEIU and CTU is significant: Both unions give money to their endorsed candidates and provide boots-on-the-ground to canvas, phone bank, and get out the vote. These endorsements also carry weight with union members when they vote. SEIU represents more than 16,000 CPS staff and more than 100,000 workers statewide. CTU represents 30,000 educators.

“Sometimes our interests align. Sometimes they don’t,” said Trumaine Reeves, executive vice president of SEIU Local 73, the chapter representing CPS support staff, including janitors, crossing guards, bus aides, and special education classroom assistants.

Reeves noted the alignment with CTU on candidates Ed Bannon, Ebony DeBerry, Norma Rio Sierra, Claudia Peralta, and Anusha Thotakura. He said choosing Biggs for the president role came down to her experience.

“She knows firsthand the impacts of the budget, how fully funding or underfunding at a school-based level impacts the school community. She lived it firsthand,” Reeves said. “We felt like out of the five candidates running, she’s the most qualified.”

Biggs is a current school board member representing parts of downtown and the south lakefront. She’s also an organizer with Southwest Organizing Project and has been since she was let go by CPS in 2018 from her job as principal of Burke Elementary. WBEZ reported her termination came after the Inspector General said she altered attendance data and allowed staff to transport students without proper paperwork.

Biggs, who has successfully appealed being placed on the CPS do-not-hire list, says she was targeted because she was a critic of the district’s move to privatize janitorial operations. SEIU represents school janitors and pushed CPS to end their agreement with Aramark in 2024, a decade after the initial privatization.

Tensions rose between SEIU and CTU in 2024 when the teachers union put a proposal on the table in bargaining that could’ve taken work away from SEIU members. It would’ve given CPS administrators the ability to use teacher assistants represented by the CTU and special education classroom assistants, or SECAs, represented by SEIU almost interchangeably.

Mayor Brandon Johnson won his seat in 2023 with the help of SEIU. But in 2025, that union’s support appeared to be waning. Johnson faces reelection in 2027.

On Wednesday, the CTU posted on social media to label Biggs as a candidate backed by billionaires and people who closed 50 schools in 2013. The union highlighted $17,300 in donations Biggs received last year from Michael Sacks, a donor to former Mayor Rahm Emanuel, as well as a $1,000 donation from David Vitale, who served as school board president in 2013, and $2,900 in donations from former CPS CEO Janice Jackson. Jackson was a high school principal in 2013.

CORRECTION: This article has been updated to note SEIU Local 73 represents school bus aides, not bus drivers.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Teachers and CTU tell Chicago Board of Education to reject proposed budget cuts, furloughs

2026-07-20T23:02:09+00:00

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More than a dozen teachers and their union pushed the Chicago Board of Education Monday to reject the district’s $9.88 billion budget proposal that includes all-staff furloughs and a spending freeze in the middle of this upcoming school year.

During one of two required budget hearings, teachers discussed how the district’s proposed budget — which also includes staff cuts to help close a $732.5 million deficit — would hurt them and their schools and would exacerbate problems that educators are already facing due to recent budget woes.

For example, a teacher in the Austin neighborhood said Monday that teachers across four grades at her school have already received layoff notices, meaning each of those grades would have just one teacher, and at least one class could have as many as 47 kids, based on current enrollment estimates, she said. That figure would violate the Chicago Teachers Union’s contract with the district.

Another teacher at Funston Elementary School in Logan Square said her school couldn’t get more custodial or pest control help as it dealt with a rodent infestation.

The comments during Monday’s hearing signal sharp tensions over a budget proposal that CPS revealed last week and wants its board to approve in ten days.

The Chicago Teachers Union estimates that the proposed furloughs, which would happen on staff professional development days, would mean a 2.3% pay cut for its members. The union has made two key demands: The state should hold a special legislative session and raise revenue for schools, and CPS should sue Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas for repeatedly late tax bills, which has meant late revenue that CPS and other school districts rely on.

In an interview with Chalkbeat Monday, CPS CEO Macquline King described her budget plan as “very painful.” Proposing furloughs was the hardest decision she and her team made, in part because they would happen on days meant for educators to improve their work with students, she said. King added that she hopes elected officials in a position to help CPS will consider the impact of furloughs when making decisions.

“What I do believe is really important is that there is a sense of urgency in order for Chicago Public Schools to make payroll in the fall,” King said to Chalkbeat. “We really need the budget to pass because ultimately we do not want to disrupt services to our students.”

Emila Zoko, acting CPS budget director, said furloughs and the mid-year spending freeze are “options of last resort” and avoidable if the district gets an additional $200 million in revenue, such as from special taxing district dollars from the city known as tax increment financing — or TIF — surplus. CPS is already assuming it will receive $200 million in TIF surplus in its budget proposal.

The district is already laying off more than 760 teachers and 800 paraprofessionals, most of whom the district expects to rehire at other schools with openings. Overall, the district, which employs about 37,000 people in schools, would cut a net total of 164 school-based employees. The district, where enrollment has declined, also laid off 162 central office and citywide employees earlier this month.

Still, the layoffs mean the neediest students may lose contact with an adult they have come to trust, staffers said during the hearing.

“Think about how this impacts our [unhoused] students — what happens when those people in their lives are not there to make sure they feel safe, secure, and thriving?” said Tiwanda Parker, a college and career coach who said she was laid off.

Board members legally have until the end of August to pass a budget, but district leaders want the board to adopt a plan by July 30. That’s because, in order to make up for late Cook County property tax revenue, CPS needs a few weeks to take out a short-term loan to pay for daily operations, including payroll, at the start of the school year, according to Wally Stock, acting chief financial officer. That process will require CPS to have an approved budget, Stock previously told the board.

CPS says it’s owed at least $250 million from the last round of late tax payments alone. Pappas’ office told the Chicago Tribune the figure is closer to $70 million or $80 million.

The district does not have cash to provide a cushion as it waits for the tax dollars, and in the last year, borrowing to fill the tax-revenue gap has cost CPS about $40 million in interest, Stock has said. On Monday, Stock said he is talking to the county on possibly getting access to an interest-free bridge loan that typically isn’t available to CPS, but even that wouldn’t be large enough to get the district through its bills from September to October.

Board of Education members focused on ways to raise more funding but diverged on how to get there.

For example, Che “Rhymefest” Smith, an elected board member, focused his questions during the hearing on how much more TIF dollars City Council and Mayor Brandon Johnson could send to CPS to avoid furloughs and a midyear spending freeze. Elected member Jitu Brown, however, said it’s not realistic to expect more TIF after receiving a record amount last year, and said the district should instead build in the possibility for more state funding.

Budget officials said their numbers are rooted in historical projections. CPS has received at least $200 million in TIF surplus dollars every year since 2023.

The budget proposal wouldn’t implement a spending freeze and furloughs until January, providing CPS leaders “a window of time” to attempt securing more revenue, Stock said.

CPS held a second budget hearing Monday evening. People can view it on the district’s YouTube channel.

Mila Koumpilova contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

CTU endorses 15 school board candidates, throwing weight behind incumbents, mayoral picks

2026-07-14T01:16:22+00:00

This story was published in partnership with WBEZ and the Chicago Sun-Times.

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The Chicago Teachers Union announced Monday it will endorse only 15 candidates in the upcoming school board race in which all 21 seats are up for election — a decision that could make it difficult for the union to hold onto its majority.

The union will back 10 incumbents who they supported in the election two years ago or were appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson. Johnson, a former organizer for the CTU, is an ally of the union.

Notably absent from their list of endorsements is Yesenia Lopez, who won in 2024 with the union’s endorsement, but occasionally voted independently of other CTU-aligned school board members over the past year and half.

CTU last month endorsed their political director Hilario Dominguez in the citywide race for school board president. There are four other people running for that seat.

In the six districts where the CTU did not endorse anyone, it was because the race had only one candidate or there’s no candidate aligned with the CTU.

One of the five non-incumbents getting CTU’s nod is Tameka Walton, who the union said is mounting a write-in campaign. Walton’s petition signatures were challenged and the Chicago Board of Elections is expected to make decisions on petition challenges Tuesday.

Angel L. Velez, the incumbent vice president of the board who was appointed by Johnson and filed to run for his seat in district 9a, also announced on social media last week that he did not have enough valid signatures to stay on the ballot. That leaves Brittany Bailey Preston, the wife of state Sen. Willie Preston, as the only candidate in the race.

Juan Rangel, the CEO of the Urban Center, a political action committee paying for many of the petition challenges, said Cydney Wallace, a Johnson appointee running in 8b is also expected to be removed from the ballot. CTU did not include Velez or Wallace in their endorsements.

The CTU has been seen as a politically powerful force, especially after getting Johnson elected, but it remains to be seen how much their endorsement matters.

In the first school board election in 2024, the union endorsed in all 10 races and only four of their candidates were victorious. Still, the union had a friendly school board because Johnson appointed 11 people, giving them enough backers to have a majority on the 21-member board.

CTU-backed candidates would have to win 11 races to hold onto a majority. The CTU’s two political action committees had a balance of less than $200,000 as of March 31, the last time quarterly filings were due. New reports are due out on Wednesday.

The union also boasts more than 30,000 members that can knock on doors and get out the vote, which will be important in the Nov. 3 election where turnout could be low.

Kimberly Walls-Kirk, chair of the CTU’s political action committee, says the union’s endorsements carry weight with voters because they trust teachers.

“I’m the parent of a child who graduated from a Chicago Public School. I’m a teacher in Chicago Public Schools,” she said. “So if I have a vision of what learning conditions look like for my child, then I, as a teacher, am one of the best people to endorse a candidate.”

A handful of other political action committees have already raised more than a million each and have already started donating money to candidates.

Rangel said he was surprised that the CTU wasn’t more organized as they approached this election. The Urban Center PAC is supported by centrist billionaires and pro-charter groups.

“The CTU has a reputation of having first-class, first-grade political operations, but I think they’ve been kind of sloppy on this this time around, and I’m not sure the exact reason why,” he said.

Dominguez, the CTU’s endorsed presidential candidate, blamed the lack of challengers in some races on the fact that it is a volunteer position that is essentially a full-time job, he said.

Andrew Broy, the president of the Illinois Network of Charter Schools, said that based on 2024 election results, the power of a CTU endorsement is a “mixed bag” — more helpful in some well-to-do or gentrifying areas such as the North Side and Logan Square, and less so on the Southwest and Northwest Side. Overall, he said, recent opinion polls suggest the union’s popularity has dipped.

“That might blunt the positive impact of a CTU endorsement,” Broy said.

Sarah Karp covers education for WBEZ. Follow her on X @WBEZeducation and @sskedreporter. Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools cut hundreds of custodian jobs last year. Staff say their schools are dirtier.

2026-05-11T10:00:00+00:00

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Last summer, as the district faced a massive budget deficit, Chicago Public Schools cut nearly 500 custodian positions, or close to one-fifth of full-time staffers who cleaned schools, and ended all private custodial contracts.

Then, three months into this school year, complaints rolled in through a district survey of 168 principals and 423 custodians: Three-quarters of principals indicated they didn’t have enough custodians on staff to meet their cleaning needs, and at least 40% asked the district for more staff. Nearly two-thirds of custodians said their tasks were difficult to manage given the size of their buildings and the number of people on their team.

The survey responses from late November, obtained by Chalkbeat through a Freedom of Information Act request, are a window into how the custodial staffing changes have impacted school cleanliness — and the potential challenges ahead in maintaining hygienic environments for kids and staff. Many custodians signaled that they were not equipped to clean schools well. Principals said they were picking up trash and cleaning spills or vomit. A few schools had new pest issues.

“It is so disappointing to observe the current state of custodial service and resource availability at our school, as it directly impacts our students’ well-being and basic dignity,” wrote one principal.

“I have never experienced anything like this in my 14 years in CPS,” they said.

Studies have shown links between school cleanliness or air quality, student health, and attendance. One study found that higher levels of contaminants on student desks were associated with student absences for gastrointestinal problems.

Some people are pushing for change now: SEIU Local 73, the union that represents CPS custodial workers, said the issues highlighted in the fall survey remain today, and it wants the district to hire more custodians.

But that’s a tall ask for a district that’s planning a budget with a $700 million deficit and may be looking at cuts to schools this year without any additional revenue.

The district, which as of April employed about 2,200 custodians, said that it took the survey results seriously and, in response, implemented two rounds of custodial shift changes at schools. More than half of principal respondents said they were satisfied with responsiveness with the district’s facilities management office.

“The District continues to utilize feedback from students, staff and families as a guide to ensure school buildings are safe and welcoming environments,” Evan Moore, a spokesperson for CPS, said in a statement.

District defends cuts to custodial staff

Before the custodial changes last year, CPS directly employed 1,375 full-time custodians — who are represented by SEIU Local 73 — and also contracted out to seven private custodial companies, whose roughly 1,250 workers were represented by SEIU Local 1, according to a district memo last year. CPS’ contracts with those companies came after the district severed ties in 2024 with Aramark, which had for a decade helped manage janitors and cleaning supplies but had been sharply criticized for failing to keep schools clean.

The district’s layoff plans last year meant cutting the 1,250 privately contracted custodial jobs and then filling roughly 750 of those positions.

Both unions protested against the district’s plans, which were estimated to save the district $40 million. At the time, CPS’ chief operating officer Charles Mayfield said direct district oversight, coupled with better training and a mobile app for custodians to upload information about the rooms they’ve cleaned, would help the district ensure schools were clean. Bringing custodial services in house helped meet a district goal to move away from privatized services, CPS said.

Responses to the district’s fall survey, which came two months after the custodial changes went into effect, told a different story.

Custodians, principals describe difficulties with keeping buildings clean

Custodians reported finding it difficult to clean all types of school spaces with less staff and raised concerns with a later start time in the morning — providing a shorter runway to complete certain tasks before kids and staff get in. CPS noted that shifts ranged across schools and started as early as 4 a.m. before the custodial changes. Now, no shift starts sooner than 5 a.m. or ends later than 11:30 p.m.

Many custodians expressed concerns in the survey about being the only custodian on staff during the day, making it difficult to complete tasks or respond to multiple calls for help. One custodian said they’re now the only person on their shift cleaning the two-building campus.

At Walt Disney II Magnet in Irving Park, custodian Johnny Jones, who has worked for CPS for 35 years, said his start time changed from 5 a.m. to 7 a.m., about a half-hour before other staff and students get in. Unlike previous years, there’s no longer a second custodian who joins him.

The school eventually hired an additional custodian for the night shift, which helped get the building ready for the next morning, Jones said. But it can still be difficult to fly solo during the day, he said. He might be cleaning up a spill in the lunchroom and get a call for soap in the girls’ bathroom. Depending on the importance of the task he’s handling — for example, spills can be a safety hazard — a new task may need to wait until the second shift starts.

Keeping the building clean is personal for Jones, who thinks about wanting clean spaces for his own grandchildren, and he wishes the district would give schools more autonomy over shifts.

“Do I want my kid going to a dirty building? Do I want my baby using an unclean bathroom?” Jones asked. “Absolutely not.”

Principals noted various spaces in their schools that are now dirtier, such as classrooms, student bathrooms, and hallways, and many noted that the result is unclean and unhygienic spaces for students and staff.

Several principals reported having to pick up trash or clean up spills on their own. Some said cleaning tasks have fallen to other educators and, in at least one case, students. And a few noted new issues with rodents or cockroaches.

“I feel that the communication, quality of cleaning, and the lack of staffing has put a huge strain on the school resulting in unclean, unsafe conditions for students and teachers alike,” one principal wrote in the survey. “Teachers are having to clean their own rooms in addition to their already large workload.”

One principal said fewer staff custodians has resulted in a “consistently filthy” building, contradicting a CPS goal to provide “a joyous and equitable learning environment.”

“It cannot be a joyous place for scholars or staff when the school is dirty and unsanitary,” they wrote.

As CPS brought on hundreds of new hires, some initial onboarding problems may have impacted staffing, including technical issues that resulted in some custodians not being paid. The district said it has since resolved the problem and issued more than $916,000 in back pay to custodians. But the lack of pay initially led many custodians to not report to work or quit, said Trumaine Reeves, SEIU Local 73’s CPS division director.

At one Southwest Side high school, where the custodial staff was cut by one-third, a teacher has noticed that trash often is not picked up overnight and sneaker scuffs aren’t cleaned off the floor. Those details can make a difference for how comfortable both students and staff feel in the building, he said.

The teacher, who asked for anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak with the press, said veteran custodial staffers who have always been good at their jobs tell him that they now feel stretched.

There are a myriad of challenges that teachers face at his high school, such as supporting students with a lot of needs. Navigating those difficulties, then walking into a dirty classroom “just really hurts your soul,” he said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools marks May Day after tense debate over canceling school

2026-05-01T19:53:57+00:00

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For all the intense debate and controversy over May Day in Chicago Public Schools this year, the start of the school day Friday at Burbank Elementary was low on drama.

Eight teachers and five staff members called in sick overnight — a fairly typical number for the 95-employee Northwest Side school, which was able to quickly line up substitutes for all but two elective classes. Meanwhile, students in grades 6 through 8 spent part of the morning writing letters to elected officials on topics such as homelessness, gun laws, and immigration in a nod to a district push to encourage student civic engagement.

Districtwide, CPS officials said about 13% of its teachers were absent amid a national “day of no school, no work, no shopping” — about 3,320 absences in all, compared with 2,615 per day on average for this week, including Friday. Most requested the day in advance as the district had asked. CPS, which employs about 43,000 people, enlisted more than 2,600 substitute teachers and about 940 support staff subs to fill in for absent employees. Central office staff deployed to help out at 76 schools.

The district approved about 40 May Day field trips for 2,200 of the district’s 315,000 students, including some to a Union Park pro-labor, anti-Trump rally, where protestors also called for more school funding. The Chicago Teachers Union, one of the protest’s organizers, had demanded that the district close schools for May Day.

After some tense back-and-forth, the district and the union agreed to make Friday a day of civic engagement for students. Schools stayed open for a full day of instruction. But the district committed to back lessons on labor and civics and to provide transportation so students at up to 100 schools could participate in the downtown rally and other activities.

The district said high school attendance was slightly down on Friday while elementary and middle grade attendance remained stable. About 72% of high school students attended compared to 75% last Friday.

Some parents and advocates voiced dismay that the cash-strapped district chose to chip in for student participation in a political rally and questioned whether classroom May Day lessons would verge on partisan indoctrination.

On Friday, U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon criticized the district’s handling of May Day on X, calling it “a dereliction of duty.”

“There’s never an excuse for diverting taxpayer dollars away from students and into political agendas,” she posted.

But the district had stressed that principals would only allow students with signed parent permission forms to attend field trips and would only approve instructional materials that “provide diverse perspectives rather than advance any particular viewpoint.”

At Burbank Elementary, science teacher Caroline Hallendorff pitched reviving a project she had premiered with her students in 2017, when they wrote to electeds about the first Trump administration’s decision to pull out of the Paris Climate Accords. The students got responses from President Donald Trump and Democratic Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, making the experience a memorable lesson in civics.

Other educators at the school and Burbank Principal Edward Collins rallied around the idea. This time, middle grade students could pick any topic for their letters, which they handwrote in class to “make it very clear it’s not some AI thing,” as Hallendorff put it.

Science teachers Caroline Hallendorff speaks on Friday, May 1, 2026, with students in her science class at Chicago's Burbank Elementary who wrote letters to elected officials for a special May Day project.

Student Daniel Gutierrez, for example, wrote to Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson urging him to open more homeless shelters after seeing more homeless people on drives across the neighborhood with his family. In research he did before putting pen to paper, Gutierrez found out life expectancy can be up to 30 years lower for people who experience homelessness.

“This lesson made me really focus on the problems of today that are important to me,” Gutierrez said.

The experience of navigating the day and the run-up to it varied across the district. Some principals told Chalkbeat

Burbank Elementary student Oscar Jaramillo, front, and Daniel Gutierrez. worked on letters to elected leaders as part of a schoolwide project to spur more civic engagement by students on May Day 2026. Oscar wrote to Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin urging him to push for more gun restrictions and Daniel wrote to Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson with a request to open more homeless shelters.

Friday that they had few absences and a largely normal school day. One principal said roughly half of teachers on that school leader’s campus took the day off, including some calling out overnight on Friday.

The district had directed principals to reject day-off requests if they meant schools would be too short-staffed to function normally Friday.

At one West Side school, a student “Peacewalk” in the neighborhood was on, then off after an initial district rejection of the plan, then on again. Ultimately, the district did not reject any field trips after reviewing transportation, safety, and chaperone plans. CPS said officials reviewed field trip plans into the early morning hours Friday and ultimately provided yellow buses for 25 of them, with the city offering public transit cards to other students. The district said it would tally costs later this month.

At Burbank, Collins said no teachers or staff requested the day off in advance though some called out overnight. Thanks to a stable of regular substitutes — many of them retired Burbank teachers — the school was able to fill most last-minute absences. However, two “special” classes — art, music, and physical education — would have to be made up next week.

Student attendance was down to 85% Friday from about 92% on average, but Collins was not sure to what extent May Day affected that number. No one approached Collins with a request to plan a field trip, and he heard from relatively few parents about the day. All of them just wanted to verify that school would happen Friday.

Hallendorff said she would mail all the letters students wrote Friday.

“I love the fact that students had this opportunity to think about what’s important to them,” she said, “and to express those feelings.”

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools gears up for May Day protest

2026-04-30T18:03:11+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools officials say they feel confident schools will be fully staffed Friday amid Chicago Teachers Union push to embrace a national “no school, no work, no shopping” day of protest.

The district did not say how many teachers and staff members requested the day off to participate in May Day activities. But it said it is on track to enlist enough substitutes from a pool of almost 10,000 to cover any absences. The district previously said it might deploy some central office employees to help out at short-staffed schools.

CPS also said officials are reviewing about 45 May Day field trip requests, and so far none have been denied.

The union had pushed to cancel school Friday so students and educators could participate in an afternoon pro-labor, anti-Trump administration protest downtown. But district officials balked at the demand, insisting that May Day should remain a full day of instruction and end-of-school-year activities as designated in the CPS calendar.

The union and district struck an agreement to enable teachers and students to take part in the protest, to provide bagged lunches and transportation to the event for up to 100 schools, and to encourage lessons on civic engagement that morning. But more recently, the district has stressed repeatedly that employees must request the day off with enough notice — and must secure approval from their principals for any materials they use to teach about May Day.

These directives have generated tension with the CTU. The union has insisted that its members have academic freedom to select teaching materials that day without school leaders’ pre-approval. This week, district leaders said principals would only allow materials that “provide diverse perspectives rather than advancing any particular viewpoint.”

Recent meetings between district officials and principals have been dominated by discussion of navigating staff absences and materials for May Day, with school leaders bracing for a day with lean staffing. In a post Wednesday on its website, the union implored its members to join protests and rallies.

“We need you there — because we’re taking on the billionaires who are underfunding our schools, shortchanging our communities, and imperiling democracy,” the union’s leadership team wrote in the message.

But CPS said that schools are fully prepared for the day.

“We do feel confident we’ll be able to cover any absences,” a district spokeswoman said.

The district said previously it aims to have a solid estimate of staff absences at least 48 hours in advance of May Day, but it did not immediately provide that number in response to a Chalkbeat request.

Teachers are preparing for a day focused on civics

Nationally, most urban districts are remaining in session Friday. In North Carolina, multiple districts, including Charlotte-Mecklenburg, announced closures this week as they braced for widespread teacher absences. School in Madison, Wisconsin, was also cancelled for May 1.

CPS said schools that submitted May Day field trip requests had to provide safety plans with transportation arrangements, chaperone assignments, and other information. It said officials have agreed to review some requests that came after a Friday deadline, but that some principals have since cancelled field trip plans.

“School leaders have the autonomy and authority to determine if a proposed field trip meets educational and safety standards,” the district said.

In an email to members last week, CTU urged teachers to alert their union representatives if requests for field trips, curriculum, or days off are denied.

At one North Side school, staff and the principal worked together to decide on lessons related to labor and May Day, said music teacher Kat Zamorran, who is part of several union committees.

Zamorran asked students this week about various roles that made a recent school concert possible, such as security staff and teachers. She then broadened the conversation to talk about the jobs kids notice in their daily lives and telling them that May Day is a holiday to celebrate labor.

“It’s kind of nice to ask, ‘Well, do your parents have a job? What do your parents do when you go to school?’” Zamorran said. “That kind of opens it up for kids.”

In one of Zamorran’s classes, students made art that thanked people for their work. One student drew a picture for her mom, thanking her for caring for her. Another made a poster thanking the school’s custodians for cleaning the stage.

Zamorran said her school doesn’t have a field trip planned, but students may hold a small parade outside toward the end of the day.

Parents have varying takes on May Day protests

The district has stressed that only students with signed permission slips from their parents would be able to go on school-sponsored field trips to the Grant Park protest or other May Day events.

Though the district and the union said their agreement struck an admirable balance, some parents and advocacy groups have continued to voice discomfort with the district’s embrace of a politicized event. Others have welcomed the opportunity for students to engage in civic advocacy.

One group of parents, organized in part by the pro-school choice organization Urban Center, described the union’s push as a form of political indoctrination of students. Some of those parents, flanked by Bill Quinlan, the attorney representing former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez in his ongoing lawsuit against some Chicago Board of Education members, attended a school board meeting last week to express their concerns.

Other parents have more mixed feelings.

Princess Shaw, whose 7-year-old daughter attends DePriest Elementary School in the Austin neighborhood, said she didn’t support cancelling classes on May 1 because she and other working parents wouldn’t have child care options. Shaw helped write a letter that the West Side branch of the NAACP distributed to some board members, asking them to keep school open.

She is relieved that classes will be in session.

“May 1 is for my kid to go to school,” said Shaw, who was recently elected to sit on the DePriest Local School Council.

Still, she supports older students who have parental permission to attend a protest as a learning opportunity on Friday and likes the idea of teaching kids about labor history and civic engagement.

About one week before CPS reached its agreement, the Local School Council at Logan Square’s Brentano Math and Science Academy unanimously approved a resolution supporting the idea of a May 1 “Day of Civic Action” after a request from some teachers, said Andrew Yankech, one of the parent representatives on the LSC.

Yankech said he supports the idea of protesting on Friday due to his school community’s concerns over federal education and social service funding cuts, as well as more aggressive immigration enforcement under President Donald Trump. The latter has created “a climate of fear” for some Brentano families, especially for those whose relatives have been stopped or arrested by immigration agents, he said.

Those challenges were “front of mind for me,” Yankech said of his decision to support the resolution.

Yankech’s daughter will stay home Friday. Her parents have tasked her with writing an essay about the history and significance of May Day and the labor movement.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

An Illinois governor-backed bill to restrict school cell phone use gains momentum

2026-04-28T20:33:00+00:00

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Illinois is poised to join a majority of states that have mandated restrictions on cell phone use in schools — a priority of Gov. JB Pritzker that he and other supporters say will boost learning and student mental health.

A bill limiting cell phone use floundered last year despite winning unanimous approval in the state Senate. But an amended version this spring passed the House and appears headed for Senate backing.

The bill would ban cell phone use in elementary and middle schools throughout the school day but give districts the option of restricting high school use only during instruction time. It also aims to address concerns about overly punitive or uneven discipline for students and about the access some students — such as those with certain disabilities or medical conditions — need to their phones throughout the day.

The proposal has gotten a lukewarm reception by the Illinois Federation of Teachers. Though they are not actively opposing the bill, union leaders have raised concerns about the possible cost and logistics of implementing the restrictions.

But backers of the legislation, which would go into effect in 2027, have voiced unbridled enthusiasm.

“We think this bill is one of the most impactful things we could be doing in education now,” said Jessica Handy, the executive director of the nonprofit Stand for Children Illinois.

She added, “Kids lose a significant amount of instructional time because of time on their phones. It’s such a barrier to students being able to focus.”

A modest but growing body of research has suggested that limited cell phone use in school can indeed improve learning. A recent study by the research organization RAND Corp., for instance, found a cell phone ban in one large urban Florida district led to test score and attendance improvements, particularly in the middle and high school grades.

Chicago Public Schools, the state’s largest district, currently gives principals discretion to limit cell phone use and doesn’t track how many do so. In a statement, the district said it “supports initiatives aimed at improving educational focus that serve the best interests of students.”

The Illinois Senate will likely take up the bill later in May — and Michelle Mussman, its sponsor in the House, feels good about its odds of passage. So does the Senate sponsor, Cristina Castro, who notes that similar proposals have drawn bipartisan backing across the country.

“I feel we are in a good place to finally send this bill to the governor,” she said.

Last year, Stand for Children and the legislature’s Black Caucus had voiced concern that the cell phone ban could lead to a rise in punitive discipline for students who violate restrictions — and a widening in existing racial disparities in punishment. The new version says schools cannot suspend or expel students over cell phone use infractions.

The bill also includes exceptions for students who need their cell phones for medical reasons, English learners who use them for translation, and students who care for family members.

Handy of Stand for Children said these changes make the legislation “a model bill in terms of how we treat equity and discipline.” But the advocacy group was disappointed that high schools would have the discretion to allow phone use outside of class time. Handy said that would hamper the bill’s potential to help students “rebuild that muscle of having human interaction” and put more of an onus on teachers to make sure phones are put away for class.

“We feel strongly that a bell-to-bell ban is best,” she said. “We don’t love that high schools get to opt out if they choose to.”

The Illinois Federation of Teachers has said the cell phone bill imposes another “unfunded mandate,” noting that the Peoria school district spent almost $250,000 on pouches to store cell phones during the school day. The union says that only adds to other obligations the state places on districts without providing full funding for them, such as providing transportation for students with disabilities. Leaving cell phones at home is not an option for some students, including those from immigrant families terrified of stepped-up immigration enforcement near schools, a union spokesman said.

In an earlier statement, the union’s executive vice president, Cyndi Oberle-Dahm, criticized Pritzker, with whom the union has clashed, over the proposal.

“Schools already have the authority to set cell phone policies, but what they cannot do is fund themselves or the cellphone lockers or pockets that will be required to enforce this unfunded mandate,” she wrote.

Mussman, the House sponsor, said a key benefit of the bill would be making teachers’ lives easier by reducing cell phone-powered distraction and conflict. Districts could use existing student lockers to store phones or lean on apps that disable phone capabilities during the school day.

“There are low- or no-cost options out there,” she said. “Each school has to decide for themselves how to best manage this.”

Karen Foley, president and CEO of the Juvenile Protective Association, a nonprofit that provides mental health services in Chicago schools, said she understands the concerns about the bill’s implementation. Besides the phone storage question, she anticipates a need for more clerical support, as front offices field more calls and messages from parents who would have previously contacted students directly. Districts should also plan to prepare teachers for an initial uptick in behavioral issues and to check in regularly on the rollout and its academic and mental health outcomes, she said.

But the nonprofit is strongly supportive of the legislation based on numerous conversations with students, parents, and educators, who have all spoken frankly about the damage to learning and school climate that phones cause. The JPA has also vocally supported another Pritzker-backed bill that would impose more safeguards and restrictions on social media use by children.

Foley has also been encouraged by anecdotal reports and emerging research from other states that have implemented such restrictions.

“Kids start to talk to each other more face to face,” she said, “and that is such a good thing.”

As for navigating some of the implementation challenges, Foley recommended more input from students and their families: “Kids have incredible ideas if only you ask them.”

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Two dozen cited as Chicago Public Schools’ lunchroom workers rally for more pay

2026-04-24T01:06:27+00:00

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Two dozen Chicago Public Schools’ lunchroom workers and their supporters were cited for obstructing traffic Thursday during a rally to draw attention to protracted negotiations over pay and staffing levels.

UNITE HERE Local 1, the union representing roughly 1,700 CPS lunchroom workers, planned the rally and civil disobedience outside district headquarters as negotiations over a new union contract have surpassed 10 months. Now, both sides have agreed to get a federal mediator involved, CPS and the union confirmed.

The rally attracted more than 200 participants.

The group first gathered at Daley Plaza around 4 p.m. and chanted slogans such as, “Overworked and underpaid, that’s how your kids’ food gets made.”

By 5 p.m., the large group walked a couple of blocks to CPS headquarters at 42 W. Madison St., where people held up signs, played drums, and chanted while filling up a bus shelter and sidewalk outside of the building. Pedestrians looked on as roughly two dozen people set up metal chairs in the middle of Madison Street and sat down.

After a few minutes, Chicago Police ushered each person away with their hands behind their backs behind a nearby building, where police wrote tickets.

A Chicago police officer writes tickets to protesters for obstructing traffic during a rally for lunchroom workers.

One of the people cited was Stephanie Martin, a lunchroom manager who has worked in CPS schools for 27 years. She said she earns about $1,200 every two weeks. After she pays her bills, she typically has nothing left. As of Thursday, she had 10 cents in her bank account, she said.

“I’m not hopeful about what CPS is going to do,” she said.

Lunchroom workers and their supporters sit in the middle of the street during a rally outside of the Chicago Board of Education headquarters Thursday.

The contract negotiations are happening as CPS faces a possible $520 million deficit next school year. In a statement, the district said it values its lunchroom employees and is committed to reaching “a fair and sustainable deal.”

About 60% of lunchroom workers work fewer than eight hours a day and are not full-time, according to CPS.

UNITE HERE has said its workers are the lowest paid in CPS, and starting pay for their lunchroom attendants is just under $17 an hour, which is about $4 less than starting pay for custodians. The union is pushing for hourly pay that at least matches that of custodial workers.

The union is also trying to beef up staffing. A WBEZ analysis found the district has 20% fewer lunchroom workers compared with five years ago. About half of lunchroom workers surveyed by the union last fall said they have trouble paying for basic needs, and about one-fifth said they have visited food banks.

During her daily six-hour shift, Laura Najera, a lunchroom attendant at Ella Flagg Young Elementary School, prepares bags of breakfast and other snacks for the kids. Sometimes she helps take out trash or does the dishes if other employees are out, even though that’s not in her job duties, she said.

In order to make ends meet, Najera said she works at a dog shelter some days after she gets off work at school. Some weeks she only has about $20 left for groceries after paying her other bills and buys instant noodles for meals.

“I do (the job) because I like being with the kids,” said Najera, who attended Thursday’s rally. “But obviously it would be a lot more helpful if I could also live off of that paycheck.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago will keep school in session May 1 but let students and staff participate in protest

2026-04-17T16:12:14+00:00

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School will be in session on May 1 in Chicago, but Chicago Public Schools and its teachers union reached an agreement Thursday that would allow some students and educators to attend a pro-labor, anti-Trump afternoon rally and provide buses to the event.

The Chicago Teachers Union had pushed to cancel classes that day so students and staff members could join a national “no school, no work, no shopping” day of protests. But despite strong backing from Mayor Brandon Johnson, newly appointed CEO Macquline King balked at that demand, saying in an earlier note to parents that “every minute in the classroom is vital for students.”

The standoff became national news and a political hot potato for Johnson, a former CTU employee and close ally. Critics of his stance argued that canceling school on a short notice would put working parents in a tough spot and pointed to the district’s post-pandemic problems with high student absenteeism, especially at the high school level.

In a Friday morning statement, the district stressed holding the line on keeping classes in session for the entire school day. It said that staff are expected to work the full day but can use personal days or other time off after giving proper notice. It also said principals can exercise discretion in allowing students to participate in civic engagement activities that day, but no students will be required to do so.

“This agreement preserves the classroom time students deserve and respects our staff and families who must be able to trust CPS to uphold the academic school year calendar,” said King in the statement. “At the same time, the agreement honors the proud history of civic action in Chicago and beyond.”

The agreement says that the district will work “in good faith” to provide at least 100 schools with bagged lunches and transportation to a 1 p.m. Union Park rally or other events, though the city would supply free transit cards if CPS cannot line up enough buses. The district will also give 65 CTU members paid leave to travel to Springfield the week of May 13 and lobby state lawmakers for more funding for schools. CPS will also designate May 1, 2028, as a teacher-directed professional development day of non-attendance for students.

In an email to members, the teachers union hailed the agreement with the district as “monumental news” and a victory for encouraging civic engagement among students and employees.

“We’re proud to be part of a school district that recognizes the responsibility of educators to stand up for our students, support them in finding their voice, and to not sit on the sidelines of history when the people of this country finally say ‘enough’ to the abuses from the White House,” the message said.

In a statement, Johnson praised the agreement as well, saying his office looks forward to “a day of meaningful solidarity and community resistance to the forces trying to tear us apart.”

The announcement of the agreement caps days of tension and confusion for families. King had argued that the school board could call a special meeting and vote to cancel school on May 1. A majority of board members aligned with Johnson had supported the teachers union request in an informal closed session vote, but a formal, binding vote never took place.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools to stay open May 1 during nationwide protest — at least for now

2026-04-09T23:01:09+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools will stay open May 1 for now, despite a push from board members and the Chicago Teachers Union to allow teachers and students to join a nationwide protest that day, in part against the Trump administration.

But it’s still possible schools will close that day, since a majority of Board of Education members support the move.

In a statement issued Thursday afternoon, interim CPS CEO Macquline King — who will begin leading the district permanently July 1 — said she’s recommended that school should stay open. She added that if the board wants to cancel classes, it must convene a special meeting and take a formal vote “as soon as possible.”

“Our staff, students and families need a clear understanding of what to expect on May 1,” she said.

Union leaders have pushed for the day to be a teacher-directed professional development day — for which students are off from school — so that teachers and students could participate in the national day of “no school, no work, no shopping.” The protest is meant to advocate for raising taxes on the rich, reining in immigration enforcement, and more funding for schools, union officials have said.

The disagreement could be an early test of King’s leadership of the district, which is confronting a range of challenges.

Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former CTU organizer and close ally of the union’s, previously said he supports letting students miss school on May 1, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

But confusion over whether the day would be off began Wednesday, after a memo from King leaked to the press. King’s memo, dated Tuesday and delivered to board members, said she wanted to keep classes in session in order to “ensure continuity of instruction, maintain safe and supervised environments, and minimize disruption for families,” including providing access to free student meals, according to a copy of the memo obtained by Chalkbeat.

She also noted that in a recent survey, 113 schools — or roughly one-fifth of all schools — reported a range of activities happening May 1, including field trips, college-decision day events, sports events, and make-up AP testing, the memo said. Just over 100 schools said they had out-of-school activities planned, including prom and senior night.

Those activities, which required “months of planning and financial commitments” could be difficult to reschedule as the district gets closer to the end of the year, the memo said.

Board members are split on calling the day off.

But also this week, the Chicago Teachers Union filed a grievance against the district, claiming CPS had violated its contractual agreement when planning this school year by failing to work with the union to schedule one professional development day for the 2025-26 school year.

In a letter dated Monday, CTU president Stacy Davis Gates wrote that the contractual language was negotiated “with the express purpose of accommodating a day of civic action on May 1.”

King notes in her memo that the provision cited by the union is set to take effect next school year, not this year. The school board adopted its calendar for next school year, when May 1 falls on a Saturday.

The union has also pointed to a state law allowing middle and high school kids to participate in a civic event. But in her memo, King said the law allows those students to take one excused absence a year for such an action and doesn’t allow a district-wide day off.

The grievance and the matter of May Day came up during the board’s closed session on Wednesday, board members said. King asked board members to weigh in and presented them with multiple options, including to keep schools open. A majority of board members, who are aligned with the mayor, voiced support for canceling classes on May 1, and some of those who were opposed stated that King had switched her position after the board’s closed session.

Debby Pope, an appointed board member, said board members shared many perspectives, including concerns for working parents. Pope said she supports closing schools May 1 because the nation is in “unprecedented times” and that “education takes many forms,” including participating in or learning about protests.

Other board members have stated staunch opposition, including Jessica Biggs and Jennifer Custer, both elected board members who have announced their runs for board president.

On X, formerly known as Twitter, Biggs said, “The academic calendar has been set. Key end of year activities are planned. Our teachers are working hard to wrap up the year on a focused note. And our families count on our schools to do what they say.”

Custer started a petition online calling for school to stay open.

On Thursday morning, King joined a call that included leaders from CTU, the city’s principals union, and the mayor’s office so that they could plan for different scenarios, but no final decision had been made, according to Kia Banks, president of the principals union. Banks said all parties are trying to be “aware of our civic responsibilities while preserving or protecting our learners.”

A source close to CTU said it has been in “productive meetings” figuring out plans with the district, the principals union and the mayor’s office.

It remains unclear how staff in other unions, such as those who represent custodians and other support workers, would be affected or if they were included on the Thursday morning call.

Board President Sean Harden issued his own memo to King and some of her top cabinet members on Thursday, expressing the board’s support for King to “operationalize a day of civic action” on May 1.

King responded the same day, telling Harden that she was sticking by her statement that the district’s position “is to remain open May 1.” She also reiterated her call for the board to publicly vote on the matter.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

State lawmakers introduce Chicago Teachers Union-backed bills to increase state education funding

2026-02-09T21:38:32+00:00

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A pair of Illinois state lawmakers introduced legislation Monday that would significantly increase state education funding — an opening salvo in a push by the Chicago Teachers Union and other labor groups to boost money for schools during this spring’s legislative session amid intense financial pressures on the state.

The proposals, sponsored by state Sen. Graciela Guzmán and Rep. Will Davis, both Democrats, would require the state to fully fund its so-called evidence-based formula for schools by a 2027 deadline lawmakers set in 2017 — a goal the state is not on track to meet. It would also provide more funding for some school district services that the state mandates, such as transportation for students with disabilities and counseling.

The state has been increasing funding for K-12 schools by about $350 million a year, though it only chipped in $307 million more last year, for a total of $11.2 billion. To fully fund schools, advocates estimate the state would have to increase that amount to at least $550 million, but likely more than $1 billion, said Davis, who represents the south suburbs of Chicago.

At a Monday press conference, the lawmakers did not specify a source of the added funding, but they pointed to ongoing discussions about ways to raise progressive revenue. The teachers union has pressed for higher taxes for wealthy residents of the state. Supporters framed their proposal as a response to what they described as a Trump administration assault on public schools, including the dismantling of the federal Department of Education.

“At a moment when Donald Trump and his allies are attacking public education, this bill is a line in the sand,” said Guzmán, a former organizer for the CTU who represents a portion of Chicago’s Northwest Side.

To do everything the legislation introduced Monday requires in 2027, the state would have to spend an additional $3.9 billion a year, Ralph Martire, the executive director of the think tank Center for Tax and Budget Accountability, said in an interview. The center is proposing a package of tax measures that would raise revenue, including expanding the sales tax base to include consumer services and increasing the income tax rate while providing tax relief to low- and middle-income households. Those two measures alone would raise enough revenue to provide the additional education funding in the Lewis and Guzmán bills and to address the state’s massive structural deficit, Martire said.

However, the state also faces $4.4 billion of added costs down the road if it chooses to fully offset safety net cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that Congress passed last year, the center has estimated.

The state has increased funding for Chicago Public Schools by about $1 billion in recent years, even as enrollment shrank dramatically. But the district remains about $1.6 billion short of what the state considers adequate funding. It received $1.9 billion from the state last year.

A 2024 report from the Center for Tax and Budget Accountability found that because of inflation and flat K-12 funding in 2020 during the height of the COVID pandemic, districts would not meet the state’s definition of adequate funding until 2034 if it continues to add $350 million each year — a forecast Martire now says is out of date.

Joining the CTU in backing the bill was the Chicago Principals and Administrators Association, the union representing the district’s school leaders. Kia Banks, the principals union’s president, said tight funding in some schools has forced school leaders to delay hiring, freeze staff positions, and make other difficult decisions.

At Monday’s press conference, Samuel Thomas, a sign language interpreter for the Waukegan school district, stressed the proposal wouldn’t just help Chicago. He said his district scaled back its after-school programs and couldn’t renew some education apps this school year.

“We are asking Gov. Pritzker and lawmakers to fully fund our schools because our students can’t wait,” he said.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago’s Sustainable Community Schools are growing. But few outperform neighboring schools.

2025-12-19T23:25:00+00:00

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Principal Anna Vilchez takes pride in how much Steinmetz College Prep has to offer:

More than a dozen student-led after-school programs, from photography to DJing. A 3D printer-equipped engineering lab. Some 30 classes each month through its Parent University.

These offerings are paid for through Chicago Public Schools’ Sustainable Community Schools initiative, a joint effort by the district and its teachers union that has given high-poverty schools about $500,000 annually to team up with community nonprofits to provide wraparound support.

Vilchez is grateful for the boost. But she also wants to see more gains in the school’s attendance, graduation rate, and test scores — growth similar community school programs have powered in other cities.

Unspent money, turnover, and tension: Chicago’s Sustainable Community Schools provide lessons for future

A Chalkbeat analysis of student outcomes at the 20 schools in the program since 2018 suggests the investments have not yet led to widespread improvement in how likely students are to attend school regularly, graduate from high school, or pass key reading and math tests. This is partly due to the pandemic’s disruption to the rollout, but also a lack of clear goals and guidelines, tensions between schools and their nonprofit partners, and money left unspent, Chalkbeat found.

Nevertheless, Chicago Public Schools is more than tripling the number of Sustainable Community Schools to 70 by 2027. The expansion will cost $35 million annually — a major investment at a time when the district is wrestling with budget deficits.

Supporters, including Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, say the initiative transforms some of the city’s most disinvested campuses into service-rich neighborhood hubs, bringing needed programs and support staff often seen as givens at higher-income schools.

“Schools are successful when every single child has everything that they need,” Johnson said last summer when he announced 16 additional campuses joining the program. “The success of a school is not just based on student outcomes.”

But critics say the district should have ensured the model is delivering measurable results before enshrining the expansion into its latest teachers contract.

District officials say they are spelling out clearer expectations and giving more guidance to schools, especially the 16 schools joining the initiative this school year.

“We’ve learned that giving schools money and partnering them [with nonprofits] does not give them the foundation of how to actually transform their school,” said Autumn Berg, the district’s community schools initiative director. “It took us a long time to get there.”

On traditional metrics, Sustainable Community Schools do not outperform

Before Steinmetz became a Sustainable Community School in 2018, the campus — which serves predominantly low-income Latino students — had few enrichment programs. And it never consistently gave students and parents a say in what it offered.

That changed with the program, which now funds a range of after-school activities, including an after-school K-pop dance club founded by junior Miguel Hernandez.

Hernandez, who came to the school as a freshman English learner, is now taking college-level arts classes at Columbia College.

He credits much of his growth to the club.

“I created a great bond with a lot of people,” he said.

Miguel Hernandez, a junior at Steinmetz College Prep High School, practices a dance routine on the school’s auditorium stage on Dec. 9, 2025, in Chicago. Hernandez founded the school’s K-pop dance club and is now taking dual-enrollment dance classes at Columbia College Chicago.

Hernandez’ experience reflects a community school promise: Engaging programs created with input from families give students a reason to go to school and do better in their classes. But the model hasn’t yet given most Sustainable Community Schools an edge in attendance and achievement.

Chalkbeat compared student metrics over time at the 20 pilot schools to those at 29 campuses that applied to the program but didn’t get in, which have an almost identical average poverty rate to the pilot group and also serve almost exclusively Black and Latino students. The analysis also looked at about 300 campuses with poverty rates of at least 80%, the minimum required to apply to the program.

Student outcomes shifted similarly in all three groups since 2018, with the SCS schools seemingly getting little academic boost from the program’s investments. Absenteeism shot up comparably during the pandemic and has remained well above pre-COVID levels, with Sustainable Community Schools struggling slightly more than other high-needs schools.

A district analysis last school year obtained by Chalkbeat did find that among students who regularly attend after-school programs at the 20 Sustainable Community Schools, chronic absenteeism was 13 percentage points lower than for their peers in the same school.

The pilot schools have also had consistently higher graduation rates than the campuses that didn’t get into the program. But over time, those campuses improved slightly more and narrowed the gap.

When it comes to test scores, all three groups saw the same trends on the SAT and the Illinois elementary proficiency test.

The Sustainable Community Schools have seen marked reduction in suspensions and, after a COVID-era uptick, in behavioral incidents. But so did other high-poverty schools.

On a University of Chicago-designed student and staff survey called 5Essentials, measures of school connectedness and climate have declined districtwide post-COVID. But the 20 pilot schools experienced a steeper drop than other high-needs schools, with almost half getting a rating of weak or very weak in the most recent year for which data was available.

And even as program supporters have held it up as a possible antidote to declining enrollment, the 20 Sustainable Community Schools have lost more than a fifth of their enrollment since 2018, while districtwide enrollment dipped about 11%.

Students move between classes at Steinmetz College Prep High School in Chicago on Dec. 9, 2025. The school is expanding its STEAM curriculum as part of the district’s Sustainable Community Schools program.

At Steinmetz, absenteeism, academic outcomes, and enrollment largely followed these pilot groups trends, with a sharper drop in suspensions than other high-poverty campuses.

In recent years, the community schools model has gained traction nationally, though the Trump administration recently cut some community schools grants.

Research has shown well-implemented programs can yield measurable student gains. Isaac Opper, a University of California, Los Angeles and RAND School of Public Policy expert who helped evaluate New York City’s community schools program implemented before the pandemic, said that several years in, that initiative had produced attendance gains, graduation rate increases, and modest but notable test score improvements.

“If you are seeing no difference, one story is that Sustainable Community Schools isn’t working,” Opper said. “Another is that it is working, but so are other things the district is doing.”

But there are outliers. Several schools in Chicago’s initiative have seen student outcomes markedly improve and enrollment stabilize. What they appear to have in common: consistent leadership through the seven years of the program, teacher and staff buy-in, and a clear vision for how to make the most of the added dollars.

At Richards High School on the Southwest Side, enrollment is up, graduation rate increases are outpacing the district’s, and absenteeism, though still high, has dipped below pre-pandemic levels. Metcalfe Elementary on the Far South Side saw improvements in test scores and attendance. Its 5Essentials rating rose to the highest possible.

Metcalfe Principal Stephen Fabiyi says the program has helped support smaller class sizes in the early grades and a robust, well-attended after-school program that blends enrichment and academic help from the school’s teachers. Getting family input on programs and curricula boosted engagement.

“My kids would have a snowball’s chance in hell of being successful in school without Sustainable Community Schools,” Fabiyi said.

With Sustainable Community Schools expansion, a promise of more accountability

Monique Redeaux-Smith, a former CPS teacher who now works at the Illinois Federation of Teachers and co-chairs the district’s Sustainable Community Schools task force, says that at these high-needs schools with histories of disinvestment, the program is “trying to rebuild after a series of hurricanes.”

“I’m not worried about not seeing outcomes,” she said. “I know from having conversations and from seeing and talking to these schools and school stakeholders often that it is making a difference in the experience that young people are having every day.”

The model just needs more time, Redeaux-Smith said.

Mayor Johnson echoes that sentiment. When pressed about the program’s outcomes, he has brushed aside critics, arguing metrics like test scores have been historically abused to justify disinvestment in neighborhood schools and even their closures.

The STEAM Makerspace at Steinmetz College Prep High School is shown on Dec. 9, 2025, in Chicago. The space is used by students for hands-on projects in science, technology, engineering, arts, and math as part of the school’s STEAM program.

Dwayne Truss, a former school board member who says he’s a fan of community schools generally, says the Sustainable Community Schools program shouldn’t be growing so much given the lack of measurable results and budget crisis, he said.

“It would seem that you would wait until you have the data before you that says this is the greatest thing since sliced bread and go forward with this massive expansion,” Truss said.

District leaders say they are working to harness the lessons of the program’s rollout as Chicago grows it in the coming years. CPS and the union have agreed to bring in outside experts to evaluate the program and its outcomes this school year.

Officials say there are clearer expectations for the schools and partners, and a longer, more supportive transition into the program.

And the district is pushing for a new process whereby schools that don’t meet a set of performance goals — still under discussion — could lose half and eventually all of their SCS funding.

Vilchez and other principals say they hope the new push to better track results won’t take away flexibility and the ability to let families and local communities shape the model’s priorities. At the same time, they want the program to power student gains.

“I am committed to owning our data,” Vilchez said, ”and working to improve it.”

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Unspent money, turnover, and tension: Chicago’s Sustainable Community Schools provide lessons for future

2025-12-19T23:25:00+00:00

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When Anna Vilchez became principal at Steinmetz College Prep four years ago, she had to quickly turn to an unexpected crisis.

Since 2018, the high school on Chicago’s Northwest Side had teamed up with the nonprofit Northwest Center as part of Sustainable Community Schools, a partnership between the school district and its teachers union. High-needs campuses and partner nonprofits receive about $500,000 a year to expand family outreach, wraparound student services, and after-school programs.

But as Vilchez took over, Steinmetz and Northwest Center were poised to part ways. Their visions for the program were at odds. Meanwhile, the nonprofit struggled to spend the money it received through the initiative. Vilchez set out to salvage the partnership.

As Chicago Public Schools and the Chicago Teachers Union gear up to expand the program from 20 to 70 schools in the next two years, their leaders say the initiative has been a boon to high-poverty campuses. It has allowed them to enlist key support staff, offer more programs, and give their communities more of a voice in school decisions.

Chicago is expanding its Sustainable Community Schools. They haven’t yet boosted student outcomes.

But a Chalkbeat analysis of program spending showed schools and especially their community partners have left more than $6.6 million on the table since 2018. The initiative has also faced leadership and staff turnover, and tensions between schools and their nonprofit partner, which — along with the pandemic’s disruption to its rollout — could help explain why the model hasn’t yet given the 20 pilot schools an edge in improving student outcomes, as a Chalkbeat analysis of academic and school climate metrics found.

Clear goals and firm leadership are key to realizing the promise of the community school model, said William Corrin, an expert at the think tank MDRC.

“For Chicago, this juncture seems really critical,” he said. “We’re about to create more community schools. So what could we do to set ourselves up to do it better?”

‘There was no blueprint’ for Chicago’s community schools

Steinmetz, in a grand building in the Belmont Cragin neighborhood, was exactly the kind of school the district and union were looking for when they negotiated a 20-campus Sustainable Community Schools pilot that started in 2018. A neighborhood campus that serves predominantly low-income Latino students, including many English learners, the school was also already a community hub, with a health clinic and a Parent University.

Deja Kirk, a senior at Steinmetz College Prep High School, sings in the school’s recording studio on Dec. 9, 2025, in Chicago. The space is used by students in the music program to create and record original work as part of the school’s STEAM initiatives.

Steinmetz teamed up with local nonprofit Northwest Center for its successful bid to join the program. Then COVID hit, disrupting the rollout.

Here, as on other campuses, turnover and some resistance from educators and staff have been key hurdles. Jesse Livingston, the resource coordinator with Northwest Center (formerly the Northwest Side Housing Center), said teachers have seen programs and reform efforts come and go over the years, leaving them skeptical that this latest initiative would last. Some have also balked at the idea of engaging students, parents, and the nonprofit in more school decisions.

“Our biggest challenge has been adult buy-in,” he said. “Every school community wants to function as a village, but there’s conflict and a clique mentality and old gunky energy.”

Earlier on, the school and the nonprofit also didn’t see eye to eye on what the program should accomplish and struggled to understand how the other did business.

Angel Gonzalez, at the time the school’s program coordinator who also had experience working at a nonprofit, tried to mediate. Lack of guidance and training were big issues, he said.

“There was no blueprint,” Gonzalez said. “You just had to figure it out as you went along.”

Money for community schools initiative left on the table

Northwest Center, like other community partners in the program, receives about half of the $500,000 allocated to Steinmetz. But records obtained by Chalkbeat show the nonprofit, and others in the program, are not spending all the money.

Livingston said unfilled positions and midyear turnover as well as the district’s cumbersome reimbursement process for vendors have been key challenges.

“We’ve gotten better every year,” he said. Data show the nonprofit left more than $142,000 unspent in the first year working at Steinmetz, while last year, they used all but $45,000.

Chalkbeat found money went unspent at many of the other 20 schools, though last year they came closer to using all of it. At Beidler Elementary, the school and its partner, Blocks Together, have failed to spend more than 45% of their overall SCS funding so far, which the district attributed to “operational challenges rather than a lack of need.”

The union in its last round of contract negotiations won a provision allowing schools to carry over up to $300,000 in unspent SCS dollars to the next year.

Spending and staffing data Chalkbeat obtained shows in more recent years, campuses in the program used the money to pay for relatively few staffers. Some principals said rising salary and benefit costs have meant the dollars don’t stretch nearly as much as they did in 2018. The district did not provide data on school staff hired by partner nonprofits.

Across the city from Steinmetz, Farragut High School on the Southwest Side used Sustainable Community Schools money to pay for valuable positions, including a college and career coordinator and a youth intervention specialist, principal Virag Nanavati said.

But even as the school dipped into non-SCS funds to pay for these staffers, its partner, Enlace Chicago, left more than $75,000 unspent the year before Nanavati started alone. At the time, that meant the money stayed with the district instead of flowing to the school.

Nanavati says the nonprofit struggled to staff after-school programs and ran some that were poorly attended. The nonprofit also hired a resource coordinator, an assistant to the resource coordinator, and two counselors, even as the school had to cut staff because of budget woes. Enlace did not respond to a request for comment.

The school and Enlace worked to rethink the spending, Nanavati said, pitching in for holiday celebrations that have brought in prospective families and other residents. Farragut also expanded its after-school offerings, offered attendance incentives, and launched a credit recovery program during the school day — initiatives he credits with a dramatic increase in the school’s graduation rate this year.

“Your lead partner needs to understand that it’s not their money,” he said he told a principal at one of the 16 schools joining the program this fall. “It’s money to serve students that they help manage.”

Overcoming tensions to honor the community schools model

In the weeks after she started at Steinmetz, Vilchez spent an entire day with staff at Northwest Center, talking about how to work better together and avert the looming breakup.

Vilchez says the partnership with Northwest Center is strong now. The nonprofit oversees the school’s Parent University classes, from yoga to financial literacy to suicide prevention, as well as student after-school programs. It also connects families with key resources, including foreclosure prevention, workshops for first-time home buyers, and help enrolling in public benefits.

District officials say they are trying to better prepare schools and partners to work together as 16 new campuses transition into it this school year. The district has spelled out clearer staffing and spending expectations, and provided more training to both schools and nonprofit staff, said Autumn Berg, the district’s community schools initiative director.

“There’s always going to be struggle in partnerships,” she said. “It’s a lot like being married. You have to figure out how to work together. You have to figure out how to communicate.”

Galadryel Arroyo, a senior at Steinmetz College Prep High School, is pictured on Dec. 9, 2025, in Chicago. She is a member of the school’s mural club, which is part of its STEAM programming.

Vilchez says the program is paying off at Steinmetz. The school’s restorative justice work powered by Sustainable Community Schools led to a reduction in more serious student misconduct and suspensions. The say in decisions the model gave students and parents boosted a sense of connectedness to school. This fall, a districtwide student survey captured that greater sense of belonging, she said.

But there is still a lot to do, particularly in improving student outcomes. Vilchez said she welcomes the greater focus from the district on how the program is affecting academic and other metrics.

“I just hope that they honor what the SCS model is about — giving schools autonomy and flexibility to meet the needs of that specific community,” she said.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Teachers union pushes Illinois lawmakers for more school funding

2025-10-29T20:00:03+00:00

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Waves of teachers in blue shirts filled the Illinois capitol Wednesday to lobby state lawmakers for more education funding and push them to tax the rich.

Members of the Illinois Federation of Teachers spoke about the impact of the Trump administration’s cuts to the Department of Education and other public goods, such as the looming end of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, also known as SNAP, and how that impacts classrooms.

Those who spoke at a press conference on the steps of the capitol building demanded lawmakers find revenue to better fund state universities and K-12 schools.

The lobbying effort was the first led by IFT’s new leadership, which now includes Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates at the helm. Davis Gates won election to the CTU’s parent union earlier this month and took over for Dan Montgomery, who served as IFT president for 15 years.

“I’m not looking for a fight,” said Davis Gates. “I think Democrats in a blue state that understand the tyranny of Trump need to show up for our children in Illinois.”

Davis Gates said lawmakers and Gov. JB Pritzker should do more than hold press conferences denouncing President Donald Trump’s policies and she repeated the union’s push to “tax the rich.”

“We’re going to spend a lot of time in Springfield creating the lesson plans, the pathways for elected officials to honor the working people, the public servants, and the educators of the state of Illinois,” Davis Gates told a crowd of union members outside the capitol building.

Illinois House Democrats are currently eyeing a proposal to tax billionaire investments and entertainment in order to fund public transportation. But it could face hurdles getting through the Senate, which passed its own plan in the spring to tax rideshare, deliveries, and real estate transfers to better fund public transit. The state’s veto session ends Thursday.

The teachers union is supportive of taxing the rich to fund public services, including transit. But much of their focus Wednesday was to push lawmakers to fully fund public school districts and universities.

In 2017, Illinois lawmakers changed the way it distributed state funding to 850-plus school districts. They also committed to increasing funding by $350 million every year with a goal of getting every district to its unique “adequacy target” under a new evidence-based formula by 2027.

Chicago is one of hundreds of districts considered less than 90% funded. Although CPS has seen boosts in state funding, it still needs $1.6 billion to get from its current 73% funded level to 100% under the state’s formula.

“Too many districts are still so far from their adequacy targets,” said Mari Maldonado, a fourth grade special education teacher from Lincolnwood, a suburb north of Chicago. “We are demanding that the lawmakers close the loopholes, tax the ultra-wealthy, and deliver every penny our students were promised.”

Other IFT members who work at colleges and universities spoke about the need to overhaul funding for higher education in Illinois. There’s currently a proposal in the Senate that would implement an evidence-based formula similar to the one used for K-12 schools, distributing money based on need. It stalled in the spring after losing support from the University of Illinois over concerns it could harm the state’s flagship campus in Urbana Champaign.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Amid ICE activity, CTU and elected officials call for community to protect students, families

2025-10-02T23:24:02+00:00

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In the wake of aggressive immigration enforcement in Chicago, some elected officials and union leaders are calling on the community to help protect immigrant students and their families.

Chicago Public Schools is also reminding families that it doesn’t collect immigration information and that parents should provide emergency contact information to schools.

The messages from CPS, the Chicago Teachers Union, and state and local elected representatives came after a mother and her children, ages 8 and 3, were detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at Millennium Park over the weekend. Their comments also come after federal agents rappelled onto an apartment building in South Shore on Tuesday, where ICE arrested more than 30 people. Many migrant families have settled in the South Side neighborhood in recent years.

Chicago Public Schools did not say whether South Shore-area schools had planned or offered additional support for their students this week after the raid.

During a press conference Thursday outside of Roosevelt High School in the immigrant-rich neighborhood of Albany Park, teachers and elected officials reported ICE activity and arrests in the neighborhood Wednesday, including near schools. A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security did not confirm whether ICE detained anyone near the school or elsewhere in the neighborhood.

“I am standing here with educators, teachers, school clerks, teachers assistants, social workers and nurses to say that again … They are not welcome to pick up parents and detain them after they drop their children off at our schools. They are not welcome in our neighborhoods to terrorize, to ask for papers,” Stacy Davis Gates, president of the CTU, told reporters.

In a Wednesday letter to CPS families, interim CPS CEO Macquline King said teachers do not ask students or families for immigration status, and CPS does not share student records with ICE or other federal representatives without a court order or consent from the student’s guardian. Her letter also reminded families that schools do not allow federal agents inside without a criminal judicial warrant signed by a federal judge.

Five things to know about immigration policy and your rights

Evelyn Gonzalez, a teacher and CTU delegate at Roosevelt, said teachers volunteered to stay late at the building Wednesday for kids who felt safer staying back.

“There were businesses offering refuge in case we needed it, and there were neighbors from our community stepping up to make sure our students were safe walking home,” Gonzalez said. “I hope that we can stand together and that we can care for each other.”

Ald. Rossana Rodriguez, whose ward includes Albany Park, said she closed her office early Wednesday so that she and staff could help monitor school dismissal. Her office and community organizers were able to gather 50 people in about two hours who would help “notify the community” in case ICE agents showed up, she said.

State Sen. Graciela Guzman told reporters that the children and mother arrested at Millennium Park have been released, and the 8-year-old girl went to school Thursday, crediting advocacy from the community. A federal judge ordered that both are protected from deportation for now, the Chicago Tribune reported.

“She went to school today and she played in her playground today,” Guzman said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools should sue feds over magnet school money, teachers union president says

2025-09-30T21:18:08+00:00

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Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates said Tuesday Chicago Public Schools should “absolutely” sue the U.S. Department of Education over its decision last week to cut millions in federal magnet school funding from the district.

Trump administration officials said $5.8 million will not be awarded to Chicago in the coming year under the Magnet Schools Assistance Program and $17.5 million would not be awarded for the remaining years of the district’s grants. The move created an $8 million hole in the current school year’s CPS budget, district officials said.

The federal government’s decision stems from a dispute over whether Chicago’s school district is violating federal civil rights laws with its efforts to help improve Black student achievement and protect transgender students’ rights.

“This time period is going to require an entire encyclopedia of strategies employed at every turn, because that’s what it’s going to take to both resist, challenge, and win in this moment,” Davis Gates said. “So yes, they have to sue. That is their duty to sue.”

A CPS spokesperson said the district is “considering all legal options” regarding the magnet school money.

A spokesperson for Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson echoed the district, noting that with CPS’ current budgetary constraints, “every single dollar counts.” Johnson said earlier this year that he would take the Trump administration to court if it took federal funding away from CPS because of the district’s diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts.

About two weeks ago, the U.S. Department of Education’s acting assistant secretary of civil rights Craig Trainor told CPS he would not certify the district’s eligibility for the magnet school money unless the district abolished its Black Student Success Plan and changed its policies on transgender students by Sept. 23.

Chicago called the demand “unreasonable and untenable” and requested an additional 30 days to respond. The district’s interim general counsel Elizabeth K. Barton also argued that the federal department was violating its own procedures and “investigatory process” given that there are still two open investigations into both the Black Student Success Plan and Chicago’s compliance with Title IX as it relates to transgender students.

Both of the matters under investigation are requirements of Illinois law, putting Chicago’s school system between a “rock and a hard place,” Davis Gates noted. A 2024 state law requires Chicago’s school board to create a Black Student Achievement Committee and make a plan for serving Black students. Illinois Human Rights Law also requires schools to allow transgender students access to facilities that correspond to their gender identity.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools wants to tighten up employees’ use of paid time off

2025-09-10T22:10:17+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education is considering tightening up paid time off policies for CPS employees, including requiring more notice for taking off for religious holidays and adding explicit language that says CPS can fire employees who misuse sick days.

The district also proposed changes to bring its sick leave policies for non-union employees into alignment with new City of Chicago policies.

CPS is proposing the changes for approval at its board meeting on Sept. 25.

Under the proposed changes, employees would have to provide 14 days notice — a week more than currently required — before taking one of their three allotted religious days off. The proposal also includes additional language on what does not count as religious beliefs, including “social, political, or economic philosophies, or personal ideological preferences.”

The proposed policy changes for religious holidays come two years after the district stopped docking pay for teachers who took off on religious holidays. The old policy cut pay for teachers because, they argued, the school needed to be able to pay for a substitute. At the time, union leaders who had pushed for the tweaks applauded that policy change, saying it penalized teachers who observe religious holidays that aren’t accounted for in the school calendar, such as Yom Kippur.

Administrators can deny religious holiday time off for employees if there is an “operational need” for that person to stay at work. Those supervisors would have to provide their denial in writing at least seven days before the requested holiday off, the proposed changes said.

These changes would give “managers, mostly principals, more time for planning and coverage when an employee is out,” Ben Felton, the district’s chief talent officer, told the board during a meeting Wednesday to review the board’s agenda for the Sept. 25 meeting. Felton said clarifying definitions for religious beliefs and denial procedures “are in case religious holidays are not being used properly.”

The district is proposing that employees who abuse paid sick leave “may be subject to discipline up to and including termination,” which Felton said is possible under current board policy but isn’t explicit.

According to current board policy, unionized employees not represented by CTU who are found to be using sick leave “in an unauthorized manner” can be suspended from work without pay for up to 15 days. The current policy also says that employees who fraudulently use leaves of absence or have “excessively poor attendance” can be fired.

“It is not our intent to create more severe discipline for these infractions,” Felton said in a brief interview with Chalkbeat. “It’s just to align our policies and make sure that it’s clear that in some instances, using sick days in this way could result in termination.”

Employees who are out on sick leave for more than three days must present documentation that they were treated by a doctor or another practitioner for their illness.

CPS got little feedback on the proposed changes when it opened the policies up for public comment last month, Felton told the board. He did not specify the nature of that feedback. Neither the Chicago Teachers Union nor SEIU Local 73 responded to a request for comment.

Separately, CPS is proposing that hourly and part-time employees would begin accruing sick leave immediately upon being hired and can begin using that time 30 days after they’re hired. The district has already started implementing those changes but is updating its policies to come into compliance with a new city ordinance, Felton told board members.

Full-time, non-union employees would also be able to carry over some unused sick days into the new fiscal year; previously, these employees had to use their sick days or forfeit them by June 30, or the end of the fiscal year.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

It’s the first day of school at Chicago Public Schools. Here are 5 things we’re watching.

2025-08-18T10:00:00+00:00

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As Chicago Public Schools students return to class this week, families may feel the effects of the district’s belt-tightening over the summer as it worked to close a $734 million deficit.

Even as the first day starts — Monday for K-12 students and Tuesday for those in pre-K — the district and Chicago Board of Education have not yet adopted a budget that covers this school year. The board, which is already divided on the district’s proposal, must legally adopt a budget by Aug. 29, and is expected to vote on a plan Aug. 28.

Families and kids may also feel the impact of changes related to the new Chicago Teachers Union contract, including smaller classes and more staff.

Across the district, Chalkbeat will be watching an array of items, including potential changes to federal policy, the district’s enrollment changes, and the state’s focus on school quality — and how those impact student learning and the public’s perceptions of schools.

Here are five things we’re watching this school year.

Will enrollment drop this year?

After more than a decade of dipping enrollment, Chicago began seeing a slight uptick in the number of kids attending CPS schools — likely due to the influx of thousands of migrant families from Central and South American countries.

Public schools have seen drops in enrollment across the nation for several reasons, including decreasing birth rates. Last year, a total of 325,305 students attended Chicago Public Schools by the 20th day of school, or the day the district officially counts how many students it’s serving.

But it’s unclear if enrollment will increase again this year, especially as immigration to the U.S. slows as President Donald Trump ramps up immigration enforcement.

Chicago Public Schools staff are instructed by the district not to allow immigration enforcement into their buildings unless they have a judicial warrant.

But advocates worry that Trump’s aggressive deportation goals will have a chilling effect. The president’s policies, they worry, could discourage newcomer kids not to attend school or even leave the city.

How well are Illinois students learning?

The state of Illinois is set to implement changes in measuring when students are proficient in core subjects and is reconsidering how it labels schools — potentially impacting the public’s understanding of how well students are doing.

The Illinois State Board of Education recently approved changes to cut scores that determine when a student is proficient in a subject and expects to see an increase in how many students are considered to be learning core subjects well. The changes came after state leaders said the previous cut scores did not reflect the reality of what students were learning or their ability to enter college without remediation courses.

The state also worked with dozens of teachers on collecting feedback for potentially changing its own learning standards and benchmarks for how well schools are doing. Chicago Public Schools also rolled out new school accountability dashboards this year, which are supposed to include more traditional metrics like test scores and information about students’ well-being.

With budget cuts and new teachers contract, how will school day change?

After nearly a year of contentious negotiations, the Chicago Teachers Union reached a deal with Chicago Public Schools in the spring over a four-year deal that, in part, implements a series of changes that students may notice in the classroom.

At the same time, CPS is planning tens of millions of dollars in cuts that could impact things like meals and how clean schools will be.

Under the new teachers contract, class sizes will be lowered to 25 students in kindergarten, and the contract requires a teaching assistant for classes with more than 23 students. In grades 4-8, the class size will decrease to 30 students.

The contract also adds hundreds of new positions over the next three years, including more teacher assistants, case managers for students with disabilities, and nurses. Unrelated to the contract, the district is also restructuring its special education department and implementing staffing changes related to students with disabilities.

And, kids could be getting more recess or time in enrichment classes. The contract increased preparation time for elementary school teachers by 10 minutes. Schools will meet this requirement by getting an additional 10 minutes of recess where schools are not currently following a state requirement for a half-hour recess, district officials have said. But schools may also add specialty classes to give homeroom teachers more prep time.

As it worked to close its $734 million deficit, the district announced more than $165 million in cuts. That included layoffs to central office and crossing guards, cutting 480 full-time custodial positions, and hot meals for students.

How could Trump’s agenda impact schools?

In some ways, the Trump administration has competing interests that could have sweeping impacts on Chicago’s schools.

Trump wants to invest fewer federal dollars in the nation’s schools — which almost resulted in a loss of about $60 million for CPS — and any funding restrictions could impact CPS’ already tight budget plan.

At the same time, his administration wants a hand in what schools teach. The federal government has opened a civil rights investigation into CPS’ Black Student Success Plan, claiming that the plan is a form of race-based discrimination that seeks more resources for “favored” students. CPS has declined to comment on the matter.

If the federal government decides the district has violated federal law, it could decide to punish the district by pulling funding or reaching a settlement that impacts the district’s approach to serving students with the most needs.

What’s next in CPS’ leadership saga?

Chicago Public Schools has experienced profound leadership turnover over the past year. Since October, the entire mayor-appointed Board of Education resigned, the former CEO was fired, and a new 21-member, partially appointed, partially elected school board was seated for the first time in Chicago’s history. That board then hired interim CEO Macquline King and is searching for a permanent CEO.

And King now finds herself in the crosshairs of the city and mostly appointed members of the board after proposing a budget that doesn’t include a pension reimbursement to the city or a loan.

The board hoped to find a new CEO as early as September, but it’s unclear how quickly it will narrow down candidates for interviews. Some have raised questions in recent months about who legally has the authority to hire the CEO.

Whomever the board chooses will be charged with overseeing the district as it faces financial pressures. And, if that person stays in the job through 2027, they will be the first CPS CEO to oversee the district with the city’s first fully elected board.

Becky Vevea contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools reaches historic tentative bargaining agreement with its principals

2025-08-08T22:09:21+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools principals won pay increases and more protections against harassment in their first ever tentative collective bargaining agreement, according to the union representing the district’s school leaders.

The historic contract, which the district and union tentatively reached Friday, needs to be approved by the union’s members and the school board. It includes a retroactive 4% cost-of-living increase for the 2024-25 school year and more due process protections for principals who face discipline, said Kia Banks, the president of the Chicago Principals and Administrators Association.

It also includes cost-of-living and baseline pay increases for the coming school year, but the union is waiting to share information about them with its members before publicizing the amounts.

Banks said the union and the district will continue to negotiate on a number of issues, including benefits and a process for unsuccessful candidates for principal positions to appeal that outcome.

In a statement, Chicago Public Schools said the deal is an interim agreement that includes 4% raises for both this past year and the coming school year, which the district has already implemented. The school board will review that agreement at its regular meeting later this month.

“Our shared goal is to reach a comprehensive agreement that supports our school leaders and advances our mission to provide a rigorous, joyful and equitable learning experience for every student,” the district said.

Illinois lawmakers passed legislation in 2023 that allowed the Chicago Principals and Administrators Association to unionize the district’s principals for the first time, and the union officially formed later that year. It has been negotiating with the district since the spring of 2024, though highly contentious and protracted bargaining with the Chicago Teachers Union put the principals union contract on the backburner for much of that time.

The tentative agreement comes days before district leaders will unveil a 2025-26 budget whose approval was delayed almost two months past the fiscal year’s start amid a leadership transition and efforts to plug a $734 million deficit.

Banks said the new contract will also provide more professional development to school leaders and enshrine more protections against abuse and harassment they can face from staff, local school council members, parents, and others.

The retroactive 4% cost-of-living increase for the past school year is in line with what the teachers union negotiated in its own agreement. Principals have received raises comparable to those in the CTU contract in previous years, but those were never guaranteed until now, Banks said.

“This agreement will give school leaders the confidence and dignity to continue to do the work they do every day,” Banks said.

“In the midst of a leadership transition and a huge budget deficit, this process could have taken much longer,” she added. “There was a willingness from the district to consider our school leaders as partners, and that helped the process along.”

The average principal’s salary in CPS is about $161,000, based on a Chalkbeat analysis of district staffing data last spring. Assistant principals make roughly $131,000 on average.

Principals, who don’t get the summers off, can make less per hour than veteran educators they supervise — an issue that Banks hopes ongoing negotiations with the district will address.

Unlike teachers, principals cannot go on strike under state law though an amendment to legislation that green-lit unionization allows them to enlist an outside mediator to help with the negotiations. The union has not resorted to that option so far, Banks said.

Union leaders said they believe a collective bargaining agreement that more clearly spells out school leaders’ duties, workdays, and recourse they have if they experience harassment would improve principal retention. Roughly half of elementary principals and two-thirds of high schools principals in CPS leave their positions within five years, according to University of Chicago data.

“We have a long way to go; we’ve barely scratched the surface,” Banks said, adding that much credit for the agreement goes to the years-long advocacy of her predecessor in the president role, Troy LaRaviere. “District decisions have always been made for us and about us but never included us.”

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools cuts 480 janitor positions as it ends all private custodial contracts

2025-08-04T21:37:39+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools will cut 480 custodian jobs, end all private custodial contracts, and directly oversee the work of keeping schools clean.

The move, which comes as the district is working to close a $734 million deficit, sparked an immediate rebuke and demand for reconsideration from the two unions representing school custodians.

Starting Sept. 30, CPS will oversee 2,100 full-time custodians and end seven contracts with private custodial companies. The change will mean cutting about 1,250 private custodians and ending a longstanding practice of contracting with private companies to help clean schools.

CPS officials said the move is not only about cutting costs, but also part of the district’s goal to bring 25% of privatized positions back under direct district oversight, as outlined in the five-year strategic plan. Last year, CPS ended its agreement with Aramark, the Philadelphia-based company that oversaw management of all privately-employed and CPS custodians.

When Aramark took over management of custodians in 2014, the district also laid off 480 janitors and many schools complained of dirty conditions for many years. The cost of outsourcing went millions over budget. A decade later, unions and school principals cheered the end of the Aramark deal.

Now, some are also raising concerns about school cleanliness with these staffing reductions two weeks before the school year is set to begin on Aug. 18.

“You can’t eliminate 1,200 custodians just two weeks before school starts without any real plan for how these buildings will be cleaned and ready,” said Genie Kastrup, president of Service Employees International Union Local 1, the union representing privately-employed custodians. “Our kids deserve a safe and healthy learning environment on day one.”

Charles Mayfield, the district’s chief operating officer said Monday he believes more CPS oversight will help ensure cleanliness at schools, even with fewer custodians. That includes improved staff training, better monitoring of cleaning supplies, and a mobile app that allows custodians to upload information about rooms they’ve cleaned, giving the district “visibility” on the work at schools, he said.

Custodians with the private companies have received a text message and email about the change and instructions on how to apply for 750 full-time custodial roles inside CPS. They’re being asked to fill out an interest form by Aug. 22 and apply.

In a letter sent to elected officials Friday, Mayfield wrote that the district’s budget challenges made it “necessary to consolidate custodial services to ensure greater efficiency and long-term sustainability.”

CPS said the custodial changes will save about $40 million, which is part of the $165 million in savings that district officials already announced earlier this summer through layoffs and cutting down on some school-based services, such as hot meals and health services.

The seven private custodial contracts now set to end were expected to cost a total $222 million over the next two school years, according to a summary of the contracts that the Board of Education approved last February. CPS has the right to terminate those contracts with at least 30 days notice, according to district records.

Mayfield also wrote that the district is “mindful” that many of the private custodians losing their jobs have served CPS “loyally for years.”

“While CPS is proactively inviting all privately-employed custodians working within CPS schools to seek employment directly with CPS, unfortunately, due to budget constraints, not all positions will be retained,” he wrote.

The district says the changes will also “streamline” custodial operations and improve oversight and quality.

One South Side principal said she supports the shift to having CPS directly oversee custodians, but she’s concerned about the transition. However, she said it may be difficult for schools to manage with fewer positions and worries about schedule changes.

SEIU sharply denounced the change, raising concerns about job losses and the district’s ability to keep schools clean. The union demanded the district rethink the number of positions it is cutting, provide custodians with the most years of seniority the right of first refusal for new in-house jobs, and ensure that any worker who takes an in-house custodian role represented by SEIU’s Local 73 — which represents CPS-managed custodial workers — can keep the current rate of pay and minimum benefits.

CPS officials did not directly comment on those demands.

In SEIU’s press release, Maria Avila, Local 1 vice president, said she’s worked in CPS schools for more than 15 years, but the change feels like CPS is “throwing us away like we don’t matter.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools lays off more than 1,450 staff

2025-07-11T22:30:14+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools laid off more than 1,450 school-based staffers, including teachers, on Friday as it works to narrow a $734 million budget deficit.

The layoffs include 432 teachers, 311 paraprofessionals, such as teacher assistants, 677 special education classroom assistants, or SECAs, 33 security officers, and five parent workers.

Across district-run schools that are not alternative or specialty schools, 57% saw a reduction in positions, according to a Chalkbeat analysis of school budgets that were released publicly Friday. The remaining 43% saw no change or an increase in the number of positions available compared to last school year.

However, 123 special education teachers and up to 300 SECAs will be eligible for retention pools, meaning they would be paid centrally over the next school year and can be deployed to schools with vacant jobs, according to Ben Felton, CPS chief talent officer. Staffers with unsatisfactory ratings are not eligible for the retention pools, Felton said.

The district typically adjusts staffing and announces layoffs in the summer before school starts. In the past, about 80% of those laid off got jobs at other schools, said CPS, adding in a news release that it is “working diligently to maintain or improve that rate again this year.”

School-based layoffs are happening later than usual this year amid delays in the district’s budgeting process. The new fiscal year began July 1, but CPS doesn’t expect to present a budget to its board for approval until next month.

Interim CPS CEO Macquline King also emailed teachers and principals on Friday promising that they would get retroactive raises for last school year in their checks by mid-August, according to copies of emails obtained by Chalkbeat.

Last school year, CPS laid off 1,410 staffers. CPS did not immediately say how many of these staffers were rehired.

Layoffs announced today may not be the end of staffing cuts and changes at schools.

CPS publicly pegged its budget deficit at about $229 million this spring under former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez, hoping for about $300 million additional money from the city and state and not taking into account certain potential expenses. When King took office earlier this month, she said the gap is about $500 million larger, removing the assumption that additional money will come in and factoring in additional costs, including a much-debated $175 million pension reimbursement to the city.

The larger deficit means additional cuts could still be on the horizon. Officials could also choose to borrow money — an option that has for months divided the school board and education advocates in Chicago. CPS officials are holding a series of public meetings next week across the city to collect public feedback on how the district should close its budget deficit.

Budget Director Mike Sitkowski said CPS is in a “tough situation” and the district has been open about its funding challenges. He said officials are “open-minded” about how to solve its deficit going forward “in a way that’s student-centered and that protects our schools.”

According to Chalkbeat’s analysis of the data released Friday, there will be 477 fewer positions across all district-run schools next year. CPS officials said they could not immediately verify that number. Sitkowski said position cuts at the individual school level are because of less need for those jobs at those specific schools.

At the same time, Sitkowski said, the district plans to give schools more positions after the academic year starts, based on need and “where students show up.”

“Anything that’s looking like a net reduction is going to be made up for in what we add back,” Sitkowski said.

District officials told Chalkbeat earlier this month that they’re changing how they staff schools with special education teachers and SECAs in order to address staffing imbalances at schools across the city. And they emphasized that those staffing changes have nothing to do with budget belt-tightening. Still, families and teachers expressed concern that the shifts could reduce the amount of support provided to students with disabilities.

The layoffs sparked frustration from the Chicago Teachers Union, which represents teachers and support staff. Earlier this week, CTU called for Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker to launch a special legislative session in order to find additional funding for education.

More than 740 people laid off are CTU members, and just over 700 belong to SEIU, CPS said.

In a letter to members on its website, CTU’s leadership team called the layoffs a “harmful and distressing annual ritual at CPS” but highlighted the retention pools they bargained for.

In a statement, SEIU said it hopes the city and the school board can work with state leaders “to mitigate these cuts so the workers do not bear the brunt.”

SEIU’s statement also said that CPS informed the union the SECA layoffs are because of a “philosophical position that too much support from SECAs will impact the independence of students post-graduation.” The union said district officials did not discuss this matter with the union or advocacy organizations before making this decision, which will “negatively impact students.”

The district’s funding formula has shifted in recent years, now providing schools with positions instead of dollars. Schools with higher needs — determined by a formula called the Opportunity Index — are generally provided more resources.

One principal on Chicago’s South Side said her budget, which is based on the smaller deficit figure, was down just one position compared to last year, and she’s trying to save it through “some savvy budgeting and maneuvering.”

She’s warned her staff that more cuts could be coming, and that the budget they’ve been working on since May is like using “monopoly money.” She’s advocating with her alderperson to provide CPS with more surplus money from a city pool of tax dollars to spur economic development, known as Tax Increment Financing, or TIF.

“I am concerned that the budget I worked with and put together is not a fully funded budget,” said the principal, who requested anonymity because she was not authorized to speak to the press. “It’s fictitious in some ways at this point.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

100 students in a school meant for 1,000: Inside Chicago’s refusal to deal with its nearly empty schools

2025-06-13T09:00:00+00:00

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More than 4,000 students once crowded DuSable High School, then an all-Black academic powerhouse on Chicago’s South Side. Its three-story Art Deco building drew students with a full lineup of honors classes, a nationally known music program, and standout sports teams.

Nat King Cole played the piano in his classroom as a DuSable student. Harold Washington, Chicago’s first Black mayor, studied there. On Friday nights, teenagers zipped through its hallways on roller skates and danced in the gymnasium.

But at the turn of the millennium, enrollment plunged as Chicago closed a massive public housing complex nearby and a growing number of Black families left the city. Amid a national infatuation with smaller high schools 20 years ago, Chicago Public Schools conducted a grant-funded experiment to chop DuSable into three separate schools sharing a campus. What remains today, after that grant money ran out, is an enormous building and, inside, two tiny schools clinging to life.

One has about 115 students and claims the north corridors. The other, with only 70 students, takes the south wings. The inoperable pool is off-limits.

Hundreds of unneeded hallway lockers hide behind decorative paper and student posters of Pakistani activist Malala Yousafzai, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and former first lady Michelle Obama, whose father attended in the 1950s.

The two little high schools in Bronzeville share the same entrance and sports teams, but other things are doubled: two main offices, two principals, two assistant principals, two school counselors. Even though there’s a teacher for roughly every five students, the course offerings are limited.

Chicago Public Schools operates more than 500 schools and spends about $18,700 per student to run buildings that it considers well-utilized. At the DuSable schools, the cost is closer to $50,000 a student.

The DuSable schools are emblematic of an unyielding predicament facing the district. Enrollment has shrunk. Three of every 10 of its schools sit at least half-empty, and they are costly to run.

More critically, there are 47 schools, including those inside DuSable, operating at less than one-third capacity, by the district’s measure. That’s almost twice as many severely underenrolled buildings as Chicago had in 2013, when it carried out the largest mass school closings in the country’s history, Chalkbeat and ProPublica found. The most extreme example is Frederick Douglass Academy High School, which has 28 students this year and a per-student cost of $93,000.

Many of those schools are in historic buildings that need millions of dollars in repairs.

The costs are not only financial. Students in the city’s smallest schools have fewer courses to choose from and often miss out on clubs, extracurricular activities, and sports. Chicago’s underenrolled high schools are more likely to have lower graduation and college enrollment rates. They tend to struggle with chronic truancy and higher dropout rates, a ProPublica and Chalkbeat analysis found.

But officials in Chicago have chosen not to confront the problem of the city’s tiny schools. The teachers union and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, who used to be an organizer and legislative liaison for the union, are quick to shut down discussion of downsizing. Widespread anger over the 2013 closures helped fuel the union’s rise to political power over the past decade; the union has also wielded the radioactive closure issue to undermine opponents, notably outgoing district CEO Pedro Martinez.

Union leaders, many community activists, and some researchers say closures disrupt displaced students’ learning and harm the city’s predominantly Black and Latino neighborhoods, which were disproportionately affected by that earlier wave of closures. They argue the district needs to do much more to try revitalizing these campuses before it considers shuttering or merging them.

Helping to delay a reckoning: Since 2013, the district has operated under a series of moratoriums on closing schools, including one state lawmakers enacted with strong support from the teachers union. And a statewide school finance overhaul under former Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner increases or at least holds funding steady for districts even if enrollment declines.

Chicago has too many schools for the number of students it serves today, Martinez said in an interview with ProPublica and Chalkbeat. The district is spending too much on aging buildings, and it’s not providing a rich experience for students in many of its tiny schools, he said, adding: “They’re not having joy in that environment.”

But he said he inherited a closure moratorium and worked with school boards that had no appetite for closing or merging schools. “Our footprint is too large,” said Martinez, who leaves the district this month. “Every time somebody wants to address this issue, you see at all levels of politics, nobody wants to do it.”

He said he hopes a fully elected school board that will take over in 2027 will tackle the issue head-on, working closely with the communities it serves.

In a statement, the district noted its building utilization formula is “just one measure,” and it could overestimate available space.

The mayor’s office did not respond to requests for comment.

With public school enrollment declining across the country, a growing number of cities — Milwaukee; Denver; Flint, Michigan; Boston; San Francisco; Philadelphia — are grappling with the issue of underenrollment. Some plan to close schools.

But Chicago, the country’s fourth-largest district, operates on a larger scale: It has more students and more buildings than most other cities. The city’s school-age population, meanwhile, is on a downward trajectory, federal COVID-19 aid ran out this year, and the district faces a budget deficit of more than $500 million.

And yet, Chicago “doesn’t seem to be having an honest conversation about the challenges it’s facing,” said Carrie Hahnel, a school finance researcher with the nonprofit Bellwether.

The DuSable High School building houses two smaller schools, the Bronzeville Scholastic Institute and Daniel Hale Williams Preparatory School of Medicine. Unused lockers are covered with posters and decorative crafts.

‘A lack of political courage’

The 2013 closings of 49 Chicago elementary schools and one small high school were more than controversial. Families there felt that their communities were being torn apart as the city moved to shutter schools with long and rich histories. After protests and angry meetings, students were displaced to schools that were farther away from home. Neighborhood hubs were mothballed.

Deep distrust of Chicago Public Schools after the mass closures lingers, especially in Black neighborhoods like DuSable’s Bronzeville. University of Chicago research showed those closures set students back academically, though a small number who moved to high-performing campuses fared better. Some community groups and the teachers union in Chicago see schools as a public good; shuttering them is another mark of disinvestment.

That was the backdrop when a group of DuSable High School alumni grew concerned about dwindling enrollment at their beloved school and worried the district might target the building for closure. They approached CPS just before the pandemic with an alternative idea: Consolidate the two tiny schools at DuSable and focus classes on STEM careers.

The Bronzeville Scholastic Institute and the Daniel Hale Williams Preparatory School of Medicine would unite and revert to the name DuSable.

The alumni had no illusions that they could fully restore DuSable to what it once was. Compared to the school’s heyday, a much smaller number of school-age children live in Bronzeville today. But the alumni wanted more for the school.

The group met repeatedly with school and district leaders in DuSable’s wood-paneled social room, where trophies mark decades of athletic and musical excellence.

Officials told the group to get more input from current families at both schools — a daunting task given that the district would not provide their names or contact information. The plan fizzled out.

Hal Woods, now a policy director with the parent advocacy nonprofit Kids First Chicago, worked as the district’s school development director at the time and sat in on those meetings. He said the bottom line was that the plan smacked too much of a closure.

“We didn’t want to be seen with our fingerprints on this,” he said.

The Robert Taylor Homes — at one time the largest public housing project in the United States — once loomed over DuSable High School, as seen in these images from 1966. The complex was demolished by 2007, and DuSable High School never recovered from the loss of that student population.

Former school board President Jianan Shi, a Johnson appointee who served from 2023 to 2024, said rebuilding trust and planning for schools’ future with local communities at the helm takes time; it must begin now.

But, he said, “There’s a lack of political courage to have this conversation, and yet it’s often weaponized.”

Amid the uproar over the 2013 closings, Chicago’s then-mayor, Rahm Emanuel, vowed that his appointed school board would not close schools for five years. The state legislature then imposed a 2021 moratorium on closing Chicago schools until January of this year, part of a bill that changed the Chicago Board of Education to an elected, rather than mayor-appointed, body.

Today, Chicago has 634 schools, including 119 charter and contract schools run by outside entities, and a teachers union ally holds the mayor’s office. Last September, amid a power struggle between Johnson and Martinez, the Chicago Teachers Union publicized a facilities analysis that the district had done in late 2023, which included hypothetical scenarios for consolidating 75 schools, including Williams and Bronzeville. The union argued that even entertaining that idea was cause to fire Martinez immediately.

As the CTU pounced, Martinez pushed back, saying the district had concluded that no school would be closed while he was in charge — which he now says was really the school board’s decision. At the next school board meeting, he presented a new resolution that got unanimous support: CPS would not close any schools until 2027.

But the city’s demographic realities are not on hold. About 325,000 students enrolled this year, a drop of more than 70,000 from a decade ago. District officials project that three school years from now, there could be as few as 300,000 or, in a best-case scenario, as many as 334,000 students. Those estimates are based in part on the city’s sharply falling birth rates. Citywide, from 2011 to 2021, the number of births dropped by more than 43%.

Still, CTU leaders insist that the city is actually poised for a population turnaround. During President Donald Trump’s second administration, Chicago under Johnson can bill itself as a progressive refuge — a place that protects immigrants, abortion care, LGBTQ+ rights, and access to gender-affirming care for transgender youth and adults, said Jackson Potter, vice president of the CTU.

“We are going to need to be a citadel of protection,” he said, adding that the last thing the city wants is to shutter some of its schools, then see families arriving in these neighborhoods en masse only to find limited classroom seats.

The union’s real issue with school closures, Potter said, is that Chicago has done them without enough educator and community input and has rushed them, destabilizing other nearby schools.

An influx of immigrant families allowed CPS to stabilize its enrollment and the city to notch modest population increases in the past two years after a lengthy decline. But some demographers think the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown might mean these gains are short-lived.

Jim Lewis, a senior researcher at the Great Cities Institute, a research hub at the University of Illinois Chicago, is skeptical about the possibility of an influx of school-age children in areas with shrinking schools. Some gentrifying Chicago neighborhoods have drawn new residents, but they tend to be higher earners who generally have fewer kids.

Lewis cautions that people tend to overestimate the power of schools to attract residents. Studies have shown that crumbling schools can deter families, he said. But research also suggests new programs and attractive campuses can only do so much to draw them — unless those schools come with a complete package of job opportunities, safe neighborhoods, affordable housing, and more.

“I’m all for beautiful new schools,” Lewis said. “Do I think by itself it changes the demography of a place? I don’t think so.”

What to do about underenrolled schools and Chicago’s diminished school-age population is a decision for Chicago’s school board. Currently, 10 members are elected and 11 are appointed by the mayor. Next year, all will be up for election.

Some members, who said they could only speak candidly if they aren’t named, said the board must discuss solutions for tiny schools, including consolidation. But being branded “school closers” is a concern ahead of elections. Others said they’re open to discussing alternatives to school closings, including bringing health clinics or other family services into vacant parts of underenrolled schools.

“I think we have to talk about small schools as a result of historic racism, underfunding, neglect, and inequity,” said member Debby Pope, a former CTU employee. A conversation is going to be essential, she said, but with a moratorium on closings in place and the possibility that the board could extend it, “I don’t think this is the moment for that conversation.”

Dozens of Chicago schools are operating at less than one-third capacity.

Small enrollment, limited opportunities

About 5 miles southeast of DuSable is Hirsch High School, which was one of the district’s largest school building projects when it opened in the 1920s and once dealt with severe overcrowding. It’s gotten so small now that M’Kya Craig had taken all the electives the school offered by her junior year.

She was one of roughly 100 students at Hirsch, which could enroll 1,000. She browsed the school’s limited courses and decided to take yearbook for a second time. She was bracing to take the course a third time her senior year, but Hirsch added an African American literature class.

Craig appreciated that staff at the small school got to know her well, including a counselor who helped her get into Chicago State University. But she often felt frustrated by the school’s slim course offerings and scarce extracurriculars over the years.

“We lost a lot over the years due to being a small school,” she said.

Most of the district’s underenrolled schools serve students who do not participate in Chicago’s expansive system of school choice, where high-performing students test into selective schools ranked the best in the state, and other students find their way to magnets, charters, or strong neighborhood schools, often in wealthier parts of Chicago.

Many of the district’s small schools serve Chicago’s highest-needs students.

Hirsch High School on Chicago’s South Side opened in 1926 and has the capacity for 1,000 students. It currently has around 100.

At the Daniel Hale Williams Preparatory School of Medicine, one of the schools inside DuSable, junior Georgia Deaye was drawn to the school’s medical career program and loves the close-knit feel.

“The connection with teachers is way deeper than if I was at another school,” she said.

She participated in a summer internship program that Williams accesses through one of the larger district high schools and recently got her CPR certification. The most recent graduation rate at Williams was 93%, among the highest in the district. The graduating class was 14 students. There are a total of 70 students enrolled there, at a cost of $54,000 per student.

“Small schools are not always painted in a positive light,” said Williams Principal Leonetta Sanders, but the smaller environment is ideal for some students. In part because of its size, the campus hasn’t had to deal with gang problems or violence, she said.

“Safety,” she said, “is always money well spent.”

Some research has suggested that students tend to do better in smaller schools, notes Bruce Fuller, an expert at the University of California, Berkeley. But those findings apply to small-by-design campuses with healthy enrollments, not schools that have shrunk dramatically as families have moved away.

Fuller doesn’t think that student outcomes at those underenrolled schools have been studied rigorously because it would be too hard to control for factors such as the high needs of the students they tend to serve. “There’s consistent evidence that smaller can be better,” Fuller said. “But small in this life cycle of decline is a totally different story.”

In Chicago’s tiny schools, the limitations, even at a high per-student cost, are substantial. Bronzeville Scholastic Institute, the other school inside DuSable, used to be able to teach Spanish and French but now offers Spanish only. The school once offered Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate courses but realized it could not continue to offer both; it kept the IB program.

The schools have tried to make up for the limited course offerings by encouraging students to take online courses and dual-enrollment classes that local community colleges offer to high school students.

“You’ve got 12 kids in a class. The board is not going to pay for a calculus teacher,” Grace Dawson, who leads DuSable’s robust alumni group, said of the school district. Students are being “robbed” of opportunity, said Dawson, a former Chicago school principal.

Flush with federal COVID aid, the district added more than 7,500 new positions over the past four years even as enrollment kept declining. It also recently started guaranteeing a certain number of staff, including 10 teachers, at each school regardless of enrollment. Williams and Bronzeville, which used to share an assistant principal and a gym teacher, each hired their own. Douglass High School on the city’s West Side now has 27 employees for 28 students.

That includes six regular education teachers, six special education teachers, a school counselor, a college and career coach, a conflict resolution specialist, a restorative justice coordinator, and an assistant principal and principal. The cost to run the school is $93,000 per student.

“Is a Douglass student getting a $93,000-a-year experience? No,” said Woods of Kids First Chicago. “We can confidently say that. CPS pumps extra dollars into these schools so they can offer the bare minimum.”

The district, which handles requests for comment about individual schools, did not dispute the high per-pupil price tag at Douglass. It has said its new budgeting approach gives all schools a fiscal boost regardless of size.

David Narain, who was principal at Hirsch until 2023, said the school’s smaller size allowed his staff to focus intensely on a highly mobile student body, where many students came in reading at the third or fourth grade level. But it was challenging to build a school culture on a campus with so few students.

“You try to have a homecoming, but there’s no football team,” he said. “There’s nothing to come home to.”

And Narain understands the financial tension the district faces. “The writing is on the wall,” he said. “You can’t continue to run these schools and give them all of these resources.”

Williams Preparatory School, one of the schools inside DuSable, offers students a medical career program.

Old buildings, big expenses

In a district with a $10 billion budget, the overall spending on staff and programs at small schools can seem negligible. But keeping aging campuses running is costly no matter how many students are there. The average Chicago school building is 85 years old; dozens of them were built before 1900.

Analysis of capital spending data by ProPublica and Chalkbeat found that since 2017, the district’s 47 severely underenrolled schools — ones that sit more than two-thirds empty — have cost more than $213 million to maintain and renovate.

The emptiest buildings account for $400 million of the district’s estimated $3.1 billion in needed critical repairs. The DuSable building alone needs $21 million in urgent repairs.

Adding to the financial uncertainty at CPS is the Trump administration’s threat to withhold federal funding from districts such as Chicago that have maintained their diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts.

Education policy researcher Chad Aldeman, the former policy director of the Edunomics Lab at Georgetown University, said some closures or consolidations seem inevitable on the heels of Chicago’s massive enrollment losses. If the district doesn’t make a plan now — with community input and help to ease the transition for students — it could find itself scrambling later to reorganize in crisis mode.

“A lot of places that are closing schools are in financial distress,” Aldeman said. “They are trying to save money rather than thinking holistically.”

Closing schools can also carry steep costs. In 2013, the district spent big to add staff at schools that took in students, spruce up those schools, and move furniture out of the closed buildings.

Then there’s what to do with vacant buildings. The district is still trying to sell 20 vacant schools from the 2013 closures, which it pays to maintain.

CTU leaders, who pushed to add thousands of new school staff positions in recent contract talks, have long advocated spending more to breathe new life into underenrolled schools — an invest-and-they’ll-come theory.

Potter, the CTU vice president, holds up Dyett High School — which the district closed but later reopened after a CTU-supported hunger strike in protest — as an example of a “phoenix rising from the ashes.” Its basketball team won a state title this year. Though the school is still at 58% capacity, enrollment has stabilized at roughly 500 students, a benchmark CPS has used to weigh whether a high school is big enough.

“Why would you start with a question about consolidations when you can start with a question about support?” he said.

But recent years have tested the power of added investments to boost enrollment.

In 2018, the district and teachers union jointly launched an initiative to target 20 high-poverty campuses, including Dyett, with an additional $500,000 a year. They’ve used the money to partner with a local nonprofit to offer more services for students and families.

Some of these schools have since reported parent and student engagement gains. But with a few exceptions, they have steadily lost enrollment since then, in some cases dramatically.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Jennifer Smith Richards is a ProPublica reporter who writes about abuses of power — often focusing on schools and education — throughout the Midwest. Contact Jennifer at jennifer.smithrichards@propublica.org

Outgoing Chicago schools chief files defamation claims against teachers union and board president

2025-06-12T23:10:29+00:00

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Outgoing Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez filed defamation claims against the Chicago Teachers Union, its president, Stacy Davis Gates, and board President Sean Harden, according to court records posted Wednesday evening.

The claims were added as an amendment to his ongoing lawsuit against some current and former Chicago school board members. The amendment represents the latest escalation of tensions in Martinez’s ongoing legal battle since his firing in December.

Steve Mandell, CTU’s lawyer in the case, said the complaint “is an attempt to silence the sort of political speech that takes place in every labor negotiation.”

“If these sorts of statements were actionable, the courts would be flooded with never-ending defamation claims surrounding every negotiation,” Mandell said in a statement.

In a brief interview, Harden also denied making any defamatory comments.

The board’s law firm, Cozen O’Connor, did not respond to a request for comment. The board voted 12-7 Wednesday to increase its maximum allowed payments to Cozen O’Connor from $75,000 to $135,000.

The new defamation claims come a week before Martinez’s last day on June 18 and as he prepares to start a new job as Massachusetts’ state education commissioner on July 1.

Cook County Judge Joel Chupack will consider whether to allow the complaint to be amended next week, according to a court order issued Thursday. Bill Quinlan, Martinez’s lawyer, said he expects the judge to approve the change.

Asked why Martinez was adding defamation claims, Quinlan said Martinez “isn’t going to put up with bullies” or comply with ”the request to get him to agree to a contract that he didn’t think was fair.”

Martinez previously sued a school board in Nevada after being fired. He received a $500,000 settlement from the Washoe County School District, according to the Reno Gazette-Journal.

The defamation claims in the latest lawsuit address several social media posts and statements from both Davis Gates and the union, including comments about Martinez’s past work as the district’s chief financial officer, his current competency as CEO, his understanding of contract negotiations, and whether he was pushing to close up to 100 schools. Separately, the suit claims Harden made false statements about Martinez during an event last month with the city’s principals union.

Martinez originally filed the lawsuit in December to attempt to stop the board from interfering in contract negotiations with the CTU. He won a temporary restraining order against board members to bar them from involvement in negotiations or directing his team.

The complaint refutes statements from Davis Gates and the union that claimed Martinez is “incompetent and unqualified.” The lawsuit said Martinez “has and had every ‘qualification’ to perform every aspect of his job as CEO.”

The lawsuit also highlights social media posts last September from both Davis Gates and the union that claimed Martinez was seeking to close 100 schools. At the time, Martinez and the Board of Education denied that it planned to close schools. State law prohibited school closures in Chicago up until mid-January. Amid the controversy, Martinez proposed and the board passed a resolution to say it wouldn’t seek closures until January 2027.

Martinez claims in his lawsuit that those posts were knowingly false.

“Davis Gates and the CTU knew the schools study had been performed at the directive of the Former Board, that the ensuing list was the result of the Former Board’s own initiative, and that [Martinez] had no plan to undertake school closures on that or any other basis,” the lawsuit said.

The lawsuit also notes a May 14 Facebook post from CTU’s page that says Martinez could have “recovered millions in charter loan debt” and “billed Medicaid” to avoid budget challenges. Martinez’s complaint argues both claims are false.

On Medicaid, Martinez’s lawsuit argues that “the highest recoupment of Medicaid” for CPS happened under Martinez. On charters, the complaint says the district can only function based on the contracts it sets with charter school operators.

The defamation allegations also cite a post Davis Gates made on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, arguing the district’s current financial difficulties “can be traced back to Martinez’s time as the district’s chief financial officer between 2003 and 2009,” citing risky loans he “blessed and structured.” Martinez’s lawyers say those allegations are all false and none of his actions as CFO more than a decade ago caused today’s financial challenges.

Separately, the lawsuit claims that board President Harden made false statements last month about Martinez’s work, including that he has been more focused on “his professional future and not on the long-term stability and success of our school district” and that his actions “have undermined our board’s ability to make the best decisions on behalf of CPS students.”

Martinez’s team claims Harden’s comments are false and are an attempt to establish legal “cause” for letting Martinez go sooner than his planned departure. Martinez was fired without cause in December and, per his contract, was allowed to stay in his role through June 19.

In a brief interview Thursday, Harden said he wasn’t aware of the defamation claims and did not say anything defamatory. He said his statements on the budget cited in the lawsuit were “100% factual.” CPS has floated a possible budget plan that assumes it will receive an additional $300 million from either the city or state, which has not yet materialized.

The budget is “incomplete and unsatisfactory, so I stand by those comments,” Harden said. “We were and we still are looking at what was put out — a $229 million budget scenario with suggestions of $300 million coming from unsubstantiated sources, so the board is not in a position to make sound decisions … That is still the case today.”

Last week, the union threatened to sue the district over a potential proposal to delay some of the union’s contract agreements next year. (The district told WBEZ that it “may need to review all additional expenditures under various labor agreements and vendor contracts to ensure long-term sustainability” and would work with unions as necessary.)

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools floats hundreds of layoffs as one option to close $529 million budget gap

2025-04-25T22:19:36+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools is considering laying off hundreds of school-based staffers next school year — one of multiple scenarios being considered to close a $529 million budget gap, Chalkbeat has learned.

Between 1,600 and 1,700 positions based inside schools could be cut, according to a presentation used to brief board members obtained by Chalkbeat. However, it’s not clear if the number represents a net reduction in the overall number of CPS employees. The district currently employs more than 41,000 people.

While some of the belt-tightening could include cutting vacant positions, it would “overwhelmingly” involve layoffs, according to a CPS source who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak with the press.

The potential cuts are not yet final. The presentation suggests there are ways to lessen the blow, specifically by getting more state funding or more city money than it is already expecting from special taxing districts meant to spur development, known as TIFs. Mayor Brandon Johnson has the power to declare a surplus of those funds, and CPS is assuming it will again receive roughly $300 million in those funds next year, according to the presentation.

The CPS budget for next school year, which would begin July 1, must still go through a public hearing process and be formally adopted by the board. School budgets are typically shared with principals and Local School Councils in the spring. By state law, the district’s budget must be balanced.

The challenge ahead marks the first time in recent years that CPS has had to consider deep school-based cuts. That’s largely because the district benefitted from a windfall of nearly $3 billion in federal COVID relief money over the past four school years, which supported 7% of school budgets, according to a Chalkbeat analysis.

In a statement, CPS spokesperson Mary Ann Fergus said the district is considering multiple scenarios, including what happens if state or local revenue doesn’t change. The different scenarios don’t “necessarily reflect the district’s recommendation.” She added that CPS leaders, students, parents, and advocates will travel to Springfield next week to push for more state funding.

“CPS will continue to seek every opportunity to boost revenue and minimize cuts, particularly those that could disrupt the learning experience or impact our dedicated staff,” she said. “Our primary focus will remain on safeguarding the quality of education for our students and minimizing any disruptions to their daily learning.”

The school board’s office did not return a request for comment. Service Employees International Union local that covers school support staff also did not respond to a request for comment.

In a statement, Chicago Teachers Union president Stacy Davis Gates said the potential cuts are “evidence of a fired CEO’s failure to lead.”

CPS CEO Pedro Martinez was fired without cause in December and will leave in June. He will likely take a job as the new education commissioner of Massachusetts.

“It’s time for this board to define for Chicagoans how it will lead and show there’s no place for going backwards on the district’s commitment to quality public education,” Davis Gates said.

Closing budget gap could mean at least $200M cuts to schools

The expected $529 million gap between revenues and expenses is calculated after accounting for several new expenses, including the new teachers contract, potential raises for principals as part of their union’s negotiations, and increased costs related to SEIU and other unions, according to the internal presentation. CPS is also expecting increases in charter school funding and teacher pensions, to comply with state laws. The projection does not, however, include a much-debated pension reimbursement to the city of Chicago, which the district declined to pay this year. That suggests the district will, for now, refuse to reimburse the city for the pension payment next school year.

The projected budget gap does not include new risks to federal funding under President Donald Trump, such as Title I, which provides additional funds to about 400 Chicago schools with high shares of students from low-income families.

If the board chooses to balance the budget through this plan, it would reduce the deficit by a total $200 million to $260 million, about 6% to 7% of the $3.5 billion in funding that goes directly to schools, according to the presentation. The district also floated cutting central office expenses by $20 million to $40 million — 7% to 13% — and trimming another nearly 20%, or between $250 million and $280 million, from centralized support services and staff that work more directly with schools.

The plan could mean cuts to discretionary funding for high-needs schools, staff that provide additional support to struggling students, such as tutors, and social-emotional support, according to the presentation. However, it also said those potential cuts would keep class sizes at contractual limits in the new Chicago Teachers Union contract.

The contract lowers kindergarten class sizes to 25 students and adds a teaching assistant for any class with more than 23 students, the union previously told Chalkbeat. In first through third grade, class sizes would be 28, and in fourth through eighth grade, the cap is 30 students.

Cuts could also impact support staff, such as custodians, security guards, building engineers, lunchroom staff, and crossing guards paid for under the Safe Passage program. The internal presentation also mentioned trimming transportation costs that are not legally mandated. That could impact recent increased efforts to restore transportation to general education students who largely attend magnet or selective enrollment schools.

However, in its presentation, the district foreshadowed that there could be cuts even if new revenue comes through. For example, if the district received $300 million in additional funding through either state or city funding, it could mean a $70 million to $110 million cut to direct school funding.

Despite the potential cuts, the presentation said CPS is “committed” to maintaining teaching staff that prioritizes “reasonable class sizes” and “differentiated support for high-needs schools,” as well as support for kids with greater needs, such as students with disabilities and English learners.

According to the CPS source, the district does not prefer instituting a hiring freeze to address cuts because high-needs schools are typically where vacant positions exist. That means a hiring freeze would impose greater burdens on the schools that likely need the most staffing. Cuts would more likely impact larger schools.

School board members look to city, state for help

School board member Jitu Brown said while the presentation was “thorough,” it wasn’t a surprise. District officials have publicly shared for months that CPS expected at least a half-billion-dollar deficit.

He argued that there hasn’t been a solid legislative strategy from CPS to convince state lawmakers to send funding help. He also thinks CPS’s resistance to taking out a loan in order to reimburse the city for some pension costs was a misstep.

District officials worried that taking out such a loan would result in high-interest rates that would become difficult to pay back down the road.

While CPS is not legally required to pay the city back for those pension costs, it had done so under Mayor Lori Lightfoot. Brown worried that by not paying the city back, City Council has lost interest in sending more TIF surplus to the schools. Aldermen and city officials warned the school board in March that they could hold back on funding help for CPS if the district did not reimburse the city for the pension payment.

Brown said he and other board members plan to press state lawmakers for more funding and more relief on certain costs, such as teacher pensions that other districts don’t pay. Those are issues that district staffers have also previously highlighted.

“To me this whole piece has been due to a lack of leadership,” Brown said. “I’m not in favor of any budget cuts.”

Board member Carlos Rivas said he supports pushing the city for more TIF surplus funding to help make an “absolutely terrible” cut “much more manageable.” He placed more blame on city officials for not developing a strong state advocacy campaign and doesn’t believe the state is going to bail out CPS. But he believes there’s political will on the City Council to support the public school system, despite the tension around the pension payment.

“I believe we all want great schools so I don’t believe the City Council will hold that against us,” Rivas said.

Financial issues can be tied to the end of the COVID relief money

In the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, CPS spent nearly $3 billion in federal COVID relief funding on many school-based investments, primarily staff, including a cadre of new academic interventionists. The district touts those investments as helping students perform better than some of their peers nationwidef after the pandemic.

However, those were not one-time costs, and the money dried up last year. The district had to close a roughly half-billion-dollar deficit this year, too, as it tried to hold on to many of those new investments.

The district’s internal presentation outlined possible cuts that include many of those post-COVID investments: cuts to professional development, after-school programming, curriculum support, and academic interventionists — a position that has already been pared down since last school year.

Martinez appears to be leaning toward pushing for more TIF funding. At Thursday’s Board of Education meeting, he said after conversations with state legislators, he isn’t confident more state funding is in the cards. Illinois is working to close a $3.2 billion deficit for the coming fiscal year.

The internal presentation also outlined scenarios where the CPS deficit could grow — and require even deeper cuts. For example, the pension reimbursement would increase the district’s projected deficit, as would about $30 million in costs to begin the planning and transitioning of five Acero charter schools into district-run schools by the fall of 2026. Those are separate from the costs related to eventually taking over the schools.

The board voted in February to take over the five Acero campuses previously slated for closure. Asked why the Acero transition costs weren’t included in the district’s deficit projection, a CPS source said “doing that would require significant cuts” and district staff wanted to ensure the board knows “what the consequences are.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board approves contract with Chicago Teachers Union

2025-04-25T02:00:23+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education has finalized the new Chicago Teachers Union contract, which will cover roughly 30,000 educators and support staff.

The board’s Thursday vote puts the contract into effect; the union’s membership ratified the contract earlier this month with a nearly unanimous vote to approve it from 85% of union members.

The four-year contract is expected to cost a total of $1.4 billion. It includes class size limits, requirements to hire hundreds of new staff, including more teacher assistants, and ten additional minutes of preparation time for elementary school teachers — which at some schools could also mean ten more minutes of recess.

The vote came about a year after bargaining began. Negotiations started with cordiality and optimism, but grew contentious amid a bruising battle between the union and district that helped lead to the firing of Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez.

But those tensions were set aside on Thursday.

In public comments to the board, CTU President Stacy Davis Gates noted that reaching an agreement did not require a strike vote or a strike, as it did in 2012, 2016, and 2019.

“That is a significant development,” she said.

Davis Gates said the contract will require a partnership between the union and district leaders to implement it well.

The school board also approved an amendment to this school year’s budget, adding $139 million in surplus development funds it received from the city, which officials said would help pay for the teachers contract as well as a future contract with the principals union. Those funds come from the city’s Tax Increment Financing, or TIF, districts, which are meant to spur development. As expected, the amendment does not mention using the money to pay the city back for a highly debated pension payment for non-teaching staff.

Though the first year of the contract, which is retroactive to last July, is paid for, there are questions about whether the district has the funding to pay for the remaining years through June 2028.

Davis Gates said the district must work to find a solution to any budget constraints, including advocating for more state funding.

District officials are expecting a deficit of roughly $500 million next school year. District leaders have said they plan to advocate for additional funding, and several school board members plan to travel to Springfield soon. After a presentation about teacher recruitment and hiring, board Vice President Olga Bautista asked how the district’s financial situation could impact staffing levels and recruitment efforts.

Ben Felton, chief of talent for CPS, and Martinez said district leaders are trying to advocate for more state funding. But Martinez, who said he’s not optimistic the state will come through, has also pushed for more surplus funding from TIF districts.

“It comes down to additional revenue for the school district to be able to sustain it or having to consider painful choices and painful cuts,” Felton said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Q&A: Karen Lewis ‘Didn’t Come Here to Lie’ in new book about her life

2025-04-21T10:00:00+00:00

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It’s been four years since Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis died at the age of 67. Now, a new book shares her life story in her own words.

Co-written by Lewis and former Chicago school board member and historian Elizabeth Todd-Breland, “I Didn’t Come Here to Lie: My Life and Education” chronicles Lewis’ life from her childhood growing up in Chicago’s Hyde Park, to her twenties working a multitude of jobs, to her years leading the CTU.

“She was very clear-eyed about how she wanted to tell the story,” Todd-Breland said, adding that when people who knew her well read the book, they’ll say, “I can hear her in it.”

After decades teaching high school chemistry at Chicago Public Schools, Lewis joined a group of progressive educators to form the Caucus of Rank and File Educators in 2008. The group pushed back on bipartisan education reform efforts of the time that came with high-stakes accountability, the closure of many traditional public schools, the firing of veteran educators, and the rise of publicly-funded, privately-run charter schools in Chicago.

The group took over leadership of the CTU in 2010 and popularized a common good approach to organizing and bargaining that centered social issues and pushed to have teachers’ voices shape public education policy. Teachers unions in Los Angeles, Milwaukee, Seattle, Saint Paul, Minnesota, and Dayton, Ohio, eventually followed the approach.

Lewis sparred publicly with former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel over the length of the school day and year, whether teacher evaluations should be linked to student test scores, and air conditioning in classrooms. She led a seven-day strike in 2012 that was bruising to Emanuel and launched Lewis into the national spotlight.

In 2015, she was diagnosed with a brain tumor just as she was considering a challenge to then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Though she recovered and remained at the helm of the CTU, a stroke in the fall of 2017 led to her resignation from the union’s top role in 2018.

The book by Karen Lewis and Elizabeth Todd-Breland focuses on the life led by the former president of the Chicago Teachers Union.

Todd-Breland began working with Lewis on her memoir in early 2017. After the stroke, she couldn’t write anymore, Todd-Breland said, so she began interviewing Lewis at CTU headquarters, in her home, and eventually, at Whitehall, an assisted living facility in suburban Deerfield. Their last interview took place in February 2020, and Lewis passed away roughly one year later.

Todd-Breland worked with research assistant Sekordri Ojo, who was also a student of Lewis’s when she taught chemistry at King College Prep, to put the book together “like a puzzle” to create a cohesive narrative about a woman she calls “a master teacher, a skilled communicator, a principled person, and a renaissance woman.”

Chalkbeat spoke to Todd-Breland about the book.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

One thing that really stuck with me was her recollection of going to school for the first time and coming home from the first day of kindergarten and being devastated that she wasn’t taught to read. Was that surprising to you?

That’s a good question. I think it wasn’t surprising to me because Karen was so precocious and so curious that, of course she would expect on the first day of kindergarten to learn how to read.

But I think some of the other things that she talks about are actually interesting and speak to the moment that she went to elementary school. For example, she talks about primary grade teachers playing the piano and teaching music in the classroom. That was something that was quite widespread during that period of time. Primary grades included music in the classroom or had pianos.

As a side note, I recall I was doing some work years ago with some students at Sumner Elementary School on the West Side in an after school program. We were working on a history project about their school and we found all these old pianos. And I remember asking, “What is this about?” And they were like, “Yeah, primary grades used to have pianos and teach music in class.” I think that is sort of something of the era.

Students gathered in the Black Culture Center at Mount Holyoke, sometime between 1970 and 1972. Karen Lewis is seated on the far right.

After graduating from Dartmouth College, Lewis moved to Oklahoma, where she held so many different jobs that weren’t teaching jobs. She led this entire other life before the one we know about in Chicago. Was it difficult for her to talk about this time in her life?

I think it was a time of a lot of growth for her. Her years in Oklahoma. In a certain way, it almost felt like she was fleeing Dartmouth. I think it was very hard to be among the only Black women, very few Black people, at a time when this university had just turned coed, and I think she was ready to get out of there.

She was trying to figure out what she wanted to do with life. She worked at a drug rehab center. She worked at American Airlines. She was doing IT work. She sold Ginsu knives. She did telemarketing, which she said was actually one of her favorite things, before she found teaching. I think she really was just kind of trying to find her way, which is what a lot of people do.

She does remark on how, particularly coming from Chicago, it felt like the civil rights movement was several years behind in Oklahoma. She really felt like folks there were, in many ways, still traumatized, particularly in Tulsa, by the Tulsa race massacre that had happened earlier in the 20th century. In Tulsa, they knew what happened, they experienced very viscerally the negative consequences of fighting white supremacy, and so she felt like there wasn’t as much of a desire to aggressively confront racial inequality there in the same way she had experienced in Chicago, or even what she experienced as a student activist in her college years.

She talks about her first husband, Glenn, who she married while in Tulsa. The two split and he died at 41 when Lewis was 35, but she said Glenn taught her that “people you work with aren’t necessarily your friends. He taught me how to read between the lines. He gave me all the street smarts that I think I have now.” Decades later, Chicago Magazine wrote a profile of her characterizing her as a street fighter. Did getting this glimpse into her life in Oklahoma help you better understand that side of her?

I think that there are parts as she narrates her early life that you can still see in her later life. On the one hand, she was a singular, extraordinary person. On the other hand, she was a human and I think one of the things that the memoir does is in telling her personal story of growth over time, of learning and seeking and trying things and shifting, it also humanizes her in a way that I think hopefully also allows people to see that not that anyone can do extraordinary things, necessarily, but that we all have the capacity within us to try to do hard things.

In the book, Lewis references civil rights lawyer Lani Guinier a few times. She outlines three questions she used in her D’vah Torah that she credits to Guinier: “Who made the rules to the game? Who are the winners, and who are the losers? What are the stories the winners tell the losers to keep them playing the game?” How do you think this applies to public education today?

I think as we look particularly at the national political landscape right now, those questions remain really important. And Lani Guinier was “she-ro” of Karen’s. She was also a Black Jewish woman. She was a civil rights lawyer. She faced her own pushback for pushing the envelope, and ultimately wasn’t able to be nominated for the position [of U.S. assistant attorney general for civil rights under Bill Clinton], or go forward in her nomination.

I think these questions are basically: What is common sense? I think if we look at the period between the early 2000s and now, the education justice movement that Karen was a prominent leader in shifted that common sense locally about things like the need for fully funded education, the values of having an art teacher, a music teacher, and physical education and wraparound services. These aren’t things in our common sense today that we question. Whereas if we think back to the late ’90s and the early 2000s, it was a back-to-basics moment. It was a kill-and-drill moment, it was double-block English, double-block math and everything else goes to the wayside.

If you think back to the early 2000s, there was really bipartisan consensus around privatization, high stakes testing, high stakes accountability. The polarities are now quite different. On the one hand, you have leaders on the right who want to privatize everything, voucher out the education system, defund public education. But the alternative to that isn’t “Let’s do some form of pseudo-privatized education,” or “hard a” accountability. The alternative to that is: fully funded schools, wraparound services, culturally relevant and responsive education. In this moment, the force of narrative that those three questions point to remains relevant.

What do you think she would think about former teacher and CTU organizer Brandon Johnson getting elected Chicago mayor and now being on the rulemaking side and the winning side?

If you think back to the political project that she was engaged in, she very clearly saw a path into electoral politics for herself, potentially being mayor, but also pushing different candidates to really change the playing field. I think she would be proud of now-Mayor Brandon Johnson for stepping into that arena.

I also think she was clear eyed about the difficulties of governance that everyone encounters. Particularly in the moment we’re in right now, taking on political roles at a moment when, in particular, funding is falling out from underneath all of us, is a really daunting and difficult task.

I don’t want to put words into Karen’s mouth, but what I can say based on the conversations that we did have, and what she writes about, is that she did think it was important to move into electoral politics, regardless of how fraught that space might be.

Was there anything cut from the book, or did you have a hard time distilling it down?

I had a ton of material. When I started, the first draft had like 110,000 words. It was wildly large. But part of that is because there’s repetition.

I do think that there were — there’s not key things that I was like, “Wow, I wish I could put that in.” But there were things that, if she were still living, I would have loved to press more on. Like, tell me more stories about the classroom, because her stories about the classroom were amazing. Lighting things on fire on the first day of school in chemistry class to get students engaged and about her use of the Socratic method that she learned actually at Sullivan in her very first fulltime teaching job and how she used that and it resonated with her own liberal arts education at Mount Holyoke and Dartmouth.

She taught for so long, over 20 years, in one of the largest high schools in Chicago, Lane Tech College Prep, as well as King College Prep and Sullivan High School. Her students are everywhere. They come out of the woodworks to share stories about their experiences with Karen, how transformative she was in their lives. Just like a LinkedIn post like, hey, the book’s out and I have former students commenting “I remember when I was in class and you know, she said this and that changed my life,” and I think it does speak to the transformative power of educators. In the day to day, it can often feel futile and frustrating, but teachers are shaping and molding and impacting people’s lives in a way that travels with them for the rest of their life. And I think Karen was one of those educators.

Lewis talks about former Mayor Rahm Emanuel, with whom she had an adversarial relationship at times, and how she read the book “Brothers Emanuel,” in order to know her enemy as a form of opposition research. What were her reflections on that relationship?

I think her critiques of Rahm Emanuel were very pointed. I think her critiques of the relationship that he thought he could establish with her and her putting a check on how she would and would not be spoken to, she was very clear on that.

There’s the sort of interpersonal parts of her relationship with Rahm Emanuel, but for her it wasn’t strictly interpersonal. For her, when we talk about the winners and the losers in the game, she represented generations of educators and students who had been on the losing end of things for so many years. And so when she was in these back and forth conversations with him, she wasn’t there by herself. She was there on behalf of many, many people who had for many years not been or not had opportunities in the city. It felt like something more than just an interpersonal attack to her. When you cuss at me or when you put me down, in this way, you’re also putting down all the people that I represent here.

Angela Davis, left, and Karen Lewis pose for a photograph. Davis, a feminist political activist and member of the Black Panther Party, wrote the foreword of Lewis' posthumous memoir.

In the book, she also talks pointedly about party politics and money, saying, “We have a one party system in America, and it’s the party of money. There are just two major branches, Democrats and Republicans. And if you don’t believe it, look at who the donors are. Those donors will subsidize both branches. What we really have is one party, the party of green. And I don’t mean the environmentalist green. I mean the party of money green. This is my theory of the situation. Of course, I could be wrong as all get out.” Do you think she was wrong?

I don’t think she was wrong. I think there are so many things in this memoir and her lessons for us that speak to exactly where we are today, fighting against billionaires, using the word oligarchy profusely in the United States of America, and having it accurately reflect the power structure of our country. I think she was very keen to that issue.

She talked about how she didn’t see that much of a difference between former Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner, a Republican, and Emanuel, a Democrat, or these other billionaires that were pulling the strings behind the curtain, and that the answer to that, for her, was people power. That the power of the people, the power of mass mobilization, the power of solidarity, was the only thing that could push back and fight against that, and that’s where we are today.

Her faith was a big part of the whole book. She talks in the very final chapter, A Life Well Lived, about running into people who had wanted her to be the mayor and telling them, “God had something else planned for me. What are you going to do?” In your last interview, obviously, you probably didn’t know it was your last. Did you know it was your last?

No. No, definitely not.

Was it hard for you to figure out where to finish the story?

We weren’t able to communicate much during that COVID year and towards the very end of her life, but Karen’s faith was so important to her, and I think it was something that sustained her through difficult and joyful moments. She would say to me regularly, “I plan to live for another 100 years.” She had a different vision for herself. I think she was someone who also had a very forward-looking vision and that that sustained her in a certain way, and that her faith was a central part of that.

It actually was very difficult trying to figure out how to end the book, because when we were working on the book, she was alive. So trying to figure out how to end it was difficult. Every time I read it, it was hard when I’d get to the end, because it felt like, oh, our time together is over.

On the one hand, she had so much more in her, and on the other hand, she did so much. One thing I will say is, given the attacks on DEI, given the attacks on public education, given the defunding or deconstruction of the U.S. Department of Education, Karen’s words and ideas are as relevant today as they were in the 2000s and 2010s. I hope that people can take strength from her story — to laugh and to learn and to think about how we fight for a better world and for the world that our students deserve and our communities deserve.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

A majority of Chicago teachers, support staff ratify tentative Chicago Teachers Union contract

2025-04-14T19:43:35+00:00

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The Chicago Teachers Union announced Monday 97% of teachers and support staff at Chicago Public Schools who voted last week approved the tentative deal it reached after a year of sometimes heated bargaining with the district.

The union said 85% of all union members voted last Thursday and Friday across 500 schools and some central locations for citywide employees. The Chicago Board of Education must still vote to approve the deal. The board must also amend its budget to pay for the first year of the four-year contract, which will include retroactive pay reaching back to last July.

During a press conference Monday announcing the results, CTU President Stacy Davis Gates said the approval numbers were a result of the union’s democratic process, including consulting its roughly 30,000 members on proposals for the contract.

“That should be an expectation: That people are engaged, that people have an understanding, that they get their questions answered, they see the progression of the work and then they ratify in those numbers,” Davis Gates told reporters.

To members who voted no, Davis Gates said the union will continue to “build” with them and asked those members to give the union “a few more years” to meet their demands. Davis Gates is up for re-election in May and faces at least one slate of challengers.

The approval from CTU’s membership caps a process that heightened tensions between the district, the union, and Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former middle school teacher and CTU organizer. It fueled deep disagreement over how to pay for the contract and other costs, leading to the resignation of Johnson’s entire first appointed school board and the firing of CPS CEO Pedro Martinez, who will stay through the end of the school year.

In recent weeks, tensions grew to a boiling point, raising the question of whether the union would go on strike, as it did in 2019 and 2012. That didn’t come to pass. The union and the district agreed on a tentative deal that was far more modest than the original 700-plus proposals the union had pitched at the start of bargaining.

The new contract will include 4-5% raises annually over the life of the four-year contract, as well as additional pay for more veteran teachers. It will also require hiring hundreds more staffers, including more teacher assistants, and includes some new class size limits.

One of the thorniest issues resolved in the final days of bargaining was additional preparation time for elementary school teachers. Those educators will receive an additional 10 minutes of prep time each day, as well as an additional three teacher-directed professional development days that were previously controlled by principals. District leaders said this will be achieved differently by schools, such as by increasing recess time to the state-mandated requirement of 30 minutes so that teachers can prepare.

While CPS has said it can afford the first year of the contract, it’s unclear how it will pay for the rest of the deal, which in total is projected to cost $1.5 billion. Martinez has said the district’s revenues could be enough to cover the costs, but it struggles every year with a structural deficit.

Potentially choppy financial waters are ahead for the district, which is projected to face at least a $500 million deficit next fiscal year. Additionally, there is a looming threat of federal funding cuts under the Trump administration. Union, district, and city officials have all said they plan to advocate for more funding from the state, though so far it’s unclear if those demands will be met. Mayor Johnson said the city will sue the Trump administration if it withholds federal funding because of the district’s policies on diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Asked if she is worried about furloughs and layoffs in the upcoming school year, Davis Gates said no. She said the union has organized and fought before against painful cuts and layoffs, including during the 2013 school closures. Key players in those fights now sit in the highest places of power in Chicago’s government, she noted.

“I’m not worried about it because Jitu Brown is on the school board and he did that work already. I’m not worried about it because Brandon Johnson is on the fifth floor and he did that work already. I’m not worried about it because Jeanette Taylor is in the City Council and she’s done that work already,” she said. “See, we have set ourselves up for this moment.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago principals union looks to lock in first collective bargaining agreement

2025-04-07T22:44:04+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools officials are back at the bargaining table — this time, with the district’s principals.

In February, CPS and the Chicago Principals & Administrators Association, the union representing school leaders, restarted contract talks after putting them on hold in the fall amid time-consuming and often contentious negotiations between the district and the Chicago Teachers Union. The district reached a tentative agreement with the CTU last week.

The principals union is advocating for more professional development, a process that allows unsuccessful candidates for principal jobs to grieve that result and get feedback, eligibility criteria, and more due process for principals facing discipline, among other things. A key priority is a proposal to enshrine more protections against harassment and abuse of school leaders in the new contract, said Kia Banks, the union’s chief of staff.

The two sides are building a principals collective bargaining agreement from scratch — and Banks said they agreed not to rush the process or duke it out in the media.

“This is our first contract, and I think the district is taking an approach that allows for us to have more discussion,” Banks said.

State lawmakers passed a bill that allowed Chicago Public Schools principals to unionize in 2023, and the CPAA, which had long-served as an advocacy organization for school leaders and administrative staff, stepped in to fill the role.

Principals enter ‘new era’ with union representation

The prospect of an inaugural collective bargaining agreement feels momentous, said Chris Graves, the principal of Jordan Elementary on the city’s Far North Side.

“It’s more than a small victory,” he said. “It’s a new era for us.”

The principals union is prohibited from going on strike under the new state law. But a revision to the initial law made earlier this year does allow CPAA to enlist an independent mediator to help with contract talks if they stall.

So far, the district and union are not sharing proposals publicly. In response to questions about the resumption of negotiations with principals, CPS said in a statement that it values the district’s school leaders and is scheduled to meet with their union again this week.

“The District looks forward to an engaging and collaborative conversation focused on the overall safety of our school leaders,” the statement said.

Banks said the union hasn’t yet presented an offer on salaries and benefits to the district. School leaders in CPS customarily have received the cost-of-living increases that the Chicago Teachers Union negotiates for educators in their contract, which stand at 4% to 5% a year in the tentative agreement that CTU members are voting on this week.

According to the district’s latest staffing data, principals in Chicago make a salary of $161,960 a year on average while assistant principals make $131,800. The district’s average teacher salary is about $96,000, according to CPS.

The union is prioritizing anti-harassment protections

Banks said negotiations restarted in February with a discussion of the union’s ask on anti-harassment protections. In a union survey, she said, a significant number of principals and assistant principals reported experiencing verbal abuse, threats, harassment, and occasionally physical incidents involving students, parents, staff, or community members.

Principals are the public face of district policies and decisions, Banks said — there to explain or defend them to members of the public who might disagree. That task became especially fraught during the pandemic in Chicago and across the country as COVID protocols and policies came under intense scrutiny. Principals also sometimes must deal with students and parents upset about student discipline decisions. Some have faced personal attacks and threats during virtual or in-person local school council meetings.

“There are so many access points that make principals vulnerable,” Banks said.

Banks said CPS officials have pointed to the district’s anti-bullying and harassment policy and student code of conduct as examples of protections already on the books. The union argues these policies don’t always go far enough or are not uniformly applied.

Graves, the Jordan Elementary principal, said a contract could spell out when district administrators must respond to harassment or threats against school leaders, along with a timeline for doing so promptly. While it’s hard to say how widespread this issue is, Graves said anecdotally, “I get a sense that for people who leave the role, that’s often one of the biggest reasons.”

The collective bargaining agreement can also make a big difference in spelling out where school leaders’ duties end — and where other district officials should step in to keep principals focused on serving their students, Graves added. This can be especially important for Chicago’s school leaders — who must answer to multiple people: network chiefs, district administrators, the school board, and their own local school councils.

For the past decade, the Chicago Public Education Fund has surveyed school principals about their experiences in an effort to help CPS improve retention among school leaders; roughly half of elementary principals and two-thirds of high schools principals in the district leave their role within five years, according to University of Chicago data. In the group’s most recent survey, principals said having more time devoted to improving teaching and learning in their buildings would improve their experience the most, followed by more financial resources for their schools.

Graves also said he would like to see a clear description of what the principal’s workday looks like and a process for handling district communications and issues after hours. CPS principals routinely work on evenings and weekends, and while they’re often best equipped to respond to emergencies, it can be draining to feel on call 24 hours a day.

“To have some guardrails and boundaries feels very empowering to us,” he said.

Towanna Butler, the assistant principal at the Chicago High School for Agricultural Sciences on the Far South Side, said the new union contract in the works would improve the principal experience across the district.

“It’s powerful that we’ll have a collective bargaining agreement that will ensure that we are all heard and treated fairly,” she said.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

CTU and Chicago Public Schools reach tentative contract deal

2025-04-01T17:51:47+00:00

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The Chicago Teachers Union and Chicago Public Schools reached a tentative contract agreement Monday night that would reduce class sizes in some grades, add hundreds of new positions, and give elementary school teachers more preparation time while many students get more recess.

The deal would also grant teachers a 4% raise retroactively to cover the first year of the contract, which is the current school year, and 4-5% for each of the next three years.

The deal secures significant wins that the union left on the table during a bruising, lengthy strike in 2019 and comes after it pushed hard for its most ambitious, costliest slate of demands to date. But the tentative deal is far more modest than the union’s initial proposals, which included adding thousands of new staffers and 9% annual raises.

Teachers union members and the school board still need to vote to ratify the new contract, which would be retroactive to last June.

After helping propel Brandon Johnson, a former union employee, to the mayor’s office, the CTU expressed confidence heading into negotiations. But the union and CPS leadership clashed fiercely for nearly a year over what to include in the contract and how to pay for it.

The conflict led to the October resignation of the entire school board of Johnson appointees last October. A new board handpicked by the mayor fired CPS CEO Pedro Martinez without cause in late December, though a clause in his contract allowed him to stay on for another six months.

A partly elected, 21-member school board has pressed the Martinez administration to settle the contract since it took over in January. Johnson appointees and CTU-endorsed candidates hold a solid majority on the board.

The district said the agreement is a financially responsible and fair deal in line with other public unions. The union hailed the agreement as a victory for teachers and students.

“I have never seen a document before that has win, win, win, win, win, win for every stakeholder,” CTU president Stacy Davis Gates said in an interview. “Our young people win, the people who provide their education win, the families that send them to the Chicago Public Schools win, principals win, the Board of Education wins, the CEO wins, the mayor of Chicago wins.”

In a briefing with reporters, CPS CEO Pedro Martinez said the agreement maintains autonomy for principals, gives teachers fair wage increases, provides a “joyful experience” for students, and balances all of that “with being responsible to our taxpayers.”

The deal would expand the union’s membership ranks with additional librarians, clinicians, and teaching assistants. It would also cement CPS teachers’ position among the best paid in the country, with an average salary poised to surpass $110,000 by the contract’s end. An entry level teacher would earn nearly $69,000, and median teacher pay would be more than $98,000 next school year, district officials said.

District officials estimated the tentative four-year deal would cost a total of $1.5 billion over the life of the contract. District leaders said they can cover the cost of the first year, but questions remain about how the district will afford future years while holding onto a structural deficit. Martinez, who leaves the district in June, said it will be important to advocate for more state funding and shifting certain pension obligations.

The agreement would avert the possibility of a teacher strike, which CTU leadership had invoked in recent weeks. It could also relieve pressure on Davis Gates and CTU Vice President Jackson Potter, who are being challenged in an election by colleagues who question their leadership’s transparency and approach to politics.

Days after Johnson convened a meeting between CTU and CPS leaders that reportedly gave negotiations a boost, Board of Education President Sean Harden postponed a high-stakes vote to amend the district’s budget to pay for the CTU contract and a pending principals contract along with a controversial $175 million pension fund reimbursement to the city that was a source of tension between City Hall and CPS.

Here’s how the two sides resolved several sticking points that snarled the talks.

Additional teacher prep time and more recess for kids

The tentative deal would increase the amount of preparation time elementary school teachers get to 70 minutes every day, up from the current hour. Students in many schools would get an additional ten minutes of recess to meet a state requirement, union and district officials said.

But the two additional weekly 15-minute preparation periods that are currently provided would be eliminated, according to the district.

Schools will implement this differently and will get guidance from CPS on how to add the instructional time, said Bogdana Chkoumbova, the district’s chief education officer. For example, a school could add to its recess time, and additional teacher prep time could be added then. Another school that already has 30 minutes of recess time could decide to add more time to specialty classes in order to give homeroom teachers more prep time.

If the deal is approved, elementary teachers would also get additional preparation time throughout the year, which union and district officials said would be achieved by adjusting principal and teacher-directed days of professional development. Currently, there are 12 such days, nine of which are directed by principals. In the tentative agreement, six would remain directed by principals, and six would be teacher-directed.

The issue of prep time was the “single stickiest” because it involved changing the school day, Davis Gates said. Both district and union officials agreed on Monday that teachers should have more preparation time. Still, district officials pushed back vehemently on adding the 30 minutes that the union initially asked for, which would’ve restored prep time eliminated when CPS lengthened the school day in 2012 under former Mayor Rahm Emanuel. The union reduced its ask to 20 minutes in the final weeks of bargaining.

Chkoumbova said cutting down on instructional time for students, many of whom are still recovering from the pandemic, “was not an option.” District officials noted that Chicago teachers get more prep time than counterparts in most large urban districts.

“No one’s happy with this,” Davis Gates said of the prep time compromise.

Still, it was more progress than what the union won in 2019, when prep time was also a thorny union proposal that largely didn’t materialize.

Smaller class sizes

For the past three decades, Chicago Public Schools officials were not required to bargain with the Chicago Teachers Union over class sizes due to changes in state law in 1995 that limited the scope of what they could bargain over to primarily pay and benefits.

But the Illinois legislature restored those collective bargaining rights to CTU in 2021, making this round of contract negotiations the first since Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed that bill into law. Although the union did secure wins around class sizes in 2019, there were limits to enforcing them.

The new tentative agreement reduces the class size caps in kindergarten and middle school and includes provisions to automatically add teaching assistants to classrooms that exceed the limits.

The tentative agreement would lower kindergarten class sizes to 25 students and add a teaching assistant for any class with more than 23 students, according to the union. Both are down from the previous limit of 28.

The class size cap in first through third grade would remain at 28, and in fourth through eighth grade, it would drop from 31 to 30 students, according to the union and CPS.

The new agreement dedicates $40 million to enforcing these class sizes — $5 million more than the previous contract.

More school nurses, librarians, and teaching assistants

A key union priority was significantly increasing district staffing across a wide range of positions the CTU represents. The union argued that the influx of employees would be transformative in stepping up services for students, but staff increases are the costliest for the district to implement.

CPS hired about 7,000 new teachers and staff since 2020, using the $2.8 billion wave of federal pandemic relief money. District officials have said they want to protect those positions even as federal COVID relief dollars have dried up.

The new tentative contract deal adds hundreds more employees over the course of the next three years, union officials said. The district projected between 800-900 new positions, which will be “indexed and targeted into the highest needs schools,” said Ben Felton, the district’s chief talent officer.

According to both the union and the district, the tentative agreement adds 24 centralized fine arts positions and 68 technology coordinators. The union saids it would add roughly 90 new librarian positions, but the district said the agreement would give schools the flexibility to replace current positions with librarians.

The union said it will also boost teaching assistant positions by 50%, though district officials said staffing increases will depend on enrollment and school needs. The number of teacher assistants has dwindled in the last decade, while the number of Special Education Classrooms assistants, or SECAs, grew. The union’s fight to increase the number of teacher assistants eventually drew a wedge with its sister union, SEIU Local 73, which represents the SECAs.

The union has argued boosting those jobs will help reduce class sizes and increase support for kids. As of the latest public staffing data, the district had opened just over 1,000 teacher assistant positions and had filled all but 100 of them.

The new contract would also add 215 additional case managers by 2028 who are supposed to ensure children with students with disabilities are receiving legally required services, according to the union. However, after this story published, CPS said it estimates the number of new case managers would be 124.

The addition will help reduce case loads for case managers, Davis Gates said.

The contract would also codify the district’s new budgeting model that largely provides staff positions instead of dollars to schools.

The union’s current contract requires a social worker and nurse in every school. Under the new agreement, schools will be required to have a nurse and a social worker in every school every day, which is not currently the case, union officials said.

More salary steps, less frequent evaluations for veteran teachers

While the two sides found themselves in general agreement over the broad strokes of a pay and benefits package earlier this year, the union continued to push for changes that would benefit more veteran educators.

The first would add additional pay bumps for teachers with more than 14 years of experience. CPS officials had resisted the union’s proposal, arguing that retention of those teachers is already high. But the tentative proposal would add $30 million in pay increases for the longest-serving teachers, the district said.

CTU also pushed for changes to the district’s teacher evaluation system, which union officials said has tended to give educators working at high-needs schools consistently lower marks. This is partly due to a state requirement to connect at least 30% of a teacher’s evaluation to student performance. There’s a bill making its way through the legislature that would make that optional.

But apart from that, in recent weeks, the union continued to ask that the district agree to evaluate highly rated tenured teachers once every three years instead of every two, which is already allowed under existing state law. The district had balked, saying that would affect the quality of teaching.

Now, under the terms of the tentative deal, two types of teachers will be placed on three-year evaluation cycles: teachers with 19 or more years of experience with higher evaluation scores, who are currently rated “proficient” and earn the same designation again, and other teachers who are currently rated as “excellent” and earn the same designation in the next evaluation cycle.

This story was updated with additional data from CPS on the proposed increase to case managers.

Becky Vevea contributed.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

‘Stop the cuts!’: Educators, school activists rally to protect federal funding for public education

2025-03-04T21:36:06+00:00

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On a cloudy, cold Tuesday morning, a cluster of teachers and community activists in Newark chanted “Stop the cuts!” as they stood in their coats outside an elementary school that serves the district’s students with disabilities.

In a Philadelphia school auditorium, teachers, district officials, and lawmakers faced more than a dozen students with disabilities and promised to protect the educational services those students rely on.

In Chicago, the rain came down as more than 20 union members stood in front of Minnie Miñoso Academy elementary to join educators across the country to rally support for public schools and urge lawmakers not to cut federal funding.

The rallies on Tuesday were part of a national effort led by the American Federation of Teachers to protest threats to cut federal funding for education. The “Protect Our Kids” day of action came as newly-installed Education Secretary Linda McMahon prepares to overhaul the federal education department and shift how the agency operates.

McMahon, sworn into office a day before, promised senators at her confirmation hearing that key funding streams, such as for students with disabilities, won’t be harmed. But many advocates fear plans to upend the education department could affect federal support for low-income students, students with disabilities, first-generation college students, and other vulnerable groups.

Republican budget proposals already call for significant cuts to school meals programs and to programs overseen by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which include Medicaid. Those are important sources of money for public schools. And public education supporters fear even steeper reductions in education spending as Republicans look for ways to pay for President Donald Trump’s tax cuts.

“The millions of children and young adults who get funding to help them in literacy, to help them with occupational therapy and physical therapy, to help them go to college, to help them with hands-on learning — that’s what the federal government spends this money for,” said AFT President Randi Weingarten in a virtual press conference. “It goes directly to schools for these kinds of services.”

Across the country, in small towns and big cities, thousands of educators donned “Red for Ed” shirts and held walk-ins at their schools — and posted on social media using the hashtag #ProtectOurKids — to explain how taxpayer money funds necessary educational services.

Public schools are governed by local school boards and primarily supported by local property taxes and other state revenues. The federal government provides funding and support for school lunch programs, students with disabilities, homeless students, those from low-income families, and students learning English.

Newark schools receive roughly $80 million in federal funding, about 10% of the district’s annual budget. Philly schools receive more than $500 million in federal support, roughly 10% of that district’s budget, while Chicago Public Schools receives $1.3 billion, about 16% of its budget.

Outside of New Jersey Regional Day School in Newark, a few dozen educators and local leaders gathered Tuesday morning to call for protections to critical federal programs that support students with disabilities.

Newark at risk of losing pipeline of student teachers

In Newark, city and school leaders joined educators and student teachers outside New Jersey Regional Day School, one of five specialized schools that serve students with disabilities in the Newark Public Schools district.

Beck Akinyemi, a student teacher pursuing their teaching certification at Montclair State University, stood alongside peers and held up a sign that read “stop the attack on education.” Akinyemi is part of the latest cohort of students supported by the Teacher Quality Partnership grant, a federal grant program that helps prepare teachers for high-need schools and subject areas through a teacher residency with partner school districts.

But Akinyemi is at risk of not completing the program after the federal education department canceled the grant at Montclair State in February. Partner districts of the program, such as Newark Public Schools, could lose their pipeline of qualified teachers due to the cuts.

“Not only will this affect all the necessary social roles schools play in our communities, they will affect the future of the next generation of educators,” Akinyemi said.

Newark Mayor Ras Baraka called the threats of federal funding cuts an attack on public school education and working class families.

“We need to do what we can to support the folks here, the organizations here, and make sure the funding remains solid and stationary,” Baraka said in front of a small crowd of educators, student teachers, and union members who chanted “stop the cuts” after his speech.

New Jersey receives around $1 billion in federal funding every year for education, and about half of that money is used for programs serving students with disabilities under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Of the $1 billion, New Jersey receives over $460 million in IDEA funding, according to the Education Law Center. This school year, Newark received $66 million in special education aid from the state, according to the district’s latest budget.

Last week, the Newark Board of Education joined school boards nationwide, including Philadelphia, in passing a resolution to formally oppose the Republican congressional budget proposals and Trump administration threats to education funding more broadly.

In Philadelphia, special education cuts would be ‘catastrophic,’ leaders say

As part of Tuesday’s nationwide protests, Philly educators, city officials, and district representatives rallied at Widener Memorial School – the only public school in Pennsylvania that exclusively serves students with disabilities and diverse learners.

Widener student Taisha Cruz, who uses a wheelchair, said her school and the funding it receives “gives us a sense of freedom you will never understand.”

At the rally, the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers union described in detail what city students would lose if IDEA funds were cut.

Acting Pennsylvania Secretary of Education Carrie Rowe has said deep cuts to education programs “would be nothing short of catastrophic” and “would cause irreparable harm,” to all students, especially those students with disabilities.

According to the PFT, Philly schools receive $178 million in Title I funding, $56 million in special education funds, $7 million for career and technical education programs, and $86 million for school meal reimbursements in addition to federal grants for school facilities, prekindergarten programs, and more.

Funding cuts could threaten the very existence of Widener, which relies on federal funds to support small class sizes, paraprofessionals and teacher aides, physical and occupational therapy, speech and language therapy, and activities including wheelchair basketball.

“All of this would not be possible without the funding that comes from IDEA,” said Widener principal Theresa Harrington.

A sign in the school’s lobby showed upcoming student trips to the zoo, the city’s flower show, and dress-up days for “superheroes vs villains” and “mismatch day.”

Several city and state officeholders warned funding cuts would cause a crisis in Philly schools likely to be felt for years.

“I never thought the day would come when we would look at the possibility of education being dismantled from the federal level,” said City Councilmember Isaiah Thomas, chair of the education committee.“This will have an impact on generations to come.”

Taisha Cruz, a junior at Widener Memorial School, joined educators at her school during a rally to support federal funding for education.

Chicago teachers want contract to protect schools from federal ‘foolery’

Those messages were echoed in Chicago where Chicago Teachers Union leaders and members joined the AFT campaign while also rallying around its remaining contract demands. As McMahon moves to make drastic changes to the way the federal education department runs, the clock is ticking toward a possible strike in the country’s fourth largest school district.

Standing in the rain outside Minnie Miñoso Academy Tuesday morning, CTU President Stacy Davis Gates said the union’s contract fight is aimed at “fortifying our school communities against the encroachment of the federal government and its foolery.”

“To sit here and say that special education services are not needed, that Title I is not needed, is an affront to all the sacrifice that’s been made to create this institution called public education,” said Jitu Brown, a recently-elected Chicago school board member and longtime activist who has organized marches in Washington, D.C. with the national Journey for Justice Alliance.

Chicago is shifting away from a school system under mayoral control to one governed by elected representatives. The current partially-elected, 21-member board is grappling with budget challenges now that federal COVID relief money has disappeared.

“Now is not the time to mourn. Now is the time to organize,” Brown said. “They may run D.C., but they don’t run Chicago.”

Dale Mezzacappa contributed to this story.

Carly Sitrin is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Philadelphia. Contact Carly at csitrin@chalkbeat.org.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Jessie Gómez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org.

Catherine Carrera is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Newark. Contact Catherine at ccarrera@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board to consider saving 4 of 7 Acero charter schools slated for closure

2025-02-26T00:36:17+00:00

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After months of uncertainty for hundreds of families and teachers who are facing closures at seven Acero charter schools, Chicago’s Board of Education will vote this week on keeping four of the schools open — backtracking from a plan to prevent the closures altogether.

According to Chicago Public Schools officials, the funding needs for all seven Acero campuses on the chopping block exceed a legal state limit on how much money the district can provide to charter schools.

A resolution included on the board’s agenda for its Thursday meeting calls for CPS to provide financial help to Acero in order to keep the Casas, Fuentes, Tamayo, and Santiago campuses open next school year. It then calls for CPS to figure out “the viability” of absorbing those campuses and turning them into district-run schools after next year.

Charters are privately run, publicly funded schools and are allowed to operate under a contract with Chicago Public Schools. Acero announced in October that it would close seven of its 15 campuses due to financial problems.

Under the resolution for Thursday’s board meeting, the Paz, Cruz, and Cisneros campuses would close at the end of this school year.

In a statement, Helena Stangle, chief culture officer for Acero, said Acero has been “cooperative, transparent, and open to all remedies,” and it’s “essential” for CPS to cover all operational and capital costs, as well as deficits, “so students get the educational experience they deserve in a safe building.”

“We await CPS BOE action to determine the next steps for our impacted scholars, families and colleagues,” Stangle said.

State law requires districts to fund charters by at least 97% and up to 103% of what it spends per student at district-run schools, which CPS said it would exceed under a plan to save all seven schools. A “per capita tuition charge” is calculated annually and this year’s budget set it at $19,339.34 per student enrolled.

The new plan would walk back the previous seven-member Board of Education’s directive to keep all seven Acero schools open by helping cover any deficits for Acero. That directive also called for the district to create a plan to turn five of the schools — Cisneros, Casas, Fuentes, Tamayo, and Santiago — into district-run buildings by the 2026-27 school year and explore whether it could do the same for Paz and Cruz, which CPS previously said contributed the most to Acero’s debt.

Parents and union leaders celebrated that resolution when it passed in late December on the same day the school board voted to fire CPS CEO Pedro Martinez. The union did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Plan would leave future uncertain for 4 Acero schools

Not only would the new resolution keep just four of the schools open next year with CPS’s financial help, but unlike before, it leaves open the possibility that those schools could also close by the 2026-27 school year.

Alfonso Carmona, CPS’s chief portfolio officer, had originally endorsed a plan to keep five of the seven schools open because it was the least expensive option CPS, which is facing at least a $500 million deficit next fiscal year. In a Feb. 4 email that Acero sent to schools staff, the network said its senior staff had met with CPS leadership to “reach agreement” on how they would keep the seven campuses open. Both parties also had additional meetings about “critical funding and liability matters,” the email said.

Board of Education member Carlos Rivas Jr. said district leaders have been meeting with board members to explain their options. He was not provided specifics of the problems that would need to be fixed at the Acero schools if CPS took over. The resolution appeared to be the only legal and financially viable way forward, he said.

CPS did not immediately say how much it would cost to keep the four campuses open; multiple board members said they didn’t know. CPS plans to provide an update on Acero at the meeting Thursday.

“This is obviously very damaging to our school communities and our families, especially [from] an organization that serves Latino families,” he said. “We can’t have Acero doing this willy-nilly. We need to figure something out in order to hold charters accountable for things like this.”

Carmona informed Acero parents in a Tuesday letter of the pending resolution.

“If the Board approves the amended resolution, the district will inform the affected families by Friday, February 28th, to begin the transition process and will provide information regarding options for families for next year,” Carmona wrote in the email obtained by Chalkbeat. “Throughout this process, CPS will continue to work in good faith to carry out the Chicago Board of Education’s vision.”

Acero Schools, once known as the UNO Charter School Network, opened the Paz campus in 1998. It was the network’s first and one of Chicago’s first charter schools after state law authorized the publicly-funded, independently-run schools. It ran into trouble about a decade ago with the Securities and Exchange Commission for defrauding bondholders, and CPS threatened to end the network’s charter in 2015 amid the fallout. But the school board ultimately renewed their agreement. In 2017, the charter network separated from the neighborhood organization and rebranded as Acero.

Acero announced in October it would close half of the schools it operates before the start of the 2025-26 school year due to a $40 million budget shortfall. Closing all seven schools would impact more than 1,800 students and about 200 staff members. Families and the Chicago Teachers Union — which represents staff at those schools — launched rallies and began attending board meetings to press CPS to prevent the closures.

But since then, parents say they’ve received no updates from Acero or CPS on what would happen next. At a board meeting earlier this month to review its agenda, several Acero parents and teachers pressed the district for more answers.

When Martinez told board members that CPS was “working diligently” on the issue, an audience member shouted back, “We’ve been hearing that for 126 days. There needs to be more.”

‘They kick us while we’re down'

Micha Thurston, an academic interventionist at Paz, said she felt blindsided when she learned that Paz was once again slated for closure. She’s taught at Paz for about a year. Despite hearing that families at other Acero schools on the chopping block were transferring out, just one family at Paz had left, she said.

“We’ve had parents that now have kids at our school, that went to our school, their siblings went to our school, their uncles and aunts went to our school,” Thurston said. “So they’re making it very clear that, like, they’re waiting it out with us.”

In its Feb. 4 email to staff, Acero said staff could enroll families for next school year, and that Acero would provide a disclosure to those families saying the network was still working with CPS on how it would keep the campuses open next year, according to an email obtained by Chalkbeat.

Thurston said the Paz campus just enrolled two students who had previously attended Acero schools, and their first day is Wednesday. Paz staff was planning a meeting this week with parent leaders to discuss strategies for boosting enrollment next year, she said.

It used to feel like CPS was on their side, Thurston said. Now it feels like Acero and CPS are teaming up.

“It just feels like every turn they kick us,” she said. “They kick us while we’re down, they kick us some more and then they stomp on us.”

Becky Vevea contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago schools doubled classroom assistants in recent years. Now, labor unions are fighting over who represents them.

2025-02-20T00:05:42+00:00

The number of classroom assistants who provide extra support to students with disabilities in Chicago Public Schools has more than doubled in the past decade, according to district staffing data.

That growth has happened as the share of students with disabilities has also increased in CPS.

But the role and the ranks of these assistants is under scrutiny as the school district grapples with tighter budgets and is locked in a labor dispute that advocates worry could lead to worse services and care for children with the highest needs.

The labor dispute — between Service Employees International Union Local 73 and Chicago Teachers Union — is over a CTU proposal to allow the teacher assistants that union represents to be assigned to provide additional support to students with disabilities, a role historically represented by SEIU. The number of special education classroom assistants, or SECAs, represented by SEIU have grown in the past five years, while the number of teacher assistants, or TAs, represented by the CTU has dropped in the past decade.

On average, SECAs make slightly more than teacher assistants. For example, this school year, SECAs without a degree are making an average $48,338 — about $3,700 more than teachers assistants at a similar level, according to district data.

Mary Fahey Hughes, a former member of the Chicago Board of Education and longtime advocate of students with disabilities, said the SECAs who worked with her son Aidan were critical to his development as a student with autism in CPS. People become SECAs specifically to work with students with disabilities and gain specific experience and training along the way in working with high-needs students, she said.

“I understand that it must be awful to be a teachers assistant and to have worked many years and to have your position no longer be needed, but I can’t get behind giving SECA jobs to TAs,” Hughes said.

The CTU — traditionally a close ally of the SEIU — said its proposal is meant to boost the number of teacher assistants and provide more options of support for students with disabilities, in a district that has historically struggled to serve those kids. In 2018, the state found that the district was systemically failing to provide students with disabilities with the extra services they are legally entitled to and placed it on a corrective action plan.

Over the past few years, SEIU has fought to create guardrails on the job duties of SECAs and expand training for the position. The SEIU has characterized CTU’s proposal as “a raid” on its membership and said it would hurt the quality of services provided to students with disabilities.

SEIU has threatened to sue the district even though CPS has so far rejected the CTU proposal. SEIU’s parent union also passed a resolution earlier this month declaring that it was “under attack” by the CTU. The division between the two labor unions could come with political fallout for Mayor Brandon Johnson, who won election in 2023 with both financial and boots-on-the-ground help from both groups.

Who are SECAs and TAs?

Assistants can provide a range of needed extra help in classrooms and their exact job title may not be obvious to students and families. But their roles are distinct.

SECAs provide extra support to students with disabilities and their roles are written into legal documents governing the services those children are entitled to under federal law. Teacher assistants provide a range of additional support in the classroom and historically, the district budgets for them to support specific programs, such as pre-K or reducing class size, or principals hire them using discretionary funds.

SECAs “assist in the instruction, behavioral, and personal care needs” of students with disabilities, according to SEIU’s contract. That can mean helping them with a lesson in class, walking them to the bathroom, and helping them calm down by taking a walk in the hall, but can also include feeding and assisting them in using the bathroom, educators told Chalkbeat.

“I mean, whatever is needed for them to be safe and get their instruction,” said Kimberly Weston-Dodd, a longtime SECA at Corliss High School and SEIU delegate.

A student with a disability typically has one of two documents that outline the additional services or accommodations they’re legally entitled to: an Individualized Education Program, or IEP, or a 504 plan. A child’s IEP team, which includes a parent and other school staff, determines if the child should receive extra support from a SECA. Based on that information, CPS’s central office decides how many SECAs to allocate for each school, and then principals hire them.

Teacher assistants, in contrast, can provide a range of additional support to teachers, such as putting up bulletin boards or redirecting a student if they get off task.

Thad Goodchild, deputy general counsel for the CTU, said schools have also, at times, used teacher assistants to provide additional support to students with disabilities.

SECA jobs have ballooned over the past decade while teacher assistant jobs have dropped, but the reasons why aren’t completely clear.

A decade ago, the district had just over 3,000 SECA positions with just over 200 of them unfilled. Since Dec. 31, 2019, the number of SECA positions has grown by 65%, with roughly 7,600 positions as of Dec. 31, 2024. Of those jobs, 325 were unfilled, according to district data.

At the same time, the district has opened 225 fewer CTU-protected teacher assistant positions, or about 18% fewer of those jobs than existed right before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Asked why SECA positions have increased while teacher assistant jobs have dropped, district spokesperson Sylvia Barragan said “the staffing structure has been adjusted to accommodate” the increase in students with additional needs. District officials also said that they used some of the $2.8 billion it received in federal COVID relief dollars to hire more SECAs after identifying that as one of CPS’s “pressing needs.”

Since the 2019-20 school year, the number of students with disabilities has grown by about 5%, according to district data. Still, the number of SECA positions grew by a far greater rate: 65% in that same time period.

But that massive increase happened after the state found that the district was systemically failing to provide students with disabilities with the extra services they are legally entitled to, advocates and union officials told Chalkbeat. As a result, the state placed CPS on a corrective action plan. Lindsay Record, a spokesperson for the Illinois State Board of Education, said hiring more SECAs was not part of that corrective plan, which has since been closed.

But before the state’s investigation, many children who needed SECAs weren’t getting them, said Terri Smith-Roback, a parent of a CPS student with a disability and longtime advocate who was part of a coalition that helped spark the state’s investigation. There was also “onerous,” time-consuming paperwork required at the time to get additional help for students with disabilities, said Smith-Roback. Those issues were highlighted in the state investigation.

“I think once the inquiry ended, people were able to assign SECAs to IEPs with more professional discretion and less red tape,” Smith-Roback said.

One elementary school principal, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said he’s noticed the changing culture around IEPs. He said IEP teams are asking for SECAs “much more liberally” than they did 10 to 20 years ago. The number of SECAs at his school — where enrollment has grown — have more than quadrupled over the past decade.

Union dispute started last summer

The dispute between the two unions became public in December when the Chicago Tribune reported that SEIU was planning to sue CTU. But the roots of it reach back to at least last summer.

Last summer, CPS laid off 240 teacher assistants and roughly 260 SECAs, offering to continue paying both pools of workers for this entire school year as they searched for jobs in other schools, according to officials at both unions. Of the teacher assistants, as many as 140 have landed jobs at other schools — but a “significant number” of them have been rehired as SECAs at the same school, according to Goodchild, the CTU lawyer.

Around that time last summer, CTU leaders asked SEIU leadership if SEIU would give CTU hundreds of vacancies that existed for SECA positions, in order to prevent teacher assistant layoffs, said Dian Palmer, president of SEIU Local 73. When vacancies exist, laid-off workers can search for jobs at other schools.

Goodchild said the union worried about more teacher assistants, many of whom have supported students with disabilities at some point, losing work. CTU didn’t want layoffs to “have any negative impact on either union,” he said.

Palmer said she wanted to help CTU, but realized that sharing those vacancies could mean less layoff protection for her own members — the SECAs. So she declined CTU’s request.

On July 17, 2024, CTU filed a grievance with CPS that claimed that the district has been converting teacher assistant jobs into SECAs for years in violation of its contract. It suggested that SECAs should only support students who also require diapering and toileting help, and that all other teacher assistant jobs that were converted into SECA jobs be reverted back to teacher assistants.

“The vast majority of the students are not toileted and fed, so if that’s the criteria, we know our [SECA] numbers would go way down,” Palmer said.

The grievance also demanded that the district’s Office for Students with Disabilities not assign SECAs to teacher assistant jobs that don’t have diapering and feeding duties. The union’s contract says the district cannot “reclassify” a teachers assistant as a SECA who does not diaper and feed a child.

Chicago Public Schools declined to comment on the grievance. SEIU viewed the grievance as a power grab by CTU and an insult to suggest SECAs have no value beyond bathroom and feeding responsibilities.

Then, in the fall, as CTU bargained with CPS over its new contract, SEIU became aware of a proposal from CTU that would allow principals to choose between SECAs and teacher assistants to support students with disabilities. That raised more alarm bells for SEIU: Giving principals a choice means they could choose teacher assistants, who can also do other work around the classroom, and could mean fewer SECAs in schools, Palmer said.

Goodchild said that “of course part of the goal is to increase the number of teacher assistants” because the decrease in teacher assistants “has had damaging impacts for students and schools and educators.”

What does it look like on the ground?

While SECA roles are more defined on paper, their roles inside schools can be more complicated, according to two elementary school principals who spoke to Chalkbeat.

One principal said she never approaches her teacher assistants to help with personal care needs that only SECAs can do. But her SECAs, like her teacher assistants, are “very willing in a pinch to step in” and help with additional needs, which come up a lot in schools. SEIU’s contract allows SECAs to help in emergency situations.

The other principal said while a quarter of his SECAs provide one-on-one support to students with disabilities, others are working with multiple students, helping to manage behavioral issues or helping them with a lesson. As student needs and enrollment changes during the year, he vacillates between feeling like he doesn’t have enough SECAs and feeling like he may have too many.

The expansion of classroom aides is among the overall growth in staff at CPS in the past five years. District officials continue to tout more than 7,000 positions added at a time of declining enrollment. But much of that has been possible because of federal COVID relief money, which is now gone.

While CPS officials say it’s a priority to keep the new positions, budget cuts could be looming. Adding more teacher assistants could help reduce class size and provide more support in schools, principals have said.

Both teachers assistants and SECAs need the same state paraprofessional license in order to work at CPS, which requires at least an associate degree, 60 semester hours of college credit, or a high school degree along with certain passing scores on either a state-approved paraprofessional exam or the ACT WorkKeys Career Assessment.

SEIU’s contract says SECAs with 60 semester hours of college credit must have taken courses in severe disabilities. If SECA candidates decide instead to take the state-approved exam, they must have worked with children with disabilities for at least one year.

The experience SECAs have and the additional training they’ll receive is important for properly serving students with disabilities, advocates and a principal told Chalkbeat. SEIU’s current contract requires CPS to provide SECAs with additional training on a range of issues, including generally working with students with disabilities, deescalation practices, and how IEPs work, starting this July.

“I don’t see the win for students in having a cohort of teaching assistants that don’t have the training, the certification, the desire to work with students with disabilities,” Hughes, the former board member, said.

Weston-Dodd, the SECA from Corliss, said SECAs like her have gained years of experience working exclusively with students with disabilities and are best positioned to serve those children. She also said she’s received professional development training annually.

Still, one of the elementary school principals believes that if she wanted teacher assistants to get similar training that SECAs will get, the district wouldn’t say no.

If CTU’s proposal is accepted by the district, advocates for students with disabilities, as well as SEIU, believe principals would have some incentive to choose teacher assistants since they have broader job responsibilities and are paid less.

“There’s a lot of needs in schools, and things happen and there are times when it’s, like, ‘I just need you to be the body here for a little bit,’” said one of the elementary school principals. “You have a lot more wiggle room with the teacher assistant job description than you do with a SECA job description.”

Still, that principal said she doesn’t want to make the decision on who should work with her highest need students.

The other principal believes it’s good that he doesn’t have undue influence on deciding what a student with a disability needs. But he feels that right now, “it’s arbitrary” on whether the person providing additional support to a child “has a TA job code or a SECA job code,” because their job would be to do what’s in a child’s IEP.

But, he said, he also believes that the person assigned to do the job should have better training.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Teachers Union rejects neutral arbitrator recommendations for a new contract

2025-02-06T21:53:32+00:00

This story has been updated to include comments from district leaders.

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A neutral arbitrator recommended Chicago Public Schools and the Chicago Teachers Union agree to a new contract that includes, among other things, annual raises between 4% and 5%, 90 new librarians hired by 2029, and more family engagement coordinators.

The CTU rejected the recommendations, saying they did not tackle other union demands, such as the structure of the elementary school day, and teacher evaluations. The union’s rejection starts a countdown to a possible strike.

Martin Malin, the arbitrator, largely sided with the district in recommending holding the line on significant staffing increases for other positions — including counselors, fine arts teachers, case managers, and technology coordinators — citing the district’s precarious financial position.

In issuing his recommendations around salary increases, Malin wrote that “we do not live in typical times,” with President Donald Trump’s looming tariffs and economists predicting labor shortages. But he said it would be a “fool’s errand” to try to predict inflation and sided with CPS’s latest offer of 4% raise in the first year of the contract and 4% to 5% in subsequent years depending on inflation.

Malin also raised concerns that at least one of Trump’s executive orders, aimed at “ending radical indoctrination” in schools, could be a “potential threat” to CPS’s federal funding.

CPS CEO Pedro Martinez said the report echoed what district leaders have said about the financial limitations CPS faces and the need for restraint and flexibility in staffing. He said he is disappointed the CTU rejected what he called “a very thoughtful and thorough analysis.” But he and other officials voiced hope that the report would nevertheless spur momentum at the bargaining table.

“This report presents an opportunity for progress in our ongoing negotiations with the CTU,” said Miguel Perreta, the district lead negotiator. “Overall, the report highlights how close we are at bargaining.”

CTU president Stacy Davis Gates told reporters Wednesday said she was “dumbfounded” by the report because it unexpectedly affirmed some of the union’s viewpoints. Even though the union’s formal rejection moves the parties closer to a strike, union officials — like CPS leaders — saw the report as an opportunity to settle a deal.

“Look, we don’t agree with everything in it,” Davis Gates said. “There are things in it that make a lot of sense in terms of moving this process ahead. ”

The union and district began bargaining last April and the previous four-year contract expired in June. The two sides agreed to bring in a mediator in the fall after negotiations became increasingly contentious. The union, which has advocated for its most far-reaching and costly slate of proposals yet, paused the mediation process in December, suggesting the two bargaining teams were making headway.

But union leaders asked to restart the process after sticking points, including pay, staffing, and teacher evaluations, snarled the negotiations. CPS officials insisted that further concessions at the bargaining table would doom the deficit-plagued district to major financial trouble — and said they believe the findings of the neutral arbitrator would back them up.

Here’s what the fact-finder recommended

State statute says Malin can consider “all disputed issues” and make recommendations that take into account past contracts, the economy, and the impact on classrooms. The two parties can accept his recommendations as the “final resolution of the disputed issues” and incorporate them into the collective bargaining agreement.

In his 19-page report, Malin lays out the arguments made by both CTU and CPS on a series of contract provisions, including annual raises and the staffing levels of counselors, case managers, librarians, nurses, teaching assistants, family and community engagement coordinators, and teachers certified to work with English learners. One-by-one, he either sides with CPS or CTU or kicks the issue back to them for more bargaining.

He sided with the district on annual raises and staffing levels of counselors and case managers. He sided with the union on staffing levels for librarians and made middle-of-the-road recommendations on raises for seniority and staffing levels for teaching assistants, family and community engagement coordinators, and teachers certified to work with English learners.

Malin did not grapple with the disagreement over adding more preparation time for elementary school teachers. CTU is asking for an additional 20 minutes of preparation time, with no loss of instructional time, including by adding enrichment classes for students. The district’s counter is to add an additional 10 minutes of prep time by tweaking existing preparation periods and “reallocating” a few additional minutes.

The union started setting the stage for ultimately rejecting the report long before it was complete: CTU leaders said Malin has been fair, but argued that the process is set up to favor the employer, including by being overly focused on the financial implications of union proposals.

At a Wednesday press conference before the report’s public release, union officials echoed that assertion in explaining why they were rejecting its conclusions.

Union attorney Latoya Kimbrough said the report was “without a doubt the best fact-finding report the parties have received since this became a part of the law” under former Mayor Rahm Emanuel. She said the union hopes the report will push the district closer to the union’s priorities.

Hilario Dominguez, the union’s legislative director, said CTU also plans to hold meetings with the new members of the Chicago Board of Education over the latest in contract talks.

The board ultimately votes to approve the contract and, separately, amend the district’s budget to pay for the contract. The latter requires a two-thirds vote of approval.

Rejection of recommendations starts countdown for a strike

The district and union have resorted to a third-party mediator three times since the fact-finding process became part of state law in 2010. Twice, educators went on strike after one or both sides rejected the mediator’s recommendations.

When one side rejects the report, it becomes public — and starts a 30-day clock before the union can give the district a 10-day strike notice. On Wednesday, CTU officials did not suggest they were close to a strike.

Tensions over the teachers contract and how to pay for it fueled a clash between CPS CEO Pedro Martinez and Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former CTU employee who was elected with the union’s backing. Johnson’s handpicked school board fired Martinez without cause in December, leaving him at the helm of the district another six months under his contract.

Martinez said last week that the two sides have made a lot of progress in bargaining and are close to settling the contract.

“I can’t even imagine the need for a strike,” he told the new, partly elected board during its January meeting. “Given how close the two sides are, it wouldn’t make sense to do anything so drastic.”

The union has also acknowledged progress between both sides, but more recently has criticized the district for not bringing enough new ideas to the table to settle a deal.

The district and union have agreed to add some special education and support staff positions, set class size limits in most grades, and expand a Sustainable Community Schools program that pairs some schools with a community partner organization to beef up programs.

Prior to fact-finding, the two sides were already close on compensation. The district’s latest proposal, which the arbitrator sided with, would give teachers 4% to 5% raises each year and push the average teacher salary above $110,000 by the end of the contract.

But the union is pushing for additional staffing with assurance of no layoffs or furloughs — despite CPS officials’ insistence that would imperil some 7,000 positions the district added over the pandemic. And the CTU still feels the district can do better on pay, especially for veteran teachers.

Especially contentious have been union proposals that would give teachers much more leeway in picking their curriculums and scale back educator evaluations.

CTU could get help from state lawmakers to win changes on teacher evaluations. A bill that would no longer require districts to use student test scores to measure teacher performance sailed through committee this week and is sponsored by the Democratic Senate majority leader.

Becky Vevea contributed reporting.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools, teachers’ union turn to arbitrator to help reach new contract

2025-01-22T21:26:44+00:00

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A third-party labor arbitrator is hearing arguments from Chicago Public Schools and the Chicago Teachers Union Wednesday and Friday in an effort to reach an agreement on a new contract.

This fact-finding process involving an arbitrator has been used three times since it was established in state law in 2010. Twice, teachers still ended up going on strike. Under the timeline required by the law, the soonest a strike could now occur would be mid-April.

Once arbitrator Martin Malin reviews materials from CPS and CTU and issues his recommendations, which are nonbinding, both could accept his recommendations or either of them can reject the proposal. If one party rejects them, Malin’s report will be made public and after 30 days, the union can issue a 10-day strike notice.

The teachers’ contract expired last June. While the two sides have tentatively agreed to a host of issues, such as additional social workers and class size limits, key sticking points remain. The negotiations have taken place amid some of the most volatile moments for CPS leadership in the district’s history.

The slow pace of negotiations at the start of the school year picked up after the union requested fact-finding last October. The two agreed to instead keep working to get a deal done without the help of an arbitrator.

CTU President Stacy Davis Gates said talks then slowed to a halt in late December after the school board appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson took a dramatic vote to fire CPS CEO Pedro Martinez, who then filed a lawsuit requesting an injunction. A judge ruled that Martinez— who will remain on the job until June — is in charge of the contract negotiations, and that school board members cannot attend talks without his permission.

CPS officials disputed Gates’ comments. They said negotiations continue to progress, including over the past month, and that they “will continue to meet our labor partners at the negotiations table and bargain in good faith.”

But on Wednesday, Davis Gates expressed dissatisfaction with entering fact-finding and said starting this process shifts “what we talk about in bargaining only to finances, not what children need.”

Nevertheless, the union’s legal team filed an 80-page pre-hearing brief with Malin on Monday and outlined what they want him to consider when making his recommendations.

In a statement, the school district characterized its approach to bargaining as “fully student-centered” and aimed at preserving and building on “robust programs that have supported CPS’ impressive academic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.”

The district hired more than 7,000 additional staff using federal COVID relief money over the past four years, and there’s evidence that CPS students benefited from the district’s approach to using the aid with respect to reading. District officials have said they are committed to maintaining those positions even though the federal dollars are now gone.

CPS released its own pre-hearing brief asking Malin to consider the district’s financial position, current salaries and benefits, and its position on teacher prep time and evaluation procedures. The district continues to post additional updates about labor talks on its website.

Thad Goodchild, the CTU’s deputy general counsel, said Malin is expected to issue his recommendations for a settlement by mid-February.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Teachers Union alleges paycheck errors, asks new school board to help reach contract deal

2025-01-15T22:28:29+00:00

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The Chicago Teachers Union is calling for a systemwide audit of Chicago Public Schools’ payroll processes after reporting Tuesday that multiple union members are being underpaid this school year.

The union filed a grievance over the issue with CPS Tuesday, amid heated negotiations between CTU and CPS over the union’s new contract.

The grievance claims at least five unnamed staffers have not been paid according to their seniority with the district. In all five cases, the union alleges, employees have reached out to the district for help in correcting the issue, but CPS has not fixed their pay.

The examples include:

A school counseling office assistant, who has worked for a consecutive 19 years with CPS, should be paid at three levels higher than she is currently and should also receive more sick days, based on her seniority, the grievance said. The union estimates this employee is being underpaid by at least $8,000. She hasn’t heard back from the district since October, the grievance said.
An elementary school teacher should be paid $101,593 based on his seniority but his listed salary is $99,005, the grievance said. He has not heard from the district since reaching out in September.
A second elementary school teacher is being paid about $2,000 less than she should be, the grievance said. She reached out to CPS in September.
A high school teacher is in her 22nd year teaching for CPS but is being paid at a lower level. She reached out for help in September.
An elementary school counselor who earned her master’s degree should be placed at a higher salary level because of her additional degree, the grievance said. However, despite providing “relevant documentation” and sending multiple follow-up emails, she has not yet received a “substantive response,” according to the district.

Ben Felton, chief of talent for CPS, said the school district has run into “minor payroll mishaps” in the past, but he doesn’t have “any reason” to believe it’s a widespread issue.

“In a system of more than 45,000 employees, sometimes there are payroll errors, but of course we’re committed to looking into any issues or pay discrepancies,” Felton said. “We certainly would never deliberately shortchange our employees, and we appreciate the union bringing it to our attention.”

Asked why payroll representatives have allegedly not addressed employees’ complaints, Felton said the district has “not had the chance to look into it,” and Tuesday was the first time CPS leadership became aware of the complaints.

During a news conference Tuesday, Alex Rodriguez, a union delegate and middle school social studies teacher at Lasalle Language Academy, said he began hearing from colleagues in December that they were being underpaid, then realized his own pay was shorted. Rodriguez said he and his coworkers reached out to CPS for help, but the issue hasn’t been fixed.

Rodriguez was not one of the employees listed in the grievance, the CTU said.

“As an early career educator and father, every dollar counts as my family and I budget for our mortgage, groceries, and student loans,” Rodriguez told reporters.

The union has asked CPS to correct the reported salary issues and give them back pay. It is also asking the district to “perform a system-wide salary audit” and “review and implement changes” to the payroll and staffing services departments so that concerns about pay are “responded to and resolved within contractual timelines.”

Separately, the union urged the new partially-elected school board sworn in Wednesday to help the two sides reach a settlement.

Outside CTU headquarters Wednesday afternoon, union leaders walked through the outstanding sticking points laid out in a document they published last Friday.

Notably, the document shows the union reduced its proposal on annual raises to 4 or 5% each of the next four years, which is what CPS put on the table last September. But the union also wants guarantees from the school district that there will be no layoffs or furloughs.

The union continues to push for an agreement on issues it says are no-cost, such as adjusting the district’s teacher evaluation system and giving elementary school teachers more prep time.

CTU vice president Jackson Potter said the longer the negotiations drag on, there’s a risk of “reputational damage to both the school board and the schools themselves.”

“We need the school board to step in, use its advocacy, its power, its ability to, you know, make sure students get what they need and bring the parties together,” Potter said.

CTU also released a letter Stacy Davis Gates, the union president, sent to Board of Education President Sean Harden asking for “the opportunity to present to the Board in a public meeting a direct update” on the outstanding issues at the bargaining table. She acknowledged a court order barring school board members from negotiations without CPS CEO Pedro Martinez’s permission and wrote that the union “does not seek a negotiation session.”

Asked Wednesday about the state of negotiations, Felton, who is part of the district’s bargaining team, said both sides are making progress, including on bilingual education.

“This indecision, this back and forth, isn’t good for anybody — it’s not good for our teachers, it’s not good for our students, families,” Felton said. “So we’re at the table working relentlessly to try to get a deal that’s fair for our educators and fiscally responsible to the district.”

The two sides are also scheduled to engage with a third party fact-finder next week.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

The mayor’s on ‘union leave’ from CPS despite leaving CTU. Does that undermine contract talks?

2025-01-08T18:31:28+00:00

Mayor Brandon Johnson taught for four years at Chicago Public Schools before going on leave in 2011 to work for the Chicago Teachers Union and ultimately launch a career in politics.

But even though he no longer works for the union, Johnson remains on “union leave” from the school district.

That means, after all these years, he could return to the classroom — and earn a six-figure salary as if he never left.

The mayor’s leave status has attracted more scrutiny and concerns about a potential conflict of interest in recent weeks, as his administration negotiates a contract with the CTU that could benefit him in the future. Those negotiations have become increasingly tense and have fueled a monthslong leadership shakeup at CPS, including the recent firing of CPS CEO Pedro Martinez.

Under CPS policy, Johnson — or any CPS employee who leaves to work for the union — can accrue seniority during their time away and return to CPS with the guarantee of a job.

In an interview with Chalkbeat on Tuesday, the mayor said he hasn’t thought about what he would do after his time in office but said teaching middle school “is still the best job I’ve ever had.” He denied that his union leave status represents a conflict of interest, because he’s not currently earning a CPS paycheck.

“There’s no economic benefit for me as a CPS employee on leave as mayor of the city of Chicago,” Johnson said. “We have firefighters who are on leave, right, [on the] City Council, and they actually vote on their contracts. There are police officers who are on leave and they actually vote on those contracts. I don’t vote on any contract, so there’s no conflict of interest.”

Ald. Nick Sposato, who represents part of the city’s Northwest Side, said he was on leave from the Chicago Fire Department for his first eight years in office and voted on firefighter contracts. During that time, he did not feel conflicted because council members were not directly involved with bargaining.

“Nobody ever had a problem with me being a fireman and voting on fire contracts,” Sposato said.

Sposato, who is occasionally critical of the mayor, also said he did not believe Johnson would “give the farm away” for personal gain years from now.

“I believe he’s a man of integrity,” he said of Johnson.

Until 2027, Johnson will appoint a majority of members to the Board of Education, who will vote to approve union contracts and allocate money to pay for the costs.

On Christmas Eve, an internal CPS memo included in Martinez’s legal filings against the Chicago Board of Education documented concerns about Johnson’s employment status with the district. The memo was first reported on by the Chicago Tribune. In that June 2023 memo, Ben Felton, the chief talent officer for CPS, wrote that he was concerned about a potential conflict of interest due to the mayor’s ongoing employment with CPS, an organization that he oversees.

Felton wrote that he raised the issue with then-Deputy Mayor of Education Jen Johnson, who is not related to the mayor, on four occasions between May and June 2023. The mayor declined to resign his position because he wanted to “signal his support for education and teachers,” Felton wrote in the memo.

Johnson, who remains a close CTU ally, repeated that sentiment Tuesday.

“I’m committed to making sure that the people who do teach, the people who are in our schools, that they know that they have an advocate … and to ensure that our public schools and our public teachers are fully supported,” Johnson said.

If Johnson were to return to his CPS job, he would at minimum be placed in the district’s Reassigned Teacher Pool and assigned to a school, according to Felton’s memo. Felton added that he felt the mayor’s return to CPS “is unlikely,” but that his leave status was “not an immaterial benefit.”

Dick Simpson, professor of political science at University of Illinois at Chicago and a former alderman, said no mayor in recent history has been in Johnson’s position. But he said the economic benefit to the mayor “is not substantial enough” to be deemed a conflict of interest.

“If he becomes involved in the negotiations and the running of the schools, which many mayors like Richard M. Daley did or Richard J. Daley before him, the question is whether or not his own history and involvement will cause him to make decisions which are bad for the city or in this case, the school system, or both,” Simpson said.

The mayor’s office has pushed CPS to take out a short-term loan to help pay for the costs of a new labor contract with the CTU and the principals union, as well as to cover some pension obligations. Martinez has refused to take that step — one of the factors that led to his firing.

Other observers see things differently.

“If he has no plans to go back, he should easily resign” from CPS, said Vladimir Kogan, professor of political science at Ohio State University who has studied local politics and education policy. “I think this is a problem of his own creation.”

Joe Ferguson, Chicago’s former inspector general who now leads the Civic Federation, a government watchdog group, said it’s unclear whether the mayor’s employment status and his official position cross legal lines.

“It impels a much greater degree of transparency and public facing disclosure of his actual activities, communications, and positions, so that there is no question of where he is acting in conflict with his former employer, and there should be a reassessment of the law and regulations,” Ferguson said.

Johnson could earn over $100,000 upon CPS return

If Johnson went back after his first term in office, in 2027, he would be considered a 20th-year teacher, even though he taught for just four years before his 2011 departure. These details were not mentioned in Felton’s memo.

That means, according to the current CTU contract, that Johnson could earn at least $100,419 upon his return. That figure is the base salary for a minimum 208-day schedule and doesn’t include other benefits. It does not account for raises or changes to salary brackets that could change in the next contract. Chalkbeat was unable to verify the salary “lane” Johnson was in before he left CPS. These lanes change a person’s salary based on factors like earning a master’s degree. Johnson has a master’s degree in teaching, according to his biography.

The salary figure represents someone who has worked for 20 years and is in the lowest lane; someone in the highest lane would earn a base salary of just over $113,300, under the current union contract.

CPS has offered annual raises of between 4% and 5% for the new contract.

After Felton raised concerns about the mayor’s employment status to former Deputy Mayor Jen Johnson, she said she asked the city’s ethics adviser about the issue and that the adviser “did not have concerns,” Felton’s memo said.

Chalkbeat filed an open records request with the Chicago Board of Ethics for any official advisory positions about the mayor’s employment status; the board said no such records existed.

After this story published, Steve Berlin, executive director of the ethics board, told Chalkbeat in an email that “neither the staff of the Board of Ethics nor the Board itself was asked about leave arrangements, and have issued no opinions addressing this issue.”

One former senior CPS official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss personnel issues, said that the mayor, CPS, and CTU should all know that Johnson no longer qualifies for being on union leave due to his departure from CTU, and act accordingly by working to change his employment status.

In response to questions from Chalkbeat, CPS spokesperson Mary Ann Fergus said, “CPS flagged this area of concern as outlined in the Chief of Talent Ben Felton memo. It is presumed that the mayor determined that no action was necessary.”

At the same time, the former official acknowledged, Johnson’s position as the most powerful elected official in the city — and technically as the boss of CPS — can make it intimidating for members of his own administration to take action without his consent, especially if he’s expressed his desire to stay on leave, he said.

“It’s the mayor’s responsibility and his team’s responsibility to identify that this is an issue and take action about it,” the former official said. “And they were presented baldly with the choice, basically, and said, ‘No.’”

Becky Vevea contributed reporting.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

This story includes an updated response from Chicago Board of Ethics Executive Director Steve Berlin.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson talks class size, contract talks, school board appointments

2025-01-08T18:01:49+00:00

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Mayor Brandon Johnson defended his decision to stay on “union leave” from Chicago Public Schools in an interview with Chalkbeat Tuesday.

The mayor taught middle school in CPS before going on leave in 2011 to become an organizer with the Chicago Teachers Union. He launched a political career when he was elected as a county commissioner in 2018 and went on to win the competitive race for mayor in 2023.

Chicago’s mayor still maintains significant power over the city’s public schools even as the city transitions away from 30 years of mayoral control. Johnson appointed school board members during his first year in office and recently replaced that group after all of them resigned amid tensions between the mayor and CPS CEO Pedro Martinez. He selected new appointees and will maintain control over 11 appointments on the new 21-member, partially elected school board.

Staying on union leave allows him to accrue seniority and ensures his job protection, should he decide to return to the classroom. But Johnson denied his employment status is a conflict of interest, because he’s not currently earning a CPS paycheck.

Chalkbeat sat down with Johnson in his office on the fifth floor of City Hall for a brief interview Tuesday to discuss that and other topics like class size, migrant students, and Martinez. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

The school board is going to be sworn in on Jan. 15. You announced 10 of 11 appointments in late December, but have you selected somebody to serve in that 11th seat?

I’m incredibly excited and thrilled and humbled to be the first mayor in the history of Chicago to not only commit to elected representative school board, but see that come to fruition. In my time as an organizer and as a teacher and as a parent, the public education system in the city of Chicago ran by previous administrations have just been abysmal as it relates to showing up for working people. So I am, again, humbled by the opportunity, and we will have a fully appointed and represented board that reflects the values of the people of Chicago.

But you haven’t picked the person to serve in District 8?

We will.

What have you told the school board appointees that you’ve selected so far that you want them to prioritize?

I want them to prioritize what the people of Chicago want. As the first mayor in the history of Chicago to believe in public education so much that I send my children to the public schools in Chicago, I know exactly what parents want. I’m one of them. Smaller class size is something that parents want. And I know that experience too as a public school teacher, by the way, the only mayor in the history of Chicago to actually have taught in our public schools.

I want them to fight hard to ensure that we have libraries and librarians in our schools, social workers and counselors. I told them that we have to fight hard for resources and funding to have psychiatrists and psychologists in our schools, to have a well-rounded, rich curriculum that includes after-school activities, right? The bell rings, learning shouldn’t stop, right?

I told them that we also have to ensure that we are fully funding special education, that we are fully funding our bilingual education. There are parents who do transport their kids from one neighborhood to the other, because their neighborhood does not have all the resources that those families deserve and need. We have to have reliable transportation within our public schools to ensure that families can have reliable access to those resources.

Leading the way in this moment requires us to show up for working people, whether you live on the north side or the southeast side or anywhere else in between that we can be proud of our public school system that prioritizes families.

Class sizes are one of the sticking points in the contract negotiations. As I understand it, there’s disagreement about the caps in the middle grades. You were a middle school teacher.

You know how I feel about this then!

What do you think is an appropriate class size in the middle grades?

In some of the top school districts in the state of Illinois you have some classes that are anywhere from 17 to 22 children. Look, the middle school age is a very critical moment in our child’s children’s development. The middle school age is a transformational and transition time for young people.

As a former middle school teacher, the social and emotional development of a child is critical at that moment, particularly, as we see rises of behavioral and mental health challenges. This is why I fought, and will continue to fight hard for appropriate class sizes, because we want to ensure that children can balance equations as well as draw conclusions, but they should also feel safe and secure in their overall development.

On the campaign trail, you said “who better to deliver bad news to a friend than a friend?” Is there an example you could give of a time you’ve had to deliver bad news in the contract talks right now?

I don’t think there’s any debate that our schools are not fully funded. I wish we had the evidence-based funding model that the state of Illinois has calculated, that $1.1 billion were available to us today. You know, it’s unfortunate that that doesn’t exist.

But that’s not just confined to my friends. That’s the state of Illinois. There’s $3.6 billion that the state of Illinois, just based upon this funding formula, should be appropriated for school districts.

We have this strong triangulation — probably for the first time in the history of Chicago or, I don’t know, for the first time that I’ve ever experienced — with the Board of Education, the mayor’s office, and workers all aligned around the vision for our public schools and that that is progress in and of itself.

Your appointed school board, as one of its last acts, voted to end the contract with CPS CEO Pedro Martinez. You didn’t mention him just now as you were talking about alignment. Who would you like to see lead the school district?

I’ll be perfectly frank with you. I’ve spent most of my time thinking about the 325,000 families that want transformational leadership. They want and elected a mayor who’s a parent and has been a former teacher, and that’s what my focus has been on. This is not about some individual, because there’s not one single individual that can transform our public schools.

The Board of Education will get an opportunity as they have made a decision to go into a different direction, and when that time comes, I’m confident that the interests of the people of Chicago will be front and center as we think about this one position.

But keep in mind, we have 30,000 workers in our Chicago public schools. That’s where my heart is — 30,000 workers who show up every single day fighting for resources to ensure that their students have everything that they deserve and need. It’s the 325,000 children who rely upon our public schools. That’s where our focus should be. That’s certainly where mine is.

Can I ask why you didn’t replace the CPS CEO right after taking office?

Look again, this is not about just one individual. What were we focused on in May 2023? We were focused on [parental] leave. We got it done. We were focused on the evidence-based funding formula to ensure that we are funding our schools based upon needs.

We were focused on our bilingual education. The governor of Texas used human beings to attack us, right? It’s a very nasty way to govern. There are 20,000 more students in our public schools who were bussed from Central or South America. And so that’s what my focus has been on.

It’s not on one individual, right? Because if it was one individual, perhaps, we could find a prototype and plant that person down, and they can overcome systemic racism that has existed in our public schools for decades.

This was not about one individual. This is about the hundreds of thousands of families that are looking to me to fight and advocate on their behalf.

You mentioned the influx of new migrant students. Chalkbeat and Block Club Chicago have reported on the lack of support and staffing for bilingual education in some schools. Do you think the district’s done enough?

No, it hasn’t. This is what I’m saying. We have to have more resources for special education. We know that Chicago Public Schools, historically, has not lived up to the promise and expectation of parents, like when I was in the classroom.

We have not properly supported special education, bilingual education, particularly with this influx. That’s why it requires bold leadership in this moment, and that’s what I’m calling for. This is why I believe that some people are having a tough time with my leadership, because I have been very bold and outspoken about investments, not austerity, not privatization, not cuts, consolidations, closures, all of that crap that destroyed public education in this city,

A story published earlier this week in the Chicago Tribune looked at the wave of expiring special taxing districts, known as TIFs. There is a projected increase of tax revenue that would go to sister agencies, including the Chicago Public Schools. What would you like to see the district do with that additional revenue?

That’s always been my goal — to ensure that the tax dollars that were designed to support these sister agencies, that those dollars actually show up for the people of Chicago.

As far as what we need to see, we need better staffing. We do. We need more staffing. We saw this during the pandemic. One of the reasons why our schools were able to recover, you know, the way they did, is because we actually had paraprofessionals to help support these educators. But we also need to make sure that we have libraries and librarians, social workers and counselors. We don’t talk enough about the number of psychiatrists and psychologists that we need in our schools.

Do you understand how difficult it is when you’re living and trying to survive in a city where disinvestment has been the prevailing form of governance? Kids show up [to schools] who are hungry or unhoused, right? We need to see more support for our unhoused students in the city of Chicago, 20,000 children are underhoused in the city. And so as we ensure that there are more dollars available for these sister agencies, we have to respond to what families want.

We need to make sure that we’re providing support services for special ed, bilingual education, and transportation. We need better staff and stronger staffing in our schools to support these efforts, but we also have to support the entire community so that families are fully supported in a way that gives them the ability to experience the wholeness and the purpose of what public education was designed to do.

Would you ever like to go back to teaching in a classroom in Chicago Public Schools?

I really enjoy being mayor of the city of Chicago. I will say teaching middle school is still the best job that I’ve ever had. I did teach a year of high school, but I really enjoyed teaching seventh and eighth grade.

I haven’t really thought about what happens two terms from now or three terms from now. But I will say this, as mayor of the city of Chicago, I’m committed to making sure that you know the people who do teach, the people who are in our schools, that they know that they have an advocate on the fifth floor, and to ensure that our public schools and our public teachers are fully supported.

You are still on leave from CPS.

That is correct.

A number of people have said that is a conflict of interest.

Right, because at first, folks were saying that it was a conflict because I was on leave from the CTU. When they realized that wasn’t right, then they found another reason to figure out there’s a conflict of interest.

Do you believe that’s a conflict of interest? Have you considered resigning that position, given that you are now no longer on “union leave” because you no longer work for the union?

Let me just say this, there isn’t one. There’s no economic benefit for me as a CPS employee on leave as mayor of the city of Chicago. We have firefighters who are on leave [in] City Council, and they actually vote on their contracts. There are police officers who are on leave and they actually vote on those contracts. I don’t vote on any contract, so there’s no conflict of interest.

It’s not like there’s this classroom just waiting for me that once I’m done as mayor of the city of Chicago, I can just roll back in and start teaching the five causes of the American Revolution. Can I just say this respectfully? I just find it to be quite fascinating that somehow, as a parent, as a public school teacher, that somehow that will be in conflict with me as mayor of the city of Chicago advocating on behalf of the people of Chicago.

I wanted to give you a chance to respond. It’s brought up in Pedro Martinez’s lawsuit against the school board and people are pointing to it as ethically problematic.

Let me just say this, right, there have been board members who have been a part of banks and corporations that benefited from CPS contracts. Board members who were on boards of private charter schools that benefited their friends economically. And what has that done for the people of Chicago?

Now you have a parent, you have a public school teacher, that is advocating on behalf of the public that somehow that’s some sort of conflict. You know what? That’s a conflict to the interest of corporations who want to run our school districts to the ground. And guess what? They’ve done it. But now, with bold progressive leadership, we are rising out of the ashes of those who saw public education as a way to line their pockets, and now we actually have someone who believes in the public good.

Jen Johnson is no longer deputy mayor of education. Have you looked into filling that role?

That’s a very good question. Thank you for that. And let me just say Jen Johnson is a remarkable human being, just a classy human being that has served in this city as a social studies teacher, just like myself. Just a brilliant mind.

We’re going to go through a robust interviewing process to find the right person who understands my vision, the vision that I was elected on to ensure that every single school in the city of Chicago is fully funded and supported. That process continues to unfold. We’ll let you know once we make an announcement.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

The Chicago schools CEO got a pink slip for Christmas. He went to court. What happens now?

2025-01-03T18:49:20+00:00

The days before winter break provided no vacation from the conflict and drama engulfing Chicago Public Schools.

On the Friday before Christmas, the Chicago Board of Education voted to fire CPS CEO Pedro Martinez. But Martinez will stay on the job he’s held since 2021 until at least June. Martinez has taken the school board to court to try to reverse his firing. In addition, a judge granted a temporary restraining order on Christmas Eve that preserves Martinez’s powers as CEO — for now.

The strife between the school board, Martinez, and Mayor Brandon Johnson’s administration has riveted the city. It’s also generated major uncertainty right before another big — albeit long foreseen — shift for CPS: A new 21-person school board will take over in less than two weeks.

On top of all that, the district and the Chicago Teachers Union are engaged in high-stakes, increasingly fraught negotiations over a new CTU contract.

So where are things headed for CPS? Here’s what to watch for in the coming weeks.

Martinez continues as CPS CEO amid legal battle

Before the school board even notified Martinez of his firing, he sued the board and filed for a temporary restraining order in an effort to preserve his powers as CEO. In response, Cook County Circuit Court Judge Joel Chupack ruled the school board cannot interfere with Martinez’s role as CEO. That means school board members cannot attend negotiations with the Chicago Teachers Union without his permission, which some did shortly after they fired Martinez.

The next court date for Martinez’s lawsuit and the temporary restraining order is Jan. 9 at the Daley Center. The court has not issued a ruling on other allegations that Martinez’s team has made in their lawsuit, including that the board allegedly did not receive proper training before moving to fire Martinez. According to CPS, board members are supposed to be trained on a slew of topics, such as ethics, the district’s budget, education theory, governance, and staff firings that require a board vote.

Regardless of how long he has left as CEO, Martinez will be in charge as the district navigates some of its most pressing challenges since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. These include balancing its budget and settling new labor contracts with both the Chicago Teachers Union and the principals union.

New Chicago school board starts governing

Chicago’s new school board will be sworn in on Jan. 15. Ten of them were elected and the rest were appointed by the mayor. It will be the first school board in Chicago’s history with elected members, although Johnson must still appoint a final board member.

As with Martinez, this board will immediately have to tackle big issues like voting on labor contracts and figuring out how to pay for them as a projected $500 million deficit looms. The board will also inherit a new five-year strategic plan, which calls for more children to attend public schools within their neighborhoods.

The new school board is also scheduled for district-led training the week of Jan. 6. A previously scheduled week of training sessions in December for the new board got cancelled. By law, all school board members in Illinois must complete training requirements related to their duties.

CTU contract approval awaits new school board

The bad blood between City Hall and Chicago Public Schools leadership stems in part from souring contract negotiations between Chicago Public Schools and the teachers union, which is a close ally of the mayor’s.

The union and the district are still far apart on some key issues, including additional prep time for elementary school teachers. Even though the school board has told Martinez that he’s fired, he is still in charge of negotiations on the district’s side until June.

The new school board will likely also have to approve the new contract. Some of its members are aligned with the union and Johnson. Others aren’t. While the board could approve a new deal with CTU through a simple majority vote, a new contract will almost certainly also require CPS to amend its budget — and the latter would require approval from two-thirds of the school board, according to state law.

Budget amendments also require a minimum 15-day period of notice to the public before the board can vote.

That timeline makes it likely that the city’s new 21-person board will be the final entity to sign off on a new contract. During previous contract negotiations, the board has signed a deal and amended its budget to pay for the contract on the same day. If a deal is struck in the coming days, it’s possible the new board members could approve it at their first meeting on January 30.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Judge bars Chicago Board of Education from teachers union contract talks without CEO approval

2024-12-24T23:00:32+00:00

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A Cook County Circuit Court judge ruled Tuesday that the Chicago Board of Education may not block schools chief Pedro Martinez from doing his job and may not attend teachers contract negotiations without his approval.

Judge Joel Chupack granted Martinez’s request for a temporary restraining order in a Christmas Eve ruling from the bench, marking another dramatic turn in the power struggle between the CEO and Mayor Brandon Johnson’s hand-picked board members.

The board fired Martinez without cause on Friday, meaning he will stay on the job for another six months and collect more than $130,000 in severance pay. As part of that vote, the board said it would modify Martinez’s powers without specifying how.

But on Tuesday, the judge ruled that the Board of Education members are barred from “obstructing” Martinez’s “performance of his job duties.” They also cannot attend the district’s high-stakes contract negotiations with the Chicago Teachers Union — as three did on Monday — without first getting permission from Martinez, the ruling said.

Board members also cannot attempt to manage any of Martinez’s staffers, the ruling said.

Another court date has been set for Jan. 9.

“Pedro Martinez is still the CEO, and there’s no question about that,” said Bill Quinlan, Martinez’s attorney. “They don’t have the right to restrict his duties and limit his statutory obligations.”

Jeremy Glenn, an outside attorney representing the Chicago Board of Education, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday’s ruling.

At least three school board members took the unusual step of attending contract negotiations Monday without an invitation from the CEO or the mayor. Martinez’s lawyer responded with a letter demanding board members cease and desist from attending, describing it as “unlawful interference” with Martinez’s authority.

After Tuesday’s ruling, Martinez told reporters that the current board — picked by a mayor who is a close ally of the teachers union — could “force a contract down our throats,” and that CPS’s negotiating team considered resigning en masse when board members showed up to Monday’s negotiations and attempted to interfere, Fox 32 reported. For his part, board President Sean Harden said he and others attended simply to support CPS’s team.

During a press conference Tuesday afternoon, Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates acknowledged that no one but Martinez is in charge — and that he should be ready to take the blame if the recent progress stalls in contract negotiations.

“People get to say that this contract is being bargained with the Chicago Teachers Union and Pedro Martinez, so we look forward to finally seeing him on Thursday,” Davis Gates said.

Martinez has not attended negotiations. Typically, school district CEOs and superintendents leave contracting negotiations for district bargaining team members with rare exceptions, such as when a deal is nearly at hand.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Days after Martinez is fired, Chicago Board of Education members attend CTU contract negotiations

2024-12-23T22:34:18+00:00

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Three days after voting to fire the school district CEO, Chicago Board of Education members took the extraordinary step Monday of attending contract negotiations between the district and the Chicago Teachers Union.

The lawyer for Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez responded with a letter demanding board members cease and desist from attending negotiations, describing it as “unlawful interference” with Martinez’s authority.

The back-and-forth shows how the vote to oust Martinez has taken the power struggle over the nation’s fourth largest school district into a new, more public phase.

It also could signal that Mayor Brandon Johnson and his handpicked school board feel a sense of urgency — and perhaps see an opportunity — to get a deal done.

The union previously called for an agreement by Christmas. Negotiations started eight months ago and have become increasingly tense.

Board members Olga Bautista and Frank Thomas attended negotiations in the morning, and board President Sean Harden attended in the afternoon, according to Chicago Public Schools spokesperson Mary Ann Fergus.

Harden told Chalkbeat that the board members attended on their own, without the direction of the mayor, to “observe and be part of the support” for CPS.

“I, along with the other board members, thought it was incredibly important for our team to feel supported,” he said, adding they wanted to “make sure the talks continue.”

The mayor’s office did not respond to a request for comment, and CPS did not share Martinez’s thoughts on board members attending. But according to two sources who have spoken with the CEO, Martinez was “surprised” to hear board members planned to attend negotiations.

Typically, contract negotiations are left to bargaining teams from the district administration and union.

CTU vice president Jackson Potter wrote on social media that it was the first time board members have attended negotiations since 2012 bargaining was winding down, when then-Board President David Vitale attended. Potter wrote that members attended to help “both sides land an agreement.”

The 2012 contract negotiations led to a strike that attracted national attention. A former board member who served with Vitale described the context on condition of anonymity because he did not receive required approval from his employer to speak to the media. He said Vitale joined negotiations during “a very tense moment” because he was directed to do so by then-mayor Rahm Emanuel and then-CPS CEO Jean Claude Brizard. Before that, neither he nor his co-members were involved in negotiations, the former board member said.

“What is the function of a board? It is generally to conduct oversight and accountability and governance of management,” he said. “Board is not management.”

A board member sat in on negotiations on at least one other instance, also during labor strife. Board member Miguel Del Valle attended ahead of the union’s 2019 strike.

Martinez — who was not present at negotiations on Friday — continues to oversee the district because his contract stipulates that he is to stay on for six months if he is fired without cause, which is the route board members took. The resolution on Martinez’s firing states the board wants to modify his powers but does not specify how. Martinez said after Friday’s vote that he didn’t know what the board had in mind, but he urged reporters to “get to know” his attorney.

Martinez has clashed with Johnson, a former CTU organizer and continued close ally, over how to pay for the union’s contract demands and $175 million in pension obligations that the city wants to shift to CPS. He has resisted the mayor’s suggestion for CPS to take out a short-term loan to pay for labor contracts and pension obligations. Amid that tension, the former Board of Education — mostly appointed by Johnson — resigned en masse in October.

Negotiations have become increasingly tense since Johnson asked Martinez to resign in the fall. The union’s initial 700-plus proposal package has been pared down in recent weeks in an effort to close a deal. Current demands include a 6% raise in the first year of the contract, hiring additional staff over the life of the contract, and more teacher prep time in elementary schools — an issue the city’s principals union has taken issue with.

The union believes its demands would add critical support to schools and beef up protections for LGBTQ and immigrant students after President-elect Donald Trump takes office.

CPS has not outlined how it will pay for the contract in the next fiscal year. District leaders have raised concerns about the potential cost, pointing to a projected $500 million deficit next year before the cost of labor negotiations.

Johnson won’t have sole control over who serves on the board for very much longer. Ten members elected by voters in November will take their seats Jan. 15, joining 11 Johnson appointees. Johnson has picked 10 people for the board so far. The board will be fully elected in 2027, when Johnson is up for reelection.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

CPS shares plan to keep open 5 of 7 Acero charter schools due to close

2024-12-13T04:05:56+00:00

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As angst grows about the planned closure of seven Acero charter schools on Chicago’s Southwest Side, CPS suggested Thursday that the best option would be to support keeping five of the schools open.

The district’s recommendation came after nearly two-and-a-half hours of public comment during which teachers and families pleaded with the district to help save the seven campuses.

Acero charter network announced in October that before the 2025-26 school year, it would close seven of its schools — where more than 1,800 students are enrolled and staff are members of the Chicago Teachers Union — because of a $40 million budget shortfall. Since then, families and the union immediately launched rallies and began attending board meetings to press CPS to prevent the closures.

Alfonso Carmona, chief portfolio officer who oversees charters in the district, presented a slew of options during Thursday’s board meeting. These included transitioning the seven campuses into CPS-run schools, or just helping affected students enroll at district schools. Carmona said that based on the feedback they’ve received, “what we’ve heard from these families is that we should not close these campuses.”

But the option he ultimately recommended was more of a “hybrid” option: He said CPS supports keeping five of the seven campuses open and “phasing out” the other two, known as the Paz and Cruz campuses.

Under this option, the district would help Acero cover its budget deficit. Carmona said this could be the best option because it’s likely CPS won’t actually have to open its wallet under this scenario. He said the charter network would “break even” if it closed the Paz and Cruz campuses — both of which are for sale — because they both “contributed substantially” to the network’s projected deficit, according to a district analysis. He added that the buildings are in disrepair and would need significant investment.

“That will also allow enough time for us to also potentially transition those schools as district managed schools after the 25-26 school year,” Carmona said. It was unclear how many schools would potentially be absorbed.

Ultimately, the district would help students from Paz and Cruz enroll in CPS or charter schools, according to Carmona’s presentation.

Acero did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the CPS proposal. Acero operates a total of 15 charter schools in the city.

But it’s unclear what option the board will ultimately choose — or how soon. Sidestepping Carmona’s recommendation, Vice President Mary Gardner asked Carmona to provide more details by Monday on the option of absorbing all seven Acero campuses, which the district estimates would cost between $21 million and $28 million. Board member Michilla Blaise said the board is “working hard” to give families direction on the issue.

The district had planned to present most of these options at a special meeting last month, but the board canceled the presentation without explanation.

The board, which passed a resolution last month calling for Acero to address the board, has criticized Acero for not attending board meetings to discuss the issue. Acero subsequently sent the board a cease and desist letter, accusing the board of sharing defamatory statements about the network and its closure plans.

“There has been 200 children I think leaving Acero schools that we might not get back again, and that’s disrupting your community because people are scared and worried, so we’re trying to make sure we’re moving thoughtfully and with the appropriate guidance,” Blaise said to the families who attended Thursday’s meeting.

Acero’s charter schools are publicly funded but privately managed. The Acero network operates based on a contract with CPS, and the network announced the closures in accordance with rules set out in that contract.

The union and families have held rallies, attended multiple board meetings, and met with elected officials in an effort to save the campuses.

On top of dismaying Acero students and families, the planned closures have increased tensions between Mayor Brandon Johnson — a union ally and opponent of school closures — and Chicago Public Schools leadership. Johnson, who has generally been critical of charter schools, said he doesn’t want to see any school close and last month called for CPS to create a “contingency plan” for the closures.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Citing Trump, CTU cranks up pressure on school district to settle contract before 2025

2024-12-13T02:48:47+00:00

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The Chicago Teachers Union turned up the pressure Thursday for Chicago Public Schools to settle its contract before the end of 2024.

After roughly seven months of contentious talks, the union has pushed the district in recent weeks to strike a deal on its contract. The union appealed to the school board — appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former CTU employee and close ally — to press the administration on its behalf, and the board immediately obliged in a letter to CEO Pedro Martinez.

During nearly two-and-a-half hours of public comment during Thursday’s Board of Education meeting that sometimes featured boos and chants, several union members and CTU President Stacy Davis Gates called for a swift deal. The union also held a rally before the meeting to argue that although the district approved a resolution reaffirming its welcoming status to immigrants, Donald Trump’s mass deportation plans made it crucial to settle the contract and avoid disruptions to students and families.

The union’s latest push highlights the different pressures, including the new school board set to take office early next year, that are affecting contract talks.

Davis Gates asked the board to “make a directive to the senior leadership team and the CEO” to settle the contract before Trump’s inauguration.

“Settle this contract so we can have a protective force field over a district that represents the tapestry of this country,” Davis Gates said, to loud applause from dozens of union members in the audience.

The board was scheduled to discuss collective bargaining during its closed session portion at the end of its meeting, which is not open to the public.

Martinez said Thursday that daily negotiations sessions are yielding progress in several areas, thanks to a revised, shortened list of CTU priorities. For example, he said the district committed to maintain school athletic director positions and increase stipends for coaches. He also said the district will hold the line on protecting principals’ ability to lead their schools and on keeping instructional time for students unchanged.

But the union also continued to sharply criticize Martinez, whose job has hung in the balance for months after Johnson asked him in the fall to resign. Martinez has so far refused to leave or reportedly take out a buyout offer.

The union and the district appear to have made some more headway this week.

For months, CPS has resisted the union’s demands for a major increase in staffing, noting that the district added thousands of new positions during the pandemic and now faces growing budget deficits.

But union leaders announced in a video before the Thursday meeting that the district had offered to increase the number of teaching assistants, technology coordinators, and school librarians, and to create a bilingual teaching assistant pool.

The teachers’ union has also continued to push for higher pay raises after the district offered cost-of-living increases of up to 5% that would raise the average teacher salary to more than $110,000 in four years, along with other pay and benefit improvements. CTUIt has reduced its initial proposal for 9% increases to 6% the first year.

But some of the controversy about the contract isn’t really about salaries and pay increases. Some aldermen, other employee unions, incoming school board members, and others have increasingly expressed concern about rushing to settle a high-stakes contract with enormous financial and academic implications for the cash-strapped district and the city.

Some have said there shouldn’t be a deal before a new board, partly elected by the residents of Chicago, takes over in just five weeks.

“It should be that school board that begins the process of bringing back stability to our school district,” said Alderman Gilbert Villegas during a press conference this week calling for that new hybrid board to settle the contract. “They are the ones that voters picked.”

But Michilla Blaise and the rest of the board have said they have the right to make decisions they see fit immediately.

Villegas sent a letter Thursday to Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul to review whether the “unprecedented” standoff over the contract might violate state law, alleging that current board members have been in touch directly with the CTU about contract talks. Under state law, the schools chief is supposed to be the one negotiating directly with employee unions, with the board stepping in to approve the resulting contracts.

Separately, during Thursday’s meeting, representatives from both Service Employees International Union 73 — which represents school support staff — and the Chicago Principals and Administrators Association reiterated concerns about contract proposals that they view as scaling back the power of their own members.

And some incoming board members expressed concern about the cancellation of their board training for next week. The training was canceled at the direction of the current board, but newly elected board members say they haven’t been told why.

“The historic elected board will be joining you soon to help set district goals and priorities, approve policies, make purchasing decisions, evaluate contracts, approve the budget and capital plan, and set the school year calendar,” said board member-elect Che “Rhymefest” Smith, who will represent District 10. “We need all the information and training … with no interruptions.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Teachers Union contract negotiations cause rift with other school employee unions

2024-12-06T20:49:51+00:00

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The Chicago Teachers Union’s contentious contract negotiations have already spurred a major clash between district leaders and Mayor Brandon Johnson’s office and endangered CEO Pedro Martinez’ role.

Now the teachers union’s demands for a significant expansion of CTU-represented positions and of educators’ say over school matters are pitting that union against two other district labor groups: The Chicago Principals and Administrators Association and the Service Employees International Union 73, a longtime CTU ally.

The principals union, which is in the midst of negotiating its first contract with CPS, wrote a letter this week to the Board of Education saying some CTU proposals would trample on principals’ authority to run schools. Meanwhile, the Service Employees International Union 73, which represents support staff at schools, has voiced concern over a CTU demand it says will take work away from its members — and threatened to sue the district if it approves the proposal, the Chicago Tribune reported. The rift with the SEIU is especially notable as that union has jointly advocated for more special education services and staff with the teachers union, and the two groups went on strike together in 2019.

Principals union leaders said they are concerned about school board pressure on Martinez to settle the teachers contract as quickly as possible and about the cost of the union’s staffing and other proposals. They worry that the cash-strapped district might have to resort to assistant principal layoffs and other cuts to afford them. CPS estimated the union’s initial proposals to cost $10 billion but is reassessing that estimate; the union has called that estimate inaccurate and has pared back some of its proposals, but it has not shared a cost estimate.

“We don’t believe the problematic provisions are intentionally problematic,” wrote Troy LaRaviere, CPAA’s president, in the letter to the board. “They are simply the result of the limited perspective of teachers. By that I mean teachers run classrooms, not schools.”

Thad Goodchild, CTU deputy general counsel, told Chalkbeat that the goal of the union’s proposals is to beef up staffing in critical areas and ensure teachers have a voice at schools. He said there’s “an open dialogue” between leaders of both unions, and CTU is also “working to find a solution” with SEIU.

Contract negotiations with the teachers union have stretched on since April and soured the relationship between Martinez and Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former teacher, CTU employee and close union ally, who has asked Martinez to resign. The school board, installed by Johnson after the previous board resigned amid the conflict, wrote to Martinez late last month to demand a quick resolution to the talks.

The CTU recently shared what it is calling a “roadmap to settlement” with the district, including a smaller raise proposal than the 9% a year it demanded at first and a pared-down set of staffing and other demands. But that roadmap still includes proposals that would give teachers the final say over curriculums and a larger role in evaluating principals.

Principals worry their role in school decisions will shrink

The principals union says one of its major concerns is a proposal that would allow teachers to pick their own curriculums as long as they meet state learning objectives.

Goodchild, from CTU, said the proposal is meant to ensure that teacher voice exists in all schools.

“Academic freedom doesn’t mean that teachers get to teach whatever they want — it means that their professional judgment is respected and that they aren’t expected to teach from scripted, online curriculum with lots of gaps in it, which unfortunately is the direction that district has been heading in recent years,” Goodchild said.

But one elementary school principal, who spoke with Chalkbeat on condition of anonymity in order to speak candidly, said she felt that allowing teachers more academic freedom would prevent staff from developing a schoolwide strategy for instruction.

“I know it’s not implemented really well in every single school, but the mechanism for that teacher input and voice exists, and I think to swing to the extreme of every teacher making their own decision in that regard is going to be harmful for kids,” the principal said.

The principals union, which formed last year, also started negotiating with the district in April. But unlike the publicly contentious teachers' contract negotiations, talks with principals have unfolded quietly behind closed doors, and the two sides have taken a few months off as the CTU talks intensified.

According to a CPS presentation for the school board obtained by Chalkbeat, district officials and principals union leaders have met five times, and the union has put forth proposals on wages and benefits, discipline and discharge procedures for school leaders, and more.

The two sides haven’t reached agreements yet, Banks said, but, “We have enjoyed a much more amenable and open-minded engagement with CPS than others have.”

Earlier this week, a group of school leaders working independently of the union also sent a letter to the school board saying the contract talks with the CTU and the pressure on Martinez to step down are creating “an atmosphere of uncertainty.” Nearly 700 CPS principals and assistant principals representing almost 80% of the district’s campuses signed the letter, arguing that replacing the CEO would be “a decision rooted in political interests, not the interest of students.”

CTU leaders have dismissed these concerns on social media, with Vice President Jackson Potter recently calling principals “middle management foremen of the system.”

SEIU says CTU demands will hurt its members

Other CTU proposals have threatened a rift with SEIU Local 73.

A recently amended contract proposal by the Chicago Teachers Union obtained by Chalkbeat Chicago would give the district more flexibility to choose between teacher assistants, represented by the CTU, or Special Education Classroom Assistants (or SECAs), represented by SEIU, based on what a student’s Individualized Education Program or a 504 plan requires. SEIU Local 73 says this proposal will take work away from SECAs, who are trained to work with students with disabilities.

Stacia Scott, executive vice president of SEIU Local 73, told Chalkbeat that adding flexibility for school leaders to choose between teacher assistants or SECAs to work with students with disabilities could cause confusion in a school building.

“We have tried to make our contract as explicit as possible so that we can focus on ensuring that SECAs are providing the services that are legally required to special education students,” Scott said.

SEIU Local 73’s recent contract with the district requires that SECAs receive professional development and training and that SECAs are included in IEP meetings. It also protects SECAs from performing other tasks in schools that would take time away from students with disabilities, unless it is to support a student’s IEP.

Goodchild said the CTU proposal is ultimately meant to beef up special education staff such as teacher assistants so that students with IEPs get the support they need.

The number of SECAs has grown by roughly 150% over the past decade, when comparing employee figures from December 1, 2014 to the same day this month, according to data from CPS. In that same time period, the total number of teacher assistants grew by just over 50%, the data show.

“We’re trying to, you know, restore balance,” Goodchild said.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Samantha Smylie is the state education reporter for Chalkbeat Chicago covering school districts across the state, legislation, special education and the state board of education. Contact Samantha at ssmylie@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Mayor Johnson calls for CPS to craft ‘contingency plan’ for planned Acero closures

2024-11-13T00:14:12+00:00

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Mayor Brandon Johnson on Tuesday criticized Chicago Public Schools leadership in relation to a heated school closure proposal by the Acero charter school network and used the moment to call for greater accountability of charter schools.

Johnson, however, did not elaborate on what steps he would like to see the district take to prevent those closures. The Chicago Board of Education does not appear to have a legal path to stop the closures, according to its agreement with Acero.

While Johnson emphasized that he’s not saying CPS CEO Pedro Martinez did something wrong, he said the district needs to put together a “contingency plan” in response to the proposed Acero closures and that he and his team “haven’t seen that type of leadership” from the district.

The proposed Acero closures have added tension to the already tense relationship between Chicago Public Schools leadership and Johnson, who in September asked Martinez to resign. Martinez has refused to step down.

On Tuesday, Johnson also questioned how the Acero network — whose staff is unionized by the Chicago Teachers Union, a Johnson ally — reached its current financial situation just a year after CPS deemed it worthy of a three-year contract extension. The network has blamed the closures on a $40 million budget shortfall, Block Club Chicago reported.

“This is not about pointing the finger at someone doing something wrong — this is about how we course correct so families don’t lose out,” Johnson said.

Acero did not immediately responded to requests for comment.

In an email statement to Chalkbeat, a CPS spokesperson said the district is working with the charter network’s leadership to schedule a parent town hall, hold ongoing town hall meetings, and provide support for students.

According to the CPS spokesperson, when a charter decides to close, CPS implements internal procedures including contacting families to review options, such as neighborhood schools or schools with available seats, and providing financial support to district schools that could see an influx of students from the closed schools.

Last month, the Acero network announced that it was planning to close seven of its schools, or about half of those it operates, impacting about 2,000 students at those campuses. The network cited a $40 million budget shortfall. It’s unclear where students will enroll, but those students, like any Chicago resident, have the right to enroll in their neighborhood school.

As a charter school network, Acero is privately managed but publicly funded. It is allowed to operate 15 campuses, largely on the Southwest Side, based on conditions set out in a contract with Chicago Public Schools. Acero’s current contract was last renewed in July 2023 and runs through June 2026.

Acero’s contract allows the network to close schools but says the network must provide written notice to the district by Oct. 15, and that closures can’t happen before June 30 or the end of the school year — whichever happens last, “except in situations of an emergency where the health, safety or education of the Charter School’s students is at risk.”

CPS did not immediately say whether the network notified the district by Oct. 15. The news of the proposed closures became public Oct. 9 — which CPS CEO Martinez has said publicly is around the same time he found out.

Since the network’s announcement, Acero families and teachers have rallied against the closures and have aired their concerns with the Chicago Board of Education.

Union officials have asked the district to intervene or to absorb the campuses and keep them open for another school year. When the district declined to renew an agreement with Urban Prep charter schools in 2022, CPS officials promised to keep those schools open as district campuses. That ultimately did not happen and the two campuses remain open under an agreement with Urban Prep until June 2025.

CPS did not immediately respond to questions about the options it might be considering pursuing at this point.

The Chicago Board of Education plans to hold a special meeting Thursday during which it will vote on a resolution calling for Acero representatives to come before the board and discuss alternatives to the closures. The resolution also says that if Acero ultimately closes the seven campuses, it “shall return all unspent public funds and property,” and that the district should extend its deadline for GoCPS — the application Chicago families use to apply to various schools, including charters and selective enrollment campuses — until Dec. 15. That deadline has already been pushed back to Nov. 22.

Asked why the mayor is advocating so strongly for Acero given his past criticism of charter schools, Johnson said he doesn’t want “any family to endure that type of trauma” that comes along with school closings.

Still, Johnson invoked a long time position of his — that as privately-run entities, charter schools should get more accountability. CPS is already tasked with monitoring charter schools, setting out conditions in each operator’s contract, and deciding whether operators’ schools should be renewed.

“Part of what my task is to challenge CPS and its leadership to respond to charter operators who have these structural elements within their budgetary framework that are not sustainable long term, and that will require audits,” Johnson said. “It will require CPS digging in a little bit deeper to look at the trends that are happening.”

Tensions continue to build between Johnson, CPS

On Monday, mayor’s office staff, including Chief of Staff Cristina Pacione-Zayas, and two of the mayor’s closest allies — Alds. Carlos Ramirez Rosa and Byron Sigcho-Lopez — met with CPS staff, including Martinez, about the proposed Acero closures. Chicago Board of Education members Olga Bautista and Frank Niles Thomas were also present, according to a source with knowledge of the meeting, who was not authorized to speak to the press about private discussions.

It was a “contentious discussion,” in which mayoral staff questioned CPS leaders about when they discovered the proposed closures, whether it has combed through the charter network’s financial documents, and what CPS has been doing about the issue, the source said. Martinez said the district has engaged with Acero families and is thinking through best options, the source said.

“Pedro’s story stayed consistent with what he’s said privately and publicly: He found out when the district did around the same time they went public,” the source said.

In an interview with Chalkbeat, Sigcho-Lopez said the meeting left him “concerned with [Martinez’s] leadership style” and, like the mayor, wanting an audit of Acero’s finances.

“He had a lot of excuses, a lot of contradictions, but not a lot of answers in terms of actually what he is going to do to ensure that those 2,000 kids are not forced, you know, into a transition that is not in anyone’s interest,” Sigcho-Lopez said.

Pacione-Zayas told Chalkbeat that CPS officials were asked if the district had reached out to the Illinois State Board of Education for guidance and if the district had considered absorbing the campuses – including how it would affect their budget.

“None of that was prepared,” Pacione Zayas said. “All that was revealed to us was that they extended the GoCPS [application deadline] by seven days.”

Families use the district’s GoCPS application to apply to schools, including preschool programs, selective enrollment, and magnet schools.

CPS has reviewed the costs behind a number of scenarios, including absorbing the campuses, according to a CPS source who was not authorized to speak with the press. The source declined to elaborate whether it was a viable option and said they were unsure if City Hall was aware of the district’s analysis.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Brandon Johnson scrambles to contain CPS school board turmoil, picks 6 new members

2024-10-09T15:32:41+00:00

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A defiant Mayor Brandon Johnson named six new members to the seven-member Chicago school board Monday, as fallout from the resignations of all board members last week escalated.

On Friday, the Chicago Board of Education’s current members said they would step down this month, an announcement coming after months of fiscal feuds featuring district leadership on one side and the Chicago Teachers Union and Johnson on the other. The outgoing board was appointed by Johnson but appeared to back Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez’s approach to growing fiscal challenges.

The six appointees are: Olga Bautista, Debby Pope, Michilla “Kyla” Blaise, Mary Gardner, Frank Niles Thomas, and the Rev. Mitchell Johnson. The mayor’s office had initially said the mayor would announce seven appointees Monday morning. Johnson said Monday he would fill the seventh and final board seat soon.

He acknowledged that the appointees he announced Monday are still being vetted before they are officially sworn in later this month.

At least three of the appointees have gotten involved in notable ways in this year’s first-ever Chicago school board elections.

Blaise, a former political consultant who serves as chief of staff for Cook County Board Commissioner Frank Aguilar, was a candidate in the city’s first school board election in November but withdrew in early September. Debby Pope, a former teacher who as of Monday afternoon described herself as a part-time CTU employee on her account on X, the social media site formerly known as Twitter, filed campaign finance paperwork, but did not run — instead, she backed a CTU-endorsed candidate in her district. A CTU spokesman later said she retired from the union in June, and her X profile has since been updated and made private.

Mary Gardner, a West Side community organizer, challenged the signatures on the ballot petitions submitted by three candidates running in the school board’s District 5 election; all three were ultimately removed from the ballot.

Over the weekend, 41 of Chicago’s 50 aldermen — including key Johnson allies — signed a letter condemning the board shakeup, which comes just weeks before voters elect 10 members of a new 21-member board that will take over in January. They also called it unprecedented and destabilizing for Johnson to pick new board members amid CPS contract talks with the Chicago Teachers Union, which helped elect Johnson; the mayor is a former CTU organizer.

The aldermen demanded hearings before the mayor appoints any new members; a special hearing on the issue is slated for Wednesday.

Some state lawmakers and organizations representing the city’s business community also condemned Johnson’s actions. And Illinois Latino Agenda, a statewide coalition of Latino leaders, hosted a press conference later Monday to voice their own concerns about the move and call for transparency in running the school district.

But on Monday, Johnson forcefully pushed back, insisting the city elected him mayor to transform public schools — not to oversee cuts to staff and programs. He argued that the criticism of the shakeup is rooted at least in part in his identity as a Black man running the city, saying his detractors are “making the same argument of the Confederacy.” He stressed repeatedly he is simply using his power to appoint board members to ensure a smoother transition to a partly elected board early next year.

“I am using my authority that the people of Chicago gave me, which is to hurry up and make sure the students of Chicago get what they deserve,” he said at a press conference at Sweet Holy Spirit Church on the South Side.

The beginning of Monday’s press conference was disrupted by hecklers chanting that the board appointments are “not legit.” Some also protested the prosecutions of protesters against violence in Gaza. Both groups were escorted out.

Protesters critical of Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson hold up signs during Monday's charter school ribbon-cutting ceremony that the mayor attended.

Johnson did not explain why he was only appointing six board members Monday, not seven. But he said with lots of interest in the unpaid board slots, it won’t be a problem to appoint another member.

He said the focus of all Chicago elected officials should be on securing more funding from the state. But some of his critics have argued the discord could undermine the district’s push for more funding to skeptical state officials.

Bautista, one of the appointees and the co-executive director for the Southeast Environmental Task Force, said she wants to get more funding for the city’s schools, expand staff, and fill teacher and other vacancies. Bautista said the scrutiny of the board turmoil is misplaced: “Where’s the outrage over what’s at stake if we don’t fully fund our schools?”

Johnson was already slated to appoint 11 members to join the 10 members elected in November —the new board will start its term in January. A joint Friday afternoon press release from the mayor’s office and the departing board members stated that seating some of these appointees now will give them a head start on serving on the board, making for a smoother transition come January.

That argument may be falling flat with many officials. In their letter, the aldermen cautioned against adding to the district’s already significant debt burden. They argued Johnson focused too much on obtaining funding for a new Chicago Bears stadium rather than for schools — all while he and the union criticized Martinez for failing to talk state lawmakers into giving CPS more money.

“A School Board full of lame-duck appointees carrying out only a few months of a term before residents get a chance to elect representatives is not what is in our best interest,” the aldermen wrote. “A revolving door of CEOs that cannot complete more than a handful of years before transitioning out is not in our best interest.”

One key issue with appointing new members on the cusp of the election is that mayoral appointees must live in the half of each district not represented by the member elected in November. Until those election results come out, it will remain unclear whether the people appointed by Johnson to the board on Monday meet that requirement.

During Monday’s press conference, the mayor seemed momentarily stumped when asked if any of the appointees are running for school board seats; none of them are.

Johnson fought CPS CEO over budget, pension payment

The crux of the dispute at CPS was Johnson’s pressure on the board to take on a short-term, high-interest loan to cover the cost of a new contract the district is negotiating with the teacher union. The mayor also reportedly pushed the board to fire Martinez over his own refusal to take out the loan.

The CPS leadership turmoil began this summer as negotiations between the district and the union plodded along, and Martinez unveiled a budget that did not include money for teachers raises or other union demands. His budget also did not include a $175 million payment to a city fund that covers pensions for non-teaching CPS staff.

During the term of Johnson’s predecessor, Lori Lightfoot, Johnson and the union argued city government should continue to cover that payment as it had historically. But this summer, in an about-face, they insisted that the district should take it on to allow Johnson to pursue his progressive agenda. Chicago is facing its own budget deficit.

The mayor has said that after running on a platform of transforming public education in the city, he cannot condone cuts to staff and programs.

The mayor balked at calling on his new appointees to weigh in on taking out a loan or forcing out Martinez. However, Mitchell Johnson, one of Johnson’s appointees and the former executive director of the Developing Communities Project, said he hasn’t seen enough dedication to transforming schools from the “corporate leaders in CPS.”

The final Johnson appointee is Niles Thomas, a U.S. Air Force veteran and a labor and political organizer who formerly worked as 21st Ward superintendent for the Department of Streets and Sanitation.

Martinez has come under heavy criticism from the union in recent months.

The acrimony between Johnson and Martinez spilled into public view when the CPS CEO said the mayor asked for his resignation late last month, although Johnson has disputed that.

Martinez has said he does not intend to resign. He has gotten some support from district principals, business leaders, and some elected officials.

In a Monday statement, CTU President Stacy Davis Gates said the union “looks forward to collaborating with the new board members to enact the transformation of our public schools that our students and educators need and deserve.”

This story has been updated to include additional comments from Mayor Brandon Johnson, his appointees to the Chicago Board of Education, and Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates. It also includes a clarification that Debby Pope retired from the union earlier this year.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org .

Chicago Board of Education will consider promising no school closures until 2027

2024-09-25T02:31:38+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education is slated to vote on a resolution that commits to no school closures until 2027 — a response to a Chicago Teachers Union assertion that CEO Pedro Martinez is planning closures, which he has staunchly denied.

The vote on the resolution, which Mayor Brandon Johnson’s appointed school board will consider at its Thursday meeting, comes days after Johnson asked Martinez to resign. In an op-ed for Chicago Tribune published Tuesday, Martinez said he will not step down — and described the talk of closures as a tactic aimed at undermining him.

The resolution is worded as a recommendation from Martinez that the board will be asked to approve. But in the Tribune piece, Martinez said both he and Board President Jianan Shi are asking the board to approve the resolution. In a letter to staff and families, Martinez said the resolution has the board’s “enthusiastic support.”

Asked Tuesday night if Shi partnered with Martinez on the resolution, Shi – in his first public comments since news of Johnson’s resignation request — said Martinez proposed it. Asked if he would vote to approve it, Shi said, “As a former organizer, educator, I have no intention of closing schools.”

If passed by the board, the resolution would place a moratorium on school closures until the end of the 2026-27 school year. Currently, state law prevents Chicago from closing schools until Jan. 15, 2025, when the city’s new, partially elected school board will be sworn in.

In an email, Mary Ann Fergus, a spokesperson for Chicago Public Schools, said the resolution is binding, “but, of course, it could be reversed by future Boards.”

In his letter to staff and families, Martinez wrote that the resolution was an effort to “put to rest” what he described as a “misinformation campaign.”

“I’m disappointed that this misinformation campaign is out there, because I know it has caused unnecessary stress and worry for many in our school communities,” Martinez wrote.

Johnson’s request for Martinez’s resignation raised questions over whether the school board might move to fire Martinez at Thursday’s meeting. On Tuesday evening, a CPS spokesperson initially sent reporters a statement purporting to be from the district and the board that said there was no plan to take action on the CEO’s contract or to secure a loan at the meeting. The statement also said that “there have been an unfortunate series of rumors aimed at discrediting CEO Martinez and his leadership team,” and that any reference to school closures “is a tactic to provide more chaos and uncertainty, to steal precious time away from delivering a world-class education to our children.”

Soon after, Shi tweeted that he hadn’t seen the statement before it went out, and told Chalkbeat that the statement “caught me off guard. This was not a Board of Education statement.”

Minutes later, the district spokesperson sent out an email saying the earlier statement was incorrectly labeled and came from CPS only.

Shi declined to say whether he agreed with the statement and wouldn’t comment on Johnson’s request for Martinez to resign, saying he cannot discuss personnel issues.

Martinez’s reassurance fail to sway union leaders

School closures are a political third rail in Chicago, where in 2013, former Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s decision to close 50 schools is still painful for many Chicago residents.

Last week, the union said it had obtained a school facilities analysis that included a list of 70 schools that could be consolidated with 70 others. Citing this document, the union’s House of Delegates passed a vote of no confidence in Martinez.

Martinez has said he would not close schools during his tenure as head of CPS. In a letter last week to staff, Martinez said the school board requested the analysis, and that the district conducted it to help create a five-year strategic plan, which places more focus on bolstering neighborhood schools. Martinez has said the analysis led the board and CPS officials to decide that closures were unnecessary.

Despite Martinez’s assurances over the past week and the planned resolution, union leaders continued to press the issue of possible closures at a public bargaining session at Cameron Elementary on the West Side Tuesday evening.

The session was focused on the union’s demand to expand the number of campuses participating in the Sustainable Community Schools program, a joint district-union initiative that gives extra funding to schools to enlist community nonprofits, beef up after-school programs, and strengthen parent engagement, among other things.

The school district has offered to expand the program from 20 campuses now to 45 within four years, a more modest expansion than the union and Johnson’s administration have sought.

At the session, union Vice President Jackson Potter held up a list of schools flagged for possible consolidation as part of the facilities analysis. He noted that some Sustainable Community Schools are on the list, and questioned whether efforts to transform them could be moot if they end up shuttered down the road.

Bogdana Chkoumbova, the district’s chief education officer, again categorically denied that officials are eyeing closures.

“This referenced list was never made as a recommendation nor was it ever considered as a next step or follow up by anyone,” she said, “There never was a plan to close schools.”

CTU President Stacy Davis Gates countered that staff vacancies and large class sizes in some schools were undermining them, potentially setting them up for closure down the road.

“I am looking at the schools on the list and seeing how they’ve been starved for resources,” she said.

Gates and Potter pressed officials on possible staffing cuts to help balance the district’s almost $10 billion budget, which did not include any dollars for teacher and principal contract costs when the school board passed it earlier this summer.

District officials acknowledged that staffing shortages continue to be an issue. But they argued the district — which added 6,000 positions, including about 2,500 teachers, in the past four years — is on the right track.

“The bottom line is that there are more qualified educators in CPS than at any point before,” said Ben Felton, the chief talent officer.

He said there is no plan to lay off district employees midyear, though he did not rule out the need for such cuts later as enrollments shift.

Budget issue creates rift between mayor and Martinez

Tensions between the mayor and CPS became clear after Johnson told reporters that he was unhappy with the CPS budget, which had a slew of cuts to close its deficit.

Johnson’s desire to oust Martinez came after Martinez and the board declined to cover a chunk of pension payments for non-teaching staff, a move that helped widen a city budget deficit.

When the Johnson administration pushed CPS to take out a short-term loan to help pay for the pension costs, as well as the costs of new teachers and principals union contracts, Martinez and the board balked.

In an internal memo obtained by Chalkbeat, CPS leadership said taking out such a loan would be fiscally irresponsible, could result in a further downgrade of its bond ratings, and would worsen the district’s long-term debt. Martinez publicly confirmed those concerns in his Tribune op-ed.

During the bargaining session, district and union officials joined in praising the community schools model and professing a desire to expand it. But at a press conference afterwards, Davis Gates again took aim at Martinez, calling him a “clown show CEO” standing in the way of a mayor, teachers union and school board in agreement about pumping more dollars into schools and transforming them.

“He can just sign on the dotted line and then we can work together to win more funding for our schools,” she said.

CPS officials canceled their press conference.

In a statement Tuesday, City Hall spokesperson Ronnie Reese did not directly address the resolution.

“As an organizer, Mayor Johnson fought against school closures and participated in a hunger strike to save neighborhood schools,” Reese said. “His vision for public education in Chicago calls for investments in our students — not layoffs and harmful school actions that have traumatized families and communities across the city.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Mila Koumpilova is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Amid contract negotiation standoff, the Chicago Teachers Union invokes school closures

2024-09-19T22:43:21+00:00

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The Chicago Teachers Union is escalating a fight with CEO Pedro Martinez as its contract negotiations drag on, with the union accusing the schools chief of plotting to close or consolidate underenrolled schools.

Martinez says there are no such plans, and that the district’s recent analysis of its buildings led to the conclusion that closures were unnecessary. State law bars Chicago from closing public schools until Jan. 15, 2025.

“Let me reiterate: I will not recommend that any schools be closed during my leadership of CPS,” Martinez wrote to district families this week.

But CTU has doubled down, arguing that the existence of the analysis — which neither CTU nor the district would provide to Chalkbeat — is a problem. Jackson Potter, the union’s vice president, told Chalkbeat Wednesday that school board members should consider removing Martinez over the analysis, calling the schools chief a “huge barrier to our collective success.”

The back-and-forth is a sign that the union is looking to put additional pressure on the CEO as negotiations continue. Martinez, appointed by former Mayor Lori Lightfoot, is already on shaky ground, with Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former CTU organizer and close ally of the union, reportedly considering ousting him. And in a city where the shuttering of roughly 50 campuses a decade ago still touches a nerve, the union’s allegations are eye-catching — even if it’s unlikely the schools chief would pursue politically unpopular closures under a mayor and school board that oppose them.

The war of words over closures comes as the district faces looming budget deficits and after Martinez has clashed with both the mayor and the union. The CEO recently rejected an appeal from Johnson to take out a high-interest short-term loan to cover a $175 million employee pension payment and the cost of the teacher contract. Meanwhile, the union has lambasted Martinez for limited progress in the talks over the CTU’s slate of proposals, the union’s most far-reaching and costliest to date.

In a statement to Chalkbeat, CPS spokesperson Mary Ann Fergus reiterated that there are no plans to close or consolidate schools.

School board President Jianan Shi and Vice President Elizabeth Todd-Breland did not respond to requests for comment.

The facilities analysis: what we know

Although the arrival of migrant families helped push enrollment up last fall, CPS has grappled for years with enrollment declines that have left many of its campuses underenrolled, especially on the city’s South and West sides. How to best address the issue of shrinking schools is a challenge districts across the country are facing post-pandemic, amplifying fears of possible closures.

In a letter to families earlier this week, Martinez said the district conducted a neighborhood-by-neighborhood facilities analysis to inform a new five-year strategic plan that prioritizes efforts to prop up neighborhood schools. In separate communication to staff, he said the school board requested the study.

In his letters to parents and staff, Martinez said the district would not consider a consolidation plan without first consulting families and residents. He noted that the district is currently looking into two specific moves: a new home for the Velma Thomas Early Childhood Center and moving the seventh and eighth grade from Kelvyn Park High School to three neighborhood elementary schools.

Officials have also pointed out the state moratorium against school closures in Chicago, which expires in January on the same day a partly-elected school board will be sworn in. Johnson’s administration and his appointed school board have said unequivocally that they have no appetite for closing campuses, though they opposed a bill in Springfield that, in part, would’ve extended the moratorium to 2027.

Despite Martinez’s reassurances, union officials have repeated their claim that the district is considering closing schools, including during public comment at the school board’s Wednesday meeting.

Potter said the analysis CTU obtained included a detailed list of roughly 70 schools that could be consolidated with 70 other campuses. He also said the union has internal budget slides that reference consolidation as one option for addressing the district’s financial woes, with staff furloughs as another possibility.

“Why would a CEO have a list of 140 consolidations? Why would that be generated in such a detailed manner if they weren’t considering it?” Potter said. “That’s a waste of time and resources.”

Fergus, the district spokesperson, reiterated that the district reviewed facility usage as part of ongoing work related to the Education Facilities Master Plan and its annual capital plan.

By state law, Fergus said, CPS is required to post guidelines by Oct. 1 for “school actions,” a term used to describe changes to a school. She said only co-locations – when schools share a building – would be considered and can only be explored by CPS once a school community has requested it.

As negotiations continue and city budget looms, more pressure on Martinez

The backdrop to this fight is the ongoing contract negotiations.

After months of little progress, the district and union brought in a mediator to oversee the contract talks last month. At the bargaining table, the district has offered teachers raises of up to 5% in the next four years, which officials say will bring the average educator salary to more than $110,000 by the end of the contract, along with benefit increases at no cost to teachers and other concessions. But the district has balked at the union’s proposals to codify class sizes and staffing minimums in the contract, among others. The two are scheduled to bargain in public next Tuesday.

Also looming is pressure on Johnson to close a $223 million deficit in the City of Chicago’s current budget and close next year’s nearly $1 billion gap. Both gaps in the city’s budget, which covers city services such as police and fire, public libraries, and streets and sanitation, exist partly because the school board passed a $9.9 billion budget this summer that did not include money for the pensions of non-teaching staff. The CTU once sharply criticized Lightfoot when she passed on this same pension payment to the school district during her tenure.

Johnson suggested CPS take out a high-interest, short-term loan, but district leaders, backed by the school board, have said short-term borrowing to cover those costs would only add to CPS’s already substantial debt. Reports that Johnson was laying the groundwork to remove Martinez emerged in August amid this disagreement.

The union has made its displeasure with Martinez clear, arguing that district officials – and Martinez specifically – have failed to lobby state lawmakers and the governor aggressively for additional funding.

Potter said union leaders to his knowledge have not spoken with board members about removing Martinez. But he noted that since reports first came out that Johnson was planning to oust the schools chief, the district and union have made more headway at the bargaining table — “improvements in the pace and seriousness of bargaining.”

Still, he said, “If every time we make incremental progress at the bargaining table it’s because we have to threaten Pedro Martinez’s job, that’s not a healthy standard. It’s an impossible one.”

The CEO still has the support of many school leaders. Earlier this month, roughly 460 principals and assistant principals wrote to the school board arguing that after years of leadership turnover, Martinez is making progress in leading the district and his removal weeks into a new school year would cause significant disruption for students and staff.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org .

Is Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson trying to replace CPS CEO Pedro Martinez?

2024-08-15T01:18:58+00:00

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This story has been updated to include a comment from CPS and the Board of Education.

Chicago Public Schools staff and students could face a rocky start to the school year amid reports of a possible shake-up of the district’s top leadership.

According to WBEZ and the Chicago Sun-Times, Mayor Brandon Johnson is reportedly looking to replace Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez, who has overseen CPS since September 2021 and recently pushed back, alongside the Chicago Board of Education, against directives from City Hall.

The news comes less than two weeks before the start of a new school year and as Chicago is about to be center stage hosting the Democratic National Convention.

But three sources close to CPS who spoke on a condition of anonymity in order to speak candidly told Chalkbeat that Martinez is focused on doing his job and has not expressed interest in quitting.

Ultimately, Chicago’s Board of Education is tasked with hiring – and firing – a CEO. Historically, Chicago mayors have selected who they want to serve as CPS CEO and then had their pick voted on by board members, who were also appointed by the mayor.

The mayor’s office declined to comment about plans to oust Martinez.

In a statement, CPS and the Board of Education said, “The Chicago Board of Education, CEO Martinez, and Chicago Public Schools leadership are focused on preparing for a smooth start to the school year on August 26. We’re excited to work together with our school leaders, educators, and parents to continue to put the needs of our students first and build on our academic growth of the past two school years.”

One source close to CPS heard earlier this month that City Hall had drafted a list of potential replacements for Martinez but was not aware of the mayor’s team conducting interviews with anyone. And another source said that while the board has been aligned ideologically with the mayor’s office, it does not seem to have the appetite to fire Martinez right now.

If this board doesn’t act, the decision could ultimately be left to a new slate of people after Chicago’s first school board elections happen this November. That board will consist of 11 mayoral appointees, and another 10 members who will be elected from across the city.

The tensions between the mayor, CPS leadership, and the Chicago Teachers Union on the eve of a new school year are a stark contrast to harmonious spirit one year ago, when Johnson, Martinez, and CTU President Stacy Davis Gates visited schools together on the first day of classes.

Ald. Jeanette Taylor, who chairs the City Council’s Committee on Education and Child Development, said she had no idea that Johnson was looking to replace Martinez until Wednesday morning when a longtime City Hall newspaper reporter called her.

“I did not know, but I understand,” Taylor said. “Did the man do what he was supposed to do? Did he do his job? Did he put CPS in a better place than it was when he got there? For me, no.”

Still, Taylor said the timing is bad with the school year about to start and it’s “not a good look” given that CPS is currently bargaining with the Chicago Teachers Union.

Ald. Gilbert Villegas, past chair of the City Council Latino Caucus, which lobbied former Mayor Lori Lightfoot to pick a Latino to lead the school district, said he felt Martinez has done a good job and has been a “voice of neutrality” during the bargaining process with CTU.

“There has to be someone in the room that’s making sure that taxpayers are being heard and their issues are being considered here, and it’s just, it just doesn’t make sense that in the middle of negotiations you want to replace the CEO because he’s providing information that you don’t like,” Villegas said.

In recent weeks, the board passed a budget put forward by CPS leadership that Johnson did not approve of. That $9.9 billion spending plan approved last month closed a $505 million deficit through cuts and other savings. But it didn’t include any funding to pay for an eventual new contract with the teachers union or with the district’s new principals union. It also doesn’t include money to pay $175 million in pension costs for non-teaching staff that the city used to cover until the Lightfoot administration. A Johnson spokesperson has previously said they expect CPS to cover the $175 million in pension costs.

The board and CPS also rejected the Johnson administration’s recommendation to take out a short-term loan to pay for additional expenses, including the cost of new teachers and principal contracts and the pension payment. City Hall has continued to push CPS to take that loan and to cover the pension payment, according to one of the sources close to CPS. That source said Wednesday’s news felt disappointing to read about “when we’re all trying to do the right thing for CPS and for the students going forward.”

Negotiations between the district and Chicago Teachers Union, a close ally and former employer of Johnson’s, have become increasingly tense. CTU leadership has directly blamed Martinez for the lack of movement, saying Martinez lacks “the vision” to make the union’s proposals possible.

The 700-plus proposal package covers a variety of issues, including 9% raises for teachers and other members, additional staff to schools, and more support for students and their families in need, such as housing assistance. During a public bargaining session Tuesday, CPS said just 52 of the union’s proposals would cause the district’s deficit to balloon to $3 billion next fiscal year, roughly $2.5 billion more than what the district is already anticipating.

After that bargaining session, Davis Gates expressed frustration about the district’s deficit analysis related to the union’s proposals. Asked if the mayor’s office should reprimand CPS for defying Johnson’s wishes, Davis Gates pointed to other situations where the board has aligned with a mayor’s will, such as the notorious “Willis Wagons” created in the 1960s under former CPS CEO Benjamin Willis to avoid integrating schools or the decision under Mayor Rahm Emanuel to close 50 schools.

“You gotta ask Pedro why he doesn’t comply with the transition report that the mayor’s team said yes to,” Davis Gates said, referring to a report outlining the mayor’s vision for schools that closely aligns with policies CTU supports. “I can’t answer why they are not subordinate.”

Martinez and the board have carried out several policy changes Johnson favors, including moving away from student-based budgeting, stripping schools of on-campus police, and committing to rethinking the school choice system.

Martinez could resign on his own, though it’s unclear if he would still be eligible to receive severance in that case. If the board fired him without cause, he is entitled to severance equal to 20 weeks of pay, or close to $131,000, and would need six months notice, according to his contract with CPS.

Taylor said paying out Martinez’s contract will be costly, but keeping him could be too.

“Our kids cannot afford for us to keep trying to figure it out and fighting amongst each other,” Taylor said. “We wonder why our city is in chaos, because we [are] in chaos.”

Mila Koumpilova contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org .

Chicago Public Schools says teachers union proposals would lead to $4 billion deficit by 2029-30

2024-08-14T02:12:05+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools estimates that a chunk of the Chicago Teachers Union’s proposals, including raises for educators, would create a $4 billion deficit for the district by the 2029-2030 school year, officials said Tuesday.

The union, for its part, made recommendations for raising more money to support the district, including increasing taxes on wealthy individuals and corporations, and suing banks for what union officials described as predatory lending practices involving CPS in past years.

Their comments came during a public bargaining session Tuesday at Morgan Park High School on the city’s Far South Side, as part of negotiations between the district and the CTU over the union’s new contract. Those negotiations have not made much progress over the past few months. Tuesday’s session, the third bargaining session held in public, focused on the district’s finances.

Granting just 52 of the union’s 700-plus contract proposals would widen the district’s deficit from a projected $509 million next fiscal year, to roughly $3 billion, said Mike Sitkowski, the district’s budget director. That gap would grow by another $1 billion by fiscal year 2030, he said.

Deficits are already projected for each of the next five years, without the cost of a new contract, CPS officials have said. In order to balance future budgets, the district will have to find more funding or will make cuts to staff and programs, they said.

The Chicago Board of Education passed a budget for this upcoming school year that closed a $505 million deficit through cuts and other savings, but that budget does not include funding to cover the costs of a new teachers contract.

The district did not identify the 52 proposals it considered as part of its analysis, but Sitkowski said the list included the union’s requests for 9% raises and additional staff.

“We believe our educators deserve fair raises, but we must acknowledge what is responsible and sustainable,” Sitkowski said.

Jackson Potter, the union’s vice president, told district officials that highlighting the deficit related to CTU’s contract proposals “sends the message that you can’t meet any of our recommendations,” such as more librarians or more support for bilingual students. Union President Stacy Davis Gates didn’t directly answer a reporter’s question about how much the union’s proposals would cost.

“The price tag is opportunity for Black children, immigrant children, and Latine children,” she said.

Davis Gates credited previous union demands for delivering the post-pandemic student achievement gains that the district often touts. She said she plans to end the fight for funding with this contract, “come hell or high water, and I don’t give a damn who pay.”

Concern about budget challenges has hovered over the contract negotiations this year, as the district grapples with budget deficits as federal COVID relief dollars dry up.

In order to cover additional costs, both CPS and the union have called on the state to provide more than the $25 million funding increase it gave this year. Both parties point a finger at the state’s main school funding formula, under which the district needs an additional $1.2 billion to be considered adequately funded. That figure rose slightly this year after the district enrolled more students learning English as a new language and as the city saw a drop in tax revenue from corporate profits.

Both Gov. J.B. Pritzker and State Superintendent Tony Sanders have said more funding is not coming this year.

Beyond advocating for more state funding, Mayor Brandon Johnson’s administration also encouraged the Board of Education to take out a short-term loan to cover additional costs, which the board and CPS have rebuffed for now.

Asked recently if the district could still take out such a loan, Board President Jianan Shi said “everything is on the table,” declining to elaborate further.

During the bargaining session, the teachers union offered up several recommendations beyond more state funding on how the district could raise money. Apart from more taxes on the wealthy and suing big banks, they also suggested seeking more federal funding and taxing big tech corporations “profiting off our students’ and families’ private data.”

District officials said they want to advocate for more state funding, including to fully cover costs of preschool programs and teacher pensions. The state’s main funding formula already accounts for the fact that the district pays for its own teachers’ pensions.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Amid budget challenges, CPS and the teachers union make little movement on contract negotiations

2024-08-13T10:00:00+00:00

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When Chicago Public Schools students head back to class later this month, their teachers likely won’t yet have a new contract.

In the past, that was a bad omen, signaling that a strike loomed. This year, a strike does not appear to be on the horizon, and both sides have said the tone at the bargaining table has been more amicable.

But by most accounts, the district and the Chicago Teachers Union have made little headway in the high-stakes negotiations that began this past spring. The CTU is pushing for its most far-reaching package of proposals, which includes 9% annual raises, more school support staff, smaller class sizes, and efforts to address homelessness and the challenges migrant families face.

Those demands come as the district and city face budget deficits, with no clear path to securing extra funding for schools. Illinois lawmakers and Gov. J.B. Pritzker have balked at appeals to steer more dollars to Chicago schools. Meanwhile, district leaders and the school board have said they are wary of adding to the district’s already considerable debt burden after Mayor Brandon Johnson encouraged them to take out a short-term loan to cover some contract costs and ward off cuts.

After years of contentious relationships with mayors, the union is now negotiating with a district overseen by Johnson, a former CTU employee whom it helped propel into office. His critics had argued during last year’s mayoral race that he would readily sign off on the union’s demands, no matter the cost, even as he shot back that he would be best positioned to “deliver bad news” to his friends in the union.

Neither scenario has played out so far, according to sources on both sides.

The union has struck an increasingly combative tone. Tensions have spilled out at two public bargaining sessions; a third one focused on financial issues is slated for Tuesday evening.

In an interview with Chalkbeat, Board of Education President Jianan Shi, who is not involved in daily negotiations but will eventually vote to approve a deal, said he expected by now that both sides would have “made more progress.”

“I think the people of Chicago want to see us finding alignment, demonstrating that we can work together, and doubling down on things we know that improve student outcomes and the student experience,” Shi said.

Bargaining may bleed past the Nov. 5 school board elections, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the pace of negotiations. And if that happens, it could mean whatever agreement district and union leaders reach could come before the new 21-member board that will be sworn in on Jan. 15, including 11 mayoral appointees.

CPS did not respond to Chalkbeat’s questions or multiple requests for an interview. City Hall declined to comment.

A 9% raise, more support staff, and less learning time

The union is proposing hundreds of substantial edits or new additions to its current contract, from more prep time for elementary school teachers and making school buildings more environmentally-friendly to providing housing assistance for homeless students and dollars for transportation, mental health services, and academic support for immigrant families seeking asylum.

In its opening proposals, the union asked for a 9% pay increase and salaries that don’t dip below $46,500, or 150% of the federal poverty level. The average teaching assistant salary — a group represented by the CTU — is now about $44,000.

The starting salary for teachers is $61,990, according to the current contract. A Chalkbeat analysis of compensation data shows a regular teacher makes about $92,500 a year on average, up from $78,400 in 2019. Teacher pay varied significantly, with head teachers, who play key leadership roles on their campuses, making almost $115,000 on average, while high school support teachers average about $88,000.

In the recent past, CPS has agreed to raises of up to 4%, and an internal district memo obtained by Chalkbeat last month contemplated 4% for the coming year, which the district estimates would cost $120 million. Though comparing compensation across districts and states is tricky, Chicago teachers are better compensated than many others. One pandemic-era study from the National Council on Teacher Quality put CPS at No. 1 for teachers lifetime earnings among 90 large districts.

But union leaders have said their main focus is on proposals aimed at beefing up support for schools and students. Those include librarians in every school, air conditioning in all gymnasiums by 2026, in-home counseling for students who have experienced trauma, class sizes of between 20 to 25 students depending on the grade, and even smaller classes for those that include at least one child learning English.

Zeidre Foster, the union’s head of grievances and member of the district’s bargaining team, said the two sides have reached several tentative agreements on low-cost proposals that likely won’t excite members, such as around professional development. The tone at the table remains collaborative, she said.

But overall, progress has been slow.

“The most frustrating part at this point is the lack of urgency,” she said. “We are looking to transform the district, and CPS is stuck in the status quo.”

The union has gotten a small number of proposals from the district and some counter offers on CTU demands, she said; there has been no response on the union’s compensation proposal.

One major issue CPS and CTU are far apart on is providing additional preparation time for elementary school teachers, according to two sources familiar with negotiations. The union has argued that elementary school teachers need more time to plan engaging lessons. The current contract allows for an hour of preparation time a day. The district says more preparation time means less learning time for students amid ongoing pandemic recovery.

The union unsuccessfully demanded a similar proposal during 2019 contract negotiations.

In a July letter to CPS families, Martinez called negotiations “fruitful.” In the most recent public bargaining session at Roswell B. Mason Elementary School in North Lawndale, district officials also opted for an upbeat tone, highlighting additional investments they’ve made in schools, as well as average class sizes of 20 students in elementary schools and 20 students in high schools.

The 330,000-student district’s payroll has grown by roughly 8,200 full-time positions since 2019, to about 46,670 positions, according to district data.

But CTU members, a student, and union President Stacy Davis Gates, who unsuccessfully pressed the district to codify those class sizes in the teachers contract on the spot, offered a dimmer view. They highlighted some of their top issues, such as a lack of librarians at every school and the need for more early childhood classes for students with disabilities.

“I’m actually struggling right now trying to understand how we are going to come to some agreement and settlement of this contract,’” Davis Gates said during the bargaining session, adding that she wanted the district to acknowledge that there are problems in need of solutions.

Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates, center, talks to reporters after a public bargaining session with CPS in early August.

Proposals such as dedicated space for social workers and nurses are reasonable to Tyrone Palmer, a social worker at Walter Payton College Prep and one of hundreds of union delegates who voted to approve the proposals. Palmer’s biggest wish is for more staff inside buildings, including librarians, paraprofessionals, and social workers.

Palmer said he supports the union wielding its power to improve problems that fall outside of teacher pay and benefits and address broader problems, such as homelessness.

“When there are societal issues, that affects our jobs and if that comes in through the schools, it’s hard to educate a student,” Palmer said.

But he noted that contract talks are going more slowly than he had expected.

“When Brandon Johnson got elected, I remember thinking, one, we’re gonna ask for a super extravagant proposal and two, we’re gonna somehow get everything we ask for,” Palmer said. “It’s a harsh reality check of, ‘No … it’s still very slow-going.’”

Unknown contract costs prompt questions of cuts, borrowing

CPS budget will need amending once contract costs are known

The question of how to pay for a new contract looms over the negotiations as the district faces budget deficits that could approach $1 billion in the coming years.

The Board of Education would have to amend its already-passed budget once the contract is settled. Both Pritzker and State Superintendent Tony Sanders have made it clear that the state won’t be providing more money this year. Without additional dollars, the district will have to make cuts in order to pay for costs related to the new contract.

CPS is providing “budgets that do not include what we need,” Davis Gates told reporters after another public bargaining session this month. “And what we need are actual bodies in classrooms, teaching our young people. We need a sports program. We need an arts program — not a smorgasbord of things that you may or may not get.”

Asked what funding options are available and if CPS will take out a loan, Board President Shi said “everything is on the table,” but declined to elaborate further. More details could be revealed during the third public bargaining session on Tuesday.

Joe Ferguson of the Civic Federation, an Illinois-based nonpartisan government research group, questioned the district’s decision to pass a 2024-25 budget without any dollars for the cost of the new teacher contract. District officials could have estimated those costs and baked them into the document for a more clear-eyed plan to navigate the rough financial waters.

But it’s not a surprise the district did not do that, given the charged politics of attempting to guess at those costs, Ferguson said. Mayor Johnson has said he will not accept significant cuts to district programs or staff.

Ferguson noted the district significantly expanded its workforce and operations during the pandemic.

“You could be reductionist and say the governor is saying no,” he said. “Or you could argue the governor is saying, ‘We won’t come to the rescue of a system that hasn’t shown it is willing to do the work of reducing some costs firsts.’”

Hal Woods of the advocacy group Kids First Chicago says the group’s leadership and parent network are supportive of higher teacher pay and really like some of the proposals to beef up student support. But they are concerned about the cost of the proposal.

They also have concerns about proposals that would give new powers to Professional Personnel Leadership Committees, advisory bodies made up of educators and other staff that campuses convene under state law. The union wants these committees to have more control over curriculum, professional development, principal evaluations, and more, in some ways, potentially sidelining local school councils and school leaders.

In 2019, contract talks led to an 11-day strike, when union leaders insisted Mayor Lori Lightfoot was squarely in the driver’s seat and lambasted her for not meeting their demands. The same was true in 2012 when CTU leadership sparred with then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel over the length of the school day and year and teacher performance evaluations.

But this time around, the union has blamed Martinez for standing in the way of an agreement, calling him a “Lightfoot holdover” who lacks vision for CPS, though he, like his predecessors, serves at the mayor’s pleasure.

“Disparaging the CEO doesn’t make state legislators or Chicagoans for that matter interested in letting more of their money go to the district,” Woods said.

The union also changed its stance on a $175 million payment from CPS to the city’s pension fund. The union had sharply criticized Lightfoot for passing the payment on to the district, but it now says that the district should cover it, empowering Johnson to pursue a progressive agenda in City Hall.

A City Hall spokesperson said Johnson’s deputy mayor of labor relations, Bridget Early, has been involved in the talks. But Johnson has largely refrained from commenting on them publicly, and union officials said direct reports to Martinez rather than Johnson administration staffers have been on the frontlines.

Brad Marianno, an education labor expert at the University of Nevada, said the CTU remains a trailblazer in promoting the kind of expansive education and social justice contract talk agenda known as “bargaining for the common good.”

The union’s latest set of proposals is the most far-reaching and voluminous Marianno has seen in Chicago or anywhere else. But he said the pushback to taking on more debt to fund recurring expenses such as salaries is understandable because doing so would be “wildly irresponsible.”

And while support for educators remains strong in urban districts such as Chicago, Marianno believes even here, there is little appetite for a teacher strike among parents and community members on the heels of extended remote learning and other COVID-era disruptions to learning.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Amid financial woes, Chicago Public Schools to receive similar state funding increase this year

2024-08-05T23:09:17+00:00

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Amid a bump in students learning English as a new language and a dip in local tax revenue, Chicago Public Schools would now need nearly $1.2 billion to be adequately funded, according to state data released Monday.

The updated figure, which is $93 million more than was projected last year, was provided as part of an annual calculation determining how Illinois will distribute state money to public school districts — and comes as the city’s school district grapples with complex financial problems in the next school year.

Still, Chicago gets about 21% of the funding distributed through the state’s evidence-based formula — which allocates money to districts based on their students’ needs — but serves about 18% of Illinois’ students, said State Superintendent Tony Sanders.

“I think it’s important to note that we still have districts that are below what Chicago was funded,” Sanders said.

Data show 49 Illinois districts are still below 70% adequately funded, compared to 72 districts last year and 430 districts in 2018, right after the state’s funding formula was revamped. Chicago is considered 79% adequately funded.

Districts with greater shares of students with high needs, such as English language learners or low-income students, receive more money under the funding formula. In Chicago’s case, the district’s recent increase in English language learners impacted its adequacy calculation.

In a statement, CPS spokesperson Mary Ann Fergus said the district is “committed to working with our local, state and federal partners” to find more money for students and schools. But the district, which has previously asked Illinois leaders to provide more funding, acknowledged that significantly more money is not coming through this year.

“District leadership recognizes that achieving state funding at the 90 to 100 percent adequacy level for CPS and all districts in Illinois will take time and was not intended to be reached by Fiscal Year 2025,” Fergus wrote.

A closer look at state funding for Chicago

The Chicago Board of Education recently passed a $9.9 billion budget that closed a roughly half-billion-dollar deficit driven largely by the loss of federal COVID relief dollars.

CPS is expected to receive an additional $25.8 million from the state’s evidence-based funding formula for the coming 2024-25 school year. The district also gets state money earmarked for other education initiatives, such as $284 million for early childhood education, according to the district’s adopted budget. CPS’s budget includes a total of $2.6 billion in state funding.

Thousands of migrant families have arrived in Chicago over the past two years, fleeing political and economic strife in South and Central American countries. Amid that shift, Chicago Public Schools enrolled roughly 5,700 more students learning English as a new language in September 2023, compared to the same time in 2022, according to official district data. And over the course of last school year, between last September and this May, more than 7,500 English language learners enrolled across district and charter schools, for a total of more than 85,000 such students, according to preliminary CPS data analyzed by Chalkbeat.

A dip in local revenue also had an impact on how much funding the state calculation indicates Chicago needs. Sanders cited a dip in tax revenue imposed on corporate profits, plus “modest growth” in property values.

The data released by the state Monday focuses on the money distributed through the evidence-based funding formula, which directs more money to districts with higher needs that lack enough local wealth to cover costs.

Most school districts, including Chicago Public Schools, rely primarily on local property taxes to fund public schools. In Chicago, more than $5 billion is collected from local taxes, $4 billion of which is directly from property taxes.

Illinois boosts K-12 funding by $2 billion since 2017

Data shows Illinois has increased funding for public schools by $2 billion since overhauling the funding formula in 2017. In a news release, Gov. J.B. Pritzker said the state will “continue to build on our progress” to ensure every student “gets the quality education they deserve.”

Sanders said that compared to other states, Illinois is investing “more and more” annually into public education that has helped schools get through the pandemic “and sustain their growth” through COVID.

“I think the state deserves credit for continuing that investment year over year, recognizing we’re not there yet,” Sanders said.

State lawmakers decide every spring how much money to send to Illinois’ 852 school districts. In August, the Illinois State Board of Education finalizes the dollar amounts each district will receive.

Illinois divides school districts into four tiers in order to determine how to distribute the money allocated by state lawmakers. Tier 1 districts get the largest increases in state funding because they are considered to be the furthest away from having enough money to sufficiently fund schools; Tier 4 districts are those with the least amount of need and get smaller increases.

One report, penned by a budget watchdog organization whose leader helped craft the state’s funding formula, estimates that districts won’t be adequately funded until 2034 – seven years later than the state had originally committed.

Chicago, the state’s largest district, was a Tier 1 district until 2022, when it moved to Tier 2, as the share of the city’s low-income students dipped and property wealth grew.

Illinois’ second largest school district, U-46, which serves Elgin, Bartlett, Streamwood, and other northwest Chicago suburbs, serves 40,000 students and is considered a Tier 1 district that is 71% adequately funded. That district would need another $173 million to close that gap, according to state data.

The teachers union, as well as CPS and the board, have called on the state to provide more funding to help cover costs, which could still grow this year as officials negotiate new collective bargaining agreements for teachers and school leaders. Officials also don’t yet have a plan for covering $175 million in pension payments for non-teaching staff, which the district wants the city to cover, as it did before Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration.

Pritzker has said more money is not coming this year. Sanders reiterated that on Monday.

“The EBF funding formula is used not just for Chicago, but for funding all 852 school districts across the state,” Sanders said. “It is a fair way of distributing funds across the state, it is going to lead us to better equity in the long run, so no, there are not going to be any short-term changes.”

City Hall also directed CPS to take out a loan to cover additional costs; the district pushed back and has not yet taken out such a loan.

The state also released a report Monday detailing trends of how districts across the state had planned to use state funding.

Tier 1 districts were more likely to make lowering or maintaining class sizes a top strategy for improving student achievement, the report said. Overall, nearly a quarter of all districts said that improving programs, curriculum, and/or “learning tools” was a top strategy, while another 15% were primarily focused on maintaining or improving extra support for students.

Becky Vevea contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools and Chicago Teachers Union to hold first public bargaining session

2024-06-13T23:40:00+00:00

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Chicagoans will get a window into collective bargaining between the city’s public school district and its teachers union at a first-of-its-kind meeting Friday night.

Chicago Public Schools and the Chicago Teachers Union will hold a public bargaining session at Marquette Elementary in the city’s West Lawn neighborhood on the South Side. As of midday Wednesday, registration to attend in person had reached capacity, but officials said it will be livestreamed on YouTube.

But at Friday night’s session — held on the first weekend of summer break — the two sides do not plan to discuss any provisions of the current CTU contract, such as those dealing with class size limits, pay raises, or other benefits. Instead, they plan to discuss “healthy, safe, and green schools.”

Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former teachers union organizer, made “green schools” part of his education platform last year. School facilities are typically dealt with in the district’s capital budget, which had its own series of public hearings already this year.

Tonight’s meeting is another sign of a more friendly relationship between the two parties.

The CTU’s current contract expires on June 30. Last week, CPS posted their opening proposals online and sent an email to parents sharing more information about how they will approach labor negotiations. CTU has posted their proposals online for members to access using a passcode, and the Illinois Policy Institute, a conservative think tank, published a copy of the union’s ideas to their website.

While there is a lot for the two sides to sort out, one thing seems certain: Chicago’s new, partially elected school board likely won’t have much say over the teachers union contract during board members’ first few years on the job.

Though the length of the contract won’t be discussed Friday, the dueling proposals put forward by both sides would lock a new contract in place that would last through the first two rounds of school board elections.

CPS is proposing a five-year contract that would expire on June 30, 2029, while CTU is putting forward a four-year deal expiring on May 1, 2028.

Ten new school board members will be elected from 10 districts on Nov. 5, 2024. Those 10, plus 11 appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson, will be sworn in on Jan. 15, 2025. In November 2026, 20 members will be elected from 20 districts and the school board president will be elected at-large.

The current contract is a five-year deal that began after a 12-day strike in 2019, but negotiations between CPS and CTU occurred multiple times during the COVID pandemic around schools returning to in-person learning. The previous contract covered three school years starting in 2016, and the one negotiated in 2012 ended up being four years.

It’s common for public sector labor agreements to extend through one or more election cycles, said Robert Bruno, a professor of labor and employment at the University of Illinois.

“Things like school board elections, things like a mayoral and city council elections, really should not be first and foremost,” Bruno said.

“They should bring a package forward that says, ‘This will be good for the district, it’ll be good for students, and it’s affordable, and teachers, our employees will be supportive of it,’” Bruno said.

A CPS spokesperson said the district wants a five-year contract “to ensure stability and predictability” to allow the district “to more effectively plan our academic and operational programming, supports, and services.”

A CTU representative said school board elections did not factor into their proposal for a four-year contract. The representative added that the union supports giving parents and communities more say over the public school system through an elected board.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Could ‘newcomer liaisons’ help migrant students struggling in Chicago schools?

2024-06-11T11:00:00+00:00

This story was co-published with Block Club Chicago.

A couple months after enrolling, a few dozen migrant students were struggling to adjust to life at Kenwood Academy on the South Side.

The teens had landed in a school where few people speak Spanish, their native language, and the classrooms they were put in were “a mess,” teacher Maggie Ritthaler said.

“Kids were throwing things, punching each other, playing around — and the teacher was barely speaking Spanish,” Ritthaler said.

Ritthaler and another teacher, Zachary Hill, made it their mission to help: The two Spanish-speakers moved their schedules around to teach classes of migrant kids and got their principal to hire part-time student teachers.

Still, about 85% of Kenwood’s students are Black, and the school hasn’t historically served many students whose first language isn’t English. So the newcomers still aren’t getting the language help and emotional support they need, the teachers said.

“We provide a safe home base for them in school, but at the same time, the needs they come in with are more than we are prepared for or licensed for, or that we have resources for,” Ritthaler said.

In May, a Block Club and Chalkbeat investigation found many migrant students are landing in segregated schools like Kenwood with few if any bilingual resources. The so-called “language deserts,” concentrated on the city’s South and West sides, have left many migrant kids feeling lost in school while teachers scramble to meet their needs.

Gabriela Ruiz, 12, — from Venezuela — sets off for school from her South Shore apartment in April. She and her family were featured in a Block Club and Chalkbeat investigation into challenges faced by migrant students and their families.

But experts and teachers union leaders say the district could help the migrant students with a different approach: hiring “newcomer liaisons.” As envisioned by the Chicago Teachers Union, the liaisons would help ease the burden on teachers and other school employees who, in addition to their regular duties, are managing newcomer students’ behavioral and emotional needs while also helping them find health care and clothes.

The liaisons would also provide language support to migrant students who are enrolled in schools where few people speak Spanish, such as Laura S. Ward Elementary School in West Humboldt Park, where a kindergarten teacher and two custodians are translating for the whole building, Block Club and Chalkbeat found.

School districts across the country have been able to help migrant students with liaisons, said Alejandra Vázquez Baur, who leads the National Newcomer Network, a coalition of educators, researchers, and advocates that works to address newcomer student inequity.

While it will take a lot more to overcome the Chicago Public Schools’ long history of failing English learner and immigrant students, the liaisons would be a step in the right direction, she said.

“You get these newcomer liaisons in sooner rather than later and they can help,” Vázquez Baur said. “Students can at least get in the best programs for them, [they can be] aware of their options, their rights are upheld, things are translated and interpreted for them so they can make the best decisions for their futures.”

A go-between for migrant families and schools

Under the Chicago Teachers Union proposal, “newcomer liaisons” would be in charge of migrant student enrollment, programming, communication between families and teachers, and other duties that require bilingual services, like translating Local School Council meetings, union leaders said.

Those duties currently fall to teachers like Ritthaler and Hill who have a myriad of other responsibilities. Ritthaler is a Spanish teacher who chairs Kenwood’s world language department, while Hill is the school’s English language program teacher.

“What usually happens is [those teachers] are trying to do that either in their off time or they’re not providing the required services to kids because they’re doing those things,” said Julie Sugarman, associate director for K-12 Education Research at the Migration Policy Institute’s National Center on Immigrant Integration Policy.

A class at Erie Elementary Charter School in Humboldt Park, a dual-language school with nearly 50 newcomer students.

In other school districts that use the approach, liaisons are “local folks, maybe parents, maybe community advocates” who can communicate with new families and explain their rights, but don’t necessarily need teacher certifications, Vázquez Baur said.

Other districts have used a patchwork of funding — local, state, and federal dollars — to cover the program, experts said.

Union leaders didn’t answer specific questions about their proposal.

CPS officials also didn’t respond to questions, saying only that the district has received the union’s proposals and is reviewing them.

A list of the district’s initial proposals does not include “newcomer liaisons.”

The district needs ‘more bilingual support on every level’

“Liaisons” alone won’t be able to fix all the problems faced by under-resourced schools serving newcomers.

As of April, nearly 9,000 migrant students — many of them fleeing turmoil in South and Central American countries — had enrolled with the Chicago Public Schools. The vast majority of the new students don’t speak English and are living in temporary housing. Many have spent limited time in school and are grade levels behind for their ages.

Thousands of migrant families are getting apartments in historically Black neighborhoods like South Shore and Austin through a state rental assistance program. From there, children are enrolling at schools that haven’t historically served students whose first language isn’t English.

In addition to a lack of language support, many families are struggling with long commutes and are unaware of their rights and options, Block Club and Chalkbeat found.

All of this comes after the district has struggled for years to fully comply with state and federal laws around bilingual education.

Chicago Teachers Union president Stacy Davis Gates said newcomer families are experiencing “what it feels like to be a Black family in Chicago public schools.”

Segregated Black schools on the South and West Sides, where many migrant students have landed, have for years faced declining enrollment and a dearth of resources, the union said in a written statement. Meanwhile, some Latino schools have seen their budgets slashed in recent years as a lack of affordable housing has led to declines in enrollment.

“This is the context for the influx of newcomer students — a reflection of how CPS has lacked funding and support for Black and Brown students, and why this is so key to our contract negotiations,” union leaders said in their statement.

Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates introduces Mayor-elect Brandon Johnson after he won the mayoral runoff on April 4, 2023.

Those negotiations are the CTU’s first since the election of Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former organizer for the union. Adding resources for migrant students is one of the union’s key demands.

The union is asking for “more bilingual support on every level,” the union statement said.

On top of “newcomer liaisons,” the union is pushing for more bilingual and multilingual teachers; more dual-language programs, which offer English learners and native English speakers instruction in Spanish and English; and an expansion of the district’s Sustainable Community Schools model.

Launched in 2018, that initiative enlists community organizations to bring programs and services to high-poverty schools struggling with low enrollment.

CPS CEO Pedro Martinez speaks at a press conference at Roberto Clemente Community Academy before the opening of a pilot CPS welcome center for newly arriving families on July 17, 2023.

CPS CEO Pedro Martinez has said the district wants to expand dual-language programs, and Mayor Brandon Johnson named growing sustainable community schools as a top priority for his administration.

The union also wants “staffing and support for language access needs around early education, IEPs, guest teachers, clinicians, access to Pre-K and other high-needs areas,” along with “training and support from the Board of Education for migrant students on a yearly basis, including funding for immigration support,” according to a list provided by the union.

Union leaders didn’t respond to questions asking for more information about these proposals. The union’s current contract expires at the end of June.

‘The most traumatic journey they’ll ever go through’

Calls for more support for migrant students come as the district faces a large budget shortfall for the next fiscal year, which begins July 1.

With pandemic relief dollars drying up, the district is facing a nearly $400 million budget deficit while the state has its own financial challenges.

Lawmakers recently approved a state budget with an increase of $350 million for K-12 funding, the minimum under the law and $200 million less than education advocates had asked for. And the General Assembly didn’t approve a proposal that would’ve sent more money to school districts that have received an influx of migrant students.

CPS officials have said they’re trying to cut expenses at the district’s central office, but Martinez recently told reporters they’re still figuring out how to close the deficit.

Kenwood Academy on April 24, 2024.

At Kenwood, Ritthaler and Hill are wrapping up the school year exhausted and demoralized.

They spent the year “in survival mode,” scrambling to find Spanish-language activities and assignments, distributing donated clothes and food and providing counseling.

“We’re receiving these kids who’ve just gone through the most traumatic journey they’ll ever go through, and we’re kinda just plopping them into biology class,” Ritthaler said.

“This isn’t just getting 30 new students. This is 30 new students who are coming from a completely new world … and we’re not equipped to serve them the best way they need to be served.”

Mina Bloom is an investigative reporter for Block Club Chicago. Contact Mina at mina@blockclubchi.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson pushes education agenda with ‘urgency’ during first year in office

2024-05-14T11:00:00+00:00

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On a recent Tuesday morning, Mayor Brandon Johnson visited classrooms at Kelvyn Park High School in Hermosa to present certificates of recognition to teachers for Teacher Appreciation Week.

Flanked by an alderman and the chief of finance for the teachers union, Johnson posed for photos and created a scene rare to find before last year: The mayor standing side-by-side with teachers, some wearing bright red Chicago Teachers Union shirts.

The scene was an indicator of the pivotal role education has played in Johnson’s agenda in office.

When Johnson, a former middle school teacher and Chicago Teachers Union organizer, was elected last year, it was no surprise education would be a central priority.

The union catapulted Johnson into office, and his win was the result of a decade of CTU organizing against how previous mayors approached public education. Instead of a system in which schools compete for students and parents choose the best option no matter how far they may have to travel, Johnson promised to focus on bolstering neighborhood schools, many which have seen declining enrollment and fewer resources.

As Johnson hits the one-year mark in office, his appointed school board has overseen a change in the district’s funding formula and directed district leaders to come up with a new five-year strategic plan, to be voted on this summer, that would rethink the city’s school choice system, which includes charter, selective enrollment, and magnet schools that require applications for admission.

“We have to fund our schools based upon the need,” Johnson said in a February 2023 video interview with Block Club Chicago. “Every single school should have a social worker, counselor and nurse as the bare minimum.”

But Johnson faces a big challenge in carrying out his education agenda: Chicago Public Schools is facing a projected $391 million budget deficit next fiscal year and has provided little detail on how it will close the gap. Federal COVID money is running out and he must bargain a new contract with the teachers union.

Johnson’s agenda also called for free public transit for students, housing for the district’s 20,000 homeless students, and creating up to 200 more Sustainable Community Schools – a partnership with the CTU that provides wraparound services at needy schools. None of these promises have seen any progress.

Still, education may be the one area where Johnson has made progress during his first year in office, said Dick Simpson, professor emeritus of politics at University of Illinois at Chicago and a former alderman.

“In comparison to, say, his other problems — solving crime, for instance — he is much further along on the school agenda,” Simpson said.

The speed with which Johnson can deliver on his education promises is important because he will soon lose exclusive control over the Chicago Board of Education, as the school board begins to transition to a partially elected body this November.

In an interview with Chalkbeat, Johnson said his focus on education “has more to do with the urgency that families are calling for.”

“We’re talking about decades upon decades of school closures, the defunding of our schools, the attack on veteran educators, particularly Black educators,” Johnson said. “So our urgency is really centered around the needs of our young people and the needs that our families have.”

Mayor Brandon Johnson visits the classroom of English teacher Noe Castro at Kelvyn Park High School with Principal Keith Adams and Ald. Felix Cardona Jr. (31st) in Hermosa on May 7, 2024.

Bolstering neighborhood schools, but not without backlash

Johnson’s plans to bolster neighborhood schools kicked into gear last December.

Just before winter break, the board of education passed a resolution aimed at boosting neighborhood schools and rethinking Chicago’s school choice system, which encourages kids to enroll in public schools outside their attendance zones. Half of all elementary students go to schools that are not their zoned neighborhood schools and more than 70% of high schoolers do.

Johnson has described the choice system as a “Hunger Games scenario” that forces schools to compete for students and resources and results in less investment in neighborhood schools. The resolution said the choice system “reinforces, rather than disrupts, cycles of inequity” and must be replaced with “anti-racist processes and initiatives that eliminate all forms of racial oppression.”

Though many selective enrollment and magnet schools were created under court-ordered desegregation, many still lack the diversity of the city and are largely segregated by race and class. A couple dozen are integrated, but serve more white and Asian American students than the rest of the school district.

The board’s resolution did not change any current policies or suggest the closure of any schools. Board members emphasized that public feedback would drive any changes, such as to admissions policies. Board members have, however, said they plan to scrutinize charter schools more.

The resolution was praised by advocates who have long pushed for more investment in neighborhood schools and the Chicago Teachers Union.

Johnson “ran on equity,” said Stacy Davis Gates, president of the Chicago Teachers Union. “He said that our school district had to be more equitable, and the resolution that came from the Board of Education is speaking to the inequity and their efforts to ameliorate inequity that are often disproportionately experienced by neighborhood schools.”

Mayor Brandon Johnson meets students as he tours Kelvyn Park High School in Hermosa on May 7, 2024.

But the resolution also sparked backlash from families whose children attend schools of choice, including those already frustrated that CPS was not providing bus service to general education students, largely those attending selective and magnet schools.

Those concerns pushed state lawmakers to file a bill that is up for a final vote this week, which would prevent the district from changing admissions policies for selective enrollment schools – something the current board signaled it may do. The bill would also prevent CPS from cutting funding for selective enrollment schools or closing any school until 2027, when the school board will be fully elected. The bill is supported by powerful state lawmakers and Gov. J. B. Pritzker.

Johnson said the bill would prevent the board from taking actions to help create “real equity” and would prevent the district from balancing its budget. He began rattling off the relatively small percentages of Black students at some of the city’s most sought after selective enrollment high schools and noted how those figures were higher about two decades ago.

“What I’m troubled by is that you have a school district that is hypersegregated and that stratification has continued to grow because you haven’t had leadership like mine directing the school board and the Chicago Public Schools to commit to real equity,” Johnson said. “So is Springfield intervening to protect segregation?”

Simpson noted that Johnson has “a more strained” relationship with the legislature and Pritzker, meaning he doesn’t have a lot of clout to fight for what he wants.

Mayor Brandon Johnson pats the head of kindergartner Triston during a back-to-school event at Jackie Robinson Elementary School in Bronzeville on Aug. 21, 2023.

CPS changes funding formula

In March, CPS announced it would change how it distributes money to schools, delivering on another major promise Johnson made on the campaign trail to end student-based budgeting, which provides schools a set dollar amount for every child enrolled.

The new funding formula will now give every school a base level of staff and discretionary money based on need, which principals can use flexibly. This “needs-based” formula is meant to break a cycle in which underenrolled schools in underinvested neighborhoods lose money because they’re losing students.

That change, too, has drawn a fresh batch of concerns.

Parent leaders at selective enrollment and magnet schools said their budgets provide for fewer staffers next year under the new formula. Some Local School Councils are voting against their budgets for next year.

CPS officials have said that overall funding to schools remains the same as last year but individual schools could see changes. The district is looking for cuts at the central office to address the $391 million deficit, CPS CEO Pedro Martinez has said. CPS has not yet released school budgets for next year to the public.

The union also raised concerns about the formula, saying it lacks guaranteed positions, such as teacher assistants, and said some neighborhood schools have also seen cuts. Davis Gates blamed Martinez – not the mayor – for those flaws, because she said he is not explaining the changes well to the public or lobbying the state legislature hard enough for more money to prevent staffing cuts to some schools.

Mayor Brandon Johnson hugs art teacher Meredith Kachel at Kelvyn Park High School as he surprised her for Teacher Appreciation Week. Johnson visited the school with Principal Keith Adams and Ald. Felix Cardona Jr. (31st) in Hermosa on May 7, 2024.

Sylvia Barragan, a spokesperson for Chicago Public Schools, said “multiple staff members” have visited Springfield throughout the session to advocate for more funding, and Martinez has pushed for more funding “for well over two years in Springfield, at our Board of Education meetings and beyond.”

CPS officials have said that no type of school is being disproportionately impacted. But Martinez has acknowledged that they are working to fix concerns at individual schools.

Mayor inconsistent on police out of schools

Some education-focused organizations have criticized the mayor’s administration for pushing big changes through or flip-flopping on commitments without properly engaging the public.

Hal Woods, director of policy and advocacy for Kids First Chicago, shared some examples. For one, the board publicly posted its resolution stating its intent to rethink school choice two days before the board voted, leaving little time for the public to digest it, Woods said. The district is currently holding hearings to collect feedback for the next strategic plan.

Parents and schools have also demanded more information about why the district is changing its funding formula, Woods said. He added that the former formula wasn’t working for many schools, but the district hasn’t shared enough about the new formula or its impact on schools.

Woods also said the mayor could be more clear with communities on his position to remove police from schools. Johnson supported getting rid of campus police on the campaign trail but later said local schools should have the power to choose whether to have school resource officers. Then in February, the mayor backed the school board when it voted to unilaterally remove officers from all campuses by next school year.

School police officers in the hallways of Lane Tech High School in Chicago.

“There’s plenty of data that shows how police in schools impact youth mental health, right, and the disproportionate impact on Black students and Latino students, but … they’re kind of making a decision based on their values without kind of educating the public on why they’re making that decision,” Woods said.

Johnson said “he will talk to anyone” and rejected the idea that his administration isn’t transparent enough. He pointed to the handful of board of education meetings that have been held at high schools in the evening instead of downtown during the day. He believes some of that criticism comes from people who “have had unfettered access” to previous mayors, and there are “people who now have access who were shut out before.”

“I’ve said all along,” Johnson said, “there’s plenty of room at the table for everyone.”

Fulfilling other promises before school board shifts

There are several promises Johnson hasn’t made progress on, including expanding Sustainable Community Schools, a CPS partnership with the teachers union that pairs needy schools with community organizations that provide wraparound services to families. Each program costs about $500,000.

While Johnson has shifted focus toward neighborhood schools, his administration is struggling to support the 8,900 migrant students and families who have arrived in Chicago from the southern border since at least August 2022.

As a candidate, Johnson promised to invest more money in bilingual education. Between August 2022 and last August – five months after he was elected – the number of bilingual-certified educators grew by 90, according to CPS. Between last August and the end of April, that figure grew by another 106 teachers.

CPS and the city also opened a welcome center to help migrant students enroll in school and access other resources. CPS said it helps direct families to schools with the proper resources when they are struggling with enrollment.

Mayor Brandon Johnson speaks at a press conference at Roberto Clemente Community Academy before the opening of a pilot CPS welcome center for newly arriving families on July 17, 2023.

Still, the union, lawmakers, and families have reported that many schools are struggling to meet the needs of migrant children, most of whom are learning English as a new language and are homeless. Those challenges include lacking enough staff to help children with specialized English instructions.

Johnson again blamed state lawmakers for their efforts to protect selective enrollment schools, saying it would “prevent us from having the type of budget, autonomy, and flexibility to invest in those schools” that lack resources to help English learners.

Johnson also hasn’t gained ground on providing the district’s 20,000 homeless students with housing — a bold promise tied to a signature campaign promise to pass the Bring Chicago Home referendum. That ballot measure, which would have used a tax on property sales over $1 million to help fund housing for homeless families, failed in March.

Ultimately, Johnson’s education legacy and the fate of his preferred policies will depend on what the future elected school board does, Simpson said.

“I do think the new school board, as it begins to take shape, will revisit these issues and either move forward with the general direction of Johnson and the current school board, or will roll them back to an extent,” he said.

It could also depend on the ongoing financial challenges for Chicago Public Schools. Asked how he will achieve his goals in the absence of more money from Springfield, Johnson said he’s exploring other “measures and steps that we can take as a city.” When pressed for details, Johnson’s office declined to elaborate.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools and the union representing school support staff reach tentative contract agreement

2024-05-02T02:06:32+00:00

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The union representing school support staff came to a tentative agreement with Chicago Public Schools Wednesday night, ending a year of contract negotiations.

The four-year deal would create a baseline salary of $40,000 for all full-time workers represented by Service Employees International Union Local 73. The tentative agreement also calls for a 4% pay increase the first two years and a 4% to 5% increase the last two years of the contract. It will cover the current school year and expire at the end of the 2026-27 school year.

SEIU Local 73 represents about 11,000 school support workers, including custodians, special education classroom assistants, bus aides, security officers, crossing guards, and parent-workers. They have been working without a contract since June 30, 2023.

“These critical support staff professionals carry out vital work in our schools each day, supporting teaching and learning and ensuring the safety and well being of our students,” said CPS CEO Pedro Martinez in a press release on Wednesday evening. “This agreement reflects our District’s commitment to a fair and equitable contract.”

The union also successfully negotiated for more professional development and training, particularly for special education classroom assistants who work with students with disabilities, according to a joint news release. If approved, security officers would also transition from seven-hour to eight-hour employees, and all SEIU Local 73 members would get paid time off to observe religious holidays.

“After a year-long fight, our Union members are finally being recognized for their commitment and have secured much needed raises that will greatly improve the lives of these essential workers and provide the respect they deserve. " said Dian Palmer, President of SEIU Local 73, in a combined statement with Chicago Public Schools.

SEIU Local 73 members will have to vote in the coming weeks to ratify the tentative contract deal. If approved, the Chicago Board of Education must also vote to approve it.

The union started negotiations with the district in the spring of 2023, before their contract was set to expire on June 30, 2023. Most of these school workers are often paid lower than educators and school administrators — many of them making about $40,000 a year.

In February, the union secured a win outside of their contract negotiations when the school district announced that it would end its multi-million dollar deal with Aramark for the management of school janitors and cleaning services after 10 years.

Aramark was frequently criticized for the lack of cleanliness at schools and school custodial workers represented by SEIU Local 73 often voiced concerns about the lack of cleaning supplies.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson visits West Side high school to advocate for more Sustainable Community Schools

2024-04-19T18:15:00+00:00

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Sitting in a circle with dozens of students at Collins Academy on Chicago’s west side, Mayor Brandon Johnson asked a straightforward question: “What do you need?”

Melvin Hines, a soft-spoken junior in purple track pants and a black zip-up jacket, chimed in: “More resources, better opportunities, and more exposure.”

Answers from other students ricocheted around the room like a pinball: a law program, more connections to businesses, a grocery store in their neighborhood.

“Sometimes it feels like the only thing that’s available for us are leftovers, right?” Johnson said, nodding.

The roundtable discussion — organized with the local, state, and national teachers union, including American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten, as well as district leaders — gave the mayor and his allies a moment to advocate for expanding Sustainable Community Schools. The concept provides up to $500,000 a year to a school to partner with a local nonprofit on before- and after-school programming, community outreach, parent engagement, and other wraparound services.

Johnson has promised to grow the number of Sustainable Community Schools from 20 to as many as 200, possibly including Collins. It’s one of the ways he wants to invest more in neighborhood schools.

“This is about making sure that every single child has a library or librarian, wraparound services, class sizes that are manageable,” Johnson said. “There’s a lot of work to be done, but unfortunately, because of a long history of systemic racism, disinvestment has left our communities in despair.”

But Chicago Public Schools faces a $391 million shortfall in its $9 billion-plus budget next school year. The district is about to begin contract negotiations with the teachers union and officials recently sent principals individual school budgets using a new formula that provides set staffing levels and extra money based on need. Officials say the total amount distributed to schools is not decreasing, but individual campuses could see cuts.

Stephen Mitchell, the local school council chair at Bronzeville Classical Elementary School, a selective enrollment school that opened in 2018, said their budget is seeing reductions. He said it’s possible the school has to either let staff go or cut other resources.

“I think this is kind of pitting one against the other, which I don’t think is right,” Mitchell said. “I think we need to adequately fund our neighborhood schools and continue to fund selective enrollment schools.”

State lawmakers are moving legislation to block Johnson and his hand-picked school board from making “disproportionate” budget cuts at selective enrollment schools and also extend a moratorium on any school closures until 2027, when a fully elected school board is in place.

The bill passed out of the House late Thursday and is headed to the Senate.

CTU President Stacy Davis Gates characterized the bill with a handful of strong words — racist, disengaged, silly, an abomination — because it targets an issue “that does not exist.”

“There was a resolution that said that the Chicago Board of Education was going to finally prioritize Collins High School … and then you get a bill that says you can’t do that,” she said. “Everyone who votes for that bill needs to go into that room and engage with the same group of students that we just engaged with and explain to them why they cannot have more.”

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson poses with students at Collins Academy after a roundtable discussion about school funding and expanding the number of Sustainable Community Schools in the city.

Johnson, Davis Gates, and Mitchell, the Bronzeville parent, said Springfield should be focused on fully funding all public schools through the evidence-based funding formula approved in 2017.

That formula promised to get all Illinois school districts, including CPS, to “adequate” funding by 2027 by adding $350 million in new money for K-12 education every year. Since that time, the amount of state money allocated to Chicago schools annually has grown by more than a billion dollars. But the formula says CPS is still another $1 billion short of “adequacy.”

During the roundtable discussion with the students at Collins, Johnson and others, including the local alderwoman Monique Scott, whose dad and brother both served on Chicago’s school board, told the students they were advocating for more money from the state.

As the conversation wound to a close, Collins senior Marshall Douthard Jr. raised his hand.

Everyone has been talking about “the resources and the money problems,” Douthard Jr. said. “I would like to know when they come through: How do you plan to fulfill these requests?”

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Teachers Union reveals some key contract demands

2024-04-16T21:20:12+00:00

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The Chicago Teachers Union wants its next contract to include raising the salary floor for paraprofessionals, more dual language programs, sports and fine arts programs for every school, and more Sustainable Community Schools, which provide wraparound services for students, CTU President Stacy Davis Gates said Tuesday.

The union also wants bargaining sessions to be open to the public, Davis Gates said at a press conference at Richards Career Academy on the Southwest Side, a Sustainable Community School where she was flanked by teachers and other union members.

Davis Gates said having more Sustainable Community Schools is just one area that the union agrees on with Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former middle school teacher and former CTU organizer. That commonality is different from contentious negotiations of the past that led to two strikes, she noted.

That changing dynamic is coupled with the union’s desire to open bargaining sessions up to the broader public, such as through livestream, because the contract is meant to benefit everyone, Davis Gates said.

“When I say that this contract is about the common good, I am saying that in the front yard of this city, we will be inviting families to participate, our students to participate,” Davis Gates said. “We will be inviting Chicagoans who believe that this is the greatest city on Earth, to participate in building the greatest school district on Earth.”

Davis Gates later said that the public sessions can only happen if CPS agrees. A CPS spokesperson said the district “looks forward to learning more” about CTU’s request to publicly bargain. A representative for City Hall did not immediately return a request for comment.

“Although contract talks between CPS and the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) have not yet commenced, the District looks forward to negotiating a fair contract that balances the interests of the hard working educators with our budget constraints,” said Evan Moore, district spokesperson, in a statement.

There is some precedent. In Colorado, state law requires teachers’ contract negotiations to be done in public. In Chicago, with a union-friendly mayor who drew heavy support from the CTU on the campaign trail, contract negotiations this year may not result in a long battle or lead to a strike, as they have in past years under former mayors Rahm Emanuel and Lori Lightfoot.

However, bargaining will occur as the district is deciding how to close a $391 million budget deficit as federal COVID dollars run out. That challenge raises questions about how many costly demands CPS can commit to.

In an interview last week with Chalkbeat, CPS CEO Pedro Martinez said the district’s structural deficit — when expenses exceed revenue — preceded the pandemic and, in recent years, was due in part to the 2019 CTU contract agreement that will expire this June. Budget watchdogs have noted that this financial situation prevents the mayor from agreeing to every union demand.

Asked about the economic implications of the contract, Davis Gates did not provide more specific details but said the union will ask for “substantial amounts of investment into our school community,” and emphasized that schools still don’t have enough staff.

However, CTU and the district already agree on at least one thing: Both believe the state should provide more funding to CPS to help alleviate its financial pressures and have said they are pushing lawmakers to do so. The state has boosted funding for CPS since overhauling its funding formula in 2017. But that new formula indicates that CPS would still need $1.1 billion to be considered adequately funded.

There are no signs yet that more money is coming. Gov. J.B. Pritzker has proposed a budget that would increase K-12 funding by the same amount as last year.

CTU delivers demands across the city

After the press conference Tuesday, union leaders rode a trolley to deliver its demands to Pritzker’s office, as well as Johnson’s office and some of its critics, such as the Civic Federation, a nonpartisan government watchdog group. The trolley also stopped at the offices of White Sox and Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf, who has sought $1 billion in taxpayer subsidies to build a new Sox stadium. Asked why the union approached him, a CTU spokesperson said, “because he loves Chicago as much as we do.”

Before the trolley took off, various school staffers took the microphone at Richards to discuss different contract demands.

Christel Williams-Hayes, the CTU’s recording secretary, highlighted the work of paraprofessionals who provide additional support to schools and can include special education assistants, teacher assistants, school clerks, and parent advocates, among others. The union plans to demand a higher salary floor for paraprofessionals, Davis Gates said. Their pay can range based on the specific paraprofessional job title and years of experience.

One of the lowest paid paraprofessional positions is a teacher assistant, which has a starting salary this school year of $36,259, an increase from $30,862 in the 2019-20 school year, according to the CTU’s current contract.

Charese Munoz, an English teacher at Spencer Technology Academy in Garfield Park, said the city must expand dual language programming to more Black students who can benefit from learning a language other than English.

Rolando Perez, a restorative justice coordinator at Brighton Park Elementary School, which is also a Sustainable Community School, said the union wants “each school and each student” to have a restorative justice coordinator who oversees an alternative form of discipline that focuses on resolving conflicts. The Board of Education recently directed the district to create a new safety plan by removing school resource officers from campuses and implementing alternative disciplinary practices, such as more restorative justice.

“Simply put,” Perez said, “how can a student be ready to learn when they come into a school if they are not feeling fully supported socially and emotionally?”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools is in new era for negotiations with the CTU. What could it mean for schools?

2024-03-06T22:24:06+00:00

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When former Chicago Teachers Union President Jesse Sharkey thinks about the dynamics between City Hall and the union, he flashes back to 2011. That’s when then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel defended a decision to cancel pay raises for teachers by saying they got other types of salary boosts, while “our children got the shaft.”

The stinging quip illustrates how contentious contract negotiations and the relationship between the CTU and city officials were back then, ultimately leading to a weeklong teachers strike in 2012, said Sharkey, who currently sits on the union’s executive board.

After years of thorny relationships with district officials and mayors who did not align with the union on how to improve or support schools, the CTU is expected to begin bargaining this spring over a new contract with a district that now answers to Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former middle school teacher who rose to power as a CTU organizer.

“This is going to be a struggle because the culture in Chicago with the public schools and the teachers union is a culture of ‘No,’ and ‘Make me,’ and ‘OK,’” current CTU President Stacy Davis Gates said during a City Club speech Tuesday. “That’s different from what we are embarking on this time. We’re saying, ‘How might we?’ That’s a different question.”

In a statement, CPS spokesperson Damen Alexander said the district “looks forward to negotiating a fair contract that balances both the interests of the District’s hard-working educators and our duty to be fiscally responsible.”

A City Hall spokesperson declined to comment for this story.

The latest contract talks will come amid massive change for Chicago Public Schools. The first-ever school board elections will take place this fall and a 21-member partially elected board will take office next January. And bargaining will happen as the district attempts to fill a projected $391 million budget deficit for next year, after four years of being buoyed by $2.8 billion in federal COVID relief dollars that will soon run out.

Amid those challenges, the union has a strong ally in office.

The CTU was Johnson’s largest campaign donor, and Davis Gates introduced him at his victory party.

Before the union propelled one of its own into the mayor’s office, the teachers union regained some bargaining power in 2021 when state legislators passed a law that restored its right to bargain over a broader set of issues — such as class size or the length of the school day — which had been restricted since 1995.

Still, Johnson signaled on the campaign trail that he would face “tough decisions” as mayor in negotiations with the CTU and wouldn’t be able to meet all of the union’s demands.

“So who better to deliver bad news to friends than a friend?” he said during a mayoral forum last year.

But the Johnson administration has already overseen policy changes the union counts as victories, including expanded parental leave for CTU members, a promise to remove school resource officers by next school year, and a commitment to rethink school choice policies.

The union’s House of Delegates, made up of hundreds of educators across the city, is scheduled to vote Wednesday on proposals crafted by the union’s various committees and developed as a response to what CTU members said they wanted to see in the next contract, according to the union.

Those proposals include a wide range of ideas, from pay raises and housing assistance for teachers to providing affordable housing and support for homeless students and their families.

While union officials acknowledge that things are different this time around, they have also emphasized that Johnson does not “have a magic wand” and pushed back against the idea that the union will get everything it asks for.

“I think it is ridiculous for anyone to think that the Black man on the fifth floor who comes from the progressive movement has fairy dust to sprinkle to end this quickly,” Davis Gates said in an interview with Chalkbeat last month. “There is an entire bureaucracy that has been hired and trained to tell the Chicago Teachers Union, ‘No.’”

Joe Ferguson, president of Civic Federation, a nonpartisan government watchdog group, said the mayor can’t meet all of the union’s demands because “the money isn’t there for it.” He said the public deserves to hear from the board and the mayor on where they’ll draw the line.

“Where those boundaries are, nobody can say,” Ferguson said.

Past tensions between CTU and City Hall prompted strikes

Over the past decade, contract negotiations between CPS and the CTU have resulted in two strikes that garnered national attention and inspired education labor fights around the country.

In 2012, after months of simmering disagreement and the city skipping a raise for teachers, the union went on strike for seven days at the start of the school year. Emanuel had pushed for a longer school day and embraced education reform ideas sweeping the country at the time, including a new way to evaluate teachers, which the union strongly opposed. He also refused to bargain over issues like class size, which at the time, state law did not require CPS to do.

An 11-day strike happened in 2019 under then-Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who the union had initially expected to align with more than Emanuel. The union was fighting for “common good” ideas that exceeded the scope of a teacher’s daily duties but were meant to improve students’ and families’ lives, such as ensuring that every school had a nurse, social worker, and librarian. The contract ultimately locked in some of those demands, as well as other wins, such as a $35 million fund to help reduce class sizes, but ultimately, the long strike left many teachers and families frustrated.

Those sour dynamics appear to be gone with Johnson’s election, said Robert Bruno, professor of labor and employment relations at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, who co-wrote a book about CTU’s 2012 strike.

“Both parties believe that the other party understands and would be respectful of each other’s perspectives, which certainly wasn’t the case with the two previous mayors or even the previous CEOs — and we’ve gone through a few of them in Chicago,” he said.

Sharkey noted that Johnson’s priorities include many ideas the union agrees with and gave rise to, such as creating more sustainable community schools that provide wraparound services to families. His campaign platform also closely mirrored a document CTU first put out in 2012 titled “The Schools Chicago’s Students Deserve,” which was updated in 2018 and most recently, in 2022.

In general, the union has found that working with the district has been easier and more receptive since Johnson has taken office, according to Sharkey and Davis Gates.

But Davis Gates said she expects plenty of disagreement because she still feels that the agency has a bureaucracy “that cannot collaborate, that does not say yes, and has a difficult time understanding how to partner with us.”

Union again pushing ‘common good’ demands

The union is expected to push for cost-of-living raises that keep up with or exceed inflation and a more uniform overtime pay policy, according to proposals leaked to conservative think tank Illinois Policy Institute, which a CTU spokesperson confirmed are real. The union also wants changes to the teacher evaluation process, including to codify that evaluations cannot be used for layoffs.

Proposals also include codifying health care policies, such as gender-affirming care, paid parental leave for employees, abortion coverage, and access to weight loss medical care, such as bariatric surgery.

In a more novel demand, the union will also push for housing assistance for its members, but the leaked proposal doesn’t include more details on how that would be done. Under Emanuel, the city offered assistance to police officers who wanted to buy homes in the areas they worked in, but few officers took advantage of the program.

In the classroom, the union is expected to renew a push to give elementary school teachers more preparation and collaboration time during the school day, Sharkey said. That was a major demand in the 2019 contract negotiations that largely did not come to fruition – and could again be difficult to secure this time around given the complicated logistics of tweaking a school day.

Union officials also expect proposals around bilingual services for students, including on attracting staff and expanding access to bilingual training for teachers, and retaining more special education staff. Both bilingual and special education are teacher shortage areas.

Davis Gates said they’ll continue demanding a librarian and nurse be staffed at every school.

Separately, union officials are expecting to push for more common good items, Davis Gates said. This will include creating a career and technical education program that would involve building houses for homeless students and their families, according to the leaked proposals.

Common good proposals will also include creating more sustainable community schools, Davis Gates said. The union is also interested in pushing for more “green” – or energy efficient – schools, such as by installing more solar panels. The district is already planning to purchase 50 electric school buses.

CPS’s budget deficit could complicate negotiations

Contract talks will begin as the district plans for its budget next year, which is projected to be $391 million in the hole. That could make costly union proposals a tough sell for the district.

District officials have for months publicized the budget deficit as federal COVID relief dollars run out. The district can either cut programming or find more money, which officials want to do by demanding more funding from the state.

Bruno, the labor expert, said it is a good sign the union agrees that Springfield should provide more money, because that means all negotiating parties agree on a solution to a significant problem.

However, Ferguson, from the Civic Federation, has little hope that more money is coming, in part because of what appears to be a “frayed” relationship between City Hall and Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s office. Pritzker recently proposed a budget that provides the same increase to K-12 funding as last year. And because CPS’s deficit is driven by the loss of COVID relief dollars, this year’s negotiations are “a fairly unique stew,” he said.

“There have been deficits being faced in the past [and] constraints on funding sources, but none that have come in this particular context, where not only is there a question of, where is more money coming from, but it also comes at a moment when we all know that recent existing streams are going to end,” Ferguson said. “And it has also been made abundantly clear by Springfield, by the governor, that there is no money to be gotten from the state.”

Union officials said they don’t yet know the price tag of their proposals, and they don’t expect to propose “money-saving” ideas. But Sharkey said they’ll have ideas on how the district can fund their proposals “and would expect the board to try to work with us on that.”

Asked how the district’s financial picture will impact its approach to negotiations, a CPS spokesperson pointed to the district’s budget deficit and said the district must be “fiscally responsible.”

Even with financial challenges, Sharkey said he expects the union and the district to work out disagreements in a more timely manner, unlike past negotiations that were “unproductive for months.”

Davis Gates said CTU continues to see its contract as “leverage for the common good,” has “high expectations” for upcoming negotiations, and is hoping for more agreement that will finally deliver on the CTU’s push to get schools more resources.

At the City Club speech this week, in a room full of business leaders, educators, and philanthropists, Davis Gates said she expects people to be skeptical that the mayor is going to “give CTU everything it’s asking for.”

“I hope he does,” she said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Who’s the boss? Chicago principals report to many different people.

2024-02-27T20:48:12+00:00

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During Femi Skanes’ 10 years as a Chicago principal, her boss was primarily a district official known as a network chief, she said. Alan Mather, who was also a principal for a decade, says he answered to then-Chicago Public Schools CEO Arne Duncan.

Many principals in Chicago also feel their Local School Council, or LSC, is a boss, while others view the council as more of a partner.

Principals are the leaders of their schools and staff. But in Chicago, multiple entities have power over principals. Later this year, Chicagoans will begin electing school board members, marking another shift in control over the city’s school system, which has been run by the mayor and a hand-picked CEO since 1995 and by a decentralized system of elected LSCs since 1988.

The city’s principals have unionized in hopes of creating more job protections for a role that has seen high turnover in recent years.

“Right now it’s kind of the wild wild west,” said Cynthia Barron, program coordinator and assistant professor with UIC’s Urban Education Leadership Program. “We’re kinda all waiting to see what’s going to happen.”

Barron, who spent more than three decades at CPS, said she doesn’t foresee immediate changes as a result of unionization or an elected school board. But, given that details around the future principals union contract and the elected school board are still being ironed out, she said there are “so many unknowns.”

How Chicago principals ended up with many bosses

Those unknowns — as the principals union takes root and the city moves to an elected school board — may disrupt an already complicated hierarchy.

As it stands now, a Chicago principal’s direct supervisor is the head of their network — the geographic area their school is organized under — and they are also accountable to their Local School Council, or LSC, a unique-to-Chicago elected body at most schools made up of parents, teachers, students, and community members, that can hire principals. Both have different hiring and firing powers.

Local School Councils were created in 1988 under the state’s Chicago School Reform Act, which gave LSCs the power to hire principals, approve school budgets, and approve annual school improvement plans.

The state amended that law in 1995 in an effort to centralize and improve the city’s school system. Lawmakers voted to keep LSCs but mandated training for them. The changes also gave the mayor sole authority over appointing the school board and replaced the superintendent title with “chief executive officer” — which stands today.

Today, LSCs can hire a principal and offer them a four-year contract. They can decide to keep the principal or fire them when their contract is up for renewal.

Network chiefs, on the other hand, work for the district and are tasked with ensuring that schools are complying with district policies and meeting academic and instructional goals, according to interviews with school leaders. Network chiefs answer to district leaders who report to the CEO, the Board of Education president, and the mayor. School leaders can also turn to their chiefs when they need extra support.

Both chiefs and LSCs use a similar rubric to evaluate principals annually. Only network chiefs can fire principals at any time for just cause.

Though LSCs hold power over principals, they do not have the same connection to district officials and the school board that a network chief does. It’s also not clear how they’ll interact with the school board once it expands and includes elected members.

Froy Jimenez is a member of the city’s Local School Council Advisory Board, which the state created to advise the Board of Education. Jimenez, a teacher and LSC member at Hancock College Preparatory High School, said he believes that LSCs and principals are “co-leaders” with the shared goal of supporting students.

“When we look at [the] budget, when we look at curriculum, when we look at any specific need of our school,” Jimenez said, “we’re doing it like we’re collaborating.”

Principals balance multiple interests

Principals’ responsibilities have grown over the past two decades and especially since the pandemic. Today, in addition to being instructional leaders, they’re expected to maintain relationships with students, families, staff, and sometimes elected officials, said Jasmine Thurmond, director of Local School Council principal support at CPS.

Some school leaders appreciate the variety of voices, but others often feel torn between conflicting demands.

One principal, who asked to remain anonymous in order to speak candidly, was asked by parents who attended LSC meetings to “publicize or encourage things like picketing or public demonstrations” over a district decision this year to suspend bus service for 5,500 general education students, largely those at selective enrollment and gifted schools.

The principal agreed that the lack of busing has been challenging for many of her students. But she explained to parents and the LSC that publicly protesting the busing decision could put her in hot water with her other boss: the district.

“I have to figure out how I can advocate for the needs of my students and the needs of my families,” she told Chalkbeat, “but in a way that is very respectful of the people that are making these decisions — and that is a really difficult balance to strike.”

She has a good relationship with her LSC, which she said is “fair and reasonable” but also demanding. The council requests a lot of data and presentations. Meeting those needs and building personal relationships can be difficult along with all of her other responsibilities as a school leader, she said.

Ryan Belville, principal of McAuliffe Elementary School, said he has a close bond with his LSC that grew during the pandemic, when they worked hand-in-hand to make sure students and families had what they needed. Belville said the LSC has also held him accountable “to serve the school community effectively.”

“I really see why LSCs were developed and why they were put into action,” Belville said. “It’s something we’re very fortunate to have in Chicago.”

Sometimes the LSC wields its power, as Hancock College Preparatory High School did last year when it decided not to renew its principal’s contract in the face of student and teacher opposition.

But there are limits to an LSC’s authority.

At Jones College Prep, the LSC voted in 2022 to recommend the district fire then-principal Joseph Powers based on various allegations, including that he was ignoring problematic teachers and was not addressing issues around gender and racial discrimination. His contract was not up for renewal at the time, so the LSC could not fire him outright.

CEO Pedro Martinez declined to fire Powers, saying there wasn’t sufficient evidence. Later that year, CPS put Powers on leave after a student dressed in a Nazi uniform was seen goose-stepping in the school’s Halloween parade. Powers then retired.

One Chicago elementary school principal, who asked to remain anonymous in order to speak candidly, said that contract renewal time can sometimes feel political. She must ensure that she’s keeping “these X number of people happy or satisfied” so that she can keep her job. At the same time, she wishes she had “more robust” feedback from her LSC, which she thinks is lacking at her school because people often don’t have time to participate — an issue many LSCs face.

On Chicago’s West Side, the LSC at Oscar DePriest Elementary School is working on ensuring enough participation on its council. It is also figuring out how it will work with the school’s new principal, whom it hired in November after interviews and a candidate forum, said Wallace Wilbourn, a teacher and LSC member.

He wants the LSC to have a greater voice on the school’s curriculum, its culture, and how it approaches assessments.

But he’s already seen that many people are trying to hold the principal accountable. Ever since being hired, Wilbourn said, his principal has had to spend a lot of time in meetings with the network.

Network chiefs, top CPS officials hold power

Barron, with UIC, said the relationship between a network chief and principal more closely resembles a typical employee-manager relationship: The two work together on a leadership plan that has goals to hit throughout the year.

Skanes, who was the principal of Morgan Park High School until 2022, always viewed her network chief as her main supervisor. Feedback from the network chief was sometimes “attached to next steps, even in terms of promotion and opportunities,” she said.

The Chicago elementary school principal said the network chief is looking for things at the school that parents or community members may not have expertise in, such as best teaching practices, she said. Her LSC is more interested in school uniform policies or community events for families, she said.

“I think both of those perspectives are super important,” she said. “It shouldn’t be all one or another.”

A former Chicago principal, who asked to remain anonymous in order to speak candidly, said most of his network chiefs were good listeners and open to his ideas of how to improve his school. But he also felt pressure from the network to boost certain metrics, such as raising attendance by 10 percentage points, including by visiting student homes.

Those efforts resulted in a lot of pressure on staff and kids at his school who were already experiencing “so much trauma,” he said. After hitting the network’s goal, the principal eased up those efforts, saying it didn’t feel “worth the squeeze and my time and emotional energy.” Attendance rates dropped.

In that case, he decided to “take the heat from the network” because it meant more “sanity” for his school, he said.

A small share of schools have Appointed Local School Councils, or ALSCs, which don’t have the power to hire or fire principals but can provide nonbinding input on who they want to lead their schools. In those cases, the CEO gets final say on hiring a principal.

That was the case for Alan Mather, now the president of the Golden Apple Foundation. He became the principal of Lindblom Math and Science Academy in 2005 when the school was reopened as a selective enrollment high school. Mather was appointed by then-CEO Arne Duncan and the new school, which drew high-performing students from across the city, did not have an LSC. It wasn’t until his last year at Lindblom that an ALSC was formed, Mather said.

Mather considered Duncan to be his boss and was given a lot of autonomy to craft Lindblom’s culture and academics, such as adopting a year-round schedule during his time.

“It was the CEO who could have removed me at any time,” Mather said. “I was not working under a contract.”

As principals unionize, a question about management

When the Chicago Principals and Administrators Association, or CPAA, decided to unionize last year, its president Troy LaRaviere promised to fight for better pay, less focus on bureaucratic tasks, more job security – including the ability to voice opinions publicly without punishment – and more due process when principals face accusations of misconduct.

LaRaviere did not respond to multiple requests for an interview for this story. Another CPAA representative declined to comment, including to confirm whether the union has started bargaining, and deferred to LaRaviere.

The unionization effort could impact how network chiefs discipline and evaluate principals. But huge questions remain.

“We don’t know what is to come,” said Thurmond, from the district. She added that they’re “looking forward to deepening the collaboration” with CPAA to make sure principals are supported, versus the district “being perceived as an enemy.”

Some observers have wondered how a union contract might impact the authority of a network chief or LSC. For instance, will it be tougher for the LSC not to renew a principal’s contract?

Changes to an LSC’s powers, however, would likely require a change to the state law that created them, said Barron, the expert from UIC.

For the district’s part, Thurmond said CPS will continue “empowering LSCs and ALSCs” so that “communities continue to have control of their schools.”

One former principal thinks an elected school board could make LSCs feel redundant or powerless, since board members will represent different parts of the city.

LSCs were created when there wasn’t an elected board and are seen by some as mini-school boards at individual schools. But come January 2025, the Chicago Board of Education will be made up of 10 members elected by their communities and 11 members appointed by the mayor.

“If we have an elected school board of 21 and you have them passing resolutions saying we’re doing this, this and this,” he wondered, “then what does the LSC have the autonomy to say and do if it’s all coming from downtown?”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago’s school support staff have been working without a new contract. Union leaders say talks have stalled.

2024-02-20T23:11:14+00:00

During Aaron Jemison’s 35 years as a custodian for Chicago Public Schools, he has had to work overtime or pick up other part-time jobs such as driving an Uber or Lyft to make ends meet.

As a member of the bargaining committee for SEIU Local 73, the union representing school support staff, Jemison said he is fighting to get more retirement benefits, higher wages, and better working conditions under the next contract between the union and Chicago Public Schools.

However, it’s unclear when the next contract will be finalized since the union contract expired on June 30, 2023 and negotiations have been ongoing since May. Union leaders say contract negotiations have stalled.

Jemison, who said he makes a good salary, worries about other custodians whose pay starts off around $16 an hour. “We’re being treated like we’re nobody,” he said.

Union leaders say only one bargaining session is scheduled for February and the district has not provided them with economic proposals. SEIU Local 73 is hoping a new four-year contract will be finalized as soon as possible — or at least by the end of the school year.

SEIU has a powerful ally in the mayor’s office. The union endorsed Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former teachers union organizer, during his run for office in 2023. SEIU affiliates donated more than $2 million to Johnson’s campaign, according to an analysis by Chalkbeat Chicago.

A spokesperson for Chicago Public Schools said the district is working with SEIU to reach an agreement, with the goal of finalizing a contract before the end of this school year.

SEIU Local 73 represents about 11,000 support workers, including custodians, special education classroom assistants, bus aides, security officers, crossing guards, and parent-workers. These workers are often paid lower in comparison to educators and school administrators. On average, many of these school employees make about $40,000 a year. The average Chicago teacher’s salary is over $88,000,

In addition to waiting for economic proposals from the district, the union says it is waiting for responses from the district on proposals already talked about across the table.

Here are some of the key issues SEIU is bargaining for in its non-economic proposals:

Getting a centralized new hire orientation for school-based employees to understand their job responsibilities.
Allow special education classroom assistants to attend Individualized Education Program meetings to support students with disabilities and their families.
Prevent schools from using special education classroom assistants for other jobs such as teaching assistant or school clerk.
Transparency on how the district uses evaluation for school support staff. Evaluations determine layoffs and the amount of time a school employee works during the day.

Stacia Scott Kennedy, executive vice president of SEIU Local 73, said the union proposals come directly from rank-and-file members.

“Most of our proposals have come from our members; issues that they face in the workplace and then solutions that would help them to be able to better do their jobs,” said Scott Kennedy. “but to, ultimately, be able to better serve students.”

Shirley Shelton, who has been a special education classroom assistant for 11 years, said her experience working with students has been the most rewarding. She said she can see the fruits of her labor in the development of her students.

Shelton said she often sees her co-workers are struggling to make ends meet.

“My co-workers, some of them are single parents working two jobs. That’s taking them away from their families,” said Shelton. “In this next contract, I’m looking forward to a nice pay raise, where they could be able to spend more time with their families in the afternoons and evenings.”

Scott Kennedy said the union has secured tentative agreements for proposals regarding custodians, bus aides, and custodians.

Last week, Chicago Public Schools announced it does not plan to renew a multi-million dollar contract with Aramark for custodial services and management. The district has contracted with Aramark for a decade. For the past three years, school janitors have voiced concerns about the lack of cleaning supplies and families have complained about the lack of cleanliness in school for years.

Chicago’s Board of Education will vote on seven new contracts to help manage school custodians on Thursday at the monthly board meeting.

Samantha Smylie is the state education reporter for Chalkbeat Chicago, covering school districts across the state, legislation, special education, and the state board of education. Contact Samantha at ssmylie@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools plans to end Aramark cleaning contract

2024-02-13T01:41:10+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools said Monday it is not planning to renew a multi-million dollar deal with Aramark for the management of school janitors and cleaning services after a decade.

The move comes after years of concerns and complaints over school cleanliness from staff, parents, and students.

The school board’s latest agreement with the Philadelphia-based company is set to end June 30, 2024. According to a school board committee agenda posted Monday, the district is asking board members to increase the current contract, which started Aug. 2021, from $369 million to $391 million “due to unforeseen expenditures associated with overtime, custodial supplies and custodial equipment.”

A district spokesperson confirmed Monday the district is not renewing the contract with Aramark and the school board will vote on seven new contracts at its Feb. 22 meeting.

Charles Mayfield, chief operating officer at CPS, said the district is looking forward to more direct oversight of janitorial services and supplies and allowing principals to have more say on school cleaniness. Mayfield said the district will contract with seven vendors for custodial services. He said he doesn’t anticipate any job losses with this change.

CPS employs more than 1,000 custodians, according to staffing records updated at the end of December.

“We had an opportunity to renew at Aramark and we opted not to,” said Mayfield. “There were some challenges there, but they’ve also been great partners over a number of years. Sometimes change happens.”

A spokesperson for Aramark wrote in a statement that the company was disappointed to not be selected to continue providing facility services for CPS.

“We are proud of the efforts of our dedicated employees and are committed to ensuring a smooth transition to the school district’s new provider,” said Chris Collom, Aramark’s vice president of corporate communications.

Chicago Public Schools first contracted with Aramark in 2014. Budget officials at the time promised that outsourcing the management of school cleaning would save money and ease the burden on school principals.

But the deal backfired in the first school year when staff returned from summer break to dirty classrooms and, in some buildings, fewer custodians. Then-CPS CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett admitted the shift to privatized management of custodians was not going smoothly and the board reversed nearly 500 planned layoffs. By the spring of 2015, the contract with Aramark had gone millions of dollars over budget, WBEZ reported.

The union representing school janitors called the move a victory for its members. SEIU Local 73 — the union that also represents school employees such as special education classroom assistants, bus aides, and crossing guards — has been meeting with the district’s facilities department for almost three years to raise concerns about Aramark’s management of equipment and supplies for custodial staff.

Stacia Scott Kennedy, executive vice president of SEIU, said she is thrilled the contract is over.

“I feel hopeful that this change in management will improve the outcomes of cleanliness,” said Scott Kennedy. “I also feel hopeful that it’ll improve the working conditions of our members who have suffered under private contract with management for the last 10 years.”

SEIU Local 73 has been in contract negotiations with Chicago Public Schools since its contract ended June 30, 2023. One of the union’s economic proposals was to ask the district to get rid of the contract with Aramark. Scott Kennedy said they will keep the proposal as negotiations continue.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools reverses policy that docked pay from teachers taking religious holidays

2023-08-31T18:42:54+00:00

Chicago Public Schools teachers will no longer be docked pay when taking a religious holiday.

The Board of Education approved the change last week, overturning a yearslong policy that deducted the cost of hiring a substitute from the teacher’s salary. Different types of substitutes are paid at different daily rates, ranging between $170 to $264, according to the teachers union contract.

“I have friends who couldn’t afford to take off for Rosh Hashanah or Yom Kippur because they couldn’t afford to lose that money,” said Wendy Weingarten, a physical education teacher at Lasalle II Magnet School, who’s advocated for a change since 2016.

Teachers will still get three paid days off for religious holidays, such as the Jewish holy day Yom Kippur. But now, they must provide seven days advance notice before taking their holiday, instead of the previously required two days.

In a statement, district spokesperson Samantha Hart said the change was the result of feedback from teachers, school leaders, families, and others in the community.

“This is an important first step in ensuring that CPS’ holiday pay policy better reflects the values and diversity of the District and our staff,” Hart said.

During the board meeting, Chicago Teachers Union president Stacy Davis Gates said it was “shameful” that the policy had remained unchanged for so long.

Chicago’s public schools are off on seven federal holidays, including Labor Day, Indigenous Peoples’ Day, Veterans Day, Thanksgiving, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, Presidents’ Day and Memorial Day, according to the calendar.

Weingarten and Davis Gates noted that the district’s holiday schedule aligns with Christian holidays. While not denoted as an official holiday, Christmas is included in the district’s two-week winter break. Good Friday is typically included at the end of the weeklong spring break.

The district said the old religious holiday policy for teachers stretches back at least a decade. Weingarten, who has worked for CPS for 25 years, said she’s always been docked pay for taking off on Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah.

Eliminating that requirement will cost the district about $250,000 a year, a spokesperson said.

Weingarten said she began formally pressing the board for a change in 2021, when the start of the school year clashed with Rosh Hashanah. But she didn’t receive an explanation for why the district didn’t want to change the policy.

The next year, Weingarten said she filed a complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which investigates employee discrimination. She does not know the status of that complaint. She mentioned it to district officials during a joint meeting this April with the teachers union and CPS over the school calendar, after getting pushback about changing the religious holiday policy.

A district spokesperson did not directly say whether the policy change was sparked by the federal complaint. However, they said the change was a “preliminary step in remediating the inequities related to pay,” and that the district will review other board rules “to ensure our policies reflect the values of our diverse workforce.”

Correction: Sept. 1, 2023: A previous version of this story said Wendy Weingarten began advocating for a policy change in 2014. She began advocating for the change in 2016.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

First day of school: Chicago Public Schools reopens under a new era of leadership

2023-08-21T21:28:02+00:00

Chicago Public Schools is officially back in session.

Mayor Brandon Johnson, the first Chicago mayor in recent history to send his children to public schools, kicked off the first day of classes by joining educators, Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez, and Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates outside Beidler Elementary School on the West Side.

Under a sweltering sun at 8:30 a.m., Johnson greeted parents and children in front of a chorus of reporters and cameras, before ringing the ceremonial bell to start the school year.

The joint appearance with Davis Gates, Martinez, and other district and union officials was unsurprising for the union-friendly mayor who came up through the CTU’s ranks, but still a break from the past when the union and City Hall officials would visit schools separately.

Despite the district facing a number of challenges ahead, including unreliable bus transportation, ongoing enrollment shifts, and an influx of immigrant students, Johnson focused on a new era of collaboration at the city’s public schools.

Later in the morning, after touring two other campuses, Johnson visited Kenwood Academy, where his son is now a sophomore.

Speaking to a history class, he likened the first-day icebreakers the teacher was doing to what he’s doing as the city’s new mayor.

“I hope that you will lean into the collaborative approach that your teacher is taking, because that is what we’re doing as a city,” Johnson told the students. “We’re building relationships, we’re collaborating so that we can make collective decisions together that ultimately can help transform people’s lives.”

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, CPS CEO Pedro Martinez, CTU President Stacy Davis Gates, and other city hall, school district, and union officials pose for a photo inside a classroom at Kenwood Academy on the South Side.

CPS claws back from enrollment losses

Visiting Beidler was a symbolic choice for the mayor. The school narrowly escaped closure about a decade ago and is now part of a program Johnson wishes to expand: the Sustainable Community Schools initiative, which aims to provide wraparound services and more programming for students and families.

But Beidler is among several other schools in the program that have lost at least a quarter of their enrollment since the initiative started.

The official enrollment count will not be known until after the 20th day of school in September. But last year, 80,000 fewer students were enrolled in Chicago Public Schools than there were a decade ago and it is now the nation’s fourth largest school district. Chicago’s declining enrollment predated the emergence of COVID-19, but continued during the pandemic.

And for many parents and kids arriving at Beidler Monday morning, more pressing thoughts — like wishing for a great year — were at the forefront. Dondneja Wilson hoped that her daughter, who started preschool, would “grow, and learn, and have fun.”

“She likes kids a lot, so I feel like that’s going to be her favorite part,” Wilson said.

Dondneja Wilson and her daughter pose for a picture outside of Beidler Elementary School.

Last year, data from the last day of school in June obtained by Chalkbeat showed little change in overall enrollment. However, the number of English learners grew by more than 5,000 students. District officials have pointed to the increase as an approximation of how many migrant students have arrived on buses in the past year.

Chicago is seeing an influx of newcomers, many of whom are seeking asylum, arriving by bus from the southern border in Texas.

The number of bilingual teachers in CPS has dipped since 2015, even as the English learner population has grown, according to a recent Chalkbeat analysis. While 6,900 teachers have earned bilingual education endorsements — more than ever before, according to the district — it’s unclear how many are actually assigned to teach bilingual education.

Educators and immigrant advocates have expressed concerns about whether schools can properly support these new students. Jianan Shi, president of the Board of Education, said the city’s new welcome center for migrant students on the West Side has enrolled “hundreds” of newcomer students. He’s requested more information on the system’s overall strategy for supporting newcomers.

A classroom door welcomes students in Spanish at Kenwood Academy in Hyde Park.

Outside Beidler, CPS CEO Pedro Martinez told reporters that “the biggest challenge” is ensuring that all newcomers are registered in school, but he said the district is well-positioned to serve them, noting that Chicago has one of the largest bilingual and dual language programs in the nation. About one-fifth of the city’s students are English language learners.

“The challenge we have right now is, again, keeping up with all the new asylum-seekers that are coming in, going to them, making sure that we’re able to register them, assess them,” Martinez said. “But we’re doing that as we speak now.”

Transportation woes continue on first day

Transportation woes that have plagued the district for the last few years also cropped up on the first day, as parents reported problems with bus routes and trips that took more than an hour.

Laurie Viets, a CPS parent of three children – two of whom have transportation written into an Individualized Education Program – said the district promised to have all transportation issues resolved by last Friday.

However, Viets found out on Friday that one of her children, a seventh grader, was not going to have transportation and another child, a first-year high school student, would have a long bus route. Today, it took 70 minutes to get to school; it’s normally a 12-minute car ride, Viets said.

Viets said she wished Chicago Public Schools would have given her more time to prepare for changes in the transportation plans. Now, she won’t have transportation for one of her children for up to two weeks and she is concerned that her other child will be on the bus without air conditioning in extreme heat until they shorten his route.

The district’s bus problems stem back to 2021, the first year back to full-time, in-person school after COVID forced CPS to close buildings in March 2020. Students were left waiting on the first day and beyond for buses that never showed. In emergency mode at that time, the district began offering $1,000 stipends for rideshare services such as Lyft and Uber. But the transportation troubles continued well into the school year.

Last year, some 365 students were waiting for bus routes the first week of school and in September, district officials said they were still working to reduce 90-minute rides for some students.

The district has blamed and continues to point to a nationwide bus driver shortage as causing the transportation troubles. It signed a $4 million contract with a longtime vendor and bus-routing software company to try to fix the issues.

But last month, on July 31, district officials announced that it would not be able to transport roughly 8,000 students on the first day of school. They offered $500 monthly stipends to families of CPS students with disabilities or those in temporary living situations. Both groups are legally entitled to transportation. The district said at the time that 3,000 students had chosen the stipend option.

Davis Gates called the transportation troubles “a disaster” and a “failure of privatization.” CPS contracts with private bus companies to provide students with transportation. Davis Gates said she would like to see the district bring busing “in-house” and experiment with having its own fleet of buses that could start small by covering field trips and sporting events and then grow.

“These are Band-Aid approaches. I have not seen anything transformative or revolutionary in this space. And again, three strikes you’re out,” she said. “This isn’t a good way to start the school year with respect to transportation.”

The district has previously increased pay rates for bus driver companies, and is hoping to do so again this year. Martinez said he hopes that will help fill the driver shortage.

Viets, the parent worrying about her children’s transportation, said more needs to be done.

“Next year, if CPS is going to start by Aug. 21, by Aug. 1 they should know what the routes are,” said Viets.

If Chicago finalizes plans the Friday before the start of school, she said, the district is “not giving parents any kind of respect at all. They’re not giving us an opportunity to make other plans when they mess up.”

As Viets noted, the extreme heat also adds to worries about long bus rides. The weather also raises concerns about conditions inside buildings once students arrive.

Air-conditioning, aging buildings prompt push for green schools

With temperatures expected to reach 100 degrees this week, Martinez said his team worked “around the clock” to ensure classrooms are equipped with air conditioning this week.

Martinez said every classroom has at least a window unit, a key union demand during the CTU’s 2012 strike that was implemented a couple of years later by then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Still, in some cases, hallways are not air-conditioned, Martinez said.

Johnson has touted “climate justice” as a key focus of his administration and reiterated Monday that includes schools.

“Having buildings that are retrofitted, as well as an economy that’s built around green technology, some of that is top of mind,” he said.

Davis Gates used this week’s weather forecast to illustrate climate change’s impact on the city and why it underscores the urgent need for a new CPS facilities master plan, which hasn’t been updated since 2018. She added that building greener schools will be one issue the union will bargain over ahead of its contract expiration in 2024.

The school calendar’s pre-Labor Day start is an issue Davis Gates would immediately bargain over, she said. The late August start date began in 2021, matching up with many suburban districts.

The union was not able to bargain over the school calendar in 2019, Davis Gates said. But the passage of a 2021 state law reinstating some of the CTU’s bargaining rights could allow the calendar to be back on the table. The union’s contract expires next June and it’s likely the district and new mayor will begin negotiations with the teachers this winter.

The larger issues that officials highlighted were likely not top of mind for many students, such as 5-year-old Pierre, who started kindergarten at Beidler.

Asked what he was most excited about this school year, Pierre replied, “Playing.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools staff to get 12 weeks paid parental leave

2023-06-08T21:42:42+00:00

Chicago Public Schools employees will soon have 12 weeks of fully paid parental leave — putting the district in line with city policy and well ahead of most other school systems across the country.

Parental leave became a campaign issue in January during the mayoral election, when the Chicago Teachers Union accused former Mayor Lori Lightfoot of reneging on plans to extend the city policy to teachers. A CPS spokesperson at the time said the union and district were “actively working” to update the policy.

Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former CTU organizer and teacher, announced the new leave policy on Thursday standing alongside CPS CEO Pedro Martinez and CTU President Stacy Davis Gates.

“It will ensure that once they return from leave, they come back refreshed, energized and ready to lead the next generation of young Chicagoans into success,” Johnson said.

Martinez said the exact details are still being worked out, but the plan is to roll out the new policy before the start of the 2023-24 school year. A working group has begun meeting, according to the mayor’s office. Once finalized, the policy will go before the Chicago Board of Education for a vote. All new and revised policies must be posted online for public comment for 30 days.

Currently, teachers have two weeks of leave with the ability to use short-term disability if they are the birthing parent. Davis Gates told Chalkbeat in January that teachers usually cobble together leaves using those benefits, sick and personal days, and unpaid time off allowed under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act. They also try to time pregnancies so they give birth when school is not in session.

“There are a lot of summer birthdays if you have teacher friends and that’s for a reason,” Davis Gates said Thursday.

Chicago will become an outlier nationally in providing teachers paid leave. According to the National Council on Teacher Quality, less than a quarter of nearly 150 school districts they reviewed, including the 100 largest, offer paid parental leave, but most offer fewer than 30 days.

While the details of the policy are still being worked out, Martinez estimated it could cost an additional $10 million annually. The district’s most recent budget was $9.5 billion.

“I think it’s a worthwhile investment,” Martinez said. “Because the reality is we lose teachers when they start having children, and that creates other challenges for us.”

Tiffany Childress Price, a teacher and mom of two, said the new policy is critical for retaining and recruiting high-quality educators.

“Becoming a parent was the best thing to happen to my teaching practice,” Childress Price said. “The way that I have seen other people’s children has transformed my empathy for struggling children and struggling families.”

Parental leave has historically been negotiated during contract talks in Chicago and elsewhere. Today’s announcement signals the policy will no longer be used as a bargaining chip. But Johnson bristled when asked what this says about how he might negotiate with his friends and former colleagues.

“This is not a gift to the CTU, this is a policy for the people of the city of Chicago,” Johnson said.

The union’s current contract is set to expire on June 30, 2024. Davis Gates and Martinez both said paid parental leave is no longer something that should be negotiated.

“It really is more of a policy for how we treat all of our employees,” Martinez said.

“When it is at the negotiating table, it gets crowded out by other things,” Davis Gates added. “We shouldn’t be trading parental leave for class size or class size for parental leave.”

All three touted today’s announcement as evidence of a more collaborative relationship between the mayor, the school district, and the teachers union. The energy is a stark contrast to the fraught labor relations under Chicago’s previous two mayors. Tensions between CTU and Lightfoot prompted an 11-day strike in 2019 and two actions during the height of the COVID pandemic.

The union also went on strike in 2012 for seven days after then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel rescinded a contractually-promised raise and pushed to unilaterally lengthen the school day and year.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

From middle school teacher to Chicago mayor: Brandon Johnson sworn in to city’s top office

2023-05-15T20:30:33+00:00

Brandon Johnson, a public school parent, teachers union organizer, and former middle school teacher, has been officially sworn in as Chicago’s 57th mayor.

Johnson defeated former Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas in a runoff election on April 4 after both candidates surpassed incumbent Mayor Lori Lightfoot during a Feb. 28 general election, dashing her hopes of a second term.

“We get to write the story of our children’s and our grandchildren’s future,” Johnson said during his inaugural address Monday at the Credit Union 1 Arena at University of Illinois at Chicago on the city’s Near West Side. “What will that story say?”

As the last mayor with control of Chicago Public Schools, Johnson will oversee the city’s transition to an elected school board, which he lobbied for as an organizer with the Chicago Teachers Union. In his speech Monday, he once again promised to double the number of youth jobs, provide “child care for all,” and partner with school district leadership to “provide every single child with a world class education that meets their needs.”

“Let’s create a public education system that resources children based on need and not just on numbers,” Johnson said.

“Let’s have a system that respects its parents, educators and school employees,” he said. “Where the president of the Chicago Teachers Union and SEIU Local 73 and the CEO of the Chicago Public Schools can work together to advocate for more resources for all of our children.”

Roughly three hours after taking the oath of office, Johnson signed four executive orders — one which directs the budget office to find available money to pay for youth employment this summer and year-round. It also tasks his new Deputy Mayor of Education Jen Johnson to identify entry-level jobs “suitable for young people” within city departments and agencies. Chicago’s youth unemployment rates increased during the pandemic, hitting Black young women particularly hard, according to a new report released last week.

Johnson’s own story from middle school teacher to mayor began more than a decade ago. He left the classroom in 2012 to join a grassroots effort by the Chicago Teachers Union to build political power in order to improve the conditions beyond the classroom walls that impact students and their families, such as housing affordability, poverty, crime, and environmental racism.

“I’m struck by how much work it took to bring us to this moment,” Johnson said, with CTU president, Stacy Davis Gates, and vice president, Jackson Potter, seated behind him on the stage.

While running for mayor, Johnson promised free public transit for students, an expansion of child care programs and health clinics in schools with available space, and an increase in support staff, such as social workers and counselors.

Johnson’s election signals a national shift on education within Democratic politics away from an emphasis on high-stakes accountability and market-based school choice. That view of reform, at times, also vilified teachers and their unions and came with legislation that stripped teachers of their bargaining rights and tried to tie job security to student test scores.

The Chicago Teachers Union began to push back on that thinking in 2010 with the election of the late Karen Lewis as CTU president. Their movement gained momentum and national attention going on strike in 2012, protesting mass school closures in 2013, and electing the first teacher to City Council in 2015. The CTU’s activism galvanized unions in other cities.

In a narrow election in 2018, Johnson upset an incumbent to win a seat on the Cook County Board of Commissioners, a position he officially resigned on Friday.

Mayor Brandon Johnson shakes hands outside Michele Clark Magnet High School in Chicago’s Austin neighborhood hours before taking the oath of office.

Prior to taking the oath of office on Monday, Johnson stopped at several schools on Chicago’s West Side, including DePriest Elementary, Michele Clark Magnet High School, and Leland Elementary. A drumline and crowd of students, teachers, and elected officials greeted him outside Michele Clark.

Torrence Bell, 15, held up a poster congratulating the new mayor and stood along a fence outside the front entrance, where dozens of elected officials gathered, including Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, City Clerk Anna Valencia, and Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle.

“He’s a Black male, you know, I’m a Black male, so it’s really very inspiring for me,” Bell said.

Up the street, outside Leland Elementary students cheered and chanted for the new mayor, shaking his hand as he walked through the playground before getting in a black SUV to head to the inauguration ceremony.

“He’s one of our own,” said Alesia Franklin-Allen, acting principal at Leland. “That’s a great asset to have in a leader. He knows the needs of the schools.”

Speaking outside Michele Clark Magnet High School, current union president Davis Gates said she felt like the “personification of joy.”

“We deserve a mayor who’s going to invest in our children, who is going to practice justice and equity, not just as a value, but as a policy imperative,” Davis Gates said. “I am so very happy for us right now.”

Students from Leland Elementary on Chicago’s West Side wait to meet Mayor Brandon Johnson Monday morning before he took the oath of office.

Ten years ago this month, Davis Gates said, she and Johnson were in Springfield lobbying lawmakers to stop then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel and his appointed Chicago Board of Education from closing 50 schools. Ultimately, the board voted to close those schools, which became a galvanizing moment for the CTU. After the May 22, 2013 vote, then-CTU president Karen Lewis said the union would start training people to run for office.

“Clearly, we have to change the political landscape in this city,” Lewis said at the time.

Davis Gates choked back tears Monday morning as she recalled that moment.

“I’m so happy that teachers and clinicians and paraprofessionals believed their union who said that we could bargain for the common good, that we could be in coalition with the community, that we could transform Chicago,” Davis Gates said standing outside Michele Clark High School before heading downtown for the inauguration. “This is so amazing. And my only regret is that Karen is not here.”

A few hours later in his inaugural address, Johnson nodded to Lewis, calling her his “mentor and dear sister.”

“We all are here because of the work of giants who came before us and without whom this day would not be possible,” he said.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Teachers Union chief of staff named city’s deputy mayor of Education, Youth, and Human Services

2023-05-11T18:55:11+00:00

Chicago Mayor-elect Brandon Johnson, a former teachers union organizer, has named chief of staff at the Chicago Teachers Union and former high school history teacher Jennifer “Jen” Johnson to be the city’s next deputy mayor of Education, Youth, and Human Services.

Jen Johnson replaces Jaye Stapleton, who was appointed to the job last year after outgoing Mayor Lori Lightfoot promoted Sybil Madison from deputy mayor of education to chief of staff.

Johnson taught at Lincoln Park High School from 2003-2013 and left the classroom around the same time as Mayor-elect Brandon Johnson, who will be sworn into office Monday. The two are not related.

Both were part of a grassroots movement led by the teachers union focused on social justice, community organizing, and pushing back against top-down school reform policies, including the closure of public schools and the expansion of privately-run, often non-unionized charter schools.

“These appointments reflect our policy priorities and strategic goals as we set a bold agenda for the next four years,” Mayor-elect Johnson said in a statement. “Together we can achieve our vision for sustainable, thriving communities, responsive services for our children and most vulnerable, and a budget that illustrates our values as a city.”

Chicago Teachers Union chief of staff Jennifer “Jen” Johnson has been appointed to be the city’s next deputy mayor of Education, Youth, and Human Services.

Jen Johnson’s appointment is a signal Chicago Public Schools could enter a period of labor peace with the teachers union for at least the next four years. At the bargaining table, she has sat across from past deputy mayors, who have historically served as the mayor’s representative in negotiations.

On the campaign trail, Brandon Johnson faced repeated questioning about how he would handle contract talks with his former employer, to which he replied during one debate: “Who better to deliver bad news to friends than a friend?” The current CTU contract expires in 2024.

A spokesperson for the mayor-elect declined Chalkbeat’s request to interview the new deputy mayor Thursday.

As CTU chief of staff, Jen Johnson supports and represents 30,000 rank-and-file educators and union leadership. Recently, she spoke with Chalkbeat about the district’s rollout of a universal curriculum bank called Skyline. She applauded the effort, but said the union does not believe it should be mandated as that would take away teacher autonomy.

Jen Johnson has been at the bargaining table multiple times over the past several years and gave updates to the press and the public during the negotiations over virtual and in-person learning in 2020 and 2021 amid the COVID-19 pandemic and during an 11-day strike in 2019.

Chicago remained fully remote longer than many school districts, returning in-person on a hybrid basis in the spring of 2021.

During talks in the summer of 2020, Jen Johnson said the district’s proposal for a six-hour virtual school day was not age-appropriate for the youngest students and lacked an infrastructure to serve students with disabilities and English learners.

“You have too much screen time and not enough prep time,” she said at the time. “You can’t impose in-person school on at-home learning.”

In a speech at a labor conference in 2012, Jen Johnson called herself a “born Michigander” whose dad also taught high school history for 34 years in Grand Rapids, Michigan. She said her grandfather taught high school English in Winnetka, a wealthy suburb north of Chicago, and mentioned that her mother wrote a book in 1970 “about her experience being the only white student in an all-Black public high school called Marshall on the West Side of Chicago in 1966.”

“I knew from a very early age that I wanted to be a history teacher and that I wanted to work in public schools,” Jen Johnson said at the time.

According to a press release from the Mayor-elect’s transition team, Jen Johnson has sat on the boards of the Illinois Federation of Teachers Executive Board, Grow Your Own Illinois, and the Illinois State Board of Education State Educator Licensure and Preparation Board.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago mayoral election 2023: How Johnson, Vallas answered 10 important education questions

2023-03-01T18:23:38+00:00

Chicago voters will head to the polls once again on April 4 to vote for a new mayor, choosing between two candidates who are vastly different when it comes to public education.

Brandon Johnson is an organizer with the Chicago Teachers Union and Paul Vallas is the former CEO of Chicago Public Schools. Both are Democrats, but their views vary widely on everything from school choice to measuring academic performance to how campuses are funded.

Whoever wins will take office in late May and will get to appoint a school district CEO and seven school board members to oversee the nation’s fourth largest school district, its $9.5 billion budget, 635 schools, and the education of 322,000 children. They will also be the last mayor to have control of Chicago Public Schools before the district transitions to being governed by an elected school board.

Chalkbeat Chicago asked candidates 10 important questions about the city’s public schools in January — some of which came directly from our readers. Explore Johnson and Vallas’ answers below.

Chicago Public Schools is no longer the nation’s third largest school district after a decade of enrollment decline. The loss of students has had significant impacts on neighborhood high schools in particular. How will you address declining enrollment?
What are your plans to address learning loss and social emotional gaps that have emerged during the past three years of the COVID pandemic?
The Chicago Board of Education will expand from 7 appointed members to 21 elected officials over the next four years. How will you ensure parents, students, and teachers are fairly represented on the new school board? And how will you work with the elected board?
The Chicago Teachers Union’s contract ends next year. There was an 11-day strike in 2019, a rocky return to in-person learning in 2021, and five days of canceled classes in January 2022. How do you plan to avoid a strike in the next contract negotiation with CTU?
Chicago Public Schools stopped rating schools and holding students back during the pandemic. Both accountability policies are under review. How do you think schools should be measured, judged, or rated?
What are your thoughts about Chicago Public Schools’ student-based budgeting model, which ties a school’s funding to how many students are enrolled?
The Illinois legislature created a tax-credit scholarship program in 2017 to expand school choice. After a one-year extension, the program is scheduled to sunset in 2025. Do you support continuing the state’s tax-credit scholarship program? Why or why not?
During the early days of the pandemic, students with disabilities had limited or no access to academic accommodations written in their Individualized Education Program. Many students were unable to receive or renew IEPs to meet their needs. What will you do to ensure that students with disabilities are being identified without delay and getting the resources they need to catch up in school?
Are you for or against trade/vocational education? How would you reactivate trade school curriculum and would it be available in all schools?
Describe a high quality school. (How many staff work there? What are students taught? What programs or extracurriculars are offered? What support services are available? What does the facility look like? What is the schedule?) How many CPS schools meet your definition of a high quality school?

Chicago voters will now pick between former Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas (left) and Cook County Commissioner and teachers union organizer Brandon Johnson (right) in the mayoral runoff election on April 4.

Chicago Public Schools is no longer the nation’s third largest school district after a decade of enrollment decline. The loss of students has had significant impacts on neighborhood high schools in particular. How will you address declining enrollment?

JOHNSON: If you recall, that decade began in 2013 with the greatest closure of Black and Latinx schools in Chicago’s history. If we can build sustainable community schools alongside quality affordable housing, we will reverse the trend. We must also tackle the violence epidemic with more holistic measures that provide resources and trauma intervention for students and families.

Mayors Rahm Emanuel and Lori Lightfoot have both presided over precipitous declines in pre-kindergarten enrollment. This is not simply a result of demographic change, but the district moving to an online, centralized application process for preschool that is elitist and prejudiced against families with little access to technology. Enrollment also decreases due to poor program design. This is also evident in a number of special education crises – from State monitor to transportation – over the last 10 years.

Schools communities need direct investment, guarantees of staffing and program offerings. Every school should have a library and librarian, adequate clinicians and counselors, thriving arts offerings and sports programs and teams. And the mayor of Chicago has an obligation to be actively fighting in partnership for the revenue required to fulfill those basic needs for every school in the city, not just some.

VALLAS: Making the schools more attractive to parents by allowing for schools to take on specialties as well as bring back the work study program for high school students. We must also make our schools safe, so students feel comfortable in their learning environment. We must also have the dollars make it down to the school level, right now only 60% of the budget makes it to the schools. In my career I have worked to make education meaningful to students allowing a greater trust in the system by not only the students but also their parents. I would also expand the alternative schools network to provide for the educational needs for high school students too old for the traditional high school program.

Reader question. What are your plans to address learning loss and social emotional gaps that have emerged during the past three years of the COVID pandemic?

JOHNSON: Let’s remember that students and families are still struggling with the pandemic, and there is much trauma and recovery that must occur – especially among Black and Brown students and families who make up the majority of CPS students (like my own).

First, we must address the trauma that existed pre-pandemic, and acknowledge that COVID-19 exposed and exacerbated conditions around cleanliness, bilingual education, access to technology, special education services and more, that city leaders left unaddressed for decades. Asking a student to catch up on math when they are still recovering from the death of a loved one, or a classmate, is inhumane.

Students and families must have trauma support, such as weekly cognitive behavioral therapy, and students need summer jobs and engaging programming. Support student and staff mental health by infusing schools with mental health professionals like counselors and clinicians so that unaddressed trauma is acknowledged, and treated, and learning is more of the focus from day to day. Teachers and staff need adequate time and professional development to help address student needs. And educators need to be empowered with planning time to reinvigorate curriculum and work with students to ensure instructional practices and pedagogy meet students’ needs and interests.

VALLAS: The loss of learning due to the COVID pandemic has been unprecedented. We must work to ensure that our children catch up and can be competitive in their future. In order to meet the gap our children are facing I will open all school buildings through the dinner hour, weekends and summers. We need to invite community organizations to provide enrichment to students in the CPS during these off hours as well as invite retired CPS Teachers to provide tutoring and academic support to the students.

The Chicago Board of Education will expand from seven appointed members to 21 elected officials over the next four years. How will you ensure parents, students, and teachers are fairly represented on the new school board? And how will you work with the elected board?

JOHNSON: I support a map that ensures all communities in this tremendously diverse city have the opportunity to have their voices heard. This is why I worked so closely with Illinois Senate President Don Harmon and community organizations on the legislation to create this vibrant model of democracy for the first time ever in the history of Chicago Public Schools.

We need campaign finance rules to prevent those with no stake in our public schools, or our communities, from controlling our democracy. We cannot have uber rich, arch-conservatives usurping the power that working people in Chicago fought so hard to win. We need candidates who are deeply invested and knowledgeable from the communities served to have a fair chance to win races to influence the education of their children.

Democratic governance requires partnership. The city doesn’t absolve itself of any responsibility to schools just because there are democratically elected school community leaders sitting at the Board of Education. As mayor, I will continue to fight for resources in our schools, and maintain and build upon the coordinated support and services that the city has to offer children and families.

VALLAS: Like I have done all my career I will work with the elected board of education with the respect that is due to them as an equally elected official that is representing the needs of the community that elected them. In all CPS work I will put the needs of the students first and advocated with the board for any necessary resources. Before this board takes office it is important that they do not inherit a broken system, I will push the dollars to the school level and ensure that schools have the resources they need.

Reader question. The Chicago Teachers Union’s contract ends next year. There was an 11-day strike in 2019, a rocky return to in-person learning in 2021, and five days of canceled classes in January 2022. How do you plan to avoid a strike in the next contract negotiation with CTU?

JOHNSON: We need a mayor who can reasonably work with labor. We cannot have the type of leader who will promise something like, say, an elected representative school board and then fight tooth and nail to stop it from being enacted. We cannot have a mayor who, on the campaign trail, calls for a nurse and social worker in every school, then puts teachers on strike for two weeks when they ask for exactly that in writing. We cannot have a mayor who grants expanded parental leave to city workers, but blocks educators from receiving the same.

Just a shift in consistency and keeping one’s word will more than allow for a much more rational and collaborative process.

As mayor, I will be a partner in working with Chicago Public Schools and the Chicago Teachers Union to remove obstacles in the way of achieving excellent schools, rather than contributing to constant friction. The stakes are too high for our students and families for labor and leadership not to have a positive working relationship. And I will openly advocate and build coalitions to identify revenue sources and structures that, over time, will deliver the fully funded schools that families and communities deserve.

VALLAS: The previous CTU strike could have been avoided and we see the cost of that strike in the already exacerbated loss of learning from the pandemic. Over the course of my career I have negotiated 6 teacher contracts with teachers unions in the largest district in 4 different states that led to no strikes and members getting a pay raise. If all parties work in good faith there should be no need for a teacher strike this year which only leads to a greater negative impact of the education on Chicago’s children who are already struggling to regain confidence in the classroom.

Chicago Public Schools stopped rating schools and holding students back during the pandemic. Both accountability policies are under review. How do you think schools should be measured, judged, or rated?

JOHNSON: We cannot continue to punish schools that have suffered from decades of divestment, violence and destabilization. When a school struggles, we often give them more accountability, yet fewer resources. So any school rating formula must bring greater equity, and greater support, to ensure greater success.

Chicago Public Schools does not need its own rating structure, as the state still has and requires one. CPS’ time is better spent identifying sources of revenue to fill the gaps identified in programs, staffing, and services that we know hold schools back from meeting student needs and increasing enrollment. I live in Austin. My wife and I drive two children to Portage Park and another to Hyde Park every day because there are few schools in our community to meet their extracurricular needs. Families should not have to leave their community to find a school with a music program, a sports program, a nurse in every school, or a library with a librarian. We have to use what we already know about the strengths, weaknesses, and assets in our schools to ensure that we are directing resources to where they are needed to make every school excellent.

VALLAS: We should aspire for high standards, we cannot embrace the bigotry of soft expectations. We must set high standards, we have to measure school’s base on their improvement as a school. We must take every school uniquely and see their growth from where they were to where they are.

Reader question. What are your thoughts about Chicago Public Schools’ student-based budgeting model, which ties a school’s funding to how many students are enrolled?

JOHNSON: Student-based budgeting (SBB) and the former SQRP rating policy have had a devastating impact on our schools. SBB, in particular, has contributed to principals whose budgets are strapped to choose between keeping a veteran teacher or having a librarian and a functioning library. Schools struggling with enrollment need to have a process by which root causes are identified and resources are deployed to ensure students still have the richest possible education, and the school has an opportunity to grow its enrollment.

The state, in its evidence-based funding model, has recognized that student and community needs must drive school funding, and that all districts must be brought up to a certain level of resources to meet those needs. Yet CPS has not adopted that approach among its schools. We cannot keep supporting a system that favors choice, but does not provide schools with the same baseline resources and offerings – then punishes students who attend the less frequently chosen school.

VALLAS: The first priority is to push the funding down to the schools. We have to have the majority of the funding flow down to the local schools as of right now only 60% of the funds makes it to the local schools. My second priority is to make sure that the money that is allocated to the students encompasses the needs of the student, we need to make sure the school district is allocating Title I money directly to the school it is assigned too. This money needs to flow directly to the school with only minimal diversions because unfortunately funding due to poverty has been used as discretionary funds by the administration.

Reader question. The Illinois legislature created a tax-credit scholarship program in 2017 to expand school choice. After a one-year extension, the program is scheduled to sunset in 2025. Do you support continuing the state’s tax-credit scholarship program? Why or why not?

JOHNSON: I do not, because this is the kind of thinking that continues to reinforce unequal educational opportunities. Until every Chicago public school and big-city public school has the baseline of resources provided in suburban districts with high property tax bases, the idea of “choice” is a fallacy.

Parents with resources are able to navigate the system for their students, which I don’t begrudge. What is concerning is that families without the means, time, resources, and access to navigating these same systems have no choice at all.

I am not interested in continuing to shift unequal resources around. I am interested in leveling the playing field for all families.

VALLAS: The tax credit scholarship program is beneficial in empowering parents to pick the school that best suits their child’s needs. Whether the students attend private, parochial, public or public charter schools they are students of the City and we need to ensure quality education regardless of their zip code.

During the early days of the pandemic, students with disabilities had limited or no access to academic accommodations written in their Individualized Education Program. Many students were unable to receive or renew IEPs to meet their needs. What will you do to ensure that students with disabilities are being identified without delay and getting the resources they need to catch up in school?

JOHNSON: Teachers in Seattle last fall ratified a contract with a three adult (two teachers, one instructional assistant) to 10 student ratio to help address the needs of their special education population. Chicago must work toward something similar to address compensatory services and the particular needs of this incredibly vulnerable student population. We also need greater clinical support to properly diagnose and service the individualized education programs of these students. This includes the need to ramp up pipelines with state and local funding to hire many more teachers, special education classroom assistants, and teacher assistants to address the accumulated needs of students living with disabilities.

VALLAS: Students with disabilities are a priority even much more so after the loss of learning experienced due to the pandemic. The key to supporting these students is the availability of resources at the local school level. My administration will reallocate dollars in a way that the schools see the most benefit and allow principals to support all the students in their neighborhood schools.

Reader question. Are you for or against trade/vocational education? How would you reactivate trade school curriculum and would it be available in all schools?

JOHNSON: We need to do much better to train Chicagoans to fill the jobs that exist today. Businesses are hiring and manufacturers are hiring. There may be somewhere around 30,000 unfilled manufacturing jobs across the state, and a good number of them are here in Chicago. But we’ve abandoned vocational training in our schools. Modern manufacturing jobs require tech skills, and it is our job to give our students the skills necessary to succeed. So I am all for trade and vocational education, commonly known as Career and Technical Education (CTE), in Chicago Public Schools. CTE is essential to closing the gap between our district, and skilled trade industries and employers.

There is potential in some of the plans the district and CPS CEO Pedro Martinez have around this. With an aviator simulator in Dunbar, and making Tilden, Phillips, Chicago Vocational, and Fenger sustainable community schools with specialized and relevant trades training, we will have education and apprenticeship pipelines to create the skills and engagement necessary for a CTE corridor that will empower our Black and Latinx students to become the next generation of unionized trade workers.

VALLAS: Yes I support trade and vocational education. However I believe on a broader scale that we need to integrate a work study program into all of our high schools and make elective programs more meaningful. We need to reestablish our VocEd and occupational training programs that were in our high schools during my time at the CPS. My administration will do this by partnering with local trade unions and businesses in our city. We have to leverage these connections in ways that attract our students to take interest in these programs that offer amazing opportunities for success after high school.

Describe a high-quality school. (How many staff work there? What are students taught? What programs or extracurriculars are offered? What support services are available? What does the facility look like? What is the schedule?) How many CPS schools meet your definition of a high-quality school?

JOHNSON: We have a model that works – the Sustainable Community School (SCS) model, which calls for collaborative and effective strategy for increasing educational equity. SCS builds on the traditional community school model to prioritize specific pillars and principles to make schools the anchors of their communities, and to share leadership around meeting student, family, educator, staff, and community needs.

We also have schools that have parent mentors, community programming, and partnerships to provide additional support for mental and physical health across the district. Neighborhood schools like Kelly High, National Teachers Academy, Hanson Park Elementary (despite a horrendous facility situation), Chavez Elementary, Beidler Elementary are all vibrant school communities using culturally relevant curriculum and community partnerships to advance the academic and social/emotional needs of countless children. However, we need to do more and better. That will require greater investments in addressing the needs of homeless children, students with disabilities and all the newcomers who do not speak English as their primary language. It also cannot continue to be the case that selective enrollment schools, which provide students with the most extensive course offerings, extracurriculars and sports opportunities, serve only the wealthiest students in the system.

VALLAS: A high quality is a medium sized neighborhood school that embraces high standards and offers the students a high quality curriculum that ensures students achieve a high level of proficiency in all core areas. The ideal quality school offers key enrichment opportunities in the academic year as well as continuing into the non-traditional school hours (weekends, evenings, summers and holidays) to support students in their growth. My ideal quality school offers key wrap-around services for students to ensure they are holistically growing. This school also needs a well trained and supported local school council that broadly represents the community and can provide a vehicle for community input in school governance and supplemental activities.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago principals a step closer to unionizing as bill moves to Illinois governor’s desk

2023-01-06T21:00:41+00:00

Chicago Public Schools may soon have to bargain with principals and assistant principals — if Gov. J.B. Pritzker signs a bill passed by the Illinois legislature Friday morning.

The bill, which will give Chicago principals and assistant principals collective bargaining rights but prohibit them from going on strike, passed the state Senate by a 45-7 and heads to the governor’s desk for approval. If the bill becomes law, Chicago will join school districts such as New York City , Los Angeles, and Newark.

A spokesperson for the governor’s office said in an email Pritzker “looks forward to reviewing the bill now that it’s headed to his desk.”

Chicago’s principals have been unable to unionize because they were considered managerial employees under state law. HB 5107 changes the definition of managerial employees to district employees who have a significant role in the negotiations of collective bargaining agreements or who create employer-wide management policies and practices.

The Chicago Principals and Administrators Association, a professional membership organization that advocates for issues affecting principals and administrators, has fought for years for this change.

“We’ve gotten further than we’ve come before,” said Troy LaRaviere, president of the association and a former Chicago school principal, noting Friday in an interview that he’s worked on this for four years.

LaRaviere said his association is already part of the American Federation of School Administrators, an affiliate of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organization, and members pay voluntary dues. If signed, the bill would give the group more teeth.

The association wants to make sure that they are protecting a principal’s time to focus on what impacts students, rather than dealing with one district mandate after another, LaRaviere said.

Chicago principals have said in the past that they often don’t have a say in their working conditions and have to pick up numerous tasks to keep their schools running. This means that principals’ responsibilities vary across the city depending on a school’s needs and resources, creating long days and uncertainty for some principals.

Principals assumed more responsibilities during the pandemic to ensure that their school’s communities were protected from COVID-19, including telling families about COVID mitigations, organizing vaccine clinics, and identifying close contacts.

The stress has caused some principals to leave the profession. Chalkbeat Chicago found retirements and resignations — especially among principals and assistant principals — increased since the pandemic began in March 2020. Staffing data shows that there are more than 1,100 principals and assistant principals in Chicago Public Schools, but 50 of those positions were vacant as of Sept. 30, 2022.

If the governor signs the bill, the Chicago Principals and Administrators Association will use “our place at the table to improve conditions for principals and their schools,” LaRaviere added.

Chicago Public Schools did not support the effort to unionize principals in the past, arguing that principals are classified as managers and not subject to unionization under state law.

But following the passage by the Senate, a district spokesperson said in an email statement that Chicago Public Schools would work with school leaders as they “become eligible for possible unionization.” She added the district is committed to collaborating with school leaders to meet the needs of students, families, teachers, and staff.

“We support statewide implementation of this legislation as the tenets hold true for all school districts,” the statement said.

In a separate statement, a spokesperson for Mayor Lori Lightfoot commended the passage of the bill and encouraged the expansion of collective bargaining rights to school leaders. “CPS will continue to work hand-in-hand with principals to achieve academic excellence — a goal that should be implemented statewide,” the mayor’s spokesperson said in the email statement.

Sen. Robert Peters, D-Chicago, who championed the bill said in a statement on Friday that Chicago principals should have a voice in their working conditions, especially at a time when the district faces staff shortages.

“CPS is not only the largest school district in the state, but one of the largest in the nation,” Peters said. “With its size and staffing shortages come unique challenges that need to be addressed. I believe we should trust its principals to help create solutions to build a better work environment.”

The co-sponsor of the bill, Sen. Cristina Pacione-Zayas, D-Chicago, said in an interview with Chalkbeat that she is thrilled HB 5107 cleared the Senate Friday morning because being a principal is a thankless job and principals haven’t had much say in their workplace.

“The unionization bill now affords them some type of seat at the table, when policy is being formed,” said Pacione-Zayas. “It ensures that there’s some salary parity and representation when there are grievances. That is like a game-changer for our schools.”

Pacione-Zayas is also advocating for a companion bill that would give local school councils more transparency on who is eligible for a principal position. The councils are currently responsible for hiring and evaluating principals. Pacione-Zayas’ bill would give local school councils access to the entire eligible pool of candidates, make the rubric and scoring system from the district public, and allow due process for principal candidates who do not advance to the next stage of evaluations.

Becky Vevea contributed to this report.

Mauricio Peña is a reporter for Chalkbeat Chicago, covering K-12 schools. Contact Mauricio at mpena@chalkbeat.org.

Cook County commissioner, teachers union organizer announces bid for Chicago mayor

2022-10-27T11:00:00+00:00

Cook County commissioner and union organizer Brandon Johnson announced early Thursday he is running for Chicago mayor, entering the race with backing from the teachers union and independent political organizations.

Johnson, a former teacher at Jenner Academy and Westinghouse College Prep, is one of at least eight people challenging Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who is seeking a second term. Three aldermen and former Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas are among the candidates. The union endorsement and Johnson’s union organizing background almost assures education issues will take center stage in the 2023 Chicago mayoral election.

“As a teacher, I experienced the painful impact of disinvestment on my students and their families,” Johnson said in a press release. “And this personal experience seeing children endure inequity fuels my commitment to building a stronger, safer, and more equitable Chicago.”

Before announcing his run, Johnson’s campaign saw an influx of donations.

Last week, the American Federation of Teachers announced a $1 million donation to Johnson’s campaign.

Earlier this month, the Illinois Federation of Teachers COPE donated $150,000 and the Chicago Teachers Union’s political action committee donated $60,000. At the end of September, Johnson’s campaign reported having just over $70,000 in the bank.

The Chicago Teachers Union’s governing body last month voted to endorse Johnson for the municipal election.

The union, which also endorsed rank-and-file educators Mueze Bawany and Leonor “Lori” Torres in their respective aldermanic races in the 50th and 36th wards, said the educators were “uniquely attuned to the needs of students and families.”

Johnson recently received endorsements from the 30th, 33rd, 35th, and 39th ward independent political groups.

“I continue to be humbled, and honored, by the outpouring of support I have received in coming to this decision,” he said.

The union is pushing to unseat Lightfoot, with whom it has clashed several times, including during an 11-day teacher strike in 2019 and in two actions amid COVID safety concerns in 2021 and 2022.

“Each of them believes strongly in partnership, and coalition, and is committed to representing educator values of nurture and care for children and community,” the union said of Johnson, Bawany, and Torres in a series of tweets last month.

Johnson has been a Cook County commissioner serving the city’s West Side since 2018. After teaching at Jenner and Westinghouse, he became an organizer for the CTU in 2011 and helped organize the 2012 strike, according to his campaign website.

Mauricio Peña is a reporter for Chalkbeat Chicago, covering K-12 schools. Contact Mauricio at mpena@chalkbeat.org.

Some Chicago schools in high-poverty areas lost 1 in 7 teachers to layoffs

2021-09-27T11:00:00+00:00

Laila McKinney was dreading senior year at Chicago’s King College Prep. Not just because of COVID-19. Not just because last year was disrupted by remote learning.

But because the 18-year-old’s long-term dance teacher, someone she considers a cherished mentor, and her journalism teacher wouldn’t be there. The two were among the 562 educators — 272 teachers and 290 non-teacher employees — laid off by Chicago Public Schools at the end of last school year.

The number of layoffs this past spring was the lowest in several years. Still, a Chalkbeat analysis found the layoffs hit small schools in high-poverty areas disproportionately hard. Most schools with clusters of three or more teacher layoffs were shrinking campuses, with at least seven of the 22 schools considered “underutilized” by the district, meaning their enrollment falls significantly short of the building capacity.

At least two schools, King and Christian Fenger Academy, laid off 15% of their staff, though Fenger was among the few schools on the list that has gained enrollment over the past two years and planned to add staff this year, according to budget documents. Representatives from King and Fenger did not respond to requests for comment before publication time.

Every spring brings a cycle of layoffs in Chicago in response to factors such as budget, enrollment, and programmatic changes. The district rehires the vast majority of laid-off staff each fall, usually at different campuses. When asked to provide the number of teachers rehired this fall, the district could not provide an updated tally by publication time, and instructed Chalkbeat to file a public records request.

Chicago’s teacher layoff numbers are under particular scrutiny this fall for two reasons. Advocates and the Chicago Teachers Union say the district should have used federal pandemic relief money to prevent the layoffs. They asserted the layoffs take a toll on school programming, resources, and communities, making it difficult to recruit new students when enrollment starts to fall.

The other reason is enrollment, and how continued enrollment declines could put pressure on some schools to retain staff. Last fall, after the pandemic’s onset, Chicago Public Schools reported its sharpest enrollment drop in two decades. If the decline continues, some schools likely will lose more students than others, potentially putting them in the position of losing funding to hire teachers and facing more layoffs.

Asked about this year’s numbers, a district spokesman, James Gherardi, said 59 teachers who were laid off had one-year positions related to the pandemic and that this fall, the district planned to hire for 2,000 open teaching and staffing positions. Gherardi said he expected many laid-off teachers to be rehired for other positions in the district. Last school year, the district laid off nearly 290 teachers and rehired 72% in full-time positions.

However, advocates say the cycle of layoffs and rehires causes uncertainty and upheaval for the schools that chart the highest layoff numbers. A 2013 study found New York City students in grade levels with higher teacher turnover scored lower in English and math, and that these effects were amplified in schools with more low-performing and Black students.

For students such as Laila, the layoffs strike a personal chord.

“I remember crying,” Laila said, recalling when she heard her dance teacher was laid off. “It broke my heart. You develop relationships with these teachers. Ms. Kahphira isn’t just my dance teacher. She helped me a lot through the pandemic, as well.”

Returning to an unfamiliar place

District officials argue that layoffs are a regular part of the business operations for a big district and that despite the pandemic’s impact, teacher staffing has been relatively stable (the district has, however, struggled to fill bus driver and substitute positions) Chicago touted a start to the school year with 97% of its teaching positions filled, and data obtained by Chalkbeat showed that resignations in the spring declined, following a trend of steady decreases.

Still, the pattern of layoffs troubles students and teachers at the schools most affected. They say the process is demoralizing and amplifies disruption in an already tumultuous year.

Christian Fenger Academy laid off five of its 29 teachers in spring. Among those laid off was Xochitl Infante, who taught social studies and other subjects at the school for more than a decade.

With clusters of layoffs, Infante said, “You’re fracturing what little community has been built.”

Infante started teaching in 2009, the year Fenger student Derrion Albert was killed on his way to a bus stop. Fights broke out in the school often in the months and years that followed; parents protested for days outside Fenger, and enrollment continued to drop.

“Every year that they see you come back, those kids gain a little bit more trust. You’ve got to earn those kids’ trust,” Infante said. “Those kids were responding to the city taking their community from them. That’s why we have so many discipline issues.”

It took years for the school to build back its community. Recently, Infante recalls going all-out to compete against Fenger’s music teacher in door-decorating contests, and battling students and teachers in the “Cupcake Wars” led by Fenger’s culinary teacher. Both of those teachers lost their jobs at Fenger this June, too.

Infante was not rehired for another full-time teaching job before the fall started but will stay with the district this year and is currently categorized as a reassigned teacher.

At Fenger, she was the school’s only Embarc teacher. Embarc is a district-wide three-year program that connects high schoolers from low-income families to community-based opportunities and provides college and career readiness training. Until school reopened in August, this year’s cohort had only experienced the program remotely.

After Infante left Fenger, a new teacher took her place to close out the sequence. But the program is not supposed to be implemented that way, Infante said, noting that long-term teacher-student relationships are Embarc’s foundation.

The cut has happened before: Her first Embarc group saw the school discontinue the program for their junior year. (It was later reinstated amid popular student demand.)

Senior Taqueria Halsey credits the program — specifically, Infante’s teaching — for strengthening her personal relationships and for teaching her how to assert herself. She used those skills this summer to connect with students at her dream college and navigate the application process.

“With her not being here, my senior year is going to be hard,” Taqueria said. “She was almost the only one that followed us. It’s going to be hard going back to new teachers … [and to] brand new classes that I’ve never seen before.”

Declining enrollment spurs tough decisions

Chicago Public Schools operates according to a student-based budgeting system, meaning funding ties largely to enrollment, and schools with declining enrollment can feel budget pressures. Since 2019, the district has given equity grants to schools with consistently declining enrollment to try to bolster program offerings for students.

But enrollment can fluctuate, and those equity funds are not a guarantee. When schools receiving equity grants see student count rebound, however, they can lose some or all of those additional funds. That could explain layoffs at some schools that have gained enrollment and even positions.

Little Village’s Multicultural Arts School and West Town’s Mancel Talcott School were also among schools with the highest layoff rates, with about 12% and 10% of teachers laid off, respectively.

These schools are small to mid-size: Multicultural Arts had an enrollment of 225 last fall, while Talcott served 425 students.

Politically, the district has faced considerable pressure to keep smaller schools open, and moving forward, a new law makes any sort of consolidation or closure in the next few years unlikely. The law that establishes school board elections for Chicago for the first time also contains a provision that, from 2022 on, blocks CPS officials from closing or consolidating schools until elected board members take their seats in 2025.

As federal pandemic relief dollars hit the district this fall, some education finance researchers say they’re wary that school districts could spread resources too thin across schools that are losing students. Marguerite Roza, who runs Edunomics Lab, a school finance think tank at Georgetown University, says declining enrollment trends are first triggered by demographic changes or competing school choices, not by cuts to staff.

“A case could be made that there’s a lot going on right now and losing staff in the middle of this jumble — especially if we think enrollment will return — may not be the greatest idea,” Roza said. “At the same time, if you’re going to use one-time federal money for staffing and the kids aren’t going to return, you just push out that pain.”

“It’s not going to be there.”

At King, six teachers were laid off in June — about 15% of the school’s teaching roster at the time. Students there said returning to a new slate of educators shook their sense of stability and made them feel less connected to their classrooms.

Laila, the King senior, has taken classes with former King dance teacher Kahphira Palmer for three years. She calls dancing with Palmer “a lunch break, but not a lunch break.” It was a space where she could express herself and process life: Palmer led Laila and her classmates to choreograph pieces that affirmed their identities and reckoned with ongoing injustices, such as police brutality.

“I wanted to go out big this year — like, with a bang,” Laila said. “I wanted Ms. Kahphira to teach me all she knew this year, and choreograph my senior piece.”

Over the course of the pandemic, Laila also found herself going to Palmer for support in other courses.

Laila started her junior year with D’s and F’s and ended it with A’s, B’s, and C’s. She said she owes much of her success to Palmer’s mentorship. Palmer sharpened her own math skills to help Laila pass algebra, and connected the student with resources online so she could pass the class.

“One thing people need to understand about students and their dance teachers is that it’s like having another parent,” Palmer, who was hired this summer to teach at Carver Military Academy this year, said. “When you’re a dance teacher, you’re molding your students into something.”

In the last week of summer, Laila didn’t even know what would happen in her classes this fall. Less than a week before the start of school, her schedule still hadn’t been posted.

“I signed up for Dance 4. It’s not going to be there. I signed up for Journalism 2. It’s not going to be there,” Laila said before the year started. “I didn’t even go to registration. I didn’t know how things were going to go down.”

Soon, it will be time for Laila to start sending in college applications. But with both her dance teacher and her journalism teacher gone, Laila is no longer sure where to turn for teacher letters of recommendation.

Talks between Chicago and its teachers union are stalled — but teachers will still return for first day of school

2021-08-18T21:44:33+00:00

With less than two weeks left before the school year starts, negotiations between Chicago Public Schools and the Chicago Teachers Union are stalled. But whether or not the two groups can negotiate a reopening deal, teachers will still return to classrooms for the first day of school on Aug. 30, CTU president Jesse Sharkey said at a Wednesday press conference.

“We’re going into the school year, but we’re going into it without the safety provisions that would give us the confidence that we really feel like we need,” Sharkey said. “So we’re going to continue fighting.”

The union this summer has pressed the district to grow its vaccination program, expand social distancing guidelines from three feet back to six feet, clarify rules for student testing, and increase testing availability. The union also wants metrics for pandemic spread that would trigger school closures, among other safety measures to protect against the highly contagious delta variant.

In a statement, CPS spokesperson James Gherardi called the CTU’s demands “unscientific” and said the district is committed to the “health and safety of our students and staff.”

“All of the district’s health and safety protocols are in alignment with the health and safety guidelines recommended by the CDC, IDPH and CDPH, and in some cases go beyond them,” Gherardi said.

Nearly all CPS students will return to full-time in-person learning this fall, in line with a state board of education resolution. The district is offering a Virtual Academy for students with specific medical conditions, but signups are low, in part due to a lack of communication about the Virtual Academy’s setup. Some parents are organizing to advocate for expanded remote learning options, but the district has doubled down on its plan to limit virtual learning.

Chicago Department of Public Health commissioner Allison Arwady insisted last week that it is safe for students to return to classrooms, even as the city’s case count hits its highest level in months, most recently seeing a 4.5% positivity rate and 444 daily confirmed cases.

Chicago last Friday announced that all Board of Education employees who don’t have a medical exception must be fully vaccinated by Oct. 15 or be ineligible for work until they submit proof of inoculation or exemption. The CTU said that it welcomed the mandate and urged the district to commit to additional safety and recovery measures before schools reopen. The district has also committed to universal masking in school buildings and three feet of social distancing whenever possible.

Previous efforts to reach pandemic reopening deals have brought the district and the union to heated stalemates before.

Tense negotiations between the union and the district stretched for weeks last winter, delaying reopening for elementary and middle schoolers and establishing what experts called the most detailed, comprehensive framework for reopening nationally.

Teachers also refused to report to classrooms for two days in April before reaching a high school reopening deal that included a student vaccination plan, limits on the amount of time students spent in-person at the district’s biggest high schools, and accommodations for staff members who are medically unable to work in person or are caregivers for at-risk relatives.

But right now, teachers aren’t gearing up for an action that would delay the start of school, Sharkey said.

“If this winds up being a runaway surge where people are getting sick, being hospitalized, and dying … we’re not going to simply sit there and participate in mass spreader events inside of our schools,” he said. “We will take action before that happens.”

Amid stalemate with teachers union, Chicago mayor vows to press ahead with reopening schools

2021-01-30T03:57:52+00:00

Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Friday that Chicago plans to forge ahead with reopening prekindergarten through eighth grade classrooms Monday, even as the city failed to reach an agreement with its teachers union.

If the two sides don't come to a deal over the weekend, the district will expect teachers to report to work in person next week — likely setting the stage for a teacher strike.

District and union leaders said they have made substantial headway toward reaching an agreement this week, but it wasn’t enough to get a deal. The dispute has thrown Chicago’s second wave of reopening schools into disarray, thrusting families into uncertainty about what school will look like next week. Elementary school teachers, who were to set up their classrooms this week, instead continued to work remotely.

“Another day has passed, and the [Chicago Teachers Union] has not agreed to anything,” a visibly frustrated Lightfoot said Friday night. “We can get it done tonight, tomorrow, Sunday — but we need to get it done.”

Lightfoot said the district asked the union to put in writing issues on which the two sides have agreed in principle by 9 p.m. Friday, but it did not receive such a document. But the teachers union shot back on social media and in a statement, saying that it was the mayor who had “wrecked” a fledgling agreement Friday night.

“The educators in the room were close to reaching an agreement,” the union’s statement said. “The boss stepped in at the 11th hour and blew it to pieces.”

But the union also said it will stay at the bargaining table, noting it has a “willing partner” in the district’s negotiations team.

Last weekend, 61% of the union’s members voted against returning to campus in person — and to go on strike if the district moves to lock them out of their virtual classrooms. The district has said such a walkout, which would come 15 months after the union went on strike during the most recent contract talks, would be illegal. With no agreement within reach Tuesday night, the district suspended in-person learning for about 3,200 preschool and special education students who had returned to their classrooms Jan. 11.

Lightfoot said the district will take “further action” if educators do not report to work on Monday, but she declined to offer specifics or confirm the district intends to lock out educators and dock their pay.

“I will not speculate on what might happen when I am focused very intensely on getting a deal done,” she said.

Lightfoot acknowledged she and district CEO Janice Jackson have not attended the negotiations, saying they have to see progress to join the talks. Jackson said “thousands” of teachers have been coming into schools this week to set up their classrooms.

Back in December, about 70,000 students in kindergarten through eighth grade, or about a third of students in those grades, indicated they wanted to return to school buildings for a blend of in-person and virtual instruction. Based on student turnout during the first wave of reopening — only about 60% of students expected to return actually showed up — that number likely will be smaller.

District leaders said earlier this week that they presented to the union a comprehensive new proposal that could serve as the cornerstone of a deal. That includes doubling the frequency of COVID-19 testing for school-based staff to twice a month, offering surveillance testing for students learning in person, prioritizing vaccinations for educators and support staff in neighborhoods with the highest rates of the coronavirus, and suspending in-person learning should the positivity rate of school-based tests reach 3%.

The union has said gaps remain on some key issues, such as exactly which employees should receive work-from-home accommodations because they or a family member is at elevated risk for serious coronavirus complications. The district has said it will grant some accommodations to educators and support staff who are caregivers of people at a higher risk of becoming seriously ill. But the union is pushing to expand the number of work-from-home permissions, including for staff members who live with immunocompromised family members.

The two sides are also at odds about what testing positivity rate should be used to revert the entire district to remote learning: The union wants school closed if the city hits a 3% coronavirus positivity rate, while the district wants to use the test positivity rate of its own surveillance testing.

The city’s COVID-19 positivity rate, which has dipped in recent weeks, remains at 6.4%.

Lightfoot again cited a decline in district enrollment and an increase in failing grades and absenteeism this school year as arguments for moving swiftly to reopen schools. She argued again that the district has taken extensive safety measures to rein in coronavirus transmission on its campuses.

“We will not abandon negotiations,” she said. “We will stay at the table as long as it takes.”

Chicago cancels in-person classes Wednesday as teachers announce walkout

2021-01-27T01:32:12+00:00

With hopes dashed for a late-night deal, Chicago teachers will defy district orders to report to campuses Wednesday, forcing the school district to suspend in-person learning for 3,200 prekindergarten and special education students.

The move throws Chicago’s efforts to reopen schools to more students into disarray. If the district responds with disciplinary action against teachers, it would trigger a strike in the nation’s third largest school district, canceling school for 340,000 students.

Chicago Public Schools said the district “had no choice” but to ask all students to return to remote learning beginning Wednesday. Officials said that earlier in the day, they proposed a new round of health and safety measures, including doubling testing frequency for school-based staff to twice a month, offering surveillance testing for in-school students, prioritizing vaccinations for in-person teaching staff in neighborhoods with the highest COVID-19 rates, and suspending in-person learning should the positivity rate of school-based tests reach 3%.

But it wasn’t enough to reach a deal. Major gaps remain on vaccination timelines, the amount of surveillance testing of school staff, and which educators should get accommodations for health and family reasons.

For now, officials said they still planned to reopen schools to a broader group of kindergarten through eighth graders next Monday. But with multiple issues unresolved, hope appeared to dim for the 70,000 students who expect to resume in-person learning.

In a statement, the union called for a mediator to help resolve months of gridlocked negotiations.

Two strikes in two years?

Mayor Lori Lightfoot said she was disappointed that an agreement with the city’s teachers union remained elusive and warned of profound disruption to the district brewing for the second time in two years. The Chicago Teachers Union staged an 11-day strike in 2019 just months after Lightfoot took office.

“This instability and chaos serves no one, and least of all our children,” Lightfoot said. “Least of all our families.”

She cited “three weeks of daily evidence that our schools are safe.” City leaders acknowledged that there have been about 60 cases of students and employees testing positive for the coronavirus since the district started its phased reopening earlier this month. But they said in the overwhelming majority of cases, the district’s safety protocols had prevented in-school transmission of the virus.

The district’s CEO, Janice Jackson, said she believes her district’s safety plan goes beyond any across the country that she has seen.

“We believe our latest proposal to the union can serve as a foundation to a deal,” she said.

Parents appear divided. Some support the union’s push to delay reopening until teachers are vaccinated or more work accommodations are granted. Others are part of an increasingly vocal contingent who are concerned about the impact on students’ mental health and academics and are pushing for the reopening to proceed as planned. Some are caught in the middle, privately lamenting the instability but publicly staying mum at the risk of getting shamed on social media or causing friction with their children’s teachers or principals.

Still, fewer than a fifth of prekindergarten and special education students who need moderate to intensive support returned to in-person learning this month — a development the union has held up as evidence that families remain unconvinced by the district’s safety measures.

Failure at the bargaining table

There are many unknowns, chief among them how Chicago Public Schools will respond to the union’s labor action. The district has said it considers the move an “illegal strike” because it would cancel in-person learning, but taking the issue to labor court to weigh the legality of a strike can be a long process.

Earlier this month, the district “locked out” some teachers who didn’t report to in-person work, but it waited several days to do so, and the number of teachers denied access to their online classrooms fluctuated over the first weeks of reopening. Of the 3,800 teachers who returned to campuses, the district locked out just under 3%, or about 100 teachers.

Both sides laid out the ongoing sticking points in negotiations Tuesday. Whether educators should receive both vaccine doses before returning remained one of the biggest issues in dispute.

Asked why the city does not simply move teachers to the front of the vaccination line, however, Lightfoot said that would be unfair to frontline workers, including those who work in public transit and the city’s libraries, who have been reporting to work.

“How do we say to those folks, ‘You have to go to the back of the line?’” she said.

The district said it had stepped up its offer earlier in the day. Officials said they expanded accommodations for teachers who requested them for health reasons and were offering schools additional options to address gaps in the number of teachers reporting to in-person work. But they did not provide numbers. Of the 7,000 teachers expected to return in the first reopening wave, about 46% received accommodations.

For the first time, the district also included a plan for rapid tests for students and spelled out specific metrics that would determine when individual schools would revert back to remote learning.

Lightfoot also said she is “all for” mediation. She cautioned that the strife would hurt the district’s reputation in the long run — and would undermine efforts to improve the city.

“We won’t get there, ever, with this happening. I hear you, parents. I see your comments on social media. I understand the frustration. We are doing everything we can to make sure we get this deal done,” she said.

The union, meanwhile, said it would continue pushing for safety metrics that it felt best protected teachers returning to in-person work, including a request for all staff to be vaccinated before returning to classrooms, weekly testing, and more telework accommodations for teachers with high-risk family members.

“We are willing to keep teaching, but CPS has said they will lock us out,” said union president Jesse Sharkey in a statement, noting that a broader group of educators would become eligible for vaccinations at the end of February. “We are willing to keep negotiating, but CPS has refused to back down from insisting that 80% of educators and support staff … in every elementary school be back in class on Feb. 1 to serve less than 20% of the students.”

Negotiations with the district, union leaders said, were akin to a dysfunctional marriage, with “a spouse agreeing to marriage counseling only if the other party first concedes the spouse has the right to do whatever they want in the relationship.”

Chicago teachers vote to defy district orders and stay remote, thwarting reopening

2021-01-24T18:40:24+00:00

A majority of Chicago’s teachers, clinicians and paraprofessionals voted to defy district orders to report to school buildings on Monday, throwing the school district’s reopening efforts into disarray.

The move, which the district has warned is an “illegal strike,” could bring most in-person learning to a halt in Chicago. Union leaders rejected the idea that the move constitutes a strike, noting that teachers plan to continue teaching virtually.

To allow more time for negotiation, district leaders said Sunday they would push back the date teachers return to buildings to Wednesday, giving the two sides more time to discuss reopening without the widespread disruption some feared. Educators for kindergarten to eighth grade previously had been told to return Monday.

District officials said Sunday the two sides “agree on far more than we disagree.”

It does not change the timeline for a broader return of elementary school students, planned for Feb. 1. Prekindergarten and special education staff already reporting to buildings will continue to do so, the district said.

Still, the back-and-forth doesn’t eliminate the possibility of a strike altogether.

“Tomorrow, we choose to work safely and remotely — together,” the union said in a statement Sunday. “If we are locked out by the mayor and CPS, then the choice to strike is theirs, not ours.”

About 3,200 prekindergarten and special education returned to school campuses two weeks ago — fewer than the district expected — and another 70,000 students in kindergarten to eighth grade are expected to return Feb. 1. A second wave of teachers had been called in to prepare classrooms starting Monday.

The union said 71% of its members voted in favor of a resolution that rejects the district directive to report to in-person work on Monday. The affirmative vote also sets in motion a potential strike if the district responds to a walkout with disciplinary action against the teachers. About 86% of teachers participated in the vote.

The union has said its goal is a written agreement with the district over working conditions.

The vote unfolded as Chicago Public Schools released new plans to prioritize teacher vaccinations at four sites starting in February. Vaccine supply has proven a challenge for public officials in every state. District leaders said that, because of supply issues, it could take months to arrange vaccinations for 40,000 employees.

The vote didn’t clear the legal boundary of 75% of members in favor required for a formal strike. But the union said that threshold didn’t count in this case because they were weighing an unfair labor strike. They set the vote margin at 60%, a number the district has challenged.

The announcement throws into chaos the second stage of the district’s reopening plan by creating major staffing uncertainty. Thousands of teachers, and some 70,000 students, are expected to return to school over the next two weeks.

Chicago Public Schools came out firmly against the plan last week, warning teachers in a letter that refusing to report to school buildings Monday would constitute an “illegal strike.”

During a Friday press conference to announce the start to the district’s push to vaccinate employees, schools chief Janice Jackson declined to say how the district would respond to a boycott of in-person teaching. She stressed again that the district considers such a move unlawful and would handle it accordingly, but balked at spelling out the district’s “legal strategy.”

“That’s a strike; that’s not a lockout,” she said when asked specifically if the district will block teachers who opt to work virtually out of their online classrooms.

Some schools have told families they are making plans to staff classrooms with non-union members to keep them open for students.

But Jackson also said a beefed-up district negotiations team will continue talks with the teachers union through the weekend.

Special education classroom aides, lunch workers and security guards, represented by SEIU Local 73, will be expected at work Monday. The local’s contract includes a no-strike clause, but in the past, those staff have refused to work in conjunction with teachers in other labor disputes.

The district has said it wants to hire 2,000 retired teachers and support staff to help fill in gaps, but has not yet filled all those positions.

The district insisted last week that an agreement with the teachers union is “within reach,” and union leaders agreed, but neither have released a draft agreement or a timeline for such a document.

In a letter to teachers, Matt Lyons, the district’s chief talent officer, expressed concern about the effect of a walkout on students who have already elected to return. “This vote would cancel in-person learning for the tens of thousands of students who asked to return — and the thousands of pre-K and cluster students who are already learning safely in classrooms,” he said.

But union leaders pushed back strongly on the district’s use of the word “strike“ and who was ultimately responsible if a work stoppage happened.

“Our members didn’t vote on a strike. They (are voting) to remain in remote learning to mitigate disaster,” said Stacy Davis Gates, the union’s vice president. “The only person who can cause a stoppage is the mayor, and CPS, if they lock our members out,” referring to the district’s decision to cut off access to email and remote learning software to about 100 educators who refused to report to campuses in the first reopening wave.

Parent surveys from December showed about 1 in 3 students planned to return when campuses reopened for pre-K and special education students this month and for K-8 students in February.

District numbers shared Friday showed that about 3,250 Chicago students returned to in-person classes in the first week of January — 60% of the attendance officials had expected.

In Chicago, teachers with children less likely to get permission to work from home

2021-01-20T03:26:26+00:00

Three of the four educators on Catherine Dalber’s preschool team at Lawndale Community Academy are mothers to school-age children. Through a formal request process established by Chicago Public Schools late last fall, each woman asked to continue working from home when school buildings reopened.

The district denied all three requests, Dalber said.

Those teachers weren’t isolated situations. In Chicago, only 1 in 10 teachers who asked for a child-care accommodation that would allow them to continue working remotely received such permission, according to Dec. 29 data provided by Chicago Public Schools.

In the Chicago Teachers Union’s high-pitched labor dispute with the district, the denial of remote-work requests, and failure to respond to some, have become a flash point.

“Chicago Public Schools leaves no wiggle room for people to be human beings,” said Dalber, who has a National Board certification and is a mother of three. “When we were surveyed (late last fall on work accommodations) by CPS, it seemed that we had a choice — that they were going to take into account our family needs. Then they turned around and denied the vast majority of us.”

As districts reopen school buildings and while the pandemic continues, officials have grappled with when to grant teacher requests to work from home.

Chicago allowed teachers to submit requests based on their own medical needs, the medical issues of someone in their home, or child care needs. Of the 7,000 teachers and paraprofessionals the district called back to classrooms to teach prekindergarten and special education, officials originally said 2,000, or about 33%, asked for accommodations.

Although the district acknowledged the numbers have shifted as it allowed more teachers to work at home and schools changed their plans, Chicago still expected 54% of pre-kindergarten and special education teachers to show up on campus this week. Because hundreds failed to swipe in or failed health screening, the actually percentage is likely to be lower.

When it came to exemptions, teachers seeking medical accommodations were more likely to see them granted. In fact, teachers who themselves have medical conditions and applied for accommodations had them granted 100% of the time, in compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act, the district said.

Only 21% of those requesting an exemption because they live with someone who has a complex medical issue won permission to work from home, according to the December data.

Some teachers who were denied exemptions reluctantly reported to buildings. Others took unpaid leave. A small group continued to work remotely, defying requests to report to buildings, and last week, the school district remotely locked out approximately 100 of them from their classes.

Among them were several teacher parents, some of whom said they were still waiting on a formal determination from school officials on their request.

Speaking last week at a union event, Marina Ruiz, a special education classroom assistant at Jorge Prieto Math and Science Academy, said she was locked out while waiting for her accommodation request to be approved. She found it doubly frustrating because all of her students had chosen to remain remote, but the district still demanded that she return to the campus. Ruiz also is caring for a mother in hospice.

“All of my students have continued with remote learning. There’s no reason for me to be in the building,” said Ruiz.

One speech pathologist, who did not want to be named for fear of retaliation, also is still waiting for the district to respond to her request. Her first request was denied, but then the district reached out and asked her to sign an affidavit. She has not heard anything since. The parent of a toddler and a 4-month-old baby, she has taken unpaid leave for now, which offers her no job protection.

“I want to continue working through telework,” she said, describing her options. “If there is a vaccine, I’d go back to work immediately.” (Chicago’s chief public health official, Dr. Allison Arwady, said Tuesday that the city will enter the next vaccination phase starting Monday, and that that phase will prioritize teachers likely starting sometime in February.)

Although tens of thousands more teachers are expected to report on Monday, the district has not yet released accommodation data for that next wave.

Asked Tuesday at a press conference about the child care accommodations, schools chief Janice Jackson said that the school district gave teachers with school-age children the option of sending their own children to campuses four days a week, instead of the two-day in-person week offered to K-8 families.

“We are providing an alternative, in that our schools are providing in-person learning throughout the week,” she said. “There are some individuals with extenuating situations, and the district has been flexible. But where we have a solution, teachers should avail themselves of it.”

For some teachers, that option causes other complications.

Dalber believes sending her two elementary-age children to school four days a week appears to double her family’s risk, by exposing them to two different groups of children. She also has a younger child to consider and a caregiver for that youngster who is high risk.

Adding to her ire: In the under-enrolled school where she teaches, Dalber has only three preschoolers on her roster — all continuing to learn remotely.

“I’m not against there being a plan,” said Dalber, who reported to her campus this week. “I don’t trust this plan.”

Diane Castro, a pre-kindergarten teacher at Lorca Elementary with 14 years of classroom experience, said last week that despite teaching being “all she ever wanted to do,” she was starting to think otherwise. She has two children.

“Who is supposed to care for them,” she asked, “while I’m at work?”

Among the Chicago Teachers Union’s demands: no to ‘simultaneous instruction’

2020-12-11T00:41:47+00:00

With less than a month before some Chicago teachers could return to school buildings, the teachers union has said it rejects the district’s plan for “simultaneous instruction.”

The union also is calling for the city to set a 3% positivity threshold for reopening decisions. Above that rate, Chicago Public Schools would return to all-remote instruction.

The union released its list of demands Thursday, and it’s the most detailed look yet at what it would take to get union leaders to support reopening schools. The list heralds a looming clash between the district and union ahead of Jan. 4, when the first round of teachers are expected to return to buildings.

Despite months of negotiations, the two sides have failed to reach a written agreement. The union has accused the district of not bargaining in good faith, while the district has said the union hasn’t brought forward concrete proposals. The intensity of the conflict is reminiscent of last fall, when teachers walked out on an 11-day strike after weeks of stalled negotiations.

In New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio recently abandoned his threshold — 3% positivity over a seven-day range — after a brief school shut down and concerns from parents that the rate was arbitrary.

Some of the Chicago union’s demands — like a rejection of “simultaneous instruction,” during which teachers instruct in-person students and remote students at the same time — are likely to be more contentious than others. The approach has fast become a fixture of the return to school buildings nationally, but educators say it can be difficult, and that teachers need significant support to do it successfully.

In a statement on the union’s demands, a Chicago Public Schools spokesperson said “CTU is seeking to reduce instructional time for students and tie reopening to arbitrary standards that are not based on actual public health recommendations.”

Even as the district and union continue to meet regularly, district leaders said they don’t expect to have a written agreement with the union ahead of January’s reopening, and they plan to press ahead without it.

Among the union’s other demands:

A 3% test positivity threshold to reopen schools. District leaders have not set a positivity threshold for reopening, but said they will put school reopening plans on hold until the case-doubling metric hits 18 days.
A shutdown of school sites if a local community is above 3%. Currently, some Chicago neighborhoods, such as Belmont Cragin, clock in at a weekly positivity rate of 21%.
Testing of all staff on a rotating basis, with about 25% of educators tested weekly, and targeting high positivity areas. Under pressure from the union, Chicago Public Schools said in November it would offer random COVID-19 testing, not just tests to symptomatic individuals as it had previously planned. The city, district leaders said, will provide the district with 30,000 rapid tests to aid in that effort — but it would need a regular supply to meet the union’s demands.
Creation of a CTU-CPS Joint Committee on COVID-19 that includes independent experts.
School-level safety committees that include union delegates.

The union also listed specific demands around improving remote learning. It wants the school district to reduce screen time by one hour a day. Students would engage in individual activities during that time, and teachers would use the added hour for preparation and professional development.

The list of demands also includes some efforts toward rent support for families and additional counselors in schools in lieu of police officers, but it does not offer additional details.

Read the full list of demands here.

With a reopening date set, will Chicago teachers come?

2020-12-09T23:40:26+00:00

The first wave of teachers are expected to return to Chicago’s public schools in the new year, but Erin Young isn’t sure yet if she’ll be among them.

Remote learning has been difficult for her students at Luther Burbank Elementary on the Southwest Side. But COVID-19 could be deadly for Young, who is in a high-risk category and, she fears, for some of her students with severe disabilities.

“I have struggled with the decision,” said Young, who teaches special education cluster students from kindergarten to second grade. “I’m getting a lot of pressure from my family” not to go in.

Empty of students since March, Chicago’s public schools are moving again to reopen their doors. The district has announced staggered reopening dates for students in kindergarten to eighth grade starting in January. But among the biggest questions about reopening is this: How many teachers will return next year?

The answer depends on how many individual teachers request health accommodations or unpaid leave. It also hinges on the outcome of the increasingly tense relationship between the school district and the city’s teachers union. Union leaders have shown they are willing to press their case in the labor court system and the court of public opinion, filing labor grievances and calling for car caravan protests about reopening plans. But some critics say they also haven’t clearly outlined the specific conditions in which they would support a return to school buildings.

The intensity of the conflict is reminiscent of last fall, when teachers walked out on an 11-day strike over pay raises and hiring more social workers and nurses.

Now district leaders say the question of whether to reopen schools is no longer up for discussion. They don’t expect to have a written agreement with the union ahead of January’s reopening, and they plan to press ahead without it.

“Our desire always is to have an agreement with the union on how we educate kids,” schools chief Janice Jackson told Chalkbeat this month. “But I don’t see that on horizon anytime soon.”

The union, meanwhile, this week filed an appeal in labor court to stop reopening altogether until there is a written agreement on safety protocols around reopening, and could weigh a strike vote timeline in coming weeks.

The dispute has left Chicago teachers like Young wondering what to do — take an unpaid leave, prepare for a labor action, or plan for a return to school buildings.

“The stakes are so high,” said Young, who wants more guidance about how to teach students with disabilities and enforce social distancing or following behavior rules. She worries about the health of her students who are at higher risk.

She’s not alone. Sean Eichenser, an eighth grade teacher at an elementary school on the Northwest side, said he applied for a health-related accommodation to avoid returning to in-person work. He is now anxiously counting down the days until Feb. 1, when K-8 students are expected to return. “I keep looking at my calendar in February and thinking, ‘What are we doing?’” said Eichenser, who is worried COVID-19 rates will only get higher during the winter.

Others have said they will return to classrooms, even if they are nervous. “I’m a teacher, and it’s my job to take care of the kids and show up at school,” said Tim Daly, who teaches special education cluster students at Schurz High School in Irving Park. “I see the parents in my Zoom calls every day and they need help.”

Teachers had to inform the district by Monday if they would return to school buildings and whether they would need accommodations. An earlier round of “intent to work” forms showed 42% of teachers would return without seeking an accommodation. Meanwhile, in separate parent surveys for pre-kindergarten and special education families, 34% said they would choose an in-person learning option, the district said.

Those numbers, and how they line up, pose a logistical challenge for Chicago schools, which will need to juggle staffing, learning pods that alternate days under a hybrid plan, and a new landscape for teachers who will be expected to teach both in-person and remote students at the same time. The district has said it will expect teachers to report to buildings even if most of their class remains remote.

For teachers who apply for special exemptions, or take a leave, there are several options, but it’s unclear under what conditions, and staffing constraints, they’ll be given.

Employees who have medical conditions that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention consider high risk can apply to work remotely under the American with Disabilities Act, according to the district. But that’s no guarantee: “While they are considered a priority, not all ADA requests will be approved for full telework depending on the specific circumstances,” according to a district statement.

Teachers may also be eligible for leave through the Family and Medical Leave Act, or FMLA, public health emergency leave for educators who are struggling to find child care, or unpaid leave that may not come with any job protection.

Other cities give some sense of what reopening has looked like for teachers. In New York City, the union and school district came to an agreement on reopening, but the plan discouraged principals from assigning teachers to juggle learning pods and fully remote students, leading to a staffing crunch. The district gave roughly 21% of teachers permission to work from home for health reasons this fall.

In Washington D.C., some students returned to school in November but, without an agreement with the city’s teachers union, educators didn’t return and students were supervised by non-teaching staff.

Other teachers unions have also taken their fight to the courts, with mixed results. In Florida, the statewide teachers union fought the governor’s plans to mandate school reopening in August, but wasn’t able to gain traction to stop the move in court. Miami-Dade schools opened partially in the fall, but the teachers union questioned safety protocols, and some teachers said they had been denied health-related work accommodations.

As educators weigh their individual choices, Chicago’s teachers union is pushing forward on a few collective actions, all in an effort to stop the district’s reopening plan, which union officials have argued is unsafe amid double-digit COVID-19 rates.

Union officials have said a safety strike against reopening is on the table. “That’s certainly an option of last resort,” said union attorney Thad Goodchild. “But, you know, we’re talking here literally about a situation of life and death.”

The union has also voiced its concerns to parents at a recent virtual reopening forum, and is planning a car caravan next weekend to argue for improvements to remote learning in place of a return to school buildings.

But the union faces a battle. Many Chicago families have struggled with a screen-heavy remote learning schedule, particularly those with special education students, and school attendance has fallen. A strike vote would need the support of a majority of teachers, including many high school educators who are likely to continue remote teaching through the end of this school year. And while a labor court ruled in favor of the union in their efforts to push the district to offer remote work for school clerks, the decision has not had wide bearing on day-to-day operations.

At a town hall sponsored by the union last week, some people pressed union leaders to spell out the conditions under which they would support a return to campuses. Jesse Sharkey, president of the teachers union, said there “needs to be protocols and enforcement that we can trust.”

He called for the district to create school-level safety committees and a district-level committee with the power to make recommendations to the school board. “We need plans on testing, contact tracing, and vaccination, and that’s important because the communities we teach don’t have equal access.”

But Sharkey did not offer specific parameters, such as how much testing the union is seeking, what contact tracing protocols it would find acceptable, or how widely available a vaccine would need to be for the union to back the plan.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker has already said teachers won’t be in the first wave to receive doses from the state’s limited vaccine arsenal, and trials that would test the efficacy of vaccines for children haven’t yet started in the United States.

Educators like Erin Young, Sean Eichenser, and Tim Daly said they’re closely watching how discussions move forward between the union and the district and, for each of them, a different area of concern.

Young and Eichenser are focused on COVID-19 rates and how they’d handle a worst-case health scenario, either for themselves or their students.

Daly, meanwhile, said that while he may not have agreed with the decision to reopen, he still looks at Chicago’s reopening plan as a reasonable middle ground.

“The least risky thing in the world is to stay at home and never leave the house, the most risky thing is for everyone to go back to school without a lot of planning,” said Daly, who is already working on lesson plans for a return to school. “But there is a middle way.”

Cassie Walker-Burke contributed reporting.

Chicago is weighing whether to reopen schools. Can it move forward without the consent of its teachers?

2020-10-14T20:16:45+00:00

As Chicago weighs a school reopening plan for the year’s second quarter, one thing is conspicuously absent: an agreement with the city’s restive and powerful teachers union.

In some other large urban districts, such as Los Angeles and Boston, written agreements with unions have spelled out issues like contact tracing plans and learning hours in this unprecedented school year.

But though Chicago schools officials have met regularly with the Chicago Teachers Union representatives, they haven’t agreed on a road map or even on the need for one.

That lack reflects a deep, long-standing tension between the union and the city. The union does not want to return to buildings without a long list of safety measures and assurances, while the city has indicated it wants to open campuses where possible. The split adds to citywide uncertainty about how schools can reopen and function.

Now the union’s criticism of the district is growing more pointed, and more public, as leaders say they want to be brought in to Chicago’s reopening conversations. But the union has limited options.

If the city plans to reopen schools without winning union agreement, the union may file a grievance or labor lawsuit — which might not win district compliance. Or it may threaten to walk out, which risks heightening school disruption for a weary school community.

Still, the teachers union retains a veto power of sorts.

“If you want to reopen schools, you pretty much can’t do it without the consent of your teachers,” said Jon Shelton, an expert on labor and school districts at the University of Wisconsin in Green Bay. “The power teachers unions have does not just come from contracts. It comes from members being able to take concerted action.”

This week, schools chief Janice Jackson said again she worries that remote learning is deepening disparities facing low-income students and that virtual classrooms are not replacements for in-person learning. She promised a second-quarter decision “soon.”

With COVID-19 test-positive rates in Chicago hovering around 4.4%, and the recent coronavirus death of a first grade Chicago Public Schools teacher, the district must consider metrics that change daily and the reality that case counts are higher in some Black and Latino neighborhoods than in the city as a whole. Meanwhile, the reopening of classrooms in the Chicago suburbs and in urban districts such as Miami-Dade and Denver is putting pressure on district leaders.

Since the summer, the union and district have been bargaining twice a week, union leaders said.

District officials refused to say whether they are working toward a written agreement for a school reopening and how any discussions are going. But they have said they will continue to meet with the union.

Union representatives said that the two sides have agreed on small issues, particularly around remote learning. The union said the district is considering a union request to not tie observations, done for teacher evaluation, to job security. The sides are discussing remote learning practices, such as whether teachers must always have their cameras on, and what they’re able to record during live instruction, the union said.

Union leaders want the city to bargain the details of school reopening. They complain that the district has not proposed how to handle the second quarter, which starts Nov. 9.

They said district Chief Operating Officer Arne Rivera and second-in-command LaTanya McDade have not attended recent talks. Instead, the district has sent labor relations officer Caitlin Gerard, the Chief Talent Officer Matt Lyons, and an attorney with the Franczek law firm to bargain. To union leadership, that indicates that the district is not serious about the negotiations.

Union Vice President Stacy Davis Gates said that last summer the district informed the union of reopening plans only days, and sometimes just hours, before they were released publicly.

That has frustrated union leaders.

“I can’t make a decision without having something to react to,” Gates said. “What has changed since March that would make reopening safe? We need to be able to answer that.”

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign labor expert Bob Bruno said the law doesn’t obligate the school district to secure an agreement on its reopening plan, but the district must bargain any impact on teacher working conditions. From a labor relations standpoint, he said, it’s best practice to develop a plan collaboratively.

The biggest sticking point, experts said, may be in-person learning.

“I think these agreements are extremely important,” says Brad Marianno, a professor of education policy and leadership at the University of Las Vegas, who has been tracking about 250 district reopening agreements since spring. “Districts and unions need to get to the bargaining table to hammer out those details. It gives teachers a sense of stability if you have a plan in place that’s legally enforceable.”

An analysis by the National Council on Teacher Quality shows 15 out of the 21 large urban districts it tracked that had formal agreements in the spring also negotiated agreements for the fall.

What was in each of those agreements varied, said the council’s policy specialist Shannon Holston. “What is in those agreements is driven by local context —- for example, California districts have instructional minutes but others don’t get into that at all,” she said.

What’s the picture in other places?

Some large urban districts never crafted reopening agreements with their unions, Marianno said. Districts generally sought to preserve flexibility in an uncertain school year, he said.

Districts that did negotiate agreements haven’t gotten everything they wanted.

In Los Angeles, a memorandum of understanding specifies a school day running from 9 a.m. to 2:15 p.m., with Monday largely dedicated to teacher preparation; the district initially had pushed for teachers logging on to live classes from their empty classrooms.

The Chicago Teachers Union has held up the Los Angeles agreement as a model of productive collaboration.

In St. Paul, Minnesota, the district had insisted on daily live instruction for students. Its union pushed back, and the agreement settled on “regular” contact.

“Districts are in a very, very difficult position in these negotiations,” said Marianno, noting that an impasse or a strike can severely disrupt learning after enormous upheaval.

Does having a plan promise a smooth reopening?

Having a plan is not a guarantee. In New York City, which has had bumps and turns in trying to reopen schools, the city managed to ink an agreement with the teachers union but its complicated promises created a staffing crisis that further delayed reopening.

In Chicago, the case of school clerks may indicate the rough road ahead.

After the district called in school clerks and technology coordinators, the union filed an unfair labor practice lawsuit. The union prevailed in the suit: The judge ruled that any work that could be done remotely should be done so, to ensure clerks’ safety.

While arbitration is binding, the district rejected the arbitrator’s findings and promised to appeal the ruling. The union said that response “flouted” the rules of arbitration.

Without an agreement, the arbitrator will issue a ruling on in-school work for clerks. Until then, the 1,000 school clerks and tech support staff at the center of the dispute are still going into school buildings, without an agreement regulating their working conditions.

Chicago Teachers Union sues Betsy DeVos and district over special education plans

2020-05-20T21:29:10+00:00

The Chicago Teachers Union filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday arguing that the government’s refusal to waive parts of its cornerstone disability rights law during the coronavirus pandemic has swamped special education teachers with paperwork.

The union, which named the city’s school board in the suit, said that the way Chicago Public Schools interpreted the law requires educators and school-based teams to essentially rewrite special education plans for as many as 70,000 students by the school year’s end. Union leaders said that’s a “physically impossible mandate” that diverts teachers from the already challenging task of serving students with special needs remotely.

The lawsuit criticizes how Betsy DeVos, the federal education secretary, has handled special education during the pandemic. Last month, DeVos decided not to recommend to Congress that school districts be given the option to waive key parts of special education law.

“We are looking for relief from onerous and unmeetable bureaucratic requirements,” said the union’s president, Jesse Sharkey. “What we need to be doing is having contact with our students.”

A spokeswoman for DeVos said the lawsuit is “nothing more than political posturing for a headline,” while a spokeswoman for Chicago Public Schools said the union did not properly characterize the situation.

The district said in a statement that its remote learning guidelines for special education do not require a wholesale rewriting of individualized education programs, or IEPs, the documents that spell out the services students with special needs are entitled to receive. Those guidelines just call on teachers to “make basic accommodations” to continue serving students under the unusual circumstances brought about by statewide school closures.

“Make no mistake: This lawsuit against the district is not about helping students,” said district spokeswoman Emily Bolton in the statement. “It’s about avoiding the necessary steps to ensure our most vulnerable students are supported during this unprecedented crisis.”

How to deliver special education services in a pandemic has become a flashpoint issue for educators and disability rights groups across the country. Advocates had feared the federal government might allow districts to ease protections for students with disabilities, but DeVos said in April that she would not, with a few exceptions. Still, some parents of children with disabilities have said they feel left behind as education has shifted online.

The teachers union suit this week states that the abrupt transition to remote learning amid the coronavirus outbreak has been especially taxing on students with special needs. It calls for the creation of a compensatory fund to pay for additional services, such as tutoring, therapeutic camps, and technology support.

Union leaders and educators said the district and federal government’s suggestions that teachers are using the lawsuit to shirk their responsibilities are deeply insulting at a time they said Chicago teachers and other professionals have gone out of their way to continue serving students. They said a lack of clear direction from the district and federal officials are making that job harder.

They said special education plans do need to be adjusted even if remote learning extends into the fall. But, they said, educators must get time and guidance from the district to accomplish what they described as a heavy lift.

Social worker Carolina Juarez-Hill said about the new remote learning plans, “We are trying to roll these out like an assembly line. We are trying to do it as quickly as possible because of the mandate.”

The union notes district guidelines require educators to review students’ special education programs and draft a plan to serve students remotely. The guidelines also say teachers have to hold a formal conference with parents or guardians to help draft the remote learning plans — a step that the union argues would create “anxiety and emotional distress” for parents during a challenging time.

The union says about 51,850 Chicago students have IEPs and another roughly 20,000 have other special plans, which cover non-instructional special accommodations such as those addressing food allergies.

After special education advocates filed a complaint in 2017 that Chicago systemically delayed or denied services to children with disabilities, the state school board placed the district under oversight. A monitor oversees the district’s special education efforts.

But the monitor has not yet issued a public accounting of how children with disabilities are faring in remote learning. Asked Wednesday for details on that by one of the state’s school board members, State Board of Education Superintendent Carmen Ayala said she’d provide an update at a future meeting.

Despite coronavirus uncertainty, Chicago school leaders move forward with $125 million budget boost

2020-04-28T19:38:45+00:00

Chicago will spend $125 million next school year to boost special education and low-enrollment schools and to add some of the nurses and social workers it agreed to in the latest union contract, officials said Tuesday.

The district, which offered a first draft of school-level budgets for the 2020-21 year on Tuesday, expects to present a balanced full-district budget this summer, thanks in part to about $205 million in federal emergency funding to help it face strain from the coronavirus pandemic and resulting school building closures. Chicago Public Schools must share some of that funding with private and charter schools, according to the federal government.

The spending plan presented Tuesday for individual campuses represents about 60% of the anticipated total district budget.

Still, schools chief Janice Jackson stressed the district cannot rule out the need to adjust its plan, as the longer-term effects of the coronavirus outbreak on state and district budgets become clearer.

“We are also cognizant of the reality we live in with COVID-19,” she said. “We will continue to monitor that.”

Asked Tuesday afternoon whether budget increases are prudent as revenue projections trend downward, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker said he didn’t know yet how coronavirus-related revenue shortfalls would impact schools. He said he was working with legislators to see “whether we will be able to increase education funding at all. But I hope that we will.”

The preliminary school spending plan comes amid questions about whether Pritzker will allow school campuses to reopen in fall or whether remote learning will continue. The governor over the weekend acknowledged that extended fall closures were a possibility.

On Tuesday, Chicago Public Schools leaders said they compiled this year’s budget in response to a community engagement process, initiated by Mayor Lori Lightfoot, to reconsider how Chicago divides up its $6.2 billion operating budget, about $3.8 billion of which was earmarked for individual schools in 2019-20.

More than a third of the slated $125 million increase — $44 million — will go to 255 schools in the form of so-called “equity grants,” which have previously been directed to campuses with shrinking enrollment. The money is intended to help those schools maintain or even bulk up programs with the aim of attracting more families.

That approach has raised questions about whether Chicago should continue to throw lifelines to its most struggling schools, since that comes at a cost to other schools. According to district enrollment data, 145 campuses this school year were less than half full.

Officials said Tuesday that they were broadening the definition of the grants to include schools in communities with a high “hardship index,” a metric that factors in poverty, employment, education levels, and other data. Schools can use the additional money to hire reading specialists, for instance.

New proposed funding includes $97 million to increase special education services, $18 million to expand free full-day pre-kindergarten, $13 million to hire more nurses and social workers, and $5 million to fund college and career programs at neighborhood schools.

“The school budgets we are releasing today are key to providing every student in the district with a high-quality education,” Jackson said.

District leaders touted the special education boost as the largest single-year funding increase for special education in the district’s history. Chief Education Officer LaTanya McDade said the district tweaked its approach to budgeting for special education to give schools more flexibility and reduce the need for “mid-year corrections.” That includes giving schools more opportunities to “round up” staff positions — for instance, budgeting for two teachers or aides when school numbers call for 1.2 full-time positions.

Officials with the Chicago Teachers Union voiced disappointment Tuesday that the district had not briefed them on the school budgets ahead of time. In a statement, union President Jesse Sharkey criticized the lack of detail about how the district will address the COVID-19 crisis in school budgets. He said an increase in funding for nurses and social workers falls short of a goal to place those professionals in each school, as the union has advocated.

Before the coronavirus pandemic hit, Chicago was in the first stages of rethinking how it allocates its school budgets, part of a campaign promise by Lightfoot to revamp how the district doles out funds.

A committee of board members, district leaders, and union organizers held public meetings to solicit budget input earlier this year.

Their recommendations, also released Tuesday, suggest that in the long term the district must significantly change how it divvies up funds. In the short term, the district said it owes schools more transparency on how budget decisions are made, and will sharpen its definition of equity.

Jackson said the district incorporated two of the group’s six recommendations this spring. One was using school neighborhood’s “hardship indexes” instead of just student demographics to drive added funding to schools. The district also tried to give principals more of a say in crafting their school budgets.

Jackson said the district is still considering the remaining recommendations. She said the committee and residents who took part in listening sessions rallied around a need to advocate more aggressively for additional revenue from the state. She added she has no intention to move away from budgeting based on student enrollment, noting that slightly more than 50% of schools’ budgets are based purely on enrollment.

She added, “If the pie is not big enough for everybody, we will continue to have those debates.”

Principals are expected to receive their budgets on Tuesday afternoon.

Two principals joined Jackson in a virtual press conference to praise their latest budget allocations. Zaneta Abdul-Ahad at Hampton Fine and Performing Arts Elementary in Ashburn said she was thrilled to see additional funding for two new full-day pre-kindergarten classrooms — long on the wish list of the school community.

Victor Iturralde at Solorio Academy High School said students and families in the school’s Gage Park neighborhood face “tremendous economic challenges,” and he welcomes a new $100,000 “equity grant” the school received to provide added stability.

“Our students and community need a little help leveling the playing field,” he said.

Samantha Smylie contributed reporting.

Goodbye As, Bs and Cs? Chicago Public Schools to revisit grading during pandemic

2020-04-22T20:39:32+00:00

A new grading policy is in the works in Chicago Public Schools, where officials are weighing calls by the teachers union and others to shift to a pass/fail approach.

The district stuck with letter grades at the end of its third quarter last week, even as some educators voiced concern about grading students only days after the formal start of remote learning in Chicago.

Echoing guidance from the state, the district had decreed that students’ grades could only improve during the weeks of learning at home — a nod to disparities in access to technology and other challenges that can make remote learning tougher for some students. But some teachers argued that inequities magnified by the coronavirus crisis nevertheless make any kind of grading problematic.

District officials told the district governing board Wednesday that they are reexamining the issue of grading in consultation with the Chicago Teachers Union. They said they are trying to strike a balance between keeping students and schools accountable, and giving priority to students’ social and emotional needs during the pandemic.

“I feel strongly we need to create a system of checks and balances,” said schools chief Janice Jackson, echoing the position of some educators who have argued that students need incentives to log on and complete assignments. About the new policy in the works, she said,“we’ll put together something that’s complex and meets the needs of everybody.”

The union head, Jesse Sharkey, who addressed the board virtually during a truncated version of its monthly meeting, said a pass/fail or credit/no credit approach makes sense, calling it “the only way to account for the disruption a global pandemic has caused.” Students could opt to receive a letter grade.

“We are going to lose a certain amount of academic progress, and that’s inevitable,” he said.

In response to later questions from board members, LaTanya McDade, the district’s chief academic officer, said Chicago is researching how other districts across the country are handling grading and talking with the union and others. She noted some students still need grades for their college applications, and some have received letters from colleges reminding them they need to maintain their grade point averages.

Some districts are allowing students to opt in to letter grades. In Denver, high school students now have a choice: For each class, they can decide whether they want to receive a letter grade or would prefer their transcript to show that they earned or did not earn credit for the course. No teacher can give a student an F. In New York, schools still grade assignments, but officials have emphasized “flexibility” — like allowing more make-up work and latitude around student attendance. Officials there have said they are also weighing other options, as Chicago is.

McDade said Chicago is sensitive to the steep hurdles to learning many of its students face; officials plan to keep putting a premium on supporting students’ social and emotional well-being.

But she said, “We want to make sure we respect and honor the hard work students are doing right now. We have to find some middle ground.”

Jackson said she does not want a “situation where anything goes and everyone gets a pass.”

If students put in the work, they should have a chance to improve their standing. “My argument is if 10 kids show up, teach the 10 kids that show up,” she said.

District officials also said they are working on a more sophisticated approach to tracking how many students are engaging with schoolwork and how; the district will also collect data on what schoolwork teachers are assigning.

Some board members signaled support for changes to the grading policy.

School board member Elizabeth Todd-Breland, a college professor, noted that her university campus has shifted to a model in which students can choose between credit/no credit or letter grades. She suggested that approach could make sense for the district as well.

“Of course learning continues; I get this message loud and clear,” she said.

But, she said, “Our young people are going through lots of different things.”

In an informal Chalkbeat poll posted on Twitter just as third-quarter grades were due, 26.8% said the district should move ahead with grading, 57.1% said it should reconsider, and 16.1% were undecided. All together, 112 people responded.

Chicago teachers vote to ratify new contract by wide margin

2019-11-16T04:21:06+00:00

Chicago teachers have voted overwhelmingly to ratify a new five-year agreement, the union said Friday, staving off fears that dissatisfaction with the compromise deal might prompt teachers to walk off the job again.

The final margin was 81% to 19%, with 80% of schools reporting late Friday. Teachers mostly voted in their schools by secret ballot Thursday, with some casting ballots Friday morning. Delegates collected paper votes at schools and delivered them downtown to union headquarters.

The contract agreement, reached at the end of an 11-day strike and approved by the union’s 700-member House of Delegates by a 60-to-40% margin, requires one final signoff: Chicago’s Board of Education will take up the measure Wednesday morning. The board is expected to pass the contract, which will cost the district about $115 million additional this school year.

Combined with a new agreement with Service Employees International Union Local 73 — which represents custodians, bus aides, and special education classroom assistants — the district’s annual $2.6 billion in union labor costs will swell by $137 million this school year.

The school board met this past week to hear about the financial implications of the agreements, and some members raised questions about how the district would pay for years two through five.

On Friday night on the fifth floor of union headquarters, two dozen volunteers and union staff counted green paper votes where teachers had anonymously checked a box for “yes” or “no.” School tallies were registered on large sheets on the wall.

Union President Jesse Sharkey, watching the vote being tallied Friday evening, said he thought contract passage was likely, even though there was dissent among the ranks.

“Do I feel like we got everything we deserved for the schools? No,” he said. “And I hope our members aren’t satisfied. I’m not happy that we gave up six days pay in order to get a nurse in every school. But I do feel proud of our union and what it accomplished, and I think our members feel proud that we really moved the needle on conditions in our schools.”

Since the strike ended, teachers have reported mixed feelings about the contract, which put the city’s new mayor, Lori Lightfoot, in an uncomfortable national spotlight just months into her term. The union said all along it wanted more than pay increases for its members and demanded that the school district, which is overseen by a board and school chief who are appointed by the mayor, invest millions more into additional staffing at schools, class size reductions, and pay raises for aides and clerks who also play critical roles in buildings and are generally low paid.

The union also attempted to use negotiations to pressure the mayor to support its legislative agenda, win more preparation time for elementary teachers, and enact a moratorium on school closings in a district with falling enrollment. But the district fought those initiatives back.

In the end, teachers succeeded in seeing hundreds more staff positions, from nurses to social workers to additional teachers for English learners, written into the contract. They also won substantial pay increases for aides and other support staff, with some immediate bumps of 9% a year. They also won a substantial pot of money, some $35 million a year, to be used for a committee that has jurisdiction over reducing overcrowding, most likely by supplying teachers’ aides.

Teachers themselves also earned a cost-of-living raise on top of the raises they already receive for experience and additional credentialing — 16% across five years. But that was the pay deal on the table before the walkout, and, after the 11-day strike ended with the city only agreeing to make up five days of instruction, teachers said they effectively lost the value of their raises by taking pay cuts for the days not paid.

Experienced teachers also reported dissatisfaction with fuzzy details over veteran pay and how raises for teachers with 14 years of experience or more will be parceled out. The union and district still have not reached agreement on whether the raises will be built into the salary schedule or issued as bonuses, Sharkey said Friday evening.

“I would have loved to have that worked out by now,” he said. “At the very worst, people are going to get some extra pay. At the best, we can do that in a way that actually increases the base (salary). We’re going to have to keep fighting with the board about that.”

On Wednesday, the school board will also vote on a revised 2019-20 school calendar that includes five make-up days from the strike. The district plans to reinstate days from part of Thanksgiving and winter break.

With less than a week before strike, Chicago sweetens offer to teachers; union calls it ‘insulting’

2019-10-11T23:57:30+00:00

Seeking to avoid a strike less than six months into her term, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Friday she had sweetened the city’s offer to teachers, pledging an additional $2 million to grow the pipeline of critical support staff and another $1 million to reduce class sizes.

In a 72-page offer made public Friday, she and schools chief Janice Jackson also committed to reducing health co-pays in the teachers’ medical plan and said they were dropping a controversial proposal that would give principals more control over how teachers spend their prep time.

The offer does not include additional money for teachers’ salaries. Lightfoot’s most recent pay offer has been a 16% cost-of-living increase across five years. The city’s latest proposal and a summary document are embedded below.

“All in all, our offer includes over 80 changes to the collective bargaining agreement on issues requested by the union,” Lightfoot and Jackson said in a joint statement. “We have bent over backwards to meet CTU’s concerns.”

The union quickly rejected the offer, saying it didn’t adequately address the dire needs for support staffing and smaller class sizes in schools. Those issues have been central sticking points in months of negotiations.

“If you agree that we need smaller class sizes, if you agree that we need a nurse in every school, a social worker in every school, then why won’t you put it in writing?” asked union political director Stacy Davis Gates, calling again for the mayor to place staffing demands in the contract. “Flexibility for the 90% students of color in Chicago has always meant: less, unequal and inequitable.”

In her press release Friday, Lightfoot accused the union of not bargaining in good faith and heading for a strike at all costs.

On the staffing offer, one of the more contentious areas of negotiations, the city offered an additional $2 million over five years to build a pipeline to provide more nurses, social workers and case managers for special education students — all hard-to-fill jobs.

City Hall and the Chicago Teachers Union have disagreed over committing in the contract to adding thousands of support staff positions the union has demanded. The city has pledged to add a smaller number, in the hundreds, across five years, in part because district hiring managers have documented a scarcity of candidates that they say thwarts more substantial staffing increases.

The union has argued the district must write the staff increases into the contract to ensure that new hires are fully licensed and their work is not contracted out to private companies.

In another concession, the district put in language that better protects counselors’ time so they can support students and not be tapped for other duties, such as filling in for absent teachers or supervising lunch or recess.

The union, however, lashed out at the district for ignoring a union request to hire case managers for every school to assist special education teachers in managing paperwork and services for students.

Read the full offer below.

Chicago teachers vote by wide margin to move toward strike

2019-09-27T03:30:00+00:00

Chicago teachers, clinicians and paraprofessional union members voted by a wide margin to authorize a strike, setting the stage for a walkout less than six months into Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s term. Educators could walk out as early as Oct. 7.

The union said 94% of its members voted in favor of a walkout.

With ballots in from 90% of schools late Thursday night, the vote meets the 75% threshold of support from all active union members required by state law.

“This is a clear signal from the members of the Chicago Teachers Union that we need the mayor and the Board of Education to address critical needs across our schools,” said union President Jesse Sharkey.

In a joint statement, Lightfoot and schools chief Janice Jackson said they had been bargaining for months “in a good faith effort to create an inclusive process” that took into consideration teachers’ concerns and ideas for improving schools. “We are committed to doing everything we can to finalize a deal that is sustainable for all Chicagoans and for our city’s future, that respects our teachers, and continues our students’ record-breaking success.”

The vote does not guarantee that teachers will strike, but the union can now announce a walkout date with 10 days’ notice. The union’s 700-member House of Delegates could vote on a proposed strike day at its next meeting on Oct. 2.

Meanwhile, negotiations will continue between the city and union. Sharkey said bargaining would resume on Friday.

The teachers’ contract with the district expired June 30.

Talks have stalled primarily over whether to write additional staff that the union is demanding into the contract or not. The two sides also haven’t agreed yet on class sizes, prep time, pay, health care, or the length of the contract.

The district said it is has put a generous pay raise on the table — a 16% raise over five years for teachers. Both of the city’s major newspapers have editorialized in favor of the district’s offer.

In the joint statement from City Hall and Chicago Public Schools, the mayor and schools chief said that they had put forth a pay deal that would make Chicago teachers “among the highest compensated in the nation” and had committed to increasing support staff.

“As the product of public school systems ourselves, we know firsthand how hard our teachers work, and we celebrate their engagement and tenacity during the bargaining process over these past months,” Lightfoot and Jackson said.

When announcing the results Thursday, Sharkey said that the vote was not just about pay and benefits. “Pay and benefits alone are not enough, we care deeply about the learning and working conditions in our schools,” he said. Sharkey reiterated the union’s demands for class size limits and for the city to lock in firm numbers of nurses, social workers, and special education positions in the contract.

Earlier in the week, Sen. Bernie Sanders attended a boisterous union rally in Chicago, helping bring national attention to the effort. The Illinois Federation of Teachers union issued a statement in support of the strike authorization vote on Thursday night.

During past teacher walkouts, the school district, park district, and YMCA have offered child care and free lunch for students affected by walkouts.

Chicago could see at least three school-related strikes in October. Besides district teachers, educators at Passages charter school also voted earlier this month to authorize a strike.

And Service Employees International Union Local 73, the union representing nearly 8,000 Chicago Public Schools support staff — whose work ranges from working with special education students to staffing metal detectors at school entrances — won a strike authorization vote last month. Those employees could also walk out in October, causing further disruptions at schools.

During the city’s last contract negotiations with the Chicago Teachers Union, in 2016, observers saw a strike as all but inevitable. But district officials made several concessions at the last minute, averting a full-fledged strike.

The city’s last full-fledged teacher strike was in 2012. That year, teachers walked off the job for the first time in 25 years.