The Chicago Teachers Union strike is over after 11 school days, and students will return to class on Friday.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced the end of the walkout after a lengthy closed-door meeting with CTU officials, resulting in an agreement that five days lost to the strike will be made up.
As of late Thursday, CPS has not yet determined when the five makeup days will be scheduled.
That issue arose as an 11th-hour glitch late Wednesday when, despite the union’s House of Delegates approving a tentative contract deal, the CTU said it was contingent on teachers being able to make up all the lost school days.
Lightfoot staunchly opposed that, and angrily said late Wednesday she was through negotiating. But she relented Thursday morning, saying she was available to talk about a compromise but wouldn’t accept “unilateral demands” from the union.
A lengthy meeting followed at City Hall with union President Jesse Sharkey, who was there with throngs of rallying union members.
The union ultimately agreed to accept a compromise to make up five school days. But leaders weren’t happy about it. They expressed frustration with the mayor for refusing to make up the full 11 days teachers have been on strike.
Union Vice President Stacy Davis Gates called it a “sad day” and criticized Lightfoot for taking “vengeance” on teachers and students.
“We have a better Chicago Public Schools as a result of the last 10 days,” Davis Gates said.
Sharkey said the last two weeks have been “tense” but added that “it’s not about me or the mayor. It’s about the members of the Chicago Teachers Union.”
Of those 25,000 union members, Sharkey said: “They don’t need to see me smiling with the mayor. In fact what they need to see is they need to see we have a tentative agreement, we now have a return to work agreement. … Frankly it’s been hard on teachers to be out this long, and it’s been hard on parents to be out this long. It’s been hard on our students.”And so I just didn’t feel like doing a celebration lap with the mayor right now,” he said. “It’s not what our members need to be looking at. That’s not what people in the city need to be seeing.”
Later, he added: “It’s not a day for photo ops or victory laps.”
Despite the late hiccup over the makeup days, union officials said they were overall pleased with what’s in the tentative agreement, while the mayor called it the most generous contract in CPS history.
Union officials said it wasn’t perfect but that they received many of their demands, including enforceable class size caps and a nurse and social worker in every school.
One of the bigger wins for the city was a five-year contract. The union has wanted a three-year deal, and also did not win the paid prep time it was seeking.
But Sharkey said the mayor “did the right thing” and kept her campaign promises.
Yet despite the end of the strike – which outlasted the latest major CTU work stoppage in 2012 by several days – the work to get a new union contract continues. Rank-and-file members must still vote to ratify the agreement, and the Chicago Board of Education must also sign off on the new deal.
Sharkey said there is work to be done to sell the deal to members and that he’s “not going to say it’s going to be a slam-dunk.”
In fact, technically, the union vote was merely to suspend the strike, with ratification pending.
Here’s what happened earlier in the day:
12:10 p.m.: ‘This is only the beginning’
After trekking laps around City Hall in the snow, those rallying in support of the CTU gathered in front of the Thompson Center, where a band played a lively rendition of “Hey Lori, I wanna know will you fund our schools.”
Standing on a ledge, CTU officer Maria Moreno thanked the teachers for standing up for CPS students.
“Now we ask that you take the tentative agreement, read it, share it with every member in your building, read every word and determine for yourself, is this the beginning of change in our public schools?” she said. “This is only the beginning.” — Marie Fazio
11:20 a.m.: ‘We mean business’
Bill Weeks, a special education teacher at Foreman Foreman College and Career Academy, said he was happy to see adjustments in the tentative agreement on items such as school nurses and social workers but believes it missed the mark on key issues, namely class size.
Despite a less than ideal agreement, he said the strike has been a positive movement, bringing together teachers from all over the city who face the same issues in their classrooms.
“We’re showing the city that we mean business,” he said. — Marie Fazio
11:15 a.m. CTU president arrives at mayor’s office to talk
Chicago Teachers Union President Jesse Sharkey arrived at the mayor’s office. Asked whether he was willing to compromise on the 11 days of missed school, Sharkey said he was arriving to speak to the mayor about a deal but didn’t elaborate. — Gregory Pratt
11:05 a.m. ‘Who’s got the power?’
Aaron Talley stood at the corner of Randolph and Clark, watching his fellow teachers gathered around City Hall in the blowing snow.
“Well, obviously I’m getting tired,” he said. “I would rather be working with my kids, but at the same time I believe in labor power.”
To him, it seemed like the public narrative about the contract negotiations indicated that teachers were undeserving of certain things. “This is what we do for the kids,” he said.
He was most concerned about class sizes, saying he can feel the effect when even one student is added to his class.
Just after 11 a.m., the crowd continued doing loops around City Hall as they chanted for Mayor Lori Lightfoot to give in on making up days lost in the strike.
“Who’s got the power?” a woman yelled into a megaphone.
“You got the power,” the crowd chanted to each other. — Elvia Malagon
11 a.m.: School custodian watching anxiously for school to resume
Despite not knowing if she’ll be able to afford future rent, Tashanna Johnson continues to be fully behind the teachers.
Johnson, 44, is a custodial worker for Morgan Park High School and a member of SEIU Local 73. Her last two-week paycheck of just over $1,000 after taxes has been keeping her afloat, but she’s concerned about the future. She had to apply for a loan this week to try help pay for next month’s rent — which is $1,350 in Englewood — despite not wanting to take a hit to her credit score.
“If I don’t get approved for the loan, I don’t know what I’m going to do,” she said.
She’s ready to go back to work Friday so her next paycheck on Nov. 8 will have some more hours, she said.
For her job, Johnson wakes up at 4 a.m. to start at 6 a.m. She cleans 12 classrooms and sweeps and mops four staircases before 7:30 a.m. She goes through the bathrooms to clean and make sure they’re stocked. Throughout the day, she takes service calls then at lunch she checks garbage cans and picks up.
She loves her students and fellow staff but people may not think about who cleans their building, she said. “Sometimes, we just want to be recognized,” Johnson said.
With the holidays coming soon and the cold, Johnson knows she’ll have to buy her youngest, a 17-year-old, boots. Then there’s food for Thanksgiving and presents for Christmas. Every day that passes without a paycheck makes her nervous. But because the teachers were there for her, she said, she’ll be there for them.
“I’m trying to keep my head above water,” she said. “I’m just praying to God.” — Paige Fry
10:53 a.m.: Will CPS have to add days to the end of the year?
Chicago Public Schools will have to open school for three days at the end of June — or add days elsewhere in the school calendar — to make up for days lost to the teacher strike, if the strike is resolved Thursday. Read more here.
10:30 a.m.: CTU president says he’s willing to talk to mayor
CTU President Jesse Sharkey said he doesn’t want to extend the strike indefinitely and is seeking talks with the mayor about days that can be made up.
“I’m going to go try to talk to the mayor,” he said.
“I understand that it’s going to be difficult for the mayor and for the people who run the schools to fit 11 instructional days back into the school year. But our strong feeling is that we want to discuss it. It can’t be zero,” Sharkey said.
On the tentative agreement, Sharkey said “by far we did not achieve all our goals,” and there’s a real discussion about that and will be more debate among members as they prepare to vote.”I’m not going to say that ratification is going to be a slam dunk.”
CTU members have taken to the streets and are walking a loop around City Hall. The lively crowd chanted, “Lori needs to restore the days, restore the days.” — Elvia Malagon and Gregory Pratt
10:30 a.m.: How to crochet — and other lessons learned during the strike
Meghan Thomas, a history teacher at Von Steuben High School, said she’s happy with the tentative agreement.
“There was give and take,” she said “I’m pretty satisfied with the end result. There was no way we were going to get everything … I’m hopeful we’ll be back in school tomorrow.”
She brought her sons, Samuel, 8, and Edward, 6, students at Beaubien Elementary School, to the rally outside of City Hall.
Thomas was a teacher during the 2012 strike, but said that being a CPS mother has given her a better perspective of both sides.
“It’s really emotionally up and down,” she said. “This is such an important cause and I’m proud to stand behind it but as a parent and a teacher I realize now the hardships the parents face … both sides are clearer to me.”
For the past 11 days her sons have been cared for by her husband and their grandparents, have gone to friends’ houses, have made signs for the rallies and learned new skills, such as crocheting.
“I’m going to make my teacher a hat,” Samuel said excitedly, wearing a multicolored cap and scarf that he made during the strike.
Thomas expressed gratitude for the support from parents and other workers around the city.
“We couldn’t have done it without the support of the city,” she said. “I think that a good education system benefits everybody but it takes everybody to make it good.” —Marie Fazio
10:20 a.m.: ‘You have to stand for something’
Crystal Mallory, a special education teacher on the South Side, said she was willing to brave whatever weather elements come her way to rally at City Hall Thursday morning.
Bundled up in layers as snow fell on a crowd of teachers, Mallory said she was fighting for her students.
She’s the only special education teacher at her school. She estimates one-third of her income goes back to students, buying them supplies and other things.
“You have to stand for something,” she said. “And if I have a choice, I’m standing for kids that needs it the most and those are black and brown kids on the South Side of Chicago.” — Elvia Malagon
9:56 a.m.: Lightfoot asks union to compromise on makeup days, says she won’t accept ‘unilateral demands’
Mayor Lori Lightfoot said she is now willing to compromise on making up school days lost to the teachers strike — but put the onus on the union to make a proposal.
“We have been told by the CTU that they will end the strike only if we agree to make up all the days missed due to the strike. They basically issued a take it or leave it demand they get 11 days back or the strike continues. That’s simply a nonstarter,” Lightfoot said at a City Hall news conference. “As I’ve said all along, negotiations are about good faith and both sides must have a spirit of compromise.”
Lightfoot previously said she wouldn’t make up days lost to the strike — a stance she reiterated after the union voted Wednesday to approve a tentative agreement pending a deal on making up the lost days.
Lightfoot wouldn’t say how many make up days she would accept, other than to repeat that she’s unwilling to make up all 11 days lost to the strike so far.
“This new demand to make up all the missed days, as I said last night, was never on the table,” Lightfoot said. “As I’ve said, we cannot allow the CTU leadership to continue to make repeated new demands and move the goalposts unilaterally and repeatedly.”
CPS CEO Janice Jackson said making up all the days isn’t fair to families as it would cut into winter break or summer vacation.
Lightfoot also expressed anger at the union for not previously raising the makeup days issue as a condition for ending the strike. Lightfoot earlier said she met with Sharkey and Davis Gates for hours on Tuesday and they raised six issues that needed to be addressed for a deal. Though she was skeptical that they wouldn’t “move the goal posts,” Lightfoot said Sharkey made a “dramatic gesture” by giving his word that would be the end.
“I challenged whether or not the issues that were laid on the table were the only issues because they’ve repeatedly moved the goalpost, the CTU leadership. They told me in no uncertain terms, Jesse Sharkey, ‘Mayor, I give you my word.’ Why should I not be able to rely upon that?” Lightfoot said. “So if there were some urgency and other issue, particularly in the context of me saying repeatedly from day one that I was not going to pay them for striking, that we were not going to make up these days, wouldn’t you think that this is a priority they would’ve brought to the table?”
Sharkey tweeted late Wednesday that return-to-work provisions were always intended to be part of negotiations.
— Gregory Pratt
9:12 a.m.: Why the Chicago Teachers Union walkout is still going
Fifteen days after Chicago Public Schools teachers walked off the job, the city and the teachers union find themselves at a vexing and rather paradoxical point: They have a deal to end the strike, and yet the strike is not over. Here’s why.
8:46 a.m.: Chicago Teachers Union to rally at City Hall as strike continues
Striking teachers planned to hold a rally at City Hall on Thursday morning, refusing to return to classrooms despite a tentative agreement on a contract until city officials agree to pay them for the days they have been on strike.
The last-minute issue came up just before the CTU’s House of Delegates voted 364 to 242 Wednesday evening to approve a proposed five-year contract that meets many of the teachers’ demands, including enforceable class size caps and a nurse and social worker in every school. The proposal guarantees all CTU members a 16% raise over the life of the contract.
Before taking effect, the deal must be ratified by rank-and-file union members. The voting will take place in schools 10 days after the strike is over. It’s unclear when that will be because union officials say teachers will not go back to work until they are compensated for the days they walked out.
8:30 a.m.: Teachers union says most strike days typically made up
As Mayor Lori Lightfoot continues her standoff with the Chicago Teachers Union, CTU allies and the union plan to protest outside Lightfoot’s office later this morning.
The Illinois Federation of Teachers also released what the organization said was 35 years of data on 107 IFT strikes that shows the average days teachers lost was 2.2 out of 8.55 on strike — meaning 75 percent of days were made up by school districts.
President Dan Montgomery in a statement said “it is common practice in Illinois for teachers to make up days after a strike.”
Back in the 1970s, school districts would not make up days to punish teachers, but “times have changed,” Montgomery said.
“Our communities have rejected that philosophy,” Montgomery said. — Greg Pratt
Tentative agreement details:
Union officials said they were pleased overall with what’s in the tentative agreement, while the mayor called it the most generous contract in CPS history.
One of the bigger wins for the city was a five-year contract. The union has wanted a three-year deal, and also did not win the paid prep time it was seeking.
Here are some other details. Under the tentative agreement, the district would:
Put at least one full-time nurse and social worker in every school by July 2023. Includes phased-in hiring of at least 250 nurses and 209 social workers.
Spend $500,000 annually to recruit and train clinicians such as nurses, social workers, case managers, school psychologists, physical and occupational therapists, language pathologists and audiologists.
Reduce the ratio of students to various clinician positions and reduce clinician workloads.
Commit to staffing levels of case managers for students with Individualized Education Plans to get to at least one part-time case manager for each school with 50 students on IEPS, up to 2.5 for schools with 300 or more such students.
Increase staffing levels of English Language Program Coordinators starting with a half-time coordinator for every school with 20 to 150 English Language Learner students up to two full-time coordinators for schools with 600 or more.
Establish a joint staffing committee on equity, which in part would oversee the hiring of 30 additional positions for the 120 highest need schools.
Increase spending for coaching stipends and new equipment and other resources for athletics. The Sports Committee would have an annual budget of $5 million, a 33 percent increase in annual funding, according to the CTU.
— Hannah Leone
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