Uncommon Core- The Chicago Teachers' Union

https://www.jacobinmag.com/2014/03/uncommon-core-chicago-teachers-union/

Uncommon CORE<https://www.jacobinmag.com/2014/03/uncommon-core-chicago-teachers-union/>

by Micah Uetricht <https://www.jacobinmag.com/author/micah-uetricht/>

The 2012 Chicago Teachers Union strike would have never come to be without
the patient building of a radical formation within the union, the Caucus of
Rank-and-File Educators.
[image: ctu rally photo-1 (2)_0]

Anti Teacher Initiative Filed

Matt David, a political consultant to Michelle Rhee’s StudentsFirst has submitted an initiative for the California ballot to remove teacher seniority as a factor in lay-off decisions.  StudentsFirst has long advocated this position and worked with EDVoice to propose  state legislation to achieve this goal.  Matt David is a former communications director for Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. 

The claim that teacher seniority protection is a major factor in school achievement has no basis in research.  It has long been a favored campaign of the Right in part because it can be used to assault teachers’ unions and because it divides teachers against each other.

Younger teachers frequently assume that their youth and energy makes them a better teacher.  These factors do indeed contribute to teaching, but there is no evidence to indicate that they balance or compensate for the skill of more experienced teachers.  This is an ideological campaign assault, not a provision based upon evidence.

See the prior posts on Michelle Rhee, StudentsFirst, and their connection to corporate assaults on public education. http://choosingdemocracy.blogspot.com/2013/12/how-wall-street-power-brokers-are.html

Chicago Teachers' Union continues the struggle for equal schools

New Report Unravels the Sordid History of Racial Segregation in Chicago Public Schools

BY CTU RESEARCH  |  05/17/2013

CHICAGO—On what is the 59th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision, the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) today released a report on the history of disruptive actions against communities of color by Chicago Public Schools (CPS), exemplified by school closings that intensify the harmful effects of segregated schools and neighborhoods. The study, titled Still Separate, Still Unequal, acknowledges the deep segregation that exists in Chicago, but states that segregation is exacerbated by flawed education reform policies and assaults on communities that have long borne the brunt of its harmful effects.

The 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision was one of the most successful victories of the modern Civil Rights Movement. The ruling declared segregation in U.S. public schools unconstitutional, saying it violated the “equal protection under the law” clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Now, nearly six decades later, parents of Chicago’s African-American and special education needs students are also seeking court protection against Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s plan to shutter 53 elementary schools. On Wednesday they filed two federal lawsuits seeking a halt closures because these actions are discriminatory and will cause undue harm to their children.

Teachers' Union President arrested in Mexico

Powerful Leader of Mexican Teachers’ Union Is Arrested

By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD. NY Times

The leader of Mexico’s powerful teachers’ union, the largest labor syndicate in Latin America, has been arrested on accusations that she embezzled millions of dollars in union funds for personal expenses, including California residences, cosmetic surgery and artwork, the country’s attorney general announced Tuesday night.

The arrest of the union boss, Elba Esther Gordillo, a bombastic figure viewed as a kingmaker among politicians for her ability to deliver votes and suppress enemies, stunned a nation accustomed to seeing powerful figures escape scrutiny despite whispers of their spending habits.

“She was this mixture of political patron, incredibly powerful union boss and very, very wildly ‘entrepreneurial,’ ” said Gabriel Guerra, a political analyst in Mexico City.

Ms. Gordillo was arrested a day after President Enrique Peña Nieto signed into law sweeping changes in education law, designed to break the union’s grip on hiring and the administration of schools, and a day before the union planned to meet on a strategy to fight the changes. The timing of the arrest is sure to raise questions; Mexican presidents have been known to use the power of federal prosecutors to go after rivals, only for the cases to fall apart eventually.

A Gold Star for the Chicago Teachers' Union

After 10 years of top-down disruptions, teachers showed
the power of collective action by those who work in
schools.

By Karen Lewis and Randi Weingarten Opinion

Wall Street Journal September 23, 2012


After more than a decade of top-down dictates,
disruptive school closures, disregard of teachers' and
parents' input, testing that squeezes out teaching, and
cuts to the arts, physical education and libraries,
educators in Chicago said "enough is enough." With
strong support from parents and many in the community,
teachers challenged a flawed vision of education reform
that has not helped schoolchildren in Chicago or around
the country. It took a seven-day strike - something no
one does without cause - but with it educators in
Chicago have changed the conversation about education
reform.

These years of dictates imposed upon teachers left
children in Chicago without the rich curriculum,
facilities and social services they need. On picket
lines, with their handmade signs, teachers provided
first-person accounts of the challenges confronting
students and educators. They made it impossible to turn
a blind eye to the unacceptable conditions in many of
the city's public schools.

Teachers and parents were united in the frustration
that led to the strike. Nearly nine out of 10 students
in Chicago Public Schools live in poverty, a shameful
fact that so-called reformers too often ignore, yet
most schools lack even one full-time nurse or social
worker. The district has made cuts where it shouldn't
(in art, music, physical education and libraries) but
hasn't cut where it should (class sizes and excessive
standardized testing and test prep). The tentative
agreement reached in Chicago aims to address all these
issues.

Chicago Teachers v. Rahm Emanuel

September 14, 2012

Harold Meyerson

A Windy City majority supports the teachers, not Rahm.
Read the commentariat, or just subject yourself to the
deafening consensus of enlightened opinion, and you
have to believe that the beleaguered parents of
Chicago's schoolchildren are fuming at their city's
teachers' union, on strike now for a full week, and
backing Mayor Rahm Emanuel's efforts to shape up the
school district.

Read the polls, or just the press accounts of parental
support for the teachers, however, and you come away
with an altogether different impression. A poll
commissioned and released Thursday by Capitol Fax, an
Illinois political report, of 1,344 registered Chicago
voters found that fully 66 percent of parents with
children in the public schools, and 55.5 percent of
Chicagoans overall "approve the Chicago Teachers Union
decision to go on strike." Among African Americans,
strike support stood at 63 percent; among Latinos, 65
percent. (Roughly 80 percent of Chicago's
schoolchildren are minority.)

So, who disapproved of the strike? A majority (52
percent) of parents with children in private schools,
and a majority of whites (also 52 percent).