When Karen Lewis reflected on the contract won by the 2012 teachers strike, she noted victories like guaranteeing students’ access to textbooks on Day One.
This year, because of another 2012 contract win, mandatory air conditioning in every room, Chicago Public School students not only had textbooks but their first days back to school went uninterrupted during a historic heatwave that shut down and delayed the start to the school year in other cities.
Every time educators negotiate with CPS, at least since Karen and then Jesse Sharkey and now myself, have led our union, we have fought to bring dignity to our profession, and we have fought harder to deliver the quality education that Chicago’s students deserve.
As much as editorial pages and those on the Heritage Foundation payroll want to paint our union effort as asking for too much, the truth is, even with all our determination, we are still asking for too little.
Because of generations of disinvestment — from banning Black children from attending the city’s first public schools, to “Willis Wagons” that crowded Black children into rotating makeshift classrooms to avoid having to integrate with white students, to the failures of Renaissance 2010 and Rahm Emanuel’s gutting of public education — we are made to fight for what should already exist, what every parent wants for their child and what families in wealthier suburbs take for granted.
However, this year’s Chicago Teachers Union contract marks a turning point.
What is in the proposed settlement agreement that our delegates and then members will soon vote on are enormous improvements for Chicago’s children.
On top of millions of investment in special education we won in 2019, educators’ support to students with Individualized Education Programs will be strengthened by being able to tailor their professional development days to a specific special ed focus for the first time. Further, CPS will now be prohibited from pulling staff away from supporting students with disabilities to go cover another class whenever a substitute is needed, as happens too frequently under CPS’ chronic understaffing.
Educators will be able to better focus on lesson plans and actual teaching instead of crowd control because of enforceable smaller class sizes and increasing the prep time that’s so necessary to ready a classroom for students’ arrival.
Those same students, focused first in neighborhoods historically denied resources, will get greater access to arts, music and sports with the increase in the necessary staff and a historic $10 million annual investment in equipment, supplies, transportation and a new plan for recess each day.
Students will report every day to schools that have less mold, less asbestos, better maintenance and more ecological practices that help their health and that of the planet, such as lead pipe removal, compost and solar panels, because of CTU’s green schools initiatives.
Our agreement will double the amount of bilingual educators in the district. It will bring back school libraries with librarians so children can fall in love with reading and improve their literacy.
Students will be better served by an increased number of paraprofessionals in their classrooms supporting their learning and taught by more veteran teachers who have more incentive to remain in the district because we’ve won recognition for their expertise with new raises later in their careers. They’ll have more teachers who are less worried about heavy-handed and racially discriminatory supervision because we’re reforming the evaluation system.
Do our part to make schools better
None of this can be named without also recognizing Donald Trump and Project 2025’s current attack on public education in general and Chicago’s school communities in particular.
Because of our contract, Chicago’s students will report to sanctuary schools that protect students’ civil rights from federal agents’ violations, to LGBTQIA+ Safe Schools that respect their gender identity and their journeys of self-discovery, to schools dedicated to continuing to teach Black, Indigenous and other histories relevant to their cultures and curiosities so they can better understand themselves and the world in which they’re growing up.
No one should have to fight for these things. Parents across our city already overcome hell and high water to give their children whatever opportunities they can so they can get ahead. It’s the least they should expect from the people who work in leadership of our school district to do the same. But until that happens, our union will do whatever we can to make it a little easier for them, to do our part to make their schools better, and to match their dedication so that in each neighborhood of our world-class city, there’s a world-class public school within walking distance for their kids.
Stacy Davis Gates is a high school history teacher, public school parent, and the President of CTU Local 1.
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