Chicago Teachers Union unveils contract demands, vowing not to ‘cower’ in proposals to fully staff schools amid budget shortfall

With the Chicago Teachers Union contract expiring in June, members of the 30,000-strong union gathered Tuesday to unveil teachers’ contract proposals as the district and CTU will soon begin bargaining a four-year renewal.

Union leaders and a small group of Chicago Public Schools teachers also made stops around the city via trolley throughout the morning, as part of CTU’s effort to engage civic leaders and state officials in negotiations.

“What you’re going to see today is a long and lengthy list of everything and then some,” CTU President Stacy Davis Gates said at a Tuesday morning news conference. “It’s not just our economic proposals,” she said of as-yet-unspecified demands to pay the union’s workforce of predominantly women “their fair share” and to raise the floor for paraprofessionals such as clerks and teacher assistants who are the lowest wage earners in the union.

“We are asking for substantial amounts of investment into our school community,” added Davis Gates, flanked by educators who advocated for the expansion of bilingual, sports, fine arts and restorative justice programming and Sustainable Community Schools.

The network of 20 Sustainable Community Schools provides wraparound support services to families through a $500,000 annual grant managed in partnership between CPS and CTU. The union aims to expand the model to 200 schools and adopt mechanisms in the district that could help provide housing for an estimated 20,000 students experiencing homelessness, CTU announced Tuesday.

But contract talks are unfolding as the district works to fill a $391 million deficit that will be left by the expiration of federal COVID-19 emergency relief funds in September. The projected figure doesn’t account for raises or any new investments that may result from new collective bargaining agreements, CPS CEO Pedro Martinez told the Tribune last Wednesday. (The district is also negotiating a new contract with Service Employees International Union Local 73, which represents crossing and security guards, special education classroom assistants and cafeteria workers.)

“We are not going to cower by the largeness of the job we have before us,” Davis Gates said of the union’s demands, which include providing every school with a social worker and nurse and fine arts and sports programs. “We’re just going to organize more people to help us accomplish it.”

To bring civic leaders, public officials and families across the city to the table in finding solutions, CTU said it sent a request to CPS Friday to make bargaining sessions public via livestream and is awaiting the district’s response. CPS said it wants to learn more about the union’s request and that the district “looks forward to negotiating a fair contract that balances the interests of the hard-working educators with our budget constraints” when negotiations commence.

“We’re inviting everyone in our city, in our communities to step up and make every student in Chicago a priority,” said Natalia Segura, a high school Spanish and bilingual teacher.

That includes critics of the public school system and the Building Owners and Management Association, which recently organized to defeat the CTU-backed Bring Chicago Home ordinance, which would have generated funds to address homelessness through a real estate transfer tax on property sales topping $1 million.

“We are going to invite them to join us. You don’t have to throw rocks from the outside. You can actually come in and engage,” Davis Gates said, doubling down on a challenge to detractors to engage in the process.

Boarding a trolley, union leaders left the conference to bring invitations to participate in contract talks to CPS; the Building Owners and Management Association; Jerry Reinsdorf, chairperson of the Chicago Bulls; KIDS First, an organization that proposes CPS reforms; the Illinois State Board of Education; and Gov. J.B. Pritzker.

Over the past year, CPS and CTU have been lobbying state legislators and the governor’s office for more of the money that a 2017 state funding reform determined CPS and other high-need districts are owed.

CPS currently receives only a quarter of the aid that the state determines it needs, resulting in a $1.4 billion gap as of last year, according to the district. Certain state policies also financially hamper CPS — such as requiring the district to pay the majority of teacher pension contributions, unlike other districts whose pensions are paid by the state — and limit CPS’ ability to raise funds, Martinez has said.

“We’re going to demand from you to actually fund the funding formula in Springfield,” Davis Gates said of state officials.

Lobbying efforts have yet to decrease the deficit. But Martinez said he also remains optimistic, after CPS recently ranked first among 40 large urban districts in research conducted by Harvard and Stanford universities that measured third through eighth grade students’ reading scores on standardized tests, to gauge districts’ progress in recouping pandemic-era learning loss. In math, the study ranked CPS 13th among 43 large urban districts.

“Protecting those investments and, of course, the staff that are behind it, has really been our top priority,” Martinez said of cuts being made by the central office, to allocate funds this year so that every school is guaranteed a minimum number and ratio of teachers in core subjects like reading and math, as well as in arts and physical education. CPS’ overhauled approach to funding this year also guarantees a minimum number of administrators and support staff members, such as counselors, per school.

At schools where larger portions of the student population need access to additional resources, such as counseling or special education, CPS’ revamped funding model provides more discretionary funding per student and smaller ratios of educators to students in the building.

At Tuesday’s news conference, Davis Gates said the district’s previous method of budgeting, based on the number of students at each school, was “grossly inequitable” and that it was too soon to tell whether the district’s new approach would produce mass benefits.

“What if young people that attended Chicago Public Schools were prioritized in the Chicago Housing Authority waitlist?” Davis Gates said of union demands to address issues beyond what’s encompassed in the proposed budget. “From housing to dual language (and) special education services, to making sure that they have opportunities after school — this is about a vision for the Chicago Public Schools. …Our collective bargaining agreement is a tool, a vehicle for transformative change and we are going to up the ante.”

Whether the entities and officials invited on Tuesday will participate is yet to be seen. But at the last trolley stop of the day, at CPS, Chief Labor Relations Officer Miguel Perretta heard out the testimonies of teachers who said students are in desperate need of a litany of programs and services.

Sandra Izaguirre, a teacher at Westinghouse College Prep, said she recently lost a former student to community violence and is hoping negotiations will result in the widespread adoption of restorative justice practices. “Which one of my kids is next?” she said. “Through restorative practices, I think we can interrupt that prophecy that students have, just for being Black, brown and underserved.”

Nicholson STEM Academy in Englewood has almost 200 homeless students out of a total population of 440 elementary students, said paraprofessional Lisa Catledge. “Children don’t have a place to lay their heads at nighttime. They don’t have anywhere to do their homework and when they come to school, they’re tired,” she said.

Girls flag football and softball coach Cassie Donohue, a special education teacher at Stephen Mather High School, said that at a time when interest in women’s sports is at an all-time high, programs at her school are so underfunded that players have had to hand off parts of their uniforms to teammates when coming on and off the field. “It’s really hard to build a good program and open sports up (to girls) when we don’t have the resources,” Donohue said.

Lane Tech music teacher Javier Payano said he’s advocating to boost the fine arts budget to support students for whom the arts are a lifeline.

According to the annual State of the Arts in CPS report by arts education nonprofit Ingenuity, only 24% of CPS high schools offer a full range of arts programs and 89% of elementary schools have enrolled every student in at least one arts class.

“We know students age 13 to 24 are high-risk for suicide,” Payano said, adding that more funding can provide students a space for belonging and finding their gifts.

Perretta made no promises regarding the teachers’ requests, but said he looked forward to collaborating with the union. “It was encouraging just to hear that everything was focused on exploring the future and exploring the collaboration,” he said.