Mitch Smith and Monica Davey

In the end, the clash between the teachers and Chicago’s new mayor, Lori Lightfoot, appeared to have brought mixed results. The city agreed to spend millions of dollars on reducing class sizes; promised to pay for hundreds more social workers, nurses and librarians; and approved a 16% salary increase over the coming five years. But not all union members were satisfied; a vote to approve a tentative deal was noticeably split, and some teachers wanted to press on to seek steeper reductions in class sizes, more teacher preparation time and aid for special education.

Still, the strike in Chicago, which followed a series of major teacher walkouts in conservative states like West Virginia and Oklahoma as well as liberal cities like Los Angeles and Denver, reflected a renewed wave of activism from teachers.

“What it says is that West Virginia and Oklahoma wasn’t sui generis; it wasn’t an isolated moment,” said Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, who made several trips to Chicago during the strike. “This is now a strategy.”

Teachers in Chicago drew attention to matters far beyond salary to broad issues of social justice, casting their fight as a battle for equity among the city’s poor and rich families, for safety for immigrants and for affordable housing in an ever more expensive city. And some Democratic presidential hopefuls and others were quick to line up behind the teachers, a pivot from the political mood a decade ago when even some on the left criticized the power of teachers’ unions.

“I think the entire wave of teachers’ strikes that we’ve been seeing should have school boards quaking in their boots,” said Ileen DeVault, a professor of labor history at Cornell University. “I think more and more teachers are going to be saying, ‘Gee, I have some of the same problems. Look what the Chicago teachers, look what the LA teachers, look what all these other groups of teachers got when they went on strike.’ ”

The strike was a blow to Lightfoot, a political novice five months into her first term as mayor. Elected by winning all 50 of the city’s wards, the mayor has portrayed herself as a reformer who wants many of the very goals that the teachers were demanding, including full-time nurses, social workers and librarians in all city schools; expanded counseling services; and recruitment of more black and Hispanic teachers.

Yet throughout the walkout, Lightfoot found herself pitted against the teachers, many of whom said she was failing to keep her promises. At the same time, opponents of the teachers’ strike said Lightfoot was giving too many concessions at a time when the school system’s finances, like that of the city, are shaky. And all the while, residents spoke of the tumult that the strike created for parents with few child-care options, for student athletes who could not play in games and for high school students with standardized tests that had to be delayed.

In an interview Thursday, Lightfoot, who had been a target of protest signs along picket lines, said that the agreement was “without a doubt” good for the city — for the city’s students and teachers and for taxpayers.

“When you pick apart the pieces of this deal, whether it’s individual pieces or comprehensively, what you’re going to find is a lot of things that are focused on advancing the educational gains and outcomes for our students,” she said.

Jesse Sharkey, the Chicago Teachers Union president, held a news conference that made no secret of lingering bitterness on both sides. “We feel like we achieved a lot of things,” he said. “There’s some things we didn’t achieve. But it’s not a day for photo ops.”

Chicago’s finances are deeply troubled, struggling with huge unfunded pension liabilities and budget shortfalls that have led to tax increases in recent years. In recent days, the editorial boards of the city’s two major newspapers, The Tribune and The Sun-Times, cited those difficulties repeatedly and wrote critically about the teachers’ union.

“They made outlandish demands as if City Hall owed teachers not just a big wage bump but a utopian version of Chicago,” The Tribune’s editorial board said.

With an annual budget of $5.98 billion, the city’s school system has long faced fiscal struggles. In recent years, major credit agencies have rated the school system’s bonds below investment grade, though over recent months, its financial outlook has stabilized somewhat, in part because of increased state aid.

Laurence Msall, the president of the Civic Federation, a Chicago-based budget watchdog, said the school district had little room to spend more at a time of tight budgets and sustained enrollment losses. “The long-term sustainability of Chicago Public Schools remains a question,” Msall said, “and the viability of this contract and what has been offered remains to be seen.”

Officials were still piecing together the exact price of the deal, which some have estimated to cost about $500 million, but Lightfoot said that fiscal limits had been carefully weighed throughout weeks of negotiation.

“We were very, very conscious of making sure that we only agreed to things — on an individualized basis but also in the aggregate — that were sustainable and financially responsible, and that’s part of the reason we weren’t able to reach an agreement any sooner,” Lightfoot said.

Chicago was a birthplace of unionization among teachers in the late 1800s, and the heavily Democratic city has remained a center of teacher activism. For days, clusters of teachers — many of them wearing red — gathered outside schools, marched through downtown and met in parks for rallies.

Returning to work Friday will be about 25,000 educators in the city’s schools, where about 47% of students are Hispanic, 37% are African American and 10% are white; some 76% of students are economically disadvantaged.

The strike, which was the first multiday work stoppage by Chicago Public Schools teachers since 2012, lasted longer than any teachers’ strike in Chicago since 1987. The Chicago Teachers Union clashed with Rahm Emanuel, Lightfoot’s predecessor as mayor, during the 2012 strike, which lasted seven school days. In December 2018, Chicago was the site of the first teacher strike at a charter school network.

For parents, the last two weeks brought a daily scramble to find ways to keep their children safe and occupied.

Juliet de Jesus Alejandre said she had taken a few days off work to look after her 8-year-old twin boys, and had left them with family members on other days. She said she was pleased that more social workers and nurses would be assigned to schools, and credited the teachers with forcing an overdue conversation about racial equity.

But after filling her boys’ days with trips to the movies and the swimming pool, de Jesus Alejandre said she was looking forward to school drop-off Friday morning.

“It feels so good to know that our days have structure again,” she said. “And not having to worry about bugging a grandma.”

This article originally appeared in

Chicago Teachers Reach Deal After an 11-Day Walkout

CHICAGO — More than 300,000 public school students prepared to return to school as Chicago leaders on Thursday announced an end to an acrimonious teachers’ strike that lasted 11 days, the longest here in decades, and turned life upside down for families across the nation’s third-largest school district.

A tentative contract deal between city officials and teachers in the nation’s third-largest school district resolved a tense standoff that had upended the lives of families all over the city and represented the biggest test to date of Chicago’s new mayor, Lori Lightfoot.

The walkout by the Chicago Teachers Union, which lasted longer than any schools strike in this city since 1987, was over an array of issues, beyond traditional questions over pay. The teachers called for more social workers, librarians and nurses in schools, smaller class sizes and protections for immigrant children. Over the last few weeks, teachers marched near schools and through the city’s downtown business district, as negotiations went on with city leaders.

In the end, the city said it had agreed to $35 million to reduce class sizes and hundreds of additional staff members by 2023. The city’s offer included a 16% salary increase over five years.

During the strike, parents scrambled to find child care, some paying for impromptu day camps, while others stayed home from work to care for their children. School buildings remained open during the strike for children without other options. Several Democratic presidential candidates offered support for the teachers, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren spoke to teachers on the picket line.

For Lightfoot, who was elected earlier this year, the strike provided a test of her leadership in a city where labor unions have broad support but where severe fiscal challenges have been a perpetual concern.

Lightfoot, who carried all 50 wards in April’s election, had campaigned on promises to address long-standing inequities in the city and to hire more school nurses and librarians. But she said she was constrained on what she could offer in the contract by the school district’s precarious financial position.

The strike, which was the first multiday work stoppage by Chicago Public Schools teachers since 2012, was the latest in a string of more than a dozen major walkouts by teachers across the country. Since early last year, walkouts have taken place in conservative states like Oklahoma and West Virginia, as well as in liberal cities like Denver and Los Angeles.

Chicago was a birthplace of unionization among teachers in the late 1800s, and the heavily Democratic city has remained a center of teacher activism. The Chicago Teachers Union clashed with Rahm Emanuel, Lightfoot’s predecessor as mayor, during the 2012 strike, which lasted seven school days. In December 2018, Chicago was the site of the first teacher strike at a charter school network.

Chicago's Striking Teachers Vote to Go Back to School

CHICAGO — Thousands of Chicago’s public-school teachers will return to classrooms Friday, ending a strike that left more than 300,000 students out of school for 11 days, the city’s mayor announced Thursday.

The strike threatened to upend life in the city, as parents raced to make arrangements for child care and as city officials began to activate a contingency plan for supervising and feeding students in school buildings.

The strike in Chicago is the latest in a string of more than a dozen major walkouts by teachers across the country since early last year. It is an important early test for Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who was elected this year after a campaign in which she called for more nurses and social workers in the city’s schools — some of the very changes Chicago’s teachers are seeking now.

The city and the Chicago Teachers Union, which represents more than 20,000 educators, had been in tense contract negotiations for months, and there had been signs of progress in recent days. But as a midnight deadline approached Wednesday with no deal, Lightfoot canceled Thursday classes and both sides signaled that a walkout was inevitable.

The split between the city and the union stretches beyond traditional debates over pay and benefits, though representatives for each side disputed details of what had been offered during negotiations and what the exact points of contention were now.

The city said that it has offered teachers pay raises totaling 16% over a five-year contract, while union leaders have called for increases of 15% over a shorter three-year term. More pressing, union leaders said, are their calls for a promise — in writing — of smaller class sizes, more paid time to prepare lessons and the hiring of more school nurses, social workers, librarians and counselors. Other issues, including affordable housing provisions and protections for immigrant students, have also been raised.

The strike is the first for Chicago’s school system since 2012, when teachers walked out for seven days as part of a defining battle with the city’s previous administration.

About 7,500 school support employees represented by a different union also rejected a contract offer and planned to go on strike Thursday. Those workers include security officers, bus aides, custodians and special education classroom assistants.

The standoff with the unions represents one of the first significant challenges for Lightfoot, a Democrat who took office this year after an overwhelming electoral victory in all 50 of the city’s wards. The teachers’ union endorsed Lightfoot’s opponent, also a Democrat, and suggested Lightfoot was not progressive enough.

Lightfoot, who had never before held elective office, ran for mayor promising to undo inequities that have left parts of Chicago behind, including mostly African American neighborhoods on the city’s South and West Sides where some schools have been closed in recent years. About 47% of the system’s students are Hispanic, 37% are African American and 10% are white, according to Chicago Public Schools records; some 76% are economically disadvantaged.

Complicating matters is the school system’s fiscal situation, which has been dire but has improved enough to make labor negotiations even possible. With an annual budget of $5.98 billion, the system has long faced fiscal struggles, including high unfunded pension liabilities. In recent years, major credit agencies have rated the school system’s bonds below investment grade. But over recent months, its financial outlook has stabilized somewhat, in part because of increased state aid.

Lightfoot voiced frustration Wednesday as the strike neared, suggesting that she agreed with much of what the teachers want. During her campaign for mayor, Lightfoot called for putting full-time nurses, social workers and librarians in all city schools, and promised to expand counseling services, recruit more black and Hispanic teachers and increase after-school programs.

“At every turn, we’ve bent over backwards to meet the union’s needs and deliver a contract that reflects our shared values and vision for our schools and the support of our students,” Lightfoot told reporters at City Hall on Wednesday.

But Stacy Davis Gates, vice president of the Chicago Teachers Union, said the city had failed to offer more than the status quo on some essential issues.

“Negotiating in good faith means that we get to reach a settlement,” Davis Gates said. “If she cannot land a deal for teachers for public schools in Chicago, then you have to question her ability to get work done in this city.”

She also suggested that Lightfoot’s image would depend on how the contract dispute was resolved.

“Our children deserve the best that this city has to offer,” Davis Gates said. “They do not deserve broken promises. Our South Side communities, our West Side communities are littered with broken promises, unkept commitments. This contract has to represent something different for the city of Chicago — it has got to represent something different. And she ran to do that. Period.”

Chicago was the birthplace of unionization among teachers in the late 19th century, and the heavily Democratic city has remained a hotbed of teacher activism. The Chicago Teachers Union clashed with Rahm Emanuel, Lightfoot’s predecessor as mayor, during the 2012 strike. In December 2018, Chicago was the site of the first teacher strike at a charter school network.

Chicago Teachers Announce Strike in Nation's Third-Largest District

CHICAGO — Teachers in Chicago announced Wednesday evening that they would go on strike, forcing the cancellation of classes for more than 300,000 public school students in the nation’s third-largest district starting Thursday.

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Mitch Smith and Monica Davey

Articles written by the author

Chicago Teachers Reach Deal After an 11-Day Walkout

Chicago's Striking Teachers Vote to Go Back to School

Chicago Teachers Announce Strike in Nation's Third-Largest District