by George Batten
90% of the union teachers agreed to go on strike. Lawmakers had passed a law saying that 75% of union teachers had to agree to a strike before they could go on strike. The belief and hope of lawmakers that the 75% threshold, for calling a strike, was to high to attain. From my experience, to get 9 out of 10 teachers to agree on anything is impossible. 90% shows there were desperate needs and reasons for the strike.
Illinois lawmakers add a provision to the – Illinois Educational Labor Relations Act – last year which prohibited teachers striking on issues unrelated to economic matters; those involving pay and benefits. This provision makes it illegal to strike over issues of violence in schools, poor work conditions, teacher evaluations, excessive testing, etc., or any important educational issue. Therefore, when teachers strike, it can only be about money. With this provision in effect, government officials can call teachers greedy, the strike illegal, and avoid true discussions about teacher and educational issues.
Karen Lewis was at the negotiating table. Rahm Emanuel did not attend. He communicated by phone to his subordinates.
The Huffington Post – " The union released a statement Monday calling Emanuel a bully, noting his legal move was yet another "vindictive" indicator of diminished trust between teachers and city officials."
One point in the new contract included language that principals cannot bully teachers and teachers have the right to design their own lesson plans. Does this indicate that teachers will not have to teach to the test 100% of the time, and may have some free will?
Rahm Emanuel was upset about waiting a day for Union approval.
Mr. Emanuel must have been shocked that a leader had to report back to her underlings and wait for their approval. Hopefully, it was a great revelation to him on how democratic societies are suppose to make decisions.
Teachers will not have to wait 6 weeks to receive text books. How do teachers receive fair evaluations, when they do not have textbooks?
For teachers, violence in the schools and local communities is a big issue.
The Chicago Tribune reports that net assets for public schools have taken a nosedive in the last decade falling 200% from $1.2 billion to negative $1.2 billion.
Strikes, lack of trust, violence, and massive budget problems are all results from poor discipline in our schools. I have a discipline plan that will fix the discipline problem. If you know any teacher, administrator, school official, community leader or parent in Chicago, that wants to solve problems in education, please direct them to this blog.