CHICAGO – It began with No Child Left Behind and the move towards accountability using standardized measures — this carefully crafted disdain of teachers in the public eye, this disrespect.
The idea that teachers of the Chicago Teachers’ Union are striking because they don’t want to work longer hours, or they just want more money, is not only incorrect, but also the result of the most cynical PR job of the 21st century. The teaching profession is being maligned here in Chicago, even as public school teachers routinely work countless extra hours trying to round out their children’s education, with extra-curricular activities that the city and state will not longer fund – programs such as theater, music, varsity sports, and physical education in some instances.
The division of resources between the haves and have-nots is woefully disparate; because of this, the vast majority of Chicago Public School teachers are being asked to make a dollar out of fifteen cents.
Let’s get to the sticking points.
I literally know hundreds of Chicago public school teachers. They tell me that they’re not striking about benefits, pay or hours. Those issues, raised in intial contract negotiations, are actually pretty much worked out. But for history’s sake, let’s be clear: they’re NOT asking for a raise. They’re are asking to be paid for the extra work. They’re being asked to work more hours at the same pay. For mothers and fathers with children in daycare that means paying for an extra hour or two per day for daycare. Simple arithmetic tells us that means these teachers are working longer hours for a pay CUT.
Rahm and the board are also trying to increase class sizes. Many are the Chicago teachers who already have more students than desks and chairs. They also want teachers to pay more for benefits, which obviously would result in another pay cut.
Another major issues at work here is merit pay for teachers based on standardized testing. Even if we could magically make the circumstances for educating across the spectrum of socioeconomic, geographic, and race factors affecting schools and school districts equal, every research group to have investigated standardized testing or the idea of basing teacher effectiveness on it, has concluded emphatically that it is woefully ineffective. To compare a teacher whose students are coming to school hungry, or who are distracted by gunfire in their neighborhoods, to the performance of teachers elsewhere — based on how their students perform on standardized tests — is beyond unfair. It should be illegal.
Never once did Rahm Emanuel ask the teachers, the ones doing the educating, how to fix education in this city before calling for his changes.
The United States has a longer school day than most first world countries, yet our scores are among the lowest. Clearly extending the day even further isn’t going to solve anything. In fact, the only thing that seems to be proven time and time again is that a student’s teacher will determine his or her success in school.
The countries that are succeeding in education highly value public education and its teachers. The backlash against the strike shows that neither are being valued in Chicago.
The controversy over the strike, and the tying of student success monetarily to teacher performance, is also a smokescreen for the work of what some call the Prison Industrial Complex. The move to gut public education throughout the country through tactics such as underpaying teachers must be seen contextually.
For several states, the fiscal planning for prison housing is calculated as a function of third grade standardized test scores. Educators have pleaded with authorities for years to heed the connection between a lack of proper education and the need for prison cells. But it appears they recognize the correlation. Indeed, it appears that — along with some of the most powerful corporate and lobbying entities to hold seats on the stock exchange – they’re banking on it.
We must keep one eye on this profiteering from social misery that occurs in the prison industry, and connect the dots to the assault on public education, fighting it tooth and nail.
The teacher’s job is invaluable. Once it appears that the brilliant experiment of public education flourished in America because we believed that the way to build the most powerful country on earth, was to have as fully-educated a citizenry as possible; one capable of critical thought, even as its citizens filled positions in industry, finance and government.
The current trend, not just in Chicago, but also throughout the country, suggests a sad departure from this history. Public education is being strategically dismantled and we’re being force fed the idea that the privatization of our children’s intellectual future is what will be most advantageous for them.
On the Tuesday before the strike, Rahm Emanuel unveiled his 25 million dollar contingency plan in anticipation of a strike. Money that could have been used to pay the wages asked, so that negotiation on the other issues could have started sooner.
The city of Chicago has not negotiated in good faith. It has ‘negotiated’ by putting the reputation of the teaching profession on public trial. Should a weapon formed in such a manner be allowed to prosper?
Teachers are striking for the future of education in this country, for the respect and policies that will enable teachers to perform at their best. No one else seems to be standing up for the students, so the teachers have taken on the fight.
Chicago Public School Teacher Katie Patton contributed research assistance for this article.