After months of negotiations, the Chicago Teachers Union has requested a mediator to help settle a new four-year contract with Chicago Public Schools.
“We are not going to be okay with balancing the budget in our school community,” CTU President Stacy Davis Gates said on a conference call with the union’s membership Thursday night. “You can balance the budget with the bank. You can balance the budget with policy makers, but not with our school community and not on the backs of our students.”
On Thursday, the union met to continue outlining their concerns about Chicago Public Schools’ recently-passed budget. Topics ranged from loans for the district taken out under past mayoral leadership to the growing need for bilingual education. The union also said they sent a letter to CPS on Wednesday requesting a mediator which the district has agreed to.
Gates called the CPS CEO Pedro Martinez an “impediment” to the negotiating process. “What we’re going to continue to do, though, is offer opportunities for partnership and offer opportunities the pathway forward,” Davis Gates said. We are at the precipice of change.”
Since June, the district and CTU have engaged in a first-ever series of public bargaining sessions, with three meetings on “Green Schools,” the student experience and the budget and finances. The union has repeatedly requested more money to fund their demands, primarily from the state.
Though the union and the district presented a more united front in recent months, tensions rose as CPS moved to pass its budget for the coming school year. The district managed to close its $505 million budget deficit, passing a $9.9 billion budget in July despite pressure from the teachers union and Mayor Brandon Johnson. The budget, however, was subject to be amended due to the ongoing contract negotiations between CTU and the district.
Meanwhile, the union has retained unity with Mayor Johnson on the budget, as he has said he won’t accept staffing cuts for the district.
“We are bargaining under a different dynamic,” Vicki Kurzydlo, a special education teacher at Sauganash Elementary and member of CTU’s bargaining team said at Thursday’s meeting. “We have a new mayor, a brother, Brandon, and we are going to get through this.”
CPS said they intend to continue working with CTU to reach a contract agreement.
“Mediation is designed to help facilitate productive discussion and bridge disagreements,” CPS said in a statement provided to the Tribune. “We believe this process will be instrumental in finding common ground and moving forward with an agreement that supports our educational goals, including protecting our students, classrooms and staff.”
