Chicago teachers reach deal with city to end 11-day strike

Teachers in Chicago, home to the nation's third-largest school system, reached a deal with the city Thursday that is set to return 300,000 students and 25,000 teachers to classrooms Friday, marking an end to one of the longest teacher strikes in recent history.

The strike began Oct. 17 after the Chicago Teachers Union reached an impasse with Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who faced the first major test of her nascent administration. And it comes amid a resurgence of teacher activism in other urban school systems following a wave of walkouts in conservative states in 2018.

The strike, which kept students out of classrooms for 11 days, brought tens of thousands of people to Chicago's streets and to picket lines as the teachers pressed the city to hire more teachers, social workers and school nurses in a city where three-quarters of schoolchildren come from low-income households.

Lightfoot repeatedly said the city could not afford to meet the demands of teachers, and last week pressed the union to end the strike while negotiating continued. By Wednesday night, the union's governing body had approved a tentative contract - but teachers remained on strike until Lightfoot agreed to extend the school year by five days. It was a sticking point for educators who lost pay while on strike.

"In the interest of our students and our parents who have been suffering, it was important to me to make sure we got our kids in class," said Lightfoot at a city hall news conference Thursday. "Enough is enough."

Union leaders declined to hold a joint news conference with the mayor, and criticized her for refusing to extend the school year a full 11 days.

"This has been a tense last two weeks," said Jesse Sharkey, president of the teachers union. "This is not a day for photo ops or victory laps."

The agreement outlines salary increases for teachers and promises $25 million to reduce class sizes - one of the union's priorities in negotiations. It also calls for hiring more nurses and social workers so one will be assigned to each school by 2023. Teachers are also set to get a 16 percent pay raise over the life of the five-year contract.

The announcement of a settlement was made while sign-waving teachers rallied outside city hall in blowing snow, bundled in ponchos and jackets.

The Chicago job action follows nearly two years of strikes and walkouts coast to coast, including in West Virginia, Oklahoma and Arizona, where teachers have little bargaining power. This year, educators in Los Angeles, which has the nation's second-largest school district, went on strike in January, and teachers in Oakland, California, followed suit the next month. In Chicago, the strike represented the latest chapter in a long history of teacher activism: Teachers last walked out in 2012 and nearly went on strike in 2016.

Chicago teachers bargained over familiar issues, including salaries, staffing, class size, and hiring enough nurses and social workers to provide at least one in every school. They also sought to boost the pay of classroom aides, many of whom qualify for public benefits, and to force the city to set up programs to increase teacher diversity.

Educators also made demands that extended far beyond the classroom: They wanted policies to encourage more affordable housing in a city that critics say caters to the wealthy at the expense of longtime working-class residents. The city's black population has shrunk by a quarter since 2000. Nearly 16,500 students in 2018 were homeless.

The strike gained high-profile backers. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who is seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, joined picket lines last week, and several other candidates tweeted their support for teachers. Chance the Rapper, a Chicago native, wore a Chicago Teachers Union sweatshirt as he hosted "Saturday Night Live" over the weekend.

As the strike wore on, the stakes were raised. High school seniors applying to college could not get help from teachers and counselors with applications. Sports teams were forced to forfeit postseason games.

In their protests, Chicago teachers took aim at the city's redevelopment policy, saying it steers tax incentives to developers who do not need them, leaving schools without enough funding. This week, teachers held a sit-in at the offices of Sterling Bay, a controversial development in Lincoln Yards that received more than $1 billion in tax incentives.

Carmen Guzman, who teaches first grade at Louis Pasteur Elementary, said she was pleased with gains teachers made. Five years ago, when she taught kindergarten, she had 38 students, some with emotional problems. A student at her school who has diabetes had to transfer because there is no full-time nurse.

"It has taken a toll," Guzman said.

But she is eager to get back to the classroom. She worries that young students, having just become accustomed to the rhythm of the school day, will have to relearn routines. Kindergartners were just learning to read.

“Now,” Guzman said, “we have to start all that over again.”