Striking Chicago teachers press for final demand after accepting
tentative deal
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[October 31, 2019]
By Brendan O'Brien
CHICAGO (Reuters) - A strike by Chicago
teachers against the third-largest U.S. school district headed into its
11th day on Thursday after union leaders approved a tentative labor deal
clinched at the bargaining table but clashed with the mayor over a final
demand.
Union officials huddled behind closed doors on Wednesday to review the
deal and emerged hours later to announce they had accepted it but would
return to work only if the school calendar were extended to make up for
instructional days and pay lost during the walkout.
The standoff left classes for 300,000 students canceled once more across
the district's 500-plus schools.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot immediately rejected the demand for makeup days,
accusing the 25,000-member Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) of reneging on
the contract agreement reached in negotiations earlier in the day.
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"We've given them a historic deal by any measure," Lightfoot said in
late-night remarks live-streamed on her Twitter page. "The fact that our
children aren't back in school tomorrow is on them."
She added: "I'm not compensating for days they were out on strike."
Union leaders called on rank-and-file members to rally on Thursday
morning to press for their outstanding demand.
"We have a tentative agreement, but we do not have a return-to-work
agreement. So we will be at City Hall at 10 a.m. to demand the mayor
return our days," the union said on Twitter.
Terms of the proposed settlement were not disclosed. But some union
leaders initially voiced enthusiasm for it.
"The CTU may have reached a monumental agreement," union Vice President
Stacy Davis Gates said earlier on Twitter, referring to the tentative
deal.
The Chicago walkout follows a wave of teacher strikes across the country
over wages and education funding during the past two years, including a
week-long work stoppage in Los Angeles in January. African-Americans and
Hispanics account for the majority of Chicago's public school
enrollment.
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![](../images/103119pics/news_b5.jpg)
Teachers protest during a rally and march on the first day of a
teacher strike in Chicago, Illinois, U.S. October 17, 2019.
REUTERS/John Gress
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As was the case in Los Angeles, the labor dispute in Chicago
centered on pay as well as teacher demands for contract language to
reduce class size and increase staffing levels for support
professionals, including nurses and social workers.
Any settlement is subject to approval by the union's House of
Delegates, a body consisting of 825 elected representatives from
each of the city's schools and support staff classifications, before
classes can resume.
The district had said it was looking into whether it could make up
more than eight school days lost during a strike, and the Chicago
Board of Education would need to vote on adding any attendance days
to the school calendar.
The teachers' last contract expired July 1, and they walked off the
job Oct. 17.
The union was seeking a contract that runs three years instead of
five and includes more paid preparation time for elementary school
teachers.
Lightfoot has said the union's full demands, if met, would require
an annual spending increase of 30% beyond the current school budget
of $7.7 billion.
(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Chicago, Writing and additional
reporting by Steve Gorman in Culver City, Calif.; Additional
reporting by Dan Whitcomb in Culver City; editing by Richard Pullin)
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