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AMENDMENT
1 WOULD COME BETWEEN TEACHERS, DEDICATION TO STUDENTS
Illinois Policy Institute/
Ann Miller
Amendment 1 would give Illinois teachers a
permanent right to strike, taking more class time away from teachers who
believe their place is with their students instead of on the picket
line. Voters will decide Nov. 8.
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 In 2016 when the Chicago Teachers
Union went on strike, three weeks before chess nationals, Chicago Public Schools
teacher Joe Ocol chose to cross the picket line to run chess practice.
His team went on to win the national title, receiving presidential,
congressional, and mayoral recognition. The Chicago’s Teachers Union’s
recognition was to revoke Ocol’s union membership.
“It is my duty to be with my kids. I joined CPS as a teacher, not as a union
member. So my role first and foremost is to be a teacher, to be with my students
inside my classroom,” he said.
Ocol made the same choice when the Chicago Teachers Union walked out on students
Jan. 5, the union’s third work stoppage in less than three years. The dispute
was over COVID-19 testing and remote learning, although Chicago’s top health
official and other large city schools saw no need to suspend in-person learning.
The walkout cost students five days.
“My loyalty to the union ends where my commitment to the students begins,” Ocol
said. “There are a lot of ways to impose safety measures and changes. You don’t
dangle the plight of the kids or sacrifice the kids, just for your demands. I
made a promise that I will be in my classroom, and so I came into school.”
On Nov. 8, Illinoisians will vote on whether to give unions such as CTU the
permanent right to strike over virtually anything. Here’s how.
The Illinois General Assembly in Spring 2021 placed Amendment 1 on the upcoming
ballot. The proposal’s language includes the following: “No law shall be passed
that interferes with, negates, or diminishes the right of employees to organize
and bargain collectively over their wages, hours, and other terms and conditions
of employment and work place safety….”
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Lawmakers will never be
able pull back on union power – including the power to strike – if
the amendment passes because that would be diminishing union rights
to organize or bargain. Union bosses would forever hold the power to
strike over virtually anything, which could mean more strikes – even
against the will of members and at the expense of students and
families.
CTU has already demonstrated a willingness to strike over COVID-19
public health policy, despite the science, but its political agenda
and negotiating tactics have been applied to much more. CTU has
tried to negotiate its social agenda on housing, immigration,
“restorative justice,” wealth redistribution and defunding the
police.
For teachers such as Ocol, Amendment 1 could force more lost time
when he could be helping students. Union bosses across the state
would be emboldened to use students as pawns to get what they want –
a strategy CTU has repeatedly used.
Union power plays are already spread far beyond Chicago. Illinois
is an outlier when it comes to teacher strikes.
Teachers unions in Illinois have threatened to strike 164 times,
then actually taken to the picket lines 48 times in the past 10
years, according to annual reports filed by the Illinois Educational
Labor Relations Board.
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