CTU | consideration by design.

Although Chicago’s Public Schools have reached a tentative deal to end the Chicago Teachers’ Strike, the cost to parents, taxpayers, and—above all else—students has already been significant. While there will undoubtedly be further debate on what sort of national implications this ordeal will have, the primary question that must be addressed is simple: “How can we avoid this from happening again?”

The Chicago Teachers’ Union president, Karen Lewis, called upon parents during her Sunday evening speech to “join…in [their] education justice fight.” According to CTU, at stake in this battle are teachers’ evaluations, job security, working conditions, and the broader issues surrounding student violence, homelessness, and poverty. According to Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the only contested issues left pertain to principals’ ability to choose their staff and how to balance teachers’ evaluation demands with mandated legislation.

What is most curious about Lewis’ rally to protect students from “exposure to violence, homelessness, hunger, and other social issues beyond [teachers’] control” is that this particular method of protest places those students in the very dangers she claims to be fighting against.

While teachers picket, the Chicago community has been forced to pick up the slack. Faith-based organizations have offered “safe havens,” 144 of the public schools have offered morning activities and free meals for impoverished students, and all administrative police personnel have been deployed to Chicago’s streets in order to offer additional student protection. CTU has acknowledged that these “children are exposed to unprecedented levels of neighborhood violence,” yet they cannot—or, rather, will not—find alternative methods of protest in order to promote the safety of their students.

It is the Union’s position that teachers’ “job security is stability for [their] students.” Considering that stability requires students knowing they have a safe place and meals provided for them, CTU’s actions over the past week have demonstrated clearly that this fight for teachers’ security has come at the cost of students’ safety and well-being. Lewis calls for the Chicago community to “evaluate us on what we do, not on the lives of our children that we do not control.” If what they are doing is choosing politics and personal gain above student welfare, how can we offer anything but a failing evaluation for how the Unions are handling an educational policy crisis?

Certainly, the end of the strike is just the beginning of many continuing conversations about education reform and teachers’ collective bargaining rights. However, it is wholly disheartening to realize that the students have become the true victims of the CTU’s “education justice fight.”