Support the Chicago Teachers’ Strike

This post is meant to express the Advocacy Center’s solidarity with the striking teachers in Chicago.  Whether or not the strike is an effective strategy, the interests represented by the union and the teachers merit support as they oppose the interests represented by Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

Some people have confused those interests, which makes picking sides more difficult and tends to cast the teachers in an unfair light.  Joe Nocera’s op-ed in today’s edition of the New York Times illustrates this.  Nocera’s piece is mostly benign and somewhat sympathetic to the teachers, yet it makes critical misrepresentations.

One error that underlies Nocera’s piece is that he does not know what the teachers fight for.  He oversimplifies the conflict, equating it to some stereotypical (that is, not necessarily realistic in any meaningful way) labor fight.  For example, Nocera writes, “[l]ike unions everywhere, the Chicago Teachers Union is trying to hold on to what it has, while management is trying to impose new work rules.”  Nocera suggests that the Chicago teachers represent the past.  He says that “the status quo… is what the Chicago teachers want,” and implies that the they should have “grudgingly accepted” Mayor Emanuel’s terms, as have some other unions across the country, because “there was too much momentum to stop things like charter schools and performance standards.”

While there may be some truth in his characterization of events, it is nevertheless extremely misleading, not to mention imbued with hopelessness.  Nocera acknowledges that the privatization of public schools—Emanuel’s real aim—has not proven successful in providing quality education for all students.  Worse, it helps only a few while probably leaving the rest worse off in our increasingly resource-starved schools.

This is what the Chicago teachers are fighting for.  They are not fighting for the “status quo,” they are fighting for better schools, as well as for their own interests.  Sally Kohn of Salon reported:

“Prior to going on strike for the first time in 25 years, the Chicago Teachers Union won ‘concessions’ including that the school board would provide textbooks on the first day of school. Teachers have previously had to wait up to six weeks into the school year for instructional materials to arrive. And the union wants to limit class sizes, which are the largest in the entire state of Illinois. These aren’t the demands of greedy thugs. These are the demands of teachers who want to teach.”

The teachers fight for these things because no one else will, certainly not Mayor Emanuel.  The benefit of textbooks to a child’s education is obvious.  Class size, too, has been shown to be extremely important for children’s potential to succeed as adults.  Researchers found “that a 33 percent reduction in class size leads to an increase in students’ lifetime earnings of about $4,421 for every year the reduction takes place,” (emphasis added).

A good education is not just about small classes, of course.  Good teachers also impact students.  Contrary to the implication of the article, the striking teachers are not fighting against standards and accountability for themselves.  And they rightly argue that they should not be blamed for inevitable consequences of poverty and marginalization that undeniably affects many of Chicago’s students.  Reports link poverty to poor academic performance over and over again.  That makes Nocera’s comment that CTU President Karen Lewis’s remarks (about the reality of poverty’s afflictions) “justify” privatization reformers’ allegations that unionized teachers refuse to take responsibility for underperforming students very troubling.  Nocera, in essence, says that even though poverty causes poor results, “reformers” can hold teachers completely responsible to impose their agenda.

This is wrong not only because teachers as a matter of fact are not responsible for many of the under-performing students in poor neighborhoods, as the studies show.  More importantly, this view allows, Nocera, Emanuel, and ultimately our society to avoid the truly difficult but paramount issues in our society, such as inequality, poverty, and related ills.  School reforms as sought by Rahm Emanuel do nothing to end poverty as a whole, but it give the illusion that poverty is not a problem because a few poor people make good.  This should be unacceptable.  This is part of what the striking teachers reject.

Nocera conclusion sums up his good intentions and harmful ignorance:

“We are truly in the midst of an education crisis — one that won’t be solved until we completely rethink the way we offer public education. For starters, teachers and school administrators need to start working together instead of fighting each other. What the strike in Chicago mainly illustrates is how far we are from that goal.”

It is good that Nocera at least cares about the crisis that is America’s public education system.  Recognizing the problem, however, does not on its own lead to the solution; it may, in fact, hinder it if you misrepresent the reality of it.  The reality is that teachers are not fighting school administrators.  They are fighting politicians like Rahm Emanuel who have been captured by elites.  Nocera, by misleading the public about the teachers strike probably hinders more than helps the educational crisis.  If you want to help, stand with the Chicago teachers.