Sign up for Chalkbeat Chicago’s free daily newsletter to keep up with the latest news on Chicago Public Schools.
After eight months of contentious talks that cost CEO Pedro Martinez his job, Chicago Public Schools teacher contract negotiations are entering a decisive phase.
The union and the district provided separate bargaining updates late Friday afternoon suggesting they are making some progress — and both sides said they agreed to pause a neutral fact-finding process that started in October.
The district and union both said they have reached tentative agreements to expand the number of Sustainable Community Schools to 70 over the next four years, hire more English learner teachers and other staff, and jointly look for ways to offer housing help to homeless students.
But many sticking points remain, and union leaders this week accused Martinez of standing in the way of a final deal, saying progress at the bargaining table stalled after a judge ruled on Dec. 24 that the CEO remains in charge of negotiations during his six remaining months on the job.
“The fact that we don’t have a yes now is because of one person, and only one person,” said CTU President Stacy Davis Gates, citing alignment between their proposals and the district’s new five-year strategic plan.
On Friday, Martinez and other district leaders forcefully rejected the idea that the district has blocked progress, countering that in fact much headway has been made.
Martinez had accused school board members, appointed by former CTU employee turned Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, of trying to hijack the process after they voted to fire him without cause late on Dec. 20, the Friday night before the district’s two-week winter break.
CPS officials stressed again that they are pushing back against proposals that the district simply cannot afford amid massive looming deficits — or ones that would hamstring school leaders or affect the amount of time students spend learning core subjects.
“If we overextend ourselves today,” Martinez said at a Friday evening press conference, “it will be our children and our staff who will pay for it tomorrow.”
Here’s a look at some of the remaining disagreements.
Prep time for elementary teachers
For months, the two sides have clashed over a union proposal to give teachers more time during the school day to prepare lessons while students spend extra time in enrichment classes. Davis Gates said Friday there was finally movement but not a formal proposal.
“We are engaged in a discussion that may hopefully get us closer to an elementary school day that provides our young people with a more rounded school day that includes art, music, physical education, instrumental music, choral music, just a wide variety of opportunities,” she said.
CPS officials have said the district is already a leader in providing significant preparation time, with 330 minutes per week on average compared with 240 minutes in New York City and 90 in San Diego. They say they are unwilling to cut back on core instruction, especially at a time when students are still recovering from the academic toll of the pandemic.
Bogdana Chkoumbova, the district’s chief education officer, stressed that shortening time for core instruction remains a no-go for the district, and the two sides are exploring new ways to add more prep minutes, including the possibility of lengthening the school year.
In some ways, the disagreement harkens back to 2012, when the district lengthened the school day to seven hours for elementary schools and seven-and-a-half for high schools — a key campaign promise and significant win for former Mayor Rahm Emanuel. The change was possible because the district and union agreed that elementary teachers could start their day when students do — removing 30 minutes of prep time that they previously had. The union pushed for getting those 30 minutes back in 2019 but were unsuccessful.
Amount of annual raises
The union opened negotiations by asking for 9% raises annually. CPS countered with 4% to 5% per year. The district says that thanks to these raises, the average teacher in the district would make $115,000 or more a year by the end of the contract in four years. The district has also agreed to health coverage increases at no cost to teachers, whom officials have stressed are the highest paid among colleagues in large districts, except in New York City.
A union update to members this week called the district’s counterproposal “a decent initial offer.” But they are still pushing for additional pay improvements that they argue will help keep veteran educators in the district. And they are upset CPS won’t guarantee that paying for the raises won’t trigger layoffs or furloughs.
CPS officials have noted that the district is once again facing a structural deficit of roughly $500 million, which was papered over the past four years with federal COVID relief money and is slated to balloon to almost $1 billion in the coming years even before teacher contract costs are factored in.
Martinez said Friday that the CTU is still demanding 6% raises in the first two years and 5% the second two years of the contract, but he said, “We need to maintain our current proposal for the fiscal health of the district.”
Additional staff and class size limits
The union’s latest email said they have come close to reaching agreements on staffing social workers, librarians, tech coordinators, and bilingual teacher assistants, but the two sides are still bargaining over additional hires and job security for them. Davis Gates said Friday the two sides appear close to an agreement on class size caps in the early grades and high school, but remain stuck on what the limit should be in the middle grades.
In an email to parents, district officials again touted that they created roughly 7,000 new positions during the pandemic, even as enrollment dipped — an investment that officials say helped spur academic recovery and a return to relative normalcy for schools. They say they are concerned about maintaining that higher level of staffing without the federal COVID aid that helped power it — even before adding more jobs in response to union demands.
“Protecting those investments as we move into a tough budget season is a top priority for our CEO and our bargaining team,” said Ben Felton, the district’s chief talent officer.
The district said it has agreed to add several hundred positions that reflect an increase in the number of students with disabilities and language needs, including English learner teachers, case managers, social workers, and more.
Teacher evaluations and curriculum autonomy
How teachers are evaluated changed in the CTU contract under Emanuel’s administration more than a decade ago — at the height of a national conversation about the issue. Emanuel and many pro-education reform leaders pushed for teachers’ performance evaluations to be tied to student performance and the federal government under then-President Barack Obama incentivized districts and states to do so. What resulted was a new CPS system for evaluating educators called REACH, based in part on a test that students take at the start and end of each school year.
Though many educators and administrators find the new system helpful, some have worried it’s too punitive and can turn teachers away from the profession. The CTU is pushing to curb REACH now, including less frequent evaluations, pointing to research showing that Black educators and even white teachers in predominantly Black schools tend to get lower marks.
CPS says REACH remains an important way of holding schools accountable and ensuring educators improve their work, though the district is open to changes such as providing more mentoring to educators in high-poverty schools. It has also pushed back against a union proposal that would allow teachers to select their own curriculums. Some principals and the district’s principals union have also spoken out against that and other proposals they say will hamper school leaders’ ability to set a unified vision for their campuses.
“Strong schools are only possible with strong leaders,” Chkoumbova said.
Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.
Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.
