In Chicago, Rahm Emanuel is in a showdown against teachers (how RE wants to restrict strikes)

[alp227]

Peter Slevin, Washington Post, 9/13/12

Rahm Emanuel is not big on ambiguity. He was thrilled, a few days before he took office last year, when the Illinois House voted 112 to 1 for a school improvement package that, among other things, made it harder for teachers unions to call strikes.

A “historic day of opportunity for kids in the city of Chicago,” he said after the vote. Rank-and-file teachers were less pleased, particularly when an Emanuel ally boasted, “The unions cannot strike in Chicago.”

Teachers are now on strike in Chicago— loudly and enthusiastically — and Emanuel (D) finds himself in a far more pointed and public battle than he had bargained for. Under a national spotlight, his famous dealmaking skills are being severely tested by an increasingly familiar set of schoolhouse issues seen in communities across the country as contentious and often personal.

If the strike persists, its tone and outcome could ripple well beyond Chicago, given Emanuel’s close association with President Obama. Union support is important to the Obama campaign, which has been careful not to weigh in, even as Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney swiftly spoke out against the Chicago teachers.

full: http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/in-chicago-rahm-emanuel-is-in-a-showdown-against-teachers/2012/09/12/6c034a42-fcec-11e1-b153-218509a954e1_singlePage.html

[HiPointDem]

2. what a joke.

[HiPointDem]

3. Senate Bill 7 made salary & benefits the only 'strikeable' issues

Senate Bill 7 was the work of Jonah Edelman, his corporate reform group Stand for Children, and all those who wanted to bust teacher unions.

So, when Senate Bill 7 created a new threshold for strike authorization and limited the right to strike to salary and benefits, it didn’t take being a genius to have predicted a strike in Chicago.

Both sides even say that they are close to an agreement on money issues. But the problem is that if the CTU leadership says okay to the salary and benefits that the board has offered then negotiations are over because the board can refuse to discuss evaluations, job assignments or class size. That’s the law.\

So Jonah Edelman, the smart-ass boastful corporate school reformer, who thinks collective bargaining is the problem, created the very conditions that provoked a strike...

http://preaprez.wordpress.com/2012/09/11/jonahs-strike/


SB7 takes away tenure and seniority, ties teacher evaluations to value added measures, created the now infamous 75% threshold for a strike authorization vote by the Chicago Teachers Union and formally removed issues that could be collectively bargained in Chicago that weren’t wages and benefits.

http://preaprez.wordpress.com/2012/08/06/nea-is-still-spinning-senate-bill-7-as-teacher-led-reform/