10 Tweets That Capture Chicago Teachers’ #FightForFunding From the Inside

By Sameer Rao Apr 01, 2016

10 Tweets That Capture Chicago Teachers’ #FightForFunding From the Inside

Today, more than three years after its last major strike, the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) held a one-day action with support from allies throughout the city. 

The CTU’s day of action targeted Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner, among others, in part over failed contract negotiations and state budget issues that are negatively impacting teachers. According to VICE, Rauner refused to pass a state budget "without new rules restricting public sector workers’ union rights." Chicago Public Schools (CPS) officials also forced teachers to take three unpaid days off to save money.

The strike promoted solidarity with other public sector unions, university students (especially at public universities affected by funding issues, where some staged teach-ins) and community members who are concerned about the social service and education funding deficits, money spent on prisons, tax cuts offered to the rich and the intertwined systemic issues that contribute to those ills. The result was a multifaceted strike that VICE said "looks a lot like the type of strike that European or Latin Americans workers often engage."

CPS’s student body is primarily people of color—a fact that is not lost on the professionals who serve them. "Black and brown children on the South and West sides are bearing the brunt of this trauma," Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) member Johnae Strong said last week, after the CTU voted to strike. 

Here are ten tweets with pictures and video from inside the #FightForFunding strike:

 

(H/t VICE, Chicago Tribune, DNAInfo Chicago, Associated Press) 

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#FightForFundingArchiveBruce RaunerChicagoChicago Teachers UnionCTUJocelyn BiohLaborLaborPoliticsPoliticsRahm EmanuelSchools & Youth