How is the Chicago Teachers Union working to resurrect Chicago’s failing schools? Is it allowing parents more freedom to move their children out of failing schools, or holding underperforming schools and teachers accountable?
No? It’s voting on an arms embargo against Israel? Sure, I guess that will help little Timmy reach proficiency in math and literature.
Yes, the CTU is focused on trying to solve a conflict that is 6,169 miles away by voting on something it has no authority over, assuming that Chicago teachers are not selling military weapons to Israel — who knows, it is Chicago, after all. “Solve” is also used loosely here, as the Chicago Teachers Union is putting itself on the side of genocidal antisemitic terrorists by pushing Palestinian terrorist propaganda against Israel.
In fact, this is not the first time the CTU has offered its unsolicited opinion on the Israel-Hamas conflict. Late last year, the union voted in favor of a ceasefire, with Chicago teacher Dave Stieber writing that members fear when something “tragic happens” to their students and that “caring about students also means deliberately caring about the world we are helping them grow into.” Therefore, “we know what it is like to lose students, to see young people suffer. Whether that child is in Chicago, Israel, Palestine or anywhere in the world, we don’t want anyone else to experience this pain.”
To Stieber’s credit, given how Palestinian terrorists force children to learn antisemitic propaganda in schools, maybe the world would be better off if those students didn’t know how to read. You know, like how 2 in 3 Chicago Public Schools elementary students can’t read at grade level. For high school juniors, that number is 3 in 4.
The inability of Chicago students to read can be chalked up to the chronic absence of their teachers. The Chicago Tribune revealed that 41% of Chicago Public Schools teachers were chronically absent, missing at least 10 days of classes, in the 2023-2024 school year. This is even as the median salary for CPS teachers is $95,000. The outlet highlighted this as the Chicago Teachers Union was demanding a 9% raise, which is obviously a ridiculous ask for well-paid, chronically absent professionals who are failing to do the most basic job of actually teaching their students.
The union responded by claiming that expecting teachers to go to work for $95,000 per year while they demand a raise is “misogynistic.” The CTU even cited COVID-19 as an excuse for chronically absent teachers: “What about COVID-19?,” CPS teacher Roxanne Piersanti asked in an article. “Do members of the board work with 100-plus different kids a day? How would their immune systems hold up?”
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Coming from the same teachers union whose members said letting children go to school in classrooms during the pandemic was racist and sexist, perhaps we should all be grateful these teachers show up at all.
If Chicago teachers and their union spent less of their time writing articles complaining about people’s criticism of them or skipping classes, maybe Chicago students could actually learn how to do math before they graduate. But that isn’t what Chicago is paying its teachers to do. Evidently, they are paying them to solve the Israel-Hamas conflict. Those multiplication tables can wait.
This article was originally published at www.washingtonexaminer.com
