Parents beware: Chicago Teachers Union contract is anti-student
The new Chicago Teachers Union contract grows an education model that is failing students while attacking parents’ ability to choose alternatives. All that, at a higher cost.
The Chicago Public Schools board voted 19-0, with a former union leader abstaining, on April 24 to approve a new Chicago Teachers Union contract, estimated to add $1.5 billion to district expenses over four years.
It will bump average teacher pay from $86,000 a year to over $114,000 by the end of the contract’s term.
But the contract’s cost isn’t the only drawback. It also includes provisions that are bad for students and families.
These include an attack on student proficiency by increasing the number of “sustainable community schools,” which have among the worst outcomes in the district. The contract also attacks the district’s charter schools, limiting their growth and enrollment and clearing the way for their ultimate closure.
With fewer than 1 in 3 CPS students reading at grade level, parents need more options and support – not fewer. But CTU isn’t in it for the families, and its direct attack on education in its latest contract proves it.
Attack on student proficiency: contract increases number of schools with among worst outcomes in district
The contract mandates the creation of an additional 50 “sustainable community schools.” But CPS already has 20 sustainable community schools, and they are failing students on every metric.
That means instead of bolstering educational outcomes, the contract increases a model that has among the worst outcomes in the district.
The sustainable community school model is supposed to integrate additional student services coordinated by the school with outside organizations, such as housing or food assistance, medical or dental care, mental health services, English language or parenting classes.
CTU and its state affiliate, the Illinois Federation of Teachers, claim the model promotes improved outcomes. They claim decreased absenteeism rates, increased student performance and improved school culture stem from the model.
But numbers don’t lie: Students at sustainable community schools on average have the lowest reading and math proficiency, highest absenteeism, highest high-school dropout rate, lowest graduation rate and lowest postsecondary enrollment rate compared to the average of students at selective enrollment schools and other traditional public schools within CPS. The schools also cost the district more per pupil compared to other schools in the district.
One example: Dyett High School, which was praised by Mayor Brandon Johnson as “a great example of a sustainable community school” after CTU and CPS reached a tentative agreement. But only 2% of Dyett’s 11th-grade students could read at grade level on the SAT in 2024. None were proficient in math. At Schurz High School – the sustainable community high school that has the best outcomes – not even 10% of students could read at grade level, and only 6% could do math.
The contract’s increase in sustainable community schools is bad news for students and families who get stuck in these schools, as well as for the taxpayers forced to pay more for poorer outcomes.
Attack on charter schools: contract prevents charter school growth, enrollment; clearing way for their elimination
In general, students at charter schools outperform their peers in traditional public schools and produce, on average, more year-to-year academic growth. At least a dozen studies also show the arrival of charter schools increases the achievement of the students who remain in a district’s public schools. Competition spurs achievement.
Yet previous CTU contracts placed a moratorium on adding charter schools and capped student enrollment, essentially forbidding any additional students from enrolling. The new contract includes similar language to the previous two contracts, ensuring a net-zero increase to the number of charter schools and current enrollment levels in Chicago’s charter schools.
But it goes even farther than past contracts and requires union neutrality for charter operator contract renewals with CPS. This means charter school operators in CPS will be required to, in effect, support a union’s attempt to organize its staff, making it easier for CTU to unionize all charter schools in the district. About one-third of Chicago charter schools are currently unionized.
One of the big advantages of charter schools is their ability to operate without the strictures of teachers union contracts. Innovation and efficiency thanks to freedom from some union, district and state rules help charters focus on student achievement.
The contract also mandates the district adopt reabsorption guidelines for charter schools that close. This is similar to what is included in the bill CTU pushed in the current Illinois General Assembly and its strategy for undermining Acero charter schools through unionization and then reabsorption into CPS.
The union is obviously preparing for the ultimate shut-down of charter schools in Chicago through a strategy of unionizing, restricting, closing and then reabsorbing – maintaining a monopoly over public education and delivering a standardized mediocrity. Students at closing charter schools will be forced back into regular CPS schools, where fewer than 1 in 3 students can read at grade level.
CTU isn’t in it for the kids
CTU’s quest for contract provisions that work against sound education aren’t new. The union isn’t in it for the kids.
In fact, the union isn’t in it for the teachers, either. Representing members is supposed to be a union’s core purpose, but just 19.76% of the Chicago Teachers Union’s spending was on “representational activities” in 2024, when negotiations on the new contract started. The rest was spent on administration, politics and other union leadership priorities.
Instead of focusing on teachers or children, CTU has become a political organization that exists to spread its radical agenda. Among hundreds of stances it has taken in Springfield, it has lobbied against bills requiring a school district to notify parents a school employee has been charged with a sex offense and allowing a school district to expel students convicted of violent felonies. It has even lobbied against education bills that would benefit students, such as bills allowing high schoolers to earn unlimited dual credit or allowing schools to offer comprehensive math and reading intervention programs for K-3rd grade.
CTU spent over $2 million on “political activities and lobbying” between July 1, 2023, and June 30, 2024. The largest recipient was its own political action committee, which received over $644,000. It was able to put its lobbyist in the Chicago mayor’s office – with limited return in the new contract for its investment.
Members have no say on how the political money is spent. And because the union’s fiscal year runs July 1 through June 30, that $2 million doesn’t include the political spending that occurred in the four months leading up to the November 2024 school board election. The union spent $1.74 million trying to get its people into 10 school board spots, again to benefit its contract push, but only got four of the seats – and one of those was uncontested.
CTU’s attack on education in its new contract is just the latest proof the union is bad for Chicagoans, whether they are students, union members or taxpayers.