What you need to know about whether Chicago Teachers Union will strike in April
The Chicago Teachers Union and Chicago Public Schools entered the “fact finding” phase of negotiations in January 2025. Here’s what that means, whether Chicago students might be out of class, when and what it all could do to taxpayers.
The Chicago Teachers Union isn’t likely to be on strike until April under Illinois labor laws.
The union had expected to sail through contract negotiations with Chicago Public Schools this time around after bankrolling one of their own union operatives into City Hall in 2023.
“This year’s CTU contract negotiations will be different than any other,” CTU boasted in April 2024. Then the union started negotiations with a self-proclaimed “defiant” list of more than 700 demands that would cost the district an additional $10.2 billion to $13.8 billion. The union’s president was cavalier about how it “will cost $50 billion and 3 cents. And so what?”
But despite having former CTU employee Brandon Johnson as mayor, there’s been a gigantic hurdle: the school district’s $500 million budget deficit and CPS CEO Pedro Martinez’ determination not to stick it to Chicago taxpayers.
Seven months after the expiration of the previous agreement, the two sides are deadlocked on several provisions. They formally entered the “fact finding” portion of negotiations in January 2025, moving CTU one step closer to going on strike.
Here’s what you need to know about fact finding, how it could play out in coming weeks and how CTU is posturing itself for a strike – its go-to weapon against the families and taxpayers of Chicago.
What is fact finding?
The Illinois Educational Labor Relations Act governs collective bargaining between public school districts and teachers unions. Under the law, when CPS and CTU fail to reach an agreement, the dispute can be submitted to “fact finding” by either side.
Under the law, the parties each choose one member of the fact-finding panel and then together choose “a qualified impartial individual to serve as the fact finder and chairperson.” The fact finder is given several duties and powers, including conducting hearings and requiring the parties to submit final offers.
If the dispute is not settled within 75 days of the appointment of the fact-finding panel, the panel issues a private report containing advisory findings of fact and recommended terms of settlement. That report must be based on several criteria, including the best interest of the students and families and the district’s financial ability to fund the proposals.
The union and district then have 15 days to reject the fact finder’s report. If either rejects the report, it becomes public for 30 days. After that, the union must give a 10-day notice before it goes on strike.
The process has been in Illinois law since 2010. As CTU acknowledges, it has rejected the fact finder’s recommendations every time find finding has been used in its negotiations.
CTU isn’t likely to go on strike until April
Estimates of a strike timeline range from March to mid-April, but based on the current fact-finding process, a strike is not likely until early April.
CTU originally requested fact finding in October 2024, but it was delayed at the union’s request. Fact finding has now officially resumed, with CTU and CPS filing their written arguments on Jan. 20.
CTU expects the fact finder to issue his recommendations in mid-February, but at least one source has cited Feb. 6 as a possible release date. If that is the case, the parties would have 15 days – until Feb. 21 – to reject it. If published on Feb. 21, it would be 30 days – March 23 – before the union could issue it’s 10-day strike notice. That means it would be April 2 before the union could officially go on strike.
Notably, this falls right in the middle of the March 3-April 18 testing window for the online Illinois Assessment of Readiness, the state assessment and accountability measure given to all Illinois students in third through eighth grades. A strike during that time would disrupt that important benchmark for understanding reading and math proficiency levels in Chicago’s schools, an accountability measure CTU has fought and even deemed as racist.
CTU’s current posturing about the unfairness of fact finding is hypocritical
CTU claims the fact-finding process is stacked against the union, claiming it was “devised” by Rahm Emanuel in 2010 to weaken the union. The union ignores the fact that the law had to be passed by the Illinois General Assembly and signed by then-Gov. Pat Quinn, a Democrat.
CTU President Stacy Davis Gates also implied the process pushes the union toward a strike. “To force our hand to take a strike vote is a very cruel and mean joke,” she told WBEZ.
But that’s not what the union said last fall when it initiated fact finding. At that time, CTU told its members fact finding should help avoid a strike.
“No one wants to go on strike. Fact finding should make it unnecessary,” it posted.
The union also called the fact finder chosen by the parties, Marty Malin, a “nationally renowned labor arbitrator.” Not someone who is going to use labor laws unfairly against the union, as the union is currently implying.
What’s more, if CTU didn’t like the fact-finding provisions in Illinois law, it could have had the provisions changed. CTU has a history of getting what it wants from lawmakers in Springfield.
The union officially registered its position on 59 bills during the 103rd General Assembly, which ran from 2023 through 2024. Of those, it supported 54 bills and opposed five bills.
Here’s the kicker: lawmakers passed 32 of the 54 bills CTU supported. That’s a nearly 60% passage rate. What about the bills it opposed? Zip. None passed.
Taken together, the Illinois General Assembly did what CTU told them to do on more than 6 out of every 10 bills. From charter schools to minimum wage at restaurants, CTU had an opinion. For the most part, lawmakers did the union’s bidding – and never went against its wishes. That’s an incredible record, and one CTU could have used to its advantage in pushing changes to the fact-finding provisions.
That the union hasn’t tried to change the fact-finding law is telling.
Going on strike is CTU’s negotiating weapon of choice. In just the past 13 years, it has walked out on students five times:
- In 2012, a strike during contract negotiations kept kids out of classes for seven days.
- On April 1, 2016, the union conducted an illegal one-day strike in response to alleged “union-busting” efforts of Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner, Democratic Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and CPS CEO Forrest Claypool.
- In 2019, a strike during contract negotiations closed schools for 11 days.
- In January 2021, classes were cancelled when CTU refused to return to school for in-person learning following COVID closures.
- In January 2022, CTU walked out on school children for five days. Parents were notified of the walkout after 11 p.m. on a school night, leaving them just hours to develop a back-up plan after the union decided not to show up for Chicago’s children.
CTU even takes credit for triggering multiple teachers’ union strikes around the nation.
Now the union is lining itself up for another strike while disingenuously blaming Illinois’ union-friendly labor laws for allegedly stacking the deck against government unions. CTU’s own public flip-flops on fact finding show that argument fails.
CTU started the current negotiations with demands it explicitly described as “defiant.” Defiance isn’t the way to reach agreement. But it is a path toward walking out on the students and parents of Chicago once again, and costing taxpayers much more than is fair or sustainable.