Chicago teachers reach deal to end strike

Educators win pay raises, smaller classes

Teachers in Chicago, home to the nation’s third-largest school system, reached a deal with the city Thursday that is set to return 300,000 students and 25,000 teachers to classrooms Friday, ending one of the longest teacher strikes in recent history.

The agreement outlines salary increases for teachers and promises $25 million to reduce class sizes — one of the Chicago Teachers Union’s priorities. It also calls for hiring more nurses and social workers so that one will be assigned to each school by 2023. The pact also extends the school year five days — a sticking point for teachers, who lost six days of pay during the strike. Teachers will also get a 16% raise over the life of the fiveyear contract.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot, facing the first major test of her administration, had sought to end the school year without additional days.

Teachers have been on strike since Oct. 17 after reaching an impasse with Lightfoot. Classes were canceled for 11 days in a school system in which threequarters of students are from low-income households. Nearly 16,500 students in 2018 were homeless.

The announcement of a deal came amid a surge of teacher activism that has sparked strikes and walkouts coast to coast. This year, teachers in Los Angeles, the nation’s secondlargest school district, went on strike in January and teachers in Oakland, California, followed suit in April. In Chicago, the strike represented the latest chapter in a long history of teacher activism: Teachers last walked out in 2012 and nearly went on strike in 2016.

Chicago teachers this year bargained over familiar issues, including salaries, staffing, class size, and nurses and social workers. They also sought to boost pay for classroom aides, many of whom qualify for public benefits, and to force the city to set up programs that increase teacher diversity.

Educators also made demands that extended beyond the classroom, including policies to encourage more affordable housing in a city that critics say caters to the wealthy at the expense of working-class residents. The city’s black population has shrunk by a quarter since 2000.

Lightfoot repeatedly said the city could not afford teacher demands.

PAT NABONG/CHICAGO SUN-TIMES Members of the Chicago Teachers’ Union rally in downtown Chicago on Thursday. A deal has been announced that ends the strike by the city’s teachers that began on Oct. 17.