Chicago Public Schools Cancel Classes Monday Amid Dispute
Chicago Public Schools Cancel Classes Monday Amid Dispute
(Bloomberg) -- Chicago Public Schools said classes would be closed again on Monday, the fourth-straight academic day, as it failed to reach a deal with the local teachers’ union over demands for more measures to prevent the spread of Covid-19.
Schools have been closed in the nation’s third-largest district since Wednesday after Chicago Teachers voted to shift back to remote learning. The union has insisted that the district put in place more stringent protections from a Covid-19 surge driven by the omicron variant.
“Out of fairness and consideration for parents who need to prepare, classes will be canceled again Monday,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot said in a tweet. “Although we have been negotiating hard throughout the day, there has not been sufficient progress for us to predict a return to class tomorrow.”
The union has said it wants an expansion of testing amid a citywide positivity rate that has topped 20%. Labor officials asked Chicago Public Schools to expand testing because of low vaccination rates and the number of students who are signed up for weekly surveillance testing.
The district called the union’s decision to work remotely an “illegal strike” and planned to dock the pay of those who didn’t show up to school buildings for work.
Lightfoot has argued that the city’s schools are safe for children and she wanted to avoid the learning loss endured by students when the district was fully remote for months in the previous school year. The Chicago Teachers Union had argued the city and district have not done enough to provide testing and vaccination opportunities among other failures to prevent the spread of the virus.
This fight marks the latest in a series of conflicts between the union, the schools and the mayor. In 2019, the union held its longest strike since 1987 to demand higher pay as well as more nurses and social workers in schools. After the winter break in early 2021, the union’s actions led to a delayed and phased-in return to school.
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