CTU starts summer organizing campaign

Teachers, Paraprofessionals and Clinicians Set to Canvass Chicago Neighborhoods to Register Voters; Organize against City Hall’s Assault on Schools

CTU Summer Organizing Institute set to start June 30

CHICAGO - This summer the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) will host its fourth Summer Organizing Institute to train CTU members, parents and social justice activists in organizing skills, leadership, and political activism, labor advocacy and public education issues. To date, CTU has trained over 1,500 people through its comprehensive program.

This year the focus will include not only educating the public on the continued corporate assault on public education but also on how to use electoral power to fight for social change. CTU, along with other labor and community groups, pledged to register 100,000 new voters in time for the upcoming municipal elections where both Governor Pat Quinn and Mayor Rahm Emanuel face re-election.

Throughout the summer, trainees will meet with CTU members, parents, clergy and community leaders to organize for increased school funding; to build support for an increase in the minimum wage; to oppose educational cuts and closings; to advocate for a more sane and moral fiscal policy from the Board of Education; and to engage in other struggles to improve our schools and communities.

The Summer Organizing Institute will also work to advance the call for an elected representative school board in Chicago, which currently is the only municipality in Illinois with handpicked school board members appointed by the mayor. Because of the Board’s allegiance to the fifth floor of City Hall rather than the school children, parents and workers within the Chicago Public Schools (CPS), it voted to close 50 schools in 2013, the largest single set of school closures in the nation’s history.

Trainees will mobilize supporters and grassroots leaders and participate in neighborhood canvasses until just before the start of the new school year. In meeting with teachers, school clinicians and paraprofessionals in their homes, they will also work to help members address contract violations in their buildings and counsel members on how to resolve grievances as they organize against abusive CPS policies and principals.

“The attack on our school district, our profession, our parents and our students is unprecedented. We have no choice but to organize, organize, organize and put democracy to work,” said CTU President Karen Lewis. “We intend to organize our members, organize our parents, register voters and engage in an issues-based education campaign to arm taxpayers with the facts about our school district and what this mayor and Board have done.”

The 5-week Summer Organizing Institute was started in 2011 to help CTU members take positions of leadership in promoting their rights and fighting for educational justice in the city of Chicago. This year, more than 450 teachers, clinicians and paraprofessionals and school-related personnel applied for the program.

“This summer, CTU members will demonstrate their passion for improving our students’ educational opportunities,” said CTU Organizing Coordinator Norine Gutekanst. “Our students, families and educators face many challenges in the aftermath of the massive 2013 school closings, including budget cuts, lack of necessary resources and over-testing, and we are stronger when we unite to stand up for the schools our students deserve.”

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The Chicago Teachers Union represents 30,000 teachers and educational support personnel working in the Chicago Public Schools and, by extension, the students and families they serve. CTU, an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers and the Illinois Federation of Teachers, is the third largest teachers local in the country and the largest local union in Illinois. For more information visit CTU’s website at www.ctunet.com