Modeling the Education They Want To Be: The Great Chicago Teachers Union Transformation

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http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/22148-modeling-the-education-they-want-to-be-the-great-chicago-teachers-union-transformation


(Book cover via Verso Books)

According to labor journalist Micah Uetricht, it's high time for trade unions in the United States to decide whether they want to wither away and follow a "business unionism" model of concessions and shrinkage, or follow "social movement unionism," a bottom-up, democratic organizing strategy that is aligned with social justice movements throughout the country.

The Chicago Teacher's Union [CTU], Uetricht writes in his book, Strike for America: Chicago Teachers Against Austerity, is a prime example of the latter, a feisty, transparent, activist-led group that is willing to fight the good fight and challenge the entrenched attitudes that have made unions irrelevant to far too many workers. Uetricht makes clear that the CTU was not always a beacon and charts the union's transition from a staid, top-down organization to one that engages teachers, paraprofessionals, students and neighborhood residents in community betterment efforts throughout Chicago.

The shift, he writes, began in 2010, when a slate of teachers calling themselves the Caucus of Rank-and-File Educators [CORE] took the reins of the 26,000 member CTU from CORE's predecessors, the United Progressive Caucus. "By 2010, the UPC leadership had atrophied," Uetricht explains, and was cowering in the face of school closures, the growth of nonunion charter schools, and the Renaissance 2010 "free market education reforms" championed by Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel and supported by US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.

Not so, CORE. Its slogan - a union that actually fights for its members - proved early on that it was willing and ready to challenge authority. "They held multiple forums on cuts to public education. They built relationships with community organizations fighting school closures. They held a study group on Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine, which argues that neoliberal reform is pushed by elites during times of crisis, when the population is disoriented," Uetricht reports.