City(chicago) to hire more teachers for longer school day

[mopinko]

Source: chicago suntimes

After months of acrimony culminating in a 90 percent strike authorization vote, the Chicago Teachers Union and the city have reached an agreement that could help avert a strike and pave the way for Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s longer school day.

Instead of requiring teachers to work a 20 percent longer day, the Chicago Public Schools have agreed to hire more teachers to handle “enrichment programs” that include art and music.

Teachers will continue to work the same hours they do now. Additional time in the classroom — adding up to a 7-hour day in elementary schools and 7.5 hours-a-day, four-days-a-week in high school — will be handled by the new hires.

Read more: http://www.suntimes.com/13970433-761/city-to-hire-more-teachers-for-longer-school-day.html

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i knew that rahm had a plan up his sleeve to resolve this. i hope the rest of the negotiations go smoothly. rahm emanuel is a lot of things, but stupid enough to provoke a teachers strike is not one of them.

[malthaussen]

1. Smells to me like this gives him an opportuinity...

... to blame increased spending on those damned teachers. Well, he is a politician.

-- Mal

[msongs]

2. teachers need to work to the contract day, then go home and do nothing extra, IF it cannot be done

during the contract day, then more time and compensation must be added to the contract. Stupid teachers have assumed way to many responsibilities for free and districts will gladly pile more and more on willing martyrs.

[surrealAmerican]

3. Perhaps I'm reading this wrong, but ...

... to me, this sounds like a big win for the union and the students. I wonder where CPS "found" the money for it though.

[Moltisanti]

5. 40-50 million in cuts it sounds...

Emanuel did not say where the estimated $40 to $50 million to hire 477 additional teachers will come from. When asked how the school board could afford that price tag, Emanuel said, “We can't afford not to.”

“There's a number of remaining issues. We're going to work through those issues to make sure we obviously find the savings to achieve our goal,” he said during a news conference at Sexton Elementary School on the South Side.

Emanuel did not say where the estimated $40 to $50 million to hire 477 additional teachers will come from. When asked how the school board could afford that price tag, Emanuel said, “We can't afford not to.”

“There's a number of remaining issues. We're going to work through those issues to make sure we obviously find the savings to achieve our goal,” he said during a news conference at Sexton Elementary School on the South Side.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/chi-ctu-longer-school-day-being-scaled-backat-least-for-teachers-20120724,0,1125149.story

[mopinko]

7. i am betting on him shaking the tiff piggy bank for at least some of it.

and would be nice if he could squeeze a little money out of the state. they are way, way, way under their constitutional mandate for school funding.

he did manage (assume it was him) to squeeze a refund out of one of the more outrageous tiff's. i think he knows how brave/smart it will make him look to go shake those guys down.

[frazzled]

4. The winners here are the kids

This is a win-win for everyone: the city, CPS, the teacher's union, but most of all the students.

Chicago had the shortest school day of any major city ... and a population of more than 400,000 students (in 675 schools) who need more time (and not just for academics, but for social and safety reasons as well).

Now the kids get a longer school day; 500 teachers who were laid off during the recession will be rehired; art and music and PE will be back in the schools; and classroom teachers will not have to work any more hours than previously (with the exception of high school teachers, who will work 14 more minutes).

I hope this will avert a strike.

[NYC_SKP]

6. This looks good.

I like that they're bringing in extra people for the extra time, thus not overburdening existing staff AND providing more variety of interaction for the learners.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

8. Yes give me a 4 day week

then I can catch up with the overload. I would be happy if they brought in more staff.