Chicago teachers asking for 30% raises over next 2 years

[muon2]

I'm completely befuddled as to what krazen's on about here.  krazen, 75,000 is a middle class salary. 

75K sits in the second highest quintile that goes from about 60 to 100K according the 2010 data from the Census.

[muon2]

I'm completely befuddled as to what krazen's on about here.  krazen, 75,000 is a middle class salary. 

75K sits in the second highest quintile that goes from about 60 to 100K according the 2010 data from the Census.

Among people with advanced degrees living in one the nation's largest cities?
And just last year, the GOP was saying that $250k/year was middle-class. Make up your minds already.

I'm completely befuddled as to what krazen's on about here.  krazen, 75,000 is a middle class salary. 

75K sits in the second highest quintile that goes from about 60 to 100K according the 2010 data from the Census.

Not in chicago my friend.

 It always seems like these horrors of unionized teacher stories come from a metro area like nyc or chi twon where thecost of living is MUCH higher than normal. It serves to distort the middle-class standard of living such teacher's earn and likewise project it as a false 'coming soon to your community' warning to the rest of middle america.

Effecive ploy. Misleading, but effective.

The median income in Chicago is about 5K less than the nation as a whole. The upper quintiles for household income are generally similar to the US based on 2010 data. 30.3% of households in Chicago make more than 75K. If I expand to include all of Cook County with a median income about 2K higher than the US, 35.4% of households make more than 75K.

Either way my statement about 75K sitting in the second highest quintile is true for Chicago or Cook County, too.

[muon2]

krazen, you would do better to blame the rich,who absorb a far greater share of the worker's production than the humble teacher, and thus leave children in a state of poverty and hopelessness.

Well, the massive tax hike inflicted on the 'rich' and everyone else went directly to the chosen constituency.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/editorials/ct-edit-state-0223-20120223,0,3088174.story

In the next budget, virtually every penny of that $7 billion in new revenue goes to pension obligations.

That's not exactly true. Increases in Medicaid costs are rising rapidly and are projected to make the bulk of the budget shortfall. The majority of the pension cost increase is not from the regular payment into the pension system, but is due to payments on the back-loaded loans IL took so they could avoid paying past unfunded pension liability. IL constitutional law prevents the legislature from collecting past liability from the employees, so options are limited.

The irony in citing the link above is that Chicago is the only school system in IL where the state does not pick up the pension cost (except for a small transfer payment). The Gov has suggested that local schools throughout the state also pick up the employer cost as does Chicago. Of course that effectively acts to transfer money from the suburbs to Chicago within the picture of the state budget.

[muon2]

Well, here comes the strike.


http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/06/11/12166509-chicago-teachers-vote-for-strike-in-battle-over-pay-longer-school-days





Of course, Chicago has only about 403,000 students, a shrinking population and tax base, and a massive 25,000 teaching force.

The next battleground is brewing.

Earlier the teachers asked for mediation and the report comes out in July. To guard against a mediation report that convinces some teachers to accept it without more hard negotiation the union got a strike authorization vote so that they can use that threat at the bargaining table. The bottom line is that mayor Emanuel wants a significantly longer school day (Chicago has one of the shortest in the US) without much in additional wages. His position is generally popular, but this is his first contract negotiation with the Chicago teachers so the union wants to set a standard for the future.

[muon2]

47% of Chicago voters back teachers

http://www.suntimes.com/15081881-761/story.html

A subtext to this dispute is that teachers have pretty much had their way for the last two decades in Chitown along with the other public sector workers. The old machine was built on handing out public sector jobs. That's a hard culture to move against.

18 months ago while running for mayor, Rahm supported legislation that put pressure on the teachers of Chicago and was designed to prevent a CTU strike. Then he came in, cut last year's scheduled raise, and demanded longer school days and a longer school year without compensation. The CTU was very much geared for a fight after all that. A strike is hardly surprising. Now can Rahm move the voters of the city to his side?

[muon2]

The grand bargain, that I think "the right" will embrace (they certainly should), is that teachers can be fired like anyone else who are substandard (rather than have a sinecure where they are only fired for serial child molestation captured on a video), while on the other hand, the best and brightest after 10 years or whatever, become master teachers, and make like 150K a year, adjusted regionally by the cost of living. That is the way to attract the talent we need, while getting rid of the drones. You have a career track, and if you have the knowledge, and the talent to teach (which includes acting ability) to achieve excellence, you get rewarded in a serious way - with an upper middle class standard of living. Will it cost more?  Of course! But it is a moral imperative that we make this "investment" with, and only with, the ground rules that I outlined. Make sense?  Anyone disagree?

I agree in principle, but I do have one question that I feel hasn't been adequately answered.

How do we objectively judge merit? Test scores? Teacher grading by the pupils? I see some problems with judging who to promote to a "Master Teacher".

There are well-defined procedures that are used in higher education, including at public universities to judge merit for raises and promotion. Higher ed uses promotion to tenure and to the ranks of associate and full professor. There's a department-level committee that reviews the candidate's teaching and scholarship and recommends to a vote of the full department. Their approval in turn must be approved by the whole faculty and then to the board of trustees. It's a pretty good system for vetting promotions, though like any system there are instances that get it wrong.

As similar process can work for raises, too. A faculty committee (with forced rotation of membership) can assess members and create a ranking based on teaching, scholarship and departmental service. The rankings can be used by the college to award merit raises. By rotating the peer evaluators any bias tends to average out.

[muon2]

Chicago Public School enrollment has plunged 17% in the last decade with the fine job done by these teachers.

As it has in most urban areas...your point?

No one cares about this strike btw...

Obviously with a plunging school population, teachers need to be fired and schools need to be closed.

Why?

If they need to reduce the work force it can be accomplished easily through attrition.

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Their compensation structure makes it far more logical to get rid of the worst dinosaur tenured teachers.

See charts.

http://illinoispolicy.org/blog/blog.asp?ArticleSource=5041


In their own words, you can get 3 new teachers for the price of 1 old one.


The unions of course went to court to keep the high paid dinosaurs and Karen Lewis is making a fuss about school closures.

The threat of school closings are another big undercurrent to the strike. Emanuel has suggested massive closings to match the population loss. He's also made it clear that he'd like many more charter schools to accommodate the long waiting list, and that portends additional closings. The city he took over is deep in red ink, and the one time sale of assets like the Skyway and on street parking is not viable.

Though there is attrition, it wouldn't be enough to bring staffing down to the levels envisioned in the mayor's plan. That's why the recall provision is a big sticking point in negotiations. The CTU wants seniority control over which teachers are rehired as needed and the CPS wants the principals to have primary control of hiring from a pool of laid off teachers.

[muon2]

Despite a tentative deal reached yesterday, the teachers don't trust the administration without time to digest an actual contract in writing. So the strike will continue.

[muon2]

Despite a tentative deal reached yesterday, the teachers don't trust the administration without time to digest an actual contract in writing. So the strike will continue.

Now the word is that Emanuel will file an injunction against the union to force them to the classroom (scrolling across the bottom of the football game).