Chicago's public schools will remain closed for a fourth day on Monday after the city's teachers' union failed to reach an agr...
Chicago's public schools will remain closed for a fourth day on Monday after the city's teachers' union failed to reach an agreement with Mayor Lori Lightfoot on COVID safety protocols.
The announcement was made by Lightfoot on Twitter Sunday evening. She said: 'Out of fairness and consideration for parents who need to prepare, classes will be canceled again Monday.
'Although we have been negotiating hard throughout the day, there has not been sufficient progress for us to predict a return to class tomorrow.
'We will continue to negotiate through the night and will provide an update if we have made substantial progress'
Lightfoot's latest update struck a more considered tone than last week's condemnation of teachers, which saw her brand their behavior 'unlawful.'
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced Monday's school closures on her Twitter account Sunday night
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has clashed with teachers' union boss Jesse Sharkey, right, over ongoing school closures - but struck a more moderate tone on Sunday evening
The teachers' union justified its case in a series of tweets sent earlier on Sunday
Union bosses also cited soaring cases among teachers to justify the ongoing closures
She also put teachers who didn't show up at schools on no-pay status. The closures have infuriated the Windy City's working parents, who've been forced to find childcare at short notice.
It has also led to fresh warnings that those hardest hit by remote learning are the poorest children, who are less likely to have the required equipment, steady internet access, and a parent or carer to help when they need it.
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Teachers in Chicago - the United States' third-largest school district - are currently at war with Lightfoot over demands for the entire district to close if positive COVID tests reach a certain, currently undecided, metric.
City officials say such closures should be decided on a school-by-school basis. The union also wants to delay the start of in-person classes until January 18, and for students to have to opt-out of regular COVID tests, rather than opt-in, as they do now.
This official City of Chicago graphic explains the Windy City's COVID latest numbers
Protesters who support school closures in Chicago are pictured close to Chicago City Hall on January 5
Another pro-closure protester was snapped driving a car around Chicago on January 5 with a sign saying 'Until cases decline, class is online!'
The Chicago Teachers Union wants the option to revert to districtwide remote instruction, and most members have refused to teach in-person until there's an agreement, or the latest COVID-19 spike subsides.
But Chicago leaders reject districtwide remote learning, saying it's detrimental to students and schools are safe. Instead, Chicago opted to cancel classes as a whole two days after students returned from winter break.
Chicago faces the same pandemic issues as other districts nationwide, with more reverting to remote learning as infections soar and staff members are sidelined.
Like all other large cities in the US, Chicago has been hit by a recent surge of COVID cases, blamed on the super-infectious Omicron variant.
A total of 5,260 new cases were recorded across the city on Friday, the most recent data available, with just over one in five COVID tests coming back positive.
Meanwhile, 90 people were in hospital on Friday - a 16 per cent drop on the week before - and 11 people died of COVID on the same day.
Vaccination rates of people who have had at least one dose of COVID vaccine now sit at 72.3 per cent.
But the situation in union-friendly Chicago has been amplified in a labor dispute that's familiar to families in the mostly low-income black and Latino district who have seen disruptions during a similar safety protocol fight last year, a 2019 strike and a one-day work stoppage in 2016.
The announcement for the roughly 350,000-student district came as the principals of some schools had already notified families their schools would be closed for instruction Monday because of staffing shortages.
The tone of Lightfoot and Martinez's Sunday evening statement suggested more progress than a day earlier when shortly after the union made its latest offer public, they said, 'CTU leadership, you´re not listening' and vowed not to 'relent.'
The offer she rejected included teachers reporting to schools Monday to distribute laptops for remote learning to temporarily start Wednesday. Both sides have filed complaints to a state labor board.
Union leaders have accused Lightfoot of bullying, saying they agree that in-person instruction is better, but the pandemic is forcing difficult decisions. Attendance was down ahead of the cancelations due students and teachers in isolation from possible exposure to the virus and families opting to keep children home voluntarily.
'Educators are not the enemy Mayor Lightfoot wants them to be,' the union said in a statement Sunday, adding that the desire to be in the classroom 'must be balanced by ensuring those classrooms are safe, healthy and well-resourced, with the proper mitigation necessary to reduce the spread of COVID-19.'
Union leaders did not immediately have a response after the district's Sunday evening cancelation.
There appeared to be some headway over the weekend toward a deal.
The district, which deems the fight an 'illegal walkout,' said late Saturday it will allow more incentives for substitute teachers, provide KN95 masks for all teachers and students, and that Illinois will provide about 350,000 antigen tests.
FILE - Mick Leichenko, center, entertains his friends Jack and Will Marrion in his Chicago home, Jan. 6, 2022. Talks between Chicago school leaders and the teachers union resumed Sunday, Jan. 9, 2022 amid a standoff over remote learning and other COVID-19 safety measures. The situation looms over the start of a second week of school after three days of canceled classes in the nation's third-largest district. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast, file)
But both sides remained at odds on key issues including COVID-19 metrics that will lead to individual school closures and compensation. The district said it won't pay teachers failing to report to schools, even if they tried to log into remote teaching systems. The union doesn't want any of its roughly 25,000 members to be disciplined or lose pay.
District leaders had said some schools, where enough staff showed up, may offer instruction Monday even without an agreement; all buildings have remained open for meal pickup. However, only a handful of principals anticipated having staff to open.
Chicago Teachers' Union also retweeted this tweet mocking their testy relationship with Mayor Lightfoot
Another retweet came from a teacher who insisted he and his colleagues wanted to get back into the classroom
School leaders have touted a $100 million safety plan, which includes air purifiers in each classroom. Also, roughly 91% of staff are vaccinated and masks are required indoors.
Since the start of the academic year, some individual classrooms have temporarily switched to remote instruction when there are infections. But in rejecting a widescale return to remote learning, city health officials argue most students directed to quarantine because of possible classroom exposure don´t get COVID-19. The district is piloting a 'test to stay' program to cut isolation times.
The union argues that the measures fall short, especially considering the omicron-fueled surge that has upended the return to work and class. It has also criticized the district for not enrolling enough students in a testing program and an unreliable database of COVID-19 infections.
Several district families, represented by the conservative Liberty Justice Center in Chicago, filed a lawsuit in Cook County over the closures last week, while more than 5,000 others have signed a petition urging a return to in-person instruction.
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