Tributes to Chicago Teachers Pour In

The strike also provides a powerful antidote to the propaganda
campaign for the new Hollywood teacher bashing movie "Won't Back Down". The sea of red shirts marching through Chicago, and the teachers around the country wearing red in solidarity, show that teachers may not be as easy a target as the movie's backers anticipated. The Chicago Teachers Union has flipped the script on Michelle Rhee, Democrats for Education reform and other backers of school privatization and showed how a teachers union can be a militant advocate for the right of students to have a school experience which includes music, art, sports and class sizes small enough to receive individual attention. ---Mark Naison

God Bless Karen Lewis  and the entire Chicago Teachers Union for having
the guts to stand up to this corporate onslaught against our public schools. Their fight is our fight.  It is time to ask yourself : "Where do I stand"? ---Brian De Vale

Mark and Brian keep the ball rolling as Chicago Teachers Union and Karen Lewis gain nationwide and local support for their stand against the corporate invaders.

Brian De Vale letter to the editor:

The strike in Chicago is the long overdue stand off between those who got into education for a career in teaching vs. the corporate profiteers who

have labor and the working men and women they represent on the run. 

Make no mistake, these are rich powerful people who run the publishing, media, corporate education and the Wall St./Hedge Fund world. They are tough, cut throat and have deep pockets (Gates, Bloomberg, Walton Family, Koch Brothers, Democrats for Education Reform, Rupert Murdoch. Mort Zuckerman etc..)  They are the melding  of the neo liberal and neo con agendas. Neither of those groups like teachers and they despise public sector pensions as it bites into their wallets. They have bought off many of our traditional allies in the Democrat party and have effectively triangulated the unions that represented public school educators.

Everyone has to take a stand, regardless of  where any other union, their officials, educator or parent falls on this. I am with Karen Lewis. That is a woman who deserves to be Woman of the Year.  To stand up to Rahm Emanuel, Arne Duncan, their boss Obama's misguided education policies and  the entire "Reform" Movement takes guts!

These are not just run-of the-mill politicians, but well trained mercenaries for the corporate privatization movement.

God Bless Karen Lewis  and the entire Chicago Teachers Union for having
the guts to stand up to this corporate onslaught against our public schools. Their fight is our fight.  It is time to ask yourself : "Where do I stand"?

Brian De Vale
CSA Chairman
Community School District # 14

Mark Naison
Chicago's Teachers "Won't Back Down" and Inspire Teachers Throughout the Nation

http://withabrooklynaccent.blogspot.com/2012/09/chicagos-teachers-wont-back-down-and.html 

Whatever the outcome, the Chicago Teachers strike shows that cross
section of the nation's teachers are fed up with being made the
whipping boy for the nation's failure to reduce racial and economic
inequality and provide equal educational opportunity for its citizens.
You do not mobilize tens of thousands of people to put their jobs at
risk and take to the picket line without a powerful undercurrent of
frustration and rage with the way they have been treated. The strike
won't stop Education Reformers- who have the support of the nation's
biggest corporations- from cementing their stranglehold on education
policy on the local and national level, and from consolidating their
influence in both major parties. But it pulls aside the facade of
support and compliance with the Obama Administration's education
policies that the Democratic National Convention hoped to project and
revealed how wildly unpopular Race to the Top is with many of America's
teachers, and a small, politically savvy group of public school
parents. 

The strike also provides a powerful antidote to the propaganda
campaign for the new Hollywood teacher bashing movie "Won't Back Down" which hits American theaters at the end of the month. The sea of red
shirts marching through Chicago, and the teachers around the country
wearing red in solidarity, show that teachers may not be as easy a
target as the movie's backers anticipated. The Chicago Teachers Union
has flipped the script on Michelle Rhee, Democrats for Education reform
and other backers of school privatization and showed how a teachers
union can be a militant advocate for the right of students to have a
school experience which includes music, art, sports and class sizes
small enough to receive individual attention. There is no guarantee
that the strike will achieve its major goals, but it has already
succeeded in giving America's teachers a huge emotional lift and in
forcing the media to recognize that teachers voices cannot be
marginalized and suppressed without significant consequences


Mark D Naison
Professor of African American Studies and History
Principal Investigator
Bronx African American History Project
640 Dealy Hall
Fordham University
Bronx, NY 10458

 Newark Teachers:

ALL OUT THIS THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 13!

Parents and community members at 13th Avenue/Dr. MLK Renew School have organized a rally to say NO to school closings! 

Come together to support them and public education.  

At the same time, send a message that we support the Chicago Teachers Union Strike!

Schools are being closed in Detroit, Philadelphia, New York, Newark, and many other cities.  Teachers are being laid off, forced to work harder for less pay, evaluated with illegitimate observation tools, and blamed publicly for all social ills.  The Chicago Teachers Union is on the front lines of these battles.   It's time to unite with the Newark community and show solidarity with our brothers and  sisters in Chicago.  

                                                                         

                                                                Where: 13th Avenue/Dr. MLK Renew School (359 13th Ave.), Newark, 07103

                                                                When: 4:00 pm                                                                         

                                                                What: Bring signs!  "NO to School Closings, NO to School Privatization,"

                                                                                             "We Support Chicago Teachers,"                                                                                                      

                                                                                             "Parents, Students, Teachers Unite, Same Struggle, Same Fight!" 

ALSO:

                                   The NEW Caucus has written a letter to the Chicago Teachers Union, and are taking up a collection.  (letter is attached)

    Next week, the NEW Caucus will mail this letter and donation to the CTU.  See a NEW Caucus member to donate to the CTU solidarity fund.  

In Solidarity,

Newark Education Workers Caucus