The Chicago Public Schools are facing a major truancy problem… among teachers.
The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) was in an uproar over suggestions to hold classes on May 1, while teachers wanted to protest. May Day, called International Workers’ Day, is a global day of protest for socialist, communist and unionist groups.
The CTU was angry when parents objected that canceling a day of classes for teachers to participate in a political protest was a burden on working parents. These teachers believe that with their activism they are teaching something much more important. In defending the demand for government-sponsored protests, CTU Vice President Jackson Potter explained that “teaching our students what civic action looks like will take more than textbooks.”
While that doesn’t help with the dismal proficiency scores of actual students, it is critical to training students to be political foot soldiers.
CHICAGO TEACHERS UNION BUDGETS MILLIONS ON ‘POLITICAL ACTIVITIES,’ ACCORDING TO BUDGET REPORT
The CTU and the National Education Association recently collaborated on a “curriculum build” to bring “social justice into the classroom” ahead of May 1st. Dave Stieber, a history teacher in the Chicago Public Schools, explains, “May Day is a dress rehearsal because maybe there’s a random day in June when we’re all no work, no school, no errands… So this is a continuation and a build-up to that.”
Meanwhile, Chicago teachers chose to lower their proficiency levels rather than improve their teaching results because only two out of five students were reading at grade level.
While the CTU fails to actually teach students, it is adept at instructing politicians like Mayor Brandon Johnson through the use of union dues to finance Democratic campaigns. The CTU and other teachers unions funneled millions into Johnson’s campaigns. By one estimate, 93 percent of Johnson’s campaign budget came from unions.
DC SCHOOLS STAFF UNDERPERFORMANCE HAS GROWED 7 TIMES FASTER THAN ENROLLMENT: AUDIT
The CTU has long had the distinction of being the most radical teachers union in the country. It was a CTU delegation that went to Venezuela during the Maduro regime to praise conditions under socialism. In a country where dissenters and reporters were jailed and murdered, Chicago teachers reported that “we haven’t seen a single homeless person!”
Chicago area teachers have been charged with violent protests.
The suggestion that teachers should work instead of attending the May 1 protests upset Chicago teachers. Now the union has confirmed that classes will be held without participating teachers, and that Chicago Public Schools will pay for buses to take both students and teachers to the protests.
The city further promised that there would be no consequences for students or teachers who skip school.
This is not the first time that unions and teachers have allowed students to skip classes to support left-wing protests. In New York, teachers and students were allowed to skip school to demand a ceasefire in Gaza. Previously, students were allowed to skip school in protest against climate change.
These school districts do not show the same participatory support for protests on the right. There are no accommodations or city-subsidized buses for pro-life protests or demonstrations in favor of Israel.
Nevertheless, the Chicago school system declares that this is what education in the Windy City is all about. Macquline King, CEO of CPS, stated that “the agreement is a tribute to the proud history of citizen action in Chicago and beyond.”
Decades ago, my parents helped found an organization to halt the exodus of families from public schools and strengthen academic standards in the Chicago Public School system. They convinced more families to stay in the system because they believed (like me) that public schools can play a critical role in building citizens through a diverse and shared experience.
I have long been skeptical of voucher systems because of that commitment to public education. However, teacher unions and administrators are destroying public education in America. They treat families as a captive audience and infuse education with social and political agendas. The only way to break this decades-long cycle of failure, in my opinion, is to provide families with alternatives by allowing them to send their children to schools with core education (rather than advocacy) priorities.
Nevertheless, Mayor Johnson celebrated the funding of the May Day protests:
“We are pleased that all parties are working together to ensure that school communities can participate in commemorating International Labor Day… By encouraging participation, Chicagoans can honor our history while advocating for our future. We look forward to a day of meaningful solidarity and community resistance against the forces that seek to tear us apart.”
Schools have long been the target of indoctrination by radical elements. The Cultural Revolution in China was the most extreme example of forcing children into protests and teaching that political activism came before scholasticism under the slogan ‘rebellion is justified’.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE FOX NEWS ADVICE
Mao stated that “our educational policy should enable everyone who receives education to develop morally, intellectually and physically and become a worker with both socialist consciousness and culture.”
The CTU/NEA seminar features Kirstin Roberts, a kindergarten teacher at Chicago Public Schools, who explains that the goal is to “encourage teachers of young children not to feel like these are things that go way beyond their students, and not to be afraid to raise social justice issues, including workers’ rights, anti-racism, pro-LGBT, LGBTQIA plus issues, immigration, and immigrant rights.”
The erosion of the boundary between education and advocacy is now happening at every level of our education system. Some universities now have “resident activist” programs or offer degrees in advocacy.
INSIDE ANTIFA-LINKED GROUP’S PLAN TO ‘STRUCTURALLY CHANGE’ THE US AS MAY DAY UNTIL ARRIVES
In my book Rage and the Republic, I discuss the rise of the “new Jacobins” in the United States, including a group of radical educators who are using our schools to pursue fundamental changes in our constitutional system. Law professors and deans are now calling for our Constitution to be overturned as a threat to the nation, while teachers are using lessons to radicalize students.
Chicago’s funding for May Day protests leverages public resources in its struggling school system to advance radical political agendas. It removes any doubt from parents about the priority of Johnson, the CTU and many of these teachers.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
Some of the sentiments expressed in Chicago could have been lifted straight from Mao’s Little Red Book and speeches. He emphasized that “education must serve proletarian politics” and demanded that “the period of education be shortened and that education be revolutionized.”
In Chicago, the “period for education” is now being shortened in favor of “solidarity and community resistance.” While students may not be able to actually read, they will learn the three R’s of modern education: resist, rage, and rebel.
CLICK HERE TO JONATHAN TURLEY
