Charles Edward Miller
Here in Chicago, a teachers strike is upon us. The Chicago Teachers Union and SEIU school support staff will strike starting October 17 until a fair contract is reached. Although we are not at the negotiating table, students and community members should follow this fight adamantly, because the fight isn’t just for our schools, it’s for our future.
As a Chicago Public School student, I experience the disinvestment in public schools on a daily basis. My classes almost always have over thirty students, with never enough books for each of us, in rooms with peeling paint and broken floors. We have a running joke of only being able to get sick on specific days since we don’t have a full-time nurse. If you’re unlucky enough to have a stomach ache or a bad day when the nurse is out, you’re told to either “'power through it” or just go home early, because what else can you do?
Class size caps, full-time nurses and librarians, and proper investment in building infrastructure are demands we shouldn't have to strike over—they should be the norm.
We don’t even have a library at my high school anymore; our books are just left to collect dust because there’s no longer a system to allow students to take out books. Class size caps, full-time nurses and librarians, and proper investment in building infrastructure are demands we shouldn't have to strike over—they should be the norm.
Schools are often the heart of communities in Chicago, especially down here on the South side. No matter where you are, schools are meant to be safe havens from whatever violence and trauma might be happening on the streets. In immigrant communities like mine, that trauma involves the fear of ICE raiding our homes and tearing families apart.
But schools are not sanctuaries right now. They are being policed as if we’re criminals in the making.
In this contract fight, we’re demanding that our schools become sanctuaries where teachers are the first line of defense for undocumented students and their families; where ICE is not allowed onto school property and no police officer or school resource officer has contact with an ICE agent.
We are also demanding there be a limit of only one police officer stationed per school, and that money be spent instead on social workers and counselors. Not one student has said, “hey, let me go talk to the guy in the hall with a gun about my growing fear of school shootings.” I can't begin to count the times I’ve locked myself in a bathroom stall, trying to power through an anxiety attack because someone shut the door too loud. And I’m expected to be okay with a stranger flaunting a gun in the halls? That’s not going to happen, especially not in a primarily black and brown community where residents are being policed not protected, and where discussion on police disinvestment is at an all-time high.
This discussion about a strike isn’t about a pay raise or prettier buildings. It’s about proper investment and protecting our families. The future of the city is at stake here. As dramatic as that sounds, supporting the teachers, park workers, and paraprofessionals who work every day to make schools safe and inspiring is, to help defend the Chicago we want.