For years, the Union has been advocating for the Board of Ed to give credit for more years of outside teaching and relevant work experience. The current policy only allows for two years of credit.
Chicago Public Schools is finally considering a change to this policy for January, and has opened public comment period on the issue. Please click here to comment and:
- Ask the Board to credit outside experience AND to make it retroactive
- If not retroactive, at least insist the Board phase in the higher steps so that teachers new to CPS don’t leapfrog over someone who’s been teaching longer
CPS is considering changing this policy now because we won in our contract additional social workers, nurses, case managers, English Language Program Teachers and more. The district is concerned about attracting new candidates to work in CPS, but we know that the best way to make CPS attractive is to make schools supportive and positive places to work, and that competitive salaries that account for outside experience help too.
We know that some members are concerned about how this policy will be implemented, and want to make sure that, if passed by the Board, it’s as fair as possible. Members understandably don’t like the idea of other members receiving an incentive that they don’t have. While sometimes that is the nature of how policies change, we have an opportunity to advocate that if CPS makes this change, it accounts for members already working in schools now. So we encourage you to click here to advocate for the two above criteria in passing this Board policy change for January.
