Next steps in fight for parental leave
Nothing prevents expanded parental leave from happening for our educators and support staff — except for the mayor’s obvious bias towards our overwhelmingly female and female-oriented workers in our schools.
Nothing prevents expanded parental leave from happening for our educators and support staff — except for the mayor’s obvious bias towards our overwhelmingly female and female-oriented workers in our schools.
Randi Weingarten, who heads up union of 1.7 million teachers and support staff, to join educators, allies to demand CPS parental leave that mirrors what mayor offered to City workers – but has now been indefinitely delayed for educators, support staff.
This resolution was adopted by the CTU House of Delegates at its January 11, 2023 meeting.
Mayor Lightfoot has once again interfered with CPS operations and derailed a process that was scheduled to expand our paid parental leave rights by a factor of 6, from 2 weeks to 12, come January 25th.
On November 15, CPS officials told the CTU that CPS would recommend that the Board of Education vote to approve a new parental leave policy modeled on a similar policy available to city employees, starting on January 1st, 2023. The policy enables city workers to take up to 12 weeks of paid parental leave. In December, CPS further committed to the CTU that they were working to nail down details about the policy. Then, suddenly, in late December, the Department of Labor Relations reversed CPS’ position.
The struggle to expand parental/family leave rights has been a sustained demand at the bargaining table — and the opportunity to broaden those rights outside of contract negotiations has emerged in the course of the current mayor’s race.