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Teachers Union Offers To Compromise On Pensions

Greg Hinz Crain's Chicago Business
Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis specifically said the union is willing to consider reducing benefits for those who still are working, although she emphatically ruled out changes for members who already have retired. But such compromise wont come until the city and the school board agree to contribute more to pensions each year in order to at least partially make up for a contribution shortfall that occurred during much of the past two decades.

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Separate and Unequal: The Charter School Pedestal The Public Can’t Reach

Trymaine Lee MSNBC
Critics say that charter schools—publicly funded but run by private organizations—are being used as a means to privatize public education at the expense of the vast majority of students. They say the charter movement is a Trojan-horse riding under the guise of school choice, used as an instrument to break teachers unions.

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Some N.O. Charters Begin Exploring Teachers Unions

Andrew Vanacore The New Orleans Advocate
For New Orleans, the debate over charter schools and teachers unions has always been an either-or proposition. The Orleans Parish School Board voided the city’s union contract after Hurricane Katrina, and charter schools began taking over rapidly thereafter. Now, New Orleans is beginning to find out if this hard divide between charters and unions is really necessary, or if the two can somehow learn to coexist.

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Wisconsin: State's Two Teacher's Unions Explore Merger

Erin Richards Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Facing reduced membership, revenue and political power in the wake of 2011 legislation, Wisconsin's two major state teachers unions appear poised to merge into a new organization called Wisconsin Together.

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Teachers Group Revealed as Funder Behind Pro Walsh PAC

Wesley Lowery The Boston Globe
The American Federation of Teachers was the donor behind One Boston, a PAC that paid for a $480,000 television commercial supporting Mayor-elect Martin J. Walsh during the final days of the Boston mayoral race.

Reclaim School Reform

The Editors The Nation
Education reform must be in the public interest—on behalf of public schools and the children who attend them—rather than private interests. This coalition has set itself the task of nothing less than reclaiming “the promise of public education as our nation’s gateway to democracy and racial and economic justice.”

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Teachers Unions Face Moment of Truth

Stephanie Simon Politico
Teachers unions are facing tumultuous times, grappling with financial, legal and public-relations challenges as they fight to retain their clout and build alliances, and deal with declines in membership.

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Loeb Opposes Teachers Union on Pensions as Asness Quits

Martin Z. Braun and Amanda Gordon BLOOMBERG
In April, the union included four billionaires on its “watch list” of money managers that support groups the labor organization said are hostile to traditional public pensions. The groups included StudentsFirst, an organization that backs eliminating tenure and funding charter schools at the same level as public ones. Daniel Loeb, founder of Third Point LLC, an activist investor is the only one of 33 managers targeted by the AFT to push back publicly against the union.

Chicago School Closings-Largest in US History

Diane Ravitch, Mark Naison, Karen Lewis, Randi Weingarten
Never in U.S. history has a local school board - or any other board, appointed or elected - chosen to close 49 public schools. School closings are part and parcel of a strategy for remaking the American metropolis and will further cement economic inequality. "Today is a day of mourning for the children of Chicago. Their education has been hijacked by an unrepresentative, unelected corporate school board. Closing schools is not an education plan."

Charter Teachers Unionize, Charters - The Truth, Moratorium on Standardized Testing

Dan Mihalopoulos, Frank Pepper, Randi Weingarten
Teachers at one of Chicago's largest charter- school networks - run by the United Neighborhood Organization - have voted to organize into a union. Public school teacher, responds to question - what is behind charter schools. Idea of a motivated community of adults - parents, teachers, administrators - creating a unique school from the ground up, designed to serve that particular community - are not charter schools. AFT calls for moratorium on Common Core testing.
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