Today we're talking about education.

We're talking to Stacey Davis Gates.

She's the president of Chicago Teachers Union.

But before that, She was a social science teacher.

And before she was president, she was executive vice president.

And she started something kind of different.

They walked out historic.

15 days, two weeks.

Teachers walked out of CPS, and she negotiated a historic contract.

Smaller classes, a nurse and social worker in every Chicago public school and sanctuary for the migrants and for the homeless.

She's also raised millions of dollars to support teachers going into politics.

How about that?

And today, we're going to talk to her in full about education at large.

N'digo Studio, N'digo Studio.

For more information about this show, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Blue Sky.

Funding for this program was provided by Illinois Student Assistance Commission, the Chicago Community Trust.

Sin City Studios, Lamborghini Chicago, Gold Coast, and Downers Grove.

Blue cross, blue.

Shield of Illinois, Commonwealth Edison and the Illinois Health Plan.

N'digo Studio I wanted to talk about education with you because we see you on the news, sometimes adversarial, and we see you fighting, but I don't think we always know what you're fighting for and about.

So tell us, first of all, your platform this year for the teachers contract as you negotiate.

Well, thank you for having me.

so much, to talk about and honored to have the opportunity to do this with you.

we're fighting for the school Chicago students deserve.

since Karen Lewis, took over the union, back in 2010 as president.

we've had this idea that the Chicago public Schools can be better than it has been, that black children, who attend neighborhood schools on the South side and the West Side of Chicago, that they get to have a fully resourced school day.

What does that mean?

It means that far too many of our schools are without, history of physical education or reading English art.

A full complement of the school day curriculum.

Well, I'm talking about an experience.

A learning experience, not just curriculum.

If you boil, school down to just two subjects reading and math, then young people don't want to engage.

But when you have a full dimensional, curriculum at school day, young people want to be there.

And if young people want to be there, then everyone else.

they want to be there as well.

So we've been pushing for that.

so many of our school communities don't even offer a fall winter spring sports, program for young people.

so many of our schools don't have school newspapers or student government opportunities for our young people.

These are things that tether young people to the school district.

So when I hear, critics talking about an absenteeism or when I hear them talking about lethargy with our young people, I will have to ask other questions.

And those questions are what are you offering them?

What are they engaged with?

What are they giving you in return for what you are giving them?

Kind of a proactive approach.

-Let me ask you this because we hear this, but I don't think we always understand.

We talk about.

Types of.

Schools.

So explain to us what is a charter school?

Well, in Chicago public schools, since 1995 has run what I would call, a very unhealthy experiment on, shifting the focus from neighborhood schools.

So I'll start with neighborhood schools and most communities all over this country.

Children walk to school or they are within, a safe, distance from their school community.

So it's a neighborhood school.

Kind of live.

You go to school according to where you live.

Because Chicago has such segregated living spaces.

There have been attempts, to do two things to try in, engineer integration through our magnet and selective enrollment spaces.

And then our charter spaces.

It has been an experiment to try and marginalize the number of resources that go in there and still call it public education.

So what's a magnet school?

Well, a magnet school is a school that has a magnet that draws people in.

So it can be a world language academy.

And so we have a number of world language academies, throughout the city.

Arts.

Arts is another magnet, situation.

And so we have a lot of things that are offered in various locations through the city, which, quite frankly, put a burden on the families because our transportation system in this city, as it relates to our schools, it's not congruent to the need.

And so what that does is that it puts a lot of responsibility on parents to be able to get the young people from their home to their school.

And we know that black children, on average, have a two hour commute before and after school in the city because of the amelioration of neighborhood schools on the south side and the west side of the city.

Okay.

And then selective enrollment.

What's that?

Well, selective enrollment.

We have a number of those in the city.

In fact, we have selective enrollments that are nationally ranked, places like lane tag, places like, Northside College Prep are at the top of national rankings.

Whitney Young would be another one of those schools.

And those schools are, schools where students have to test in.

And what we find at those schools, especially within the last decade plus, is that the number of black children that are admitted into those schools has declined precipitously.

And so what that means is that those spaces which were supposed to engineer manufacturer integration, that doesn't exist with them either.

so we, we really need a reset button and, the Chicago Public Schools to audit if, in fact, black children are receiving the full benefit of a neighborhood school education.

And if, in fact, they are being refused entry into our selective and magnet programs.

Okay, so now we've seen change.

We just saw recent change where there's been a strategic plan, five year plan put forth.

And in doing so, we're going to see some different things.

I want to see if you agree with them.

Good or bad.

One of which is testing.

So standardized testing is not going to be so relevant.

And we're looking more at wellness and emotional health.

What's your what's your thoughts on that.

Well what I would say about the five year strategic plan, broadly speaking, is that, my members feel like it is a copy and paste from our contract proposals.

So the strategic plan, our contract proposals, and quite frankly, the mayor's transition report, they are basically carbon copies of each other.

they are and, you know, dimensional alignment.

You know, if I may, at, the issues that we are up against is whether or not the leader of Chicago Public Schools, Pedro Martinez, will be, legendary and that he will work with all of the stakeholders, families, students, the educators in our school communities, the unions that represent them.

the mayor of Chicago, to actually win the revenue that we need to offer, the strategic plan and dimension in all of our school communities.

So we are at a shortage.

We're experiencing a budget shortage, about $1 billion for the city.

And isn't it about $1 billion to CPS?

Well, it will it's more than that.

So, look, so how do we how do we get the raise that you want?

And how do we get all the the things that you want in the schools when money is really a problem?

How do we do that?

Well, money is only a problem when we talking about public education in Chicago?

Everywhere else, in the state where, there are affluent, families, where there are families, that are not as melanated as the ones here in this city.

This is never the discussion.

But what I will say is that, this year that discussion will be broadened because every single school district in the state of Illinois will be looking at a fiscal cliff.

So this is not an issue, singular to the city of Chicago or the Chicago Public Schools.

In fact, this is an issue that our governor, our state representatives and our state senators are going to have to work diligently on this upcoming, legislative session because everything a city that has school districts will encounter a budget deficit.

This morning I just read an editorial, that provided information about Evanston schools.

That school district is having a tough time, making ends meet there.

Pontiac.

You can go to Cahokia.

You will have those same, challenges there.

So that's not just a city challenge.

That is a statewide challenge.

And, you know, we'll need our governor to step up.

We're also going to see something different in our schools governance.

And that's elected school board.

Isn't that wonderful?

Half elected.

Yes.

And then half appointed still by the mayor.

What's your thoughts on that?

Well, it's something that our union, with a coalition of community groups, families and students have worked on, for years.

And even before Union became an advocate for an elected school board, there's been a history of this.

Look, we saw it as a voting rights issue that this, largest school district in the state of Illinois.

The school district that educates the most black children in the entire state, the third largest in the country.

It is, embarrassing that this is the first time ever in the history of this district that black parents, black families, black people in the city can provide, accountability to the policy, these that have not met their needs for generations.

A part of our democracy is to give people an opportunity to engage, to actually effectuate change in a way in which that benefits.

Them, to make decisions.

To make decisions.

And in a world where democracy is under threat.

I'm so very proud of Chicago for expanding democracy.

How do you feel now?

Education.

That's the governance of education.

Yes.

But the but the culture of education is changing, too.

What's your thoughts on two things the phones in the classroom by students and AI coming your way.

How do you feel about that?

Oh, these are very good questions.

These are things that we are debating and discussing within our union.

So the culture of education, is changing.

I think our young people are way smarter than any other generation before them, but.

They're learning differently.

And they and they are learning at a rapid pace differently.

So if you let me tell you something we did to to prove your point.

We bought a smart TV for the office.

And guess what?

We couldn't turn it on, and we had to go find a kid to say.

Would you come help us?

We found a ten year old kid who helped us figure out the smart TV.

Didn't look at a manual, didn't look.

But just our click, click, click, click and bam, there we are.

And push this for that and that for this and this for that.

And thank you very much.

So it begs the question of how we situate the classical education within a technologically advanced world that is rapidly changing.

And quite frankly, I don't think Grown-Ups should be the only ones arbitrating those decisions.

Because to your illustration here, we don't keep up well enough to understand the nuance in the context of the, rapidly changing technology.

I think it gives us an opportunity to access the knowledge of our young people in ways that give them leadership and agency and their own learning and experience.

It's going to force the Chicago Public Schools, our members and everyone connected to public education to actually understand what are the things that are important.

What types of inputs have to be in the situation to get the expected outputs?

I think it's both daunting and exciting at the same time, but it will require a coalition effort.

It will require a team.

So you think the students ought to participate?

Absolutely.

In processing and development and what we're going to learn.

But does so.

So now what happens to the teacher?

What happens to the teacher who's been there 20 years?

She's been using the same textbook.

And now we got to learn a whole, not just, new curriculum, but a whole new way of teaching that curriculum.

Like, for example, what happened to cursory writing?

I understand cursory writing is not in schools anymore, which I'm upset about very honestly.

But what happens when that teacher's teaching penmanship and we don't have to teach that anymore?

What has happened already?

Signatures are electronic now.

Signatures are very rarely on in triplicate.

we actually, as old folks, have to actually take a deep breath and understand that we're not the center of knowledge, we're not the center of methodology.

We're not the center of instruction.

That these things are now more democratized even within the school community.

So actually providing that agency to young people to help shape that is going to be the actual win in this.

Again, if young people are not engaged, if they are not having a good experience in the school community, they won't come.

So the best way forward is to gather.

I think the rapidly changing dynamics in our society require us to share power in our school communities now more than ever.

And I think also a different approach to learning.

Yes, because you're learning all the time.

We're all learning.

It's not the student learning because the teacher sometimes I went to Roosevelt University and there was a I wanted to study under Saint Clair Drake.

That was my goal.

And I never had his class, but he became my counselor.

Teaching and learning is relational right now.

The dynamics that are rapidly changing both in our city and in our, you know, larger world.

It begs a certain type of inquiry and an engagement with young people, to see how their consuming it.

Right now, most of our young people are getting their news and information values, even from social media.

Tik Tok is a completely different universe.

You can learn to cook.

You can put makeup on, you can learn to do hair, or you can become a political commentator, or you can engage in black history lessons.

It is really a different space of learning, where young people come from.

And if we're not paying attention and engaging, being curious, we're going to fall behind them.

Now, isn't this a great a great day to teach social science?

Yes.

This is a fabulous day to teach those who say.

Well, you have a black woman, of Asian descent, who is, partnered with a high school social studies teacher, governor of Minnesota, who's going to run the free world?

What does that mean to go from, Obama as president to a demagogue as president?

To, Joe Biden and now to a black woman.

So we're seeing in this, in this time, democracy at work, for real.

Like we've never really seen it before.

Worse.

And we're seeing the impact of movements that have come before us.

We don't get a vice president, Kamala Harris, future president of the United States of America, if we don't also talk about the struggles of the civil rights movement.

The inputs of the war on poverty.

One could say that Kamala Harris's ascent is due in part to the infrastructure that was put into America under President Lyndon Baines Johnson, and which he provided public schools with a great amount of resources that, quite frankly, helped black children, poor children, working class children more than at any other time in our history to in our nation's history.

To include her.

Well included her.

Hand.

And her sister.

And if we're honest about it, it extended into, higher education as well.

Under his, leadership, you get generations of first, generation graduates who are blessed, the power of policy and quite frankly, that's what the right wing has been trying to marginalize for a very long time are the gains of that particular presidency.

And Kamala Harris and Joe Biden doubled down on Johnson's, infusion of resources to public schools themselves.

You supported your union, supported, the mayor of Chicago?

Yes.

In his election.

And you won with, Brandon Johnson.

Chicago won.

Chicago won.

So should you were very responsible for that.

Should a union be involved with finance and staffing for political candidates?

So all of our union members, nearly all 30,000 of them, our residents of the great city of Chicago.

So we not only work, in our city schools, we live in all of the zip codes in our city, paraprofessionals, teachers, clinicians, we're raising our children in this city.

We are sending our children to the Chicago Public Schools.

We are full investors into this city.

And so absolutely, they our members who are 80% plus female, they should have a word about their neighborhoods.

They should have a word about how they want their children to have opportunity in this wonderful city.

So yes, I wish all working families, all working people had the ability and the power to have their voices heard and to have, their voices turned into actionable policy.

Your thoughts on banning books?

We're seeing that in certain cities.

Thank God, not Chicago.

I think, State Representative LaShawn Ford passed a bill that we will not have any banning of books whatsoever.

What are your thoughts on banning of books?

Well, we're not banning books in Chicago because 80% of our public schools do not have, libraries or librarians.

If you are south of Roosevelt Road, wait.

A minute and say it again.

80%, 80 0%, 80% of our schools in the Chicago Public Schools do not have a library or a librarian.

And it is felt most acutely in schools that are south of Roosevelt Road.

What does that mean?

It means you can't ban something that you don't even have operational.

All right.

So let's let's let's insert technology into the real world as we know it now.

So is that because I don't have a librarians because I have Google?

No, because you actually do need a librarian now more than ever because of Google, remember?

Well, I can remember because the library was my sanctuary as, student, elementary school, middle school, high school.

Listen, a librarian provides media literacy, right?

They talk to you about how you, go to sources cited, how you review those sources, how you annotate, how you evaluate, how you understand how to discern fact from fiction, which is a skill many people are sorely missing out on now, especially in the world of, Twitter and Elon Musk.

Is that part of your union?

Negotiation at this time is to advocate for librarians in schools?

Absolutely.

Libraries and libraries.

Yes, ma'am.

So we want both things and we want to start in the parts of the city that have been deprived the most of those resources.

So not only do we want them, we want to make sure that our starting point is on the south side.

We want to make us sure our starting point is on the west side.

You can't talk to me about reading scores while at the same time not having libraries.

So let's talk about the migrant student we've had, a new factor.

We've got a new student.

Migrant student.

Chicago has always been at home.

since Harold Washington, a welcoming city.

Sanctuary city.

Sanctuary county sanctuary state.

So our public school system is always welcomed in migrants.

What has happened is that we've gotten more migrant families in the city than what we normally have, and that has put a stress on the school system.

And, what we're finding is many of our newcomers are being placed in majority black schools and in majority black schools.

We don't have, a lot of bilingual support.

So back to technology.

Many of our educators are communicating through their phone and other devices with their young people.

That's not an education.

It's not good and it's not good, and it has to be a bit more planful.

So what we've been saying is what happens, -When a school district is faced with this?

One of our contract proposals speaks to dual language academies, where black children learn a language, too.

So, so many times when we talk about bilingual education, we're only talking about the young people who come in speaking a different language.

What we want to do is expand the discussion because we are a multilingual country, and so our black children should be just as prepared to speak more than one language.

and so the bilingual model, while useful and effective, it has to be expanded to include dual language academies, especially since we are seeing more migrant families that are in black neighborhoods.

Black children should have the benefit of being bilingual, too.

We're seeing shootings in schools.

We're seeing kids kill kids.

We're seeing kids kill their teachers.

Do we do anything structurally to teach our teachers and our kids to take cover, just like we used to do?

I don't know if you still do it in schools.

Fire drills.

I'm going to ask you this question, I think, in two ways.

One, there's the mechanics of how you encounter an emergency situation.

And obviously your, your, our, members are trained teachers, paraprofessionals, clinicians are trained, to protect themselves.

And the young people that they have charge over, but also as members of a union, as mothers, as fathers, as people who live in the city.

They also want to make sure that the availability of, guns are not as available.

So they are advocating for commonsense, gun regulations, common sense, key word.

Well, yeah.

And common sense isn't that common as we have found out.

So they want to do both.

And yes, if there's an emergency situation, we should know how to protect ourselves and protect the young people we have charge over.

And we are fighting against, having to even consider and do that.

And that will take some changes led by our policy makers.

Stacey, thank you so much for being with us.

And thank you for vibrant conversation.

Thank you on education and on the union and as you are working it.

Thank you for your work.

It's not easy.

It's not, it's hard and it takes a lot of dedication and commitment to do it.

And congratulations to you.

But most of all, thank you.

Thank you.

I really appreciate having the opportunity to dialog with you.

I hope, I hope our audience gets, gets a real view of Mrs. Gates as we look at the news.

We just see, I'm sick of seeing these news clips.

I'm sick of seeing these bites.

I want you to have full opportunity to express what's really going on in these schools and how you view it.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

For more information about this show, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Blue Sky.

Funding for this program was provided by Illinois Student Assistance Commission, the Chicago Community Trust, Sin City Studios, Lamborghini Chicago, Gold Coast, and Downers Grove.

Blue Cross, Blue Shield of Illinois, Commonwealth Edison, and the Illinois Health Plan.

N'digo Studio.