January 11, 2022 • 36 mins
Part 2 of our interview with Lucy about COVID in Chicago public schools in which we take a look at what these classrooms are actually like and examine the broader implications of these actions for the labor movement in general.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to It Could Happen Here, a podcast about things
going badly and falling apart. And today we are back
with part two for interview with Lucy about how the
Chicago Public school system is falling apart under the relentless
assault of cruelty and malice and incompetence by the Chicago
Public Schools and by the Mayor, LORDE. Lightfoot. Enjoy there's
everything I want to talk about a bit, which is
(00:27):
when you've been back, when you've been sort of teaching
in these really like sort of what what is it
actually like to teach in these classrooms? And like you know,
how how safe actually is it? So, I mean I've
been in a lot of different environments. When I was
teaching middle schoolers, I did not feel super COVID safe.
Um they aren't. I don't know if people know this
(00:48):
about middle school age kids. They love to touch each other,
especially boys. They love to like wrestle. There was putting
each other in headlocks. I am constantly having to just
be like six feet six ft apart or three ft
or whatever CDC has said we are now. Um, they
don't put their masks on, They put their masks in
their mouths. All the time, like in their mouths. Um.
(01:10):
There's they're constantly finding like weird little excuses to have
their mask off. Like they'll just sit there with like
like there are a lot to have water bottles because
they can't use the water countains. They'll just sit there
with like a straw in their mouth for like extended
amounts of time. And I'm like, I need you to
put your mask up, take quicksips and put your mask up.
And they're like I'm drinking, Like I'm going to be
drinking at the end of this day, but like, I know,
(01:34):
take a quick sip, put your mask back up. It's
really really important for your safety. Um. And then I
have other kids who are absolutely straight up like terrified
of this because like they've lost parents, they've lost grandparents. Um,
it's it's really scary. UM. At the high school level,
it's been a little better. High school kids are a
little more rational. UM, but I still have a few
(01:56):
who are just like their masks are down around their
chins all the time and we're under their nose and
I'm I'll like several times of class fear like okay,
time for everybody to do a mass check. Make sure
your mask is covering your nose, your mouth, your chin. Um,
I'll remind them like I have a spouse at home
who has an underlying condition and like, please don't have
me bring home a deadly disease to him, because that
(02:18):
would really not be great. Um, most of them are
pretty good, but still they're getting sick. Like I think
we had like forty kids out of my building one Monday,
and like twenty eight staff members or something like that.
We're out and we had one sub which is the
other That's the other issue is this isn't really a
(02:39):
question of, um, if we should go remote. It's a
question of when will we be forced to go remote.
And we can either do that now before everybody has
gotten sick and wait for this to subside and get
some better mitigation strategies in place, or we can do
it after everybody is sick, and then we're going to
be scrambling to figure it out and also be sick
(03:00):
at the same time. I don't really see how that
makes any sense. Yeah, that's the part of this. And
I've just been like I just like I don't get it,
Like I just like, fundamentally, there's there's like a mental
break where it's like I don't understand why, like Lightfoot
and CPS so insistance about not going remote, Like I
(03:22):
get that, like yeah, it's it's hard on kids, but
it's like it's it's you know, it is the years two,
Like no matter what you do, it's it's hard on
the kids, And it's like, yeah, I also I wonder
how much of it is the remote learning that's hard
on them, and how much of it is just the
(03:45):
um everything around them is crashing and following and burning
around their ears because um, the messaging that they've been
getting is that they don't matter. They're not important, their
safety isn't important, their families aren't important, and um, some
of them like want to be remote. A lot of them,
a lot of their parents want them to be remote.
They're like, you know, it's not as good, but at
(04:07):
least I feel safe. Some of them even thrived in
remote like actually did pretty well. And I really wish
that it was just an option for those students who
actually did well with it, that they could just like
if we even ended up with like a third of
our students choosing it, it would mitigate this so much,
because that's a third of the people not they're to
spread it around. UM. So how how big? How big
(04:31):
your class sizes are? Um? Right now the building I'm
in now, I have like thirty in some my it
was kind of similar at the last building. Like they're
in that range. I have like always have like one
or two that are like the twenty or below that
(04:51):
are usually um special education like inclusion classes where I
have co teacher. Um. But yeah, it's you know, some
of them are pretty crowded, and it really varies by school.
Like there's definitely schools that have over thirty kids in
a room, um and don't have the staff because it's
just that's the other thing is like they keep talking about,
(05:14):
you know, I keep seeing people be like fire all
the teachers, and I'm like, good luck, Like, yes, is
chronically understaffed. What are you gonna do this? Yeah? I
think again, like this job is really hard, Like it's
being a teacher. Yeah, it's hard. It's exhausting, and it's
(05:35):
very very rewarding. Like when it's good, it's great. When
it's bad it is miserable. Um. So yeah, and like
what it looks like and I mean that's you know,
it depends, it really depends on what school you're in. Um,
I think everybody can agree that it is difficult right now. Um,
(05:55):
so we we have like air purifiers going and masks on,
and I cannot understand what my kids are saying a
lot of the time, Like I do not know, and
they speak so quietly. Yeah, like I need you to
shout it, say it like you mean whatever it is.
So but you know, that's been challenging and frustrating and exhausting.
(06:15):
But um, the worst thing ever is finding out that
one of my students is sick. Like I hate when
they're I hate it when they hurt, Like whenever that
one of them is hurting, I feel bad. And knowing
that their home sick is it's it's really upsetting and
just it's you know, it's distressing for teachers to know
that their kids are struggling in a way like that.
(06:36):
So that's you know, we want them to be safe,
you know, like like these kids, it's like and this
is this is true of the staff too. When you
when you're getting sick, it's like, yeah, like some of
these people will be okay, but enormous numbers of people
(06:58):
are like so, man, these people are gonna die something.
People a lot of these people are going to get disabled.
Um yeah, I mean the long term long terfects really bad.
And you know, one off, if people remember we we
did an episode with when our Friends us a nurse
and like, yeah, like he he had long COVID. His
long COVID was like he he couldn't do more than
(07:18):
like like getting out of bed or like like walking
across the room, which just put him in bed all day.
Because there's you know, there there's an enormous range of
sort of like of of long COVID side effects. And yeah,
it's like it's it's it's like CPS is just child
cope of schools. It's just like they're getting people killed. Yeah,
(07:40):
and it's and it's you know, that's like the question
like they keep talking about percentages and I'm like, these
are human beings. Every one of the numbers is a human.
So when you say like only you know, point whatever
percent are going to be long term affected, like, okay,
those are people. Can we stop like dehumanizing them with
(08:02):
these like data points and um as for like the
issue with like how like kids are less affected by
or whatever, Like the fact is like the more we
allow this to spread around the more variants we're going
to see, and we don't know that the next variant
isn't going to be the one that is really significantly
(08:24):
harmful to children. And we are basically turning our schools
into these peatree dishes where this thing can mutate and
become stronger. And now we have vaccinated people who are
in that mix, and it's becoming resistant to the vaccine.
So you know, I'm a social studie teacher, not a
science teacher, but this seems like a bad move to me. Yeah, yeah,
(08:47):
it's I don't know, it's it's just sort of heartbreaking
a lot of ways. I mean, it's just like they've
just decided that, you know, and again, like I don't
I don't know why Lightfoot's doing this, Like maybe just
like she wants to share up her base thing because
she's trying to build a base among like the just
like rich, Weirddorsiders or something. But like it's she's a
(09:10):
small business person. That's always when people are the small
business owners who don't want to close schools because then
you know, their workers won't come in, and you know,
I want to feel sorry for them, but I know,
I don't know, like I was like fuck you, because
there's also a lot of small business owners who have
(09:32):
been very supportive of us. We had uh there's like
a taco place offering free burritos to us, Like I
really appreciate that. Like there's a community who understand that,
like the lives of our children are so much more
important than you missing two weeks of profit, Like you
will figure that out. And if you want to bail
out businesses, um, we can figure that out. But right now.
(09:55):
And also like is is saying like we have we
aren't we refused to do anything that might be inconvenient
for business owners, Like what is that? Yeah, and it's
like it's like yeah, so you know. And also yeah,
but like business owners did get bailed out, like they
got they got they got zero presented loans. Most of
those loans got written off. And meanwhile, yeah, it's like, well, okay,
(10:17):
what did life to do with the COVID buddy? She
she gave it to the cops. And oh, hey, guess
guess who's also just a ramperants better of COVID? Oh
yeah it's the cops. Yeah, resisted vaccines the most, the cops.
I mean, actually, there there there, there is one funny
thing which I'm actually very excited about, which is that
the cops are doing they're having their first so that
they have a new class graduating. But for the police academies,
(10:40):
which is really bad, and there's a whole well, one
of one of the like life Foot's things was that
there there was a huge campaign against building more police
academies because you know, everyone hates told a police apartment.
They're awful. And if you have a hundred billion dollars
for a new police academy, why or a hundred million
or whatever it was, why can't you put some better
ventilation in the schools? Yeah, well it's gonna yeah because
(11:01):
because because like the CPD are like basically feudal lords.
They have nights, they go out, they can shoot you,
like they rob you. They just like any any any
large number of like black kids on the streets, Like
if you just have like fifteen kids walking around, like
eight quad cars will show up. And you know that
there was in Lightfoot was like no, no, no, her
(11:22):
like one of her campaign things, big and pain things
like no, no no, We're gonna make sure we build these academies.
And but so they're they're having their first like rounded.
They they've been having trouble recruiting because good yeah, and
and they're they're about to have their first police Academy
exam and it's gonna be in person, and I am
this is the only what are the few? Is this?
And jaire Bosonaro where it's like I am rooting for
(11:42):
the virus here, like please God save us from these cops.
But yeah, it's it's but they're just at home and
spread it around. Yeah, yeah, that's a sad thing. It's
it's just it's grotesque. And yeah, yeah, it's been this
thing where I'm like watching, like the school system is
(12:02):
just throwing their hands up, been saying we don't care,
We're done. The health system, the health care system is
like crashing and burning all around us. Nurses are quitting,
hospitals are like we don't have room for more patients,
Like did you have a cancer treatment schedule? Sorry? Did
you have a surgery scheduled? Sorry? I just saw somebody
(12:25):
on Twitter saying she um has a brain tumor and
she's supposed to have a surgery for it and she
can't now because of COVID. Because they have no beds,
there aren't any and you're telling me that the right
move right now is to keep the schools open, which
has always been in every every pandemic that we've ever had.
(12:46):
Schools and hospitals and prisons are like the place where
the whatever diseases spreads. And I know we've been claiming
that like there's not been spread in schools, but we've
now seen the data that there, in fact is a
huge amount. Which I've been like screaming about this since
we started that their contact tracing models are they're absurd.
(13:07):
They are like kafka esque, Like basically, um, so we
start from the assumption that everybody is six ft apart
and wearing the mask at all times, which it's not.
It's not even it's not even physically possible in a
lot of classrooms for that to be happening. And then too,
we start with the assumption that those things work, and
(13:30):
so you'll get a call from a contact racer that's like, hey,
um on, you know, like last Tuesday, Tuesday of last week,
were you within six ft of any of your eighth
graders for more than fifteen minutes? Funk? If I know,
Tuesday of last week, was I near an eighth grader
for fifteen minutes. I don't know. I have no idea
(13:52):
even if, like, even if I did know, what difference
does it make. It is an aerosolized virus. It is
in the air, and the more you sit in classrooms,
the more it accumulates. Like we have seen like studies
about um this, We've seen studies about how CEO two
accumulates in the air when there's crowds. We know that
(14:13):
stuff accumulates like that in classrooms, very very quickly. And
you're gonna tell me that as long as I wasn't
within fifteen or within six ft for more than fifteen
continuous minutes, not even like um, not even fifteen minutes
like added up throughout the day, just fifteen minutes continuously,
I'm not going to get a virus. You shipping me
(14:34):
like that makes no sense. And so then if and
if and if you're answer to those questions are no,
because whatever you were following the rules, then they're like, Okay,
you got COVID somewhere else. It wasn't at school, Yeah, no,
it doesn't. It's nonsense. It's like I go to work
and I go home. I don't do anything else, so
I don't know where else it's coming from like yeah,
(14:55):
like and I also just I want to do do
a brief digression about like okay, so like like like
I went to like a like a pretty good like
like a pretty well like a very well funded like
a Chicago area school and like, okay, those places, those
places ventilation sucks. Like again, like again, I went to
a very well funded school. Like we had a we
had drowned dead rats falling out of the ceiling like
(15:19):
it was. It was incredibly my my, my, my great
high school memories with my principle just like running full
tilt pushing a trash can because dead drownd friend see
liked lord. My school was wild. We had how bad
it was like a kind of a chemistry teacher let
a kid set off a smoke bomb like that they
(15:41):
made like in a classroom, but it didn't work, so
it just like actually blew up. It was a time
but like like base learning, okay, got to light the
school on fire. But like like this is a this
is like yeah, like like these schools are not like
they're not environments. Yeah. The building I worked in at
the beginning of the year was a hundred years old.
(16:02):
It was built in nineteen twenty and there was always
this like sewage smell around the bathroom as the pipes
were messed up. It was weird, like and they couldn't
fix it. I think it was I was the second
or third time by building lived on fire. Like we
there was a there was a whole thing in the
building that was made of asbestos and they just had
left it because it was like it wasn't exposed. Yeah,
(16:23):
still have asbestos over Like I get like I went
to like a good, well funded one of these schools,
Like it's I think there's there's like there's there's these
two there's two things. I think it is. Interestingly, there's
when you like talk to like the people who want
the schools to open back up, right, they'll they're also
talking about like oh no, it's fine. Everyone wears mass
(16:44):
everyone's vaccinated, everyone succeed. It's like no, no, they're not
like this. This is how it works in this like
imaginary play world you've like created. Have you ever met
a child? Like have you met your own children? Like
oh and that's the best is like, well, I've been
having my kids wear a mask. You have your full
of ship, okay, because I hold that kid to put
(17:05):
their masks on like fifteen times yesterday, and I love
them beautiful face. I hope they get to show it
off someday, but right now, covered up, please, I'm begging you.
And I'm like, I'm not like that teacher who's really authoritarian,
Like I've never been good at like writing kids up
and getting on them for stuff because it's just like
(17:25):
I don't know, I hate doing that. I hate being
that person. So it's been like, really it's like a struggle.
It's like am I going to be the person who
nags them every five seconds? Or am I gonna be
um the teacher that they like and want to learn from?
Like you know, this isn't sustainable. So but you're asking
(17:47):
like the attitudes of people who want to open schools
back up, and I it's it's hard because I have
talked to parents who are worried, but they are also
very upset because they see that their kids are struggling.
And I really do feel for them on that, like
I really really do. It is hard to see a
(18:07):
kids struggle, but it is harder, I think to see
a kid sick. That is really hard. And it's just
this like there are ways that we can overcome the
difficulties of remote learning, Like we we can find ways
to give them the emotional support, Um, we can find
better socializing outlets. But I don't know how we fix
(18:31):
like you've become very ill and your body isn't going
to recover in the way that you thought it would, Like,
I don't. I can't fix that. So it's something I've
heard from other teachers that like that preparable about learning
(18:54):
stuff like is harder and takes more work than Yeah
it does. It's it's really off. I don't like doing it.
I want to be in the classroom, but yah, and
I just I just want to like once again, yell
at all of the people who are like the teachers
are lazy and it's like no, people like they're like, yeah,
like you're you are advocating to do more work because
(19:18):
that's that's the thing that will keep the kids safe,
and it's Yeah. I think a lot of people don't
understand like the behind the scenes how the sausage gets
made of a classroom. But I think a lot of
people have this idea that like we are given curriculum
and plans and materials pre made, and sometimes that's true,
it depends on your subject. Mine is social size is
(19:39):
not a subject where that happens very much, which is
part of why I like it, because I like to
be creative. Um, So like my week looks like, UM,
there are a lot of hours after school where I
am sitting down, I'm looking at the standards that I
need to teach, the topics that I need to teach,
(20:00):
and I'm researching it and learning it and finding a
way to teach that to kids who don't have the
same like baseline knowledge that I have. UM, And then
I'm creating like an activity for them. I'm creating, um,
you're I'm finding like material sources and videos and stuff
(20:20):
that they can watch that are going to help them,
or things to read. I'm modifying those things for the
kids who have, um, you know, learning differences. I'm translating
some of those things into Spanish for kids who don't
really read very well in English yet. So, like that's
a ton of work on its own. And then when
we switch to remote, we have to figure out how
to do all of that on Google Classroom, where now
(20:42):
it has to all be typed like or you know,
like how do I figure like how do I do
a group project online. How do I let them do
something creative that isn't just sitting here answering questions on
a worksheet. That's hard and we've been really good at it,
and I've found all kinds of really cool tools to
(21:02):
do that with. But it's so much work. And it's
work that I'm willing to do because I care about
my job. I enjoy my work. I love my students,
but um, you know, and I want them to be safe,
but like, you know, it is a ton of work.
I'm not just sitting here eating bond bonds all day
or drinking cocktails. Yeah. And I think there's there's like
(21:23):
a larger sort of like like Americans have this like
the sexist sort of like hatred of like or in
disrespect to people who do both care work and a
lot of creative work both. And then simultaneously there's this
sort of like you know, the there's there's there's a
resentment to people who get to actually do something that
(21:44):
helps people. And you know, I think right now we're
seeing just the most toxic fusion of that, which is
that like, yeah, I know, like these like you know,
instead of like you know, recognizing the enormous amount of
work that that's going into all like this going into
into teaching, like the amount of sort of like the
(22:05):
care and love that's going into the creativity. It's going
into it. And just like the people people's willing to,
like you're willing listen to make like enormous sacrifices to
try to keep these kids safe, they're just like no,
Like the teachers are lazy, they don't want to work,
they're going on strike, like and it's you know, and
and it's like they're doing this and it's like yeah,
like you you were like they're killing their own kids.
(22:27):
It's just like it's it's this weird fusion of like
we we I've had. The spaces is like a combination
of like feminized care labor, emotional labor, and UM that's
sort of like like intelligence, yeah, like professional white collar
(22:50):
intellectual kind of thing. And then also we're teaching a
UM more introductory level of our subjects, so we're seeing
as like discount intellectuals who are also women who do
care work. So it's it's very frustrating, and I don't
think a lot of people understand the amount of UM
skill and expertise it takes to be a teacher and
(23:12):
be effective at it. Like, it's not just I need
to know social studies to the level that a twelfth
grader would know it. It's I need to know social
studies beyond that level and know how to communicate it
to a high school student. And also I need to
know a lot of stuff about like child development. It's
it's really it's something and um, I you know, I
find that to be fun and challenging, but I wish
(23:34):
it was respected and you know, and then you're talking
about like people are sacrificing their own kids. I want
to point out a lot like I think there's a
racial component to this. Um, the people who are in
wealthier schools and who are mostly white know that their
kids are gonna be fine, Like they are in schools
(23:57):
that actually do have the resources to distance, that have
air filters, that have good ventilation. Um, they're vaccinated, their
kids are probably going to be fine. The kids that
aren't going to be fine are low income students of color.
And it has always been this way. It's always been
this way with schools. Like when schools were desegregated, we
(24:18):
started with private school vouchers and we started with all
of these like uh, state testing requirements and withholding funding
from schools that don't meet those you know, test standards
and all of these like um, this extra oversight owned
teachers like that stuff all comes back to white people
(24:40):
don't want to have to worry about black people's kids.
That's it. And you know they will move their kids
out to the north side or the suburbs or whatever.
Notice that all of those suburbs schools have flipped. Noticed
that Lory Lightfoot's kids are in a charter school that
is not remote well and more than Lightfoot. Light Lightfoot
realm not put herself in a room with the with
(25:03):
the same number of people like to go to every day.
She won't. And she was telling people at the press
conferences they had to wear their masks, and then she
wasn't wearing hers, which is very charrange to me. Like
that's what they like when when you when you get
to the politician level, they know it's dangerous, Like they
know they they you can tell right, yeah, like they
(25:23):
won't do it, but like no, no, they're they're perfectly
willing to just send to send you off the die,
to send all these kids off to die. And it's just, Yeah,
sometimes I feel I get kind of dumer and I
wonder if, like, if that's not the plan, Like is
it that? I mean, I don't really believe that. I
think what it really is is this just like malicious neglect.
(25:45):
Like if you're somebody who's a policymaker and someone comes
to you and it's like, I need you to care
about this population here that doesn't have a lot of
money and needs a lot of things, and you, the policymaker,
are going to be like, oh, that sounds like so
much work. And then somebody else is going to come
to you and be like, I need these things over here,
(26:07):
and I do have a lot of money, and I
do have a lot of influence, and I'm gonna make
your life difficult if you don't do what I want.
They're gonna do with that other side once. And what
the other side once right now is for kids to
get back into school so they can have free daycares,
parents can go to work, and that's and that's it.
And teachers are standing here being like, I didn't get
a master's degree, and do you know countless hours of
(26:28):
professional development to be a babysitter? You know, and no,
not to knock babysitters. I was in nanny for a
long time. That is hard work. But um, I didn't
get a master's degree to be a babysitter. I got
a master's degree to be a teacher. And I'm in
an environment right now where I can't really teach effectively
and all I'm doing is babysitting. They want to wear
(26:49):
house kids. That is what we're doing with the schools.
That's why they want them open. And it's you know,
it's it's hard not to feel like they just are
doing it because they hate us, even though I know
it's not. It's just mean, it does feel that way.
I will like, I will say that, like you're so
if you become elected as the mayor of Chicago, like
(27:10):
your job is to break the teachers union, Like that's
that's like, that's that's that's that's like the role you're
auditioning for. And they have been they have been trying
to do this for literally my entire lifetime. They've been
trying to do this, like since before I was born.
Like that's and honestly, like, wouldn't surprise me if this
was another part of this was just them once again
trying to break the teachers union. Oh absolutely, like and
(27:32):
if and not even just that, like yeah, you know,
like not just on the sort of political level, like
on the incredible cynical level of we'll just kill them. Well,
it's it's a labor thing. Like, it's not just a
Chicago teachers union or even a teacher's union thing. It
is a labor movement across the board thing that. Um,
the largest, I think the largest unionized workforce in the
(27:53):
country is teachers, and we on top of that are
a union of workers who have the power to absolutely
bring our economy to a grinding hole if we want to.
We could all go on straight right now, and nobody's
going to do ship until we go back to work.
Um they could if they, you know, they could try
to replace us with like people who are basically like
(28:14):
hall monitors and give kids like canned curriculums. But they
wouldn't really be learning very well, and parents wouldn't be
happy with it, and they wouldn't be entering the workforce
with the skills they need to make money for the economy,
to you know, make money for the almighty Tao. So um.
The it has been a project for decades in this
country to try to break teachers unions because teacher unions
(28:37):
occupy this space where they allow other unions to happen. Um,
we have, you know, enough influence on politicians that they
can't just disband the labor board and make unions illegal,
which they would absolutely fucking love to do. And if
they could just get rid of these damn teachers unions,
maybe they could do it. Um. So, you know, and
(28:58):
that's what you see with the edge cation reform movement,
where you have all these people advocating for bouchers and
charter schools and it's you know, they want to break labor.
And I see a lot of I mean, now I'm
gonna I'm gonna scold some of my comrades, but I
(29:18):
see a lot of leftists who are really skeptical of
teachers and don't want to support the teachers union. And
I get it, like, there are a lot of teachers
who really suck, and there's a lot of teachers who
are not radical, like most teachers are not radical, a
lot of them are pretty conservative. But at the same time,
if you were to abolish schools immediately right now and
(29:42):
break up the teachers unions, and all that you're gonna
get end up with. Rich people go to school, poor
people don't. If your poor, your kid goes to work,
probably won't be in a coal mine, but you know
they'll probably be like soldering my computer chips or coded
or something for like pennies an hour. And I don't
(30:03):
want that world. And if you actually care about labor,
then you need to support teachers unions because um, the
public schools are central to all these communities that we
want to be reaching, and the unions are the only
thing making sure that they stay public. Yeah. Yeah, that's
like I almost like again like to to to to
(30:24):
anarchist comrades were anti school. It's like yeah, like okay,
I hate school. I'm for a d D. Schooling is great,
but we need to do other things first. Yeah you
have to And like again like that you need to
like like support the workers, not the institution. Like it's
like it's like saying I'm a vegan, so I'm going
(30:44):
to go after McDonald's in place, like just like like
so like I I my high school was like all
the th much like incredibly conservative, but everyone was still
in the union. That was like the one that was
the one thing that was like, well, okay, there there
there were two counter failing forces. One was that I
(31:04):
the Christians didn't seem to understand what liberation theology was,
so occasionally they'd accidentally hire leftist because they were like, oh,
you're a Christian, You're fine, you're from America. We're not
going to question you further. The second thing was that
even everyone, everyone was in the Union, and that was like,
that was that was literally the only those are the
only two left wing. Like I've gotten into so many
teaching spaces by talking about how I like critical pedagogy
(31:28):
and I didn't understand Fry was a conference, yeah, or
being like, oh, I'm really really really into Chicago history.
I especially love the history of like labor in Chicago
because it's it's huge people here about it and they
don't get that like I'm an anarchist, you know, And
(31:49):
and a lot of the like um sort of like
education reform language. I think it's very funny. It is
just lifted from radical like sociologists and anthropologists and educators
who are trying to find ways to um dismantle like
authoritarian structures in schools, and so they'll come up with
(32:12):
these like Um, you know, like restorative practices and all
this stuff, and then they kind of get they make
their way up to the Ivory Tower and then get
repackaged in this It's it's like, I don't know, it's
like a machine or something that like sucks up radical ideas,
brings them up to the academy, repackages them to make
them nice for politicians, and then spits them back out
(32:35):
And it is exhausting and I hate it. It makes
me so mad. I'll never forgive people for what they
did to the term restorative justice. Yeah, do you have
anything else that you want to make sure that people
like understand about what's happening in the schools right now? Um,
I guess just the biggest thing is I want people
(32:56):
to understand that like it. This is a question of
when and under what conditions are we going to be
forced into a remote learning situation. This isn't like we
want remote learning because we like it because it's fun.
It's because it's going to happen if you like it
or not. The schools are going to close if you
like it or not, because the unless you're okay with
(33:19):
just like people are going to get sick and die
and or going to work sick, which I think most
of us agree that's insane. Um it is there are
you We're going to be in a situation where we
don't have enough staff to keep buildings open. So either
we can try and mitigate that now and keep that
from happening, or we can just start our hands up
(33:41):
and say, fine, let's let the schools collapse. I don't
want the schools to collapse, So, um, if we could
just go remote for two weeks and get some good
testing in and have a vaccine requirement, And personally, I
would like to advocate for remote as an option for
parents who want it. I don't think that's on the
table right now, but um, I think more parents out
(34:03):
there should be demanding it. And I also would like
to say to parents, you have a lot of power
that you don't understand. Um. The school districts listen to
the parents so much more than the teachers. One parents
voice is worth like ten teacher voices. So if you
see something going on in your schools that you're not
comfortable with, if you have questions, contact your principles, contact
(34:28):
the district, talk to people, talk to the other parents
that you know, organize yourselves. Um, if we had you know,
strong parent organizations on our side, we would be absolutely
unstoppable and we could have the school system that we
want and that our kids deserve. Yeah, and I think
I like the right figured this out a long time
(34:49):
ago that you absolutely, Yeah, look at what they're doing
to the school board meetings with CRT. We could have
that for people who are actually good people who care,
like there's no there's no reason that all the other
parents couldn't be going and saying I want my kids
to learn about race, and I want them to be
wearing masks, and I want everybody to be vaccinated. Yeah.
So I think I think I think that's a good
(35:10):
note to end on. We you know, we can make
this better. We just have to, you know, work together. Yeah.
Do you have anything that you want to plug, Like,
do you have a way to support the teachers who Um,
I think I'll send you a flyer that we have.
It has some information for contacting Alderman, getting COVID tests
(35:31):
and our petition to sign um. If you could post that,
I would really appreciate it. I definitely can definitely do that. Awesome,
Thank you, Thanks coming on. Yeah, good talking to you.
It could Happen Here as a production of cool zone
Media or more podcasts from cool Zone Media. Visit our
(35:52):
website cool zone media dot com or check us out
on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to podcasts. You can find sources for it
could Happen Here, updated monthly at cool zone Media dot
com slash sources. Thanks for listening.
Welcome to It Could Happen Here, a podcast about things
going badly and falling apart. And today we are back
with part two for interview with Lucy about how the
Chicago Public school system is falling apart under the relentless
assault of cruelty and malice and incompetence by the Chicago
Public Schools and by the Mayor, LORDE. Lightfoot. Enjoy there's
everything I want to talk about a bit, which is
(00:27):
when you've been back, when you've been sort of teaching
in these really like sort of what what is it
actually like to teach in these classrooms? And like you know,
how how safe actually is it? So, I mean I've
been in a lot of different environments. When I was
teaching middle schoolers, I did not feel super COVID safe.
Um they aren't. I don't know if people know this
(00:48):
about middle school age kids. They love to touch each other,
especially boys. They love to like wrestle. There was putting
each other in headlocks. I am constantly having to just
be like six feet six ft apart or three ft
or whatever CDC has said we are now. Um, they
don't put their masks on, They put their masks in
their mouths. All the time, like in their mouths. Um.
(01:10):
There's they're constantly finding like weird little excuses to have
their mask off. Like they'll just sit there with like
like there are a lot to have water bottles because
they can't use the water countains. They'll just sit there
with like a straw in their mouth for like extended
amounts of time. And I'm like, I need you to
put your mask up, take quicksips and put your mask up.
And they're like I'm drinking, Like I'm going to be
drinking at the end of this day, but like, I know,
(01:34):
take a quick sip, put your mask back up. It's
really really important for your safety. Um. And then I
have other kids who are absolutely straight up like terrified
of this because like they've lost parents, they've lost grandparents. Um,
it's it's really scary. UM. At the high school level,
it's been a little better. High school kids are a
little more rational. UM, but I still have a few
(01:56):
who are just like their masks are down around their
chins all the time and we're under their nose and
I'm I'll like several times of class fear like okay,
time for everybody to do a mass check. Make sure
your mask is covering your nose, your mouth, your chin. Um,
I'll remind them like I have a spouse at home
who has an underlying condition and like, please don't have
me bring home a deadly disease to him, because that
(02:18):
would really not be great. Um, most of them are
pretty good, but still they're getting sick. Like I think
we had like forty kids out of my building one Monday,
and like twenty eight staff members or something like that.
We're out and we had one sub which is the
other That's the other issue is this isn't really a
(02:39):
question of, um, if we should go remote. It's a
question of when will we be forced to go remote.
And we can either do that now before everybody has
gotten sick and wait for this to subside and get
some better mitigation strategies in place, or we can do
it after everybody is sick, and then we're going to
be scrambling to figure it out and also be sick
(03:00):
at the same time. I don't really see how that
makes any sense. Yeah, that's the part of this. And
I've just been like I just like I don't get it,
Like I just like, fundamentally, there's there's like a mental
break where it's like I don't understand why, like Lightfoot
and CPS so insistance about not going remote, Like I
(03:22):
get that, like yeah, it's it's hard on kids, but
it's like it's it's you know, it is the years two,
Like no matter what you do, it's it's hard on
the kids, And it's like, yeah, I also I wonder
how much of it is the remote learning that's hard
on them, and how much of it is just the
(03:45):
um everything around them is crashing and following and burning
around their ears because um, the messaging that they've been
getting is that they don't matter. They're not important, their
safety isn't important, their families aren't important, and um, some
of them like want to be remote. A lot of them,
a lot of their parents want them to be remote.
They're like, you know, it's not as good, but at
(04:07):
least I feel safe. Some of them even thrived in
remote like actually did pretty well. And I really wish
that it was just an option for those students who
actually did well with it, that they could just like
if we even ended up with like a third of
our students choosing it, it would mitigate this so much,
because that's a third of the people not they're to
spread it around. UM. So how how big? How big
(04:31):
your class sizes are? Um? Right now the building I'm
in now, I have like thirty in some my it
was kind of similar at the last building. Like they're
in that range. I have like always have like one
or two that are like the twenty or below that
(04:51):
are usually um special education like inclusion classes where I
have co teacher. Um. But yeah, it's you know, some
of them are pretty crowded, and it really varies by school.
Like there's definitely schools that have over thirty kids in
a room, um and don't have the staff because it's
just that's the other thing is like they keep talking about,
(05:14):
you know, I keep seeing people be like fire all
the teachers, and I'm like, good luck, Like, yes, is
chronically understaffed. What are you gonna do this? Yeah? I
think again, like this job is really hard, Like it's
being a teacher. Yeah, it's hard. It's exhausting, and it's
(05:35):
very very rewarding. Like when it's good, it's great. When
it's bad it is miserable. Um. So yeah, and like
what it looks like and I mean that's you know,
it depends, it really depends on what school you're in. Um,
I think everybody can agree that it is difficult right now. Um,
(05:55):
so we we have like air purifiers going and masks on,
and I cannot understand what my kids are saying a
lot of the time, Like I do not know, and
they speak so quietly. Yeah, like I need you to
shout it, say it like you mean whatever it is.
So but you know, that's been challenging and frustrating and exhausting.
(06:15):
But um, the worst thing ever is finding out that
one of my students is sick. Like I hate when
they're I hate it when they hurt, Like whenever that
one of them is hurting, I feel bad. And knowing
that their home sick is it's it's really upsetting and
just it's you know, it's distressing for teachers to know
that their kids are struggling in a way like that.
(06:36):
So that's you know, we want them to be safe,
you know, like like these kids, it's like and this
is this is true of the staff too. When you
when you're getting sick, it's like, yeah, like some of
these people will be okay, but enormous numbers of people
(06:58):
are like so, man, these people are gonna die something.
People a lot of these people are going to get disabled.
Um yeah, I mean the long term long terfects really bad.
And you know, one off, if people remember we we
did an episode with when our Friends us a nurse
and like, yeah, like he he had long COVID. His
long COVID was like he he couldn't do more than
(07:18):
like like getting out of bed or like like walking
across the room, which just put him in bed all day.
Because there's you know, there there's an enormous range of
sort of like of of long COVID side effects. And yeah,
it's like it's it's it's like CPS is just child
cope of schools. It's just like they're getting people killed. Yeah,
(07:40):
and it's and it's you know, that's like the question
like they keep talking about percentages and I'm like, these
are human beings. Every one of the numbers is a human.
So when you say like only you know, point whatever
percent are going to be long term affected, like, okay,
those are people. Can we stop like dehumanizing them with
(08:02):
these like data points and um as for like the
issue with like how like kids are less affected by
or whatever, Like the fact is like the more we
allow this to spread around the more variants we're going
to see, and we don't know that the next variant
isn't going to be the one that is really significantly
(08:24):
harmful to children. And we are basically turning our schools
into these peatree dishes where this thing can mutate and
become stronger. And now we have vaccinated people who are
in that mix, and it's becoming resistant to the vaccine.
So you know, I'm a social studie teacher, not a
science teacher, but this seems like a bad move to me. Yeah, yeah,
(08:47):
it's I don't know, it's it's just sort of heartbreaking
a lot of ways. I mean, it's just like they've
just decided that, you know, and again, like I don't
I don't know why Lightfoot's doing this, Like maybe just
like she wants to share up her base thing because
she's trying to build a base among like the just
like rich, Weirddorsiders or something. But like it's she's a
(09:10):
small business person. That's always when people are the small
business owners who don't want to close schools because then
you know, their workers won't come in, and you know,
I want to feel sorry for them, but I know,
I don't know, like I was like fuck you, because
there's also a lot of small business owners who have
(09:32):
been very supportive of us. We had uh there's like
a taco place offering free burritos to us, Like I
really appreciate that. Like there's a community who understand that,
like the lives of our children are so much more
important than you missing two weeks of profit, Like you
will figure that out. And if you want to bail
out businesses, um, we can figure that out. But right now.
(09:55):
And also like is is saying like we have we
aren't we refused to do anything that might be inconvenient
for business owners, Like what is that? Yeah, and it's
like it's like yeah, so you know. And also yeah,
but like business owners did get bailed out, like they
got they got they got zero presented loans. Most of
those loans got written off. And meanwhile, yeah, it's like, well, okay,
(10:17):
what did life to do with the COVID buddy? She
she gave it to the cops. And oh, hey, guess
guess who's also just a ramperants better of COVID? Oh
yeah it's the cops. Yeah, resisted vaccines the most, the cops.
I mean, actually, there there there, there is one funny
thing which I'm actually very excited about, which is that
the cops are doing they're having their first so that
they have a new class graduating. But for the police academies,
(10:40):
which is really bad, and there's a whole well, one
of one of the like life Foot's things was that
there there was a huge campaign against building more police
academies because you know, everyone hates told a police apartment.
They're awful. And if you have a hundred billion dollars
for a new police academy, why or a hundred million
or whatever it was, why can't you put some better
ventilation in the schools? Yeah, well it's gonna yeah because
(11:01):
because because like the CPD are like basically feudal lords.
They have nights, they go out, they can shoot you,
like they rob you. They just like any any any
large number of like black kids on the streets, Like
if you just have like fifteen kids walking around, like
eight quad cars will show up. And you know that
there was in Lightfoot was like no, no, no, her
(11:22):
like one of her campaign things, big and pain things
like no, no no, We're gonna make sure we build these academies.
And but so they're they're having their first like rounded.
They they've been having trouble recruiting because good yeah, and
and they're they're about to have their first police Academy
exam and it's gonna be in person, and I am
this is the only what are the few? Is this?
And jaire Bosonaro where it's like I am rooting for
(11:42):
the virus here, like please God save us from these cops.
But yeah, it's it's but they're just at home and
spread it around. Yeah, yeah, that's a sad thing. It's
it's just it's grotesque. And yeah, yeah, it's been this
thing where I'm like watching, like the school system is
(12:02):
just throwing their hands up, been saying we don't care,
We're done. The health system, the health care system is
like crashing and burning all around us. Nurses are quitting,
hospitals are like we don't have room for more patients,
Like did you have a cancer treatment schedule? Sorry? Did
you have a surgery scheduled? Sorry? I just saw somebody
(12:25):
on Twitter saying she um has a brain tumor and
she's supposed to have a surgery for it and she
can't now because of COVID. Because they have no beds,
there aren't any and you're telling me that the right
move right now is to keep the schools open, which
has always been in every every pandemic that we've ever had.
(12:46):
Schools and hospitals and prisons are like the place where
the whatever diseases spreads. And I know we've been claiming
that like there's not been spread in schools, but we've
now seen the data that there, in fact is a
huge amount. Which I've been like screaming about this since
we started that their contact tracing models are they're absurd.
(13:07):
They are like kafka esque, Like basically, um, so we
start from the assumption that everybody is six ft apart
and wearing the mask at all times, which it's not.
It's not even it's not even physically possible in a
lot of classrooms for that to be happening. And then too,
we start with the assumption that those things work, and
(13:30):
so you'll get a call from a contact racer that's like, hey,
um on, you know, like last Tuesday, Tuesday of last week,
were you within six ft of any of your eighth
graders for more than fifteen minutes? Funk? If I know,
Tuesday of last week, was I near an eighth grader
for fifteen minutes. I don't know. I have no idea
(13:52):
even if, like, even if I did know, what difference
does it make. It is an aerosolized virus. It is
in the air, and the more you sit in classrooms,
the more it accumulates. Like we have seen like studies
about um this, We've seen studies about how CEO two
accumulates in the air when there's crowds. We know that
(14:13):
stuff accumulates like that in classrooms, very very quickly. And
you're gonna tell me that as long as I wasn't
within fifteen or within six ft for more than fifteen
continuous minutes, not even like um, not even fifteen minutes
like added up throughout the day, just fifteen minutes continuously,
I'm not going to get a virus. You shipping me
(14:34):
like that makes no sense. And so then if and
if and if you're answer to those questions are no,
because whatever you were following the rules, then they're like, Okay,
you got COVID somewhere else. It wasn't at school, Yeah, no,
it doesn't. It's nonsense. It's like I go to work
and I go home. I don't do anything else, so
I don't know where else it's coming from like yeah,
(14:55):
like and I also just I want to do do
a brief digression about like okay, so like like like
I went to like a like a pretty good like
like a pretty well like a very well funded like
a Chicago area school and like, okay, those places, those
places ventilation sucks. Like again, like again, I went to
a very well funded school. Like we had a we
had drowned dead rats falling out of the ceiling like
(15:19):
it was. It was incredibly my my, my, my great
high school memories with my principle just like running full
tilt pushing a trash can because dead drownd friend see
liked lord. My school was wild. We had how bad
it was like a kind of a chemistry teacher let
a kid set off a smoke bomb like that they
(15:41):
made like in a classroom, but it didn't work, so
it just like actually blew up. It was a time
but like like base learning, okay, got to light the
school on fire. But like like this is a this
is like yeah, like like these schools are not like
they're not environments. Yeah. The building I worked in at
the beginning of the year was a hundred years old.
(16:02):
It was built in nineteen twenty and there was always
this like sewage smell around the bathroom as the pipes
were messed up. It was weird, like and they couldn't
fix it. I think it was I was the second
or third time by building lived on fire. Like we
there was a there was a whole thing in the
building that was made of asbestos and they just had
left it because it was like it wasn't exposed. Yeah,
(16:23):
still have asbestos over Like I get like I went
to like a good, well funded one of these schools,
Like it's I think there's there's like there's there's these
two there's two things. I think it is. Interestingly, there's
when you like talk to like the people who want
the schools to open back up, right, they'll they're also
talking about like oh no, it's fine. Everyone wears mass
(16:44):
everyone's vaccinated, everyone succeed. It's like no, no, they're not
like this. This is how it works in this like
imaginary play world you've like created. Have you ever met
a child? Like have you met your own children? Like
oh and that's the best is like, well, I've been
having my kids wear a mask. You have your full
of ship, okay, because I hold that kid to put
(17:05):
their masks on like fifteen times yesterday, and I love
them beautiful face. I hope they get to show it
off someday, but right now, covered up, please, I'm begging you.
And I'm like, I'm not like that teacher who's really authoritarian,
Like I've never been good at like writing kids up
and getting on them for stuff because it's just like
(17:25):
I don't know, I hate doing that. I hate being
that person. So it's been like, really it's like a struggle.
It's like am I going to be the person who
nags them every five seconds? Or am I gonna be
um the teacher that they like and want to learn from?
Like you know, this isn't sustainable. So but you're asking
(17:47):
like the attitudes of people who want to open schools
back up, and I it's it's hard because I have
talked to parents who are worried, but they are also
very upset because they see that their kids are struggling.
And I really do feel for them on that, like
I really really do. It is hard to see a
(18:07):
kids struggle, but it is harder, I think to see
a kid sick. That is really hard. And it's just
this like there are ways that we can overcome the
difficulties of remote learning, Like we we can find ways
to give them the emotional support, Um, we can find
better socializing outlets. But I don't know how we fix
(18:31):
like you've become very ill and your body isn't going
to recover in the way that you thought it would, Like,
I don't. I can't fix that. So it's something I've
heard from other teachers that like that preparable about learning
(18:54):
stuff like is harder and takes more work than Yeah
it does. It's it's really off. I don't like doing it.
I want to be in the classroom, but yah, and
I just I just want to like once again, yell
at all of the people who are like the teachers
are lazy and it's like no, people like they're like, yeah,
like you're you are advocating to do more work because
(19:18):
that's that's the thing that will keep the kids safe,
and it's Yeah. I think a lot of people don't
understand like the behind the scenes how the sausage gets
made of a classroom. But I think a lot of
people have this idea that like we are given curriculum
and plans and materials pre made, and sometimes that's true,
it depends on your subject. Mine is social size is
(19:39):
not a subject where that happens very much, which is
part of why I like it, because I like to
be creative. Um, So like my week looks like, UM,
there are a lot of hours after school where I
am sitting down, I'm looking at the standards that I
need to teach, the topics that I need to teach,
(20:00):
and I'm researching it and learning it and finding a
way to teach that to kids who don't have the
same like baseline knowledge that I have. UM, And then
I'm creating like an activity for them. I'm creating, um,
you're I'm finding like material sources and videos and stuff
(20:20):
that they can watch that are going to help them,
or things to read. I'm modifying those things for the
kids who have, um, you know, learning differences. I'm translating
some of those things into Spanish for kids who don't
really read very well in English yet. So, like that's
a ton of work on its own. And then when
we switch to remote, we have to figure out how
to do all of that on Google Classroom, where now
(20:42):
it has to all be typed like or you know,
like how do I figure like how do I do
a group project online. How do I let them do
something creative that isn't just sitting here answering questions on
a worksheet. That's hard and we've been really good at it,
and I've found all kinds of really cool tools to
(21:02):
do that with. But it's so much work. And it's
work that I'm willing to do because I care about
my job. I enjoy my work. I love my students,
but um, you know, and I want them to be safe,
but like, you know, it is a ton of work.
I'm not just sitting here eating bond bonds all day
or drinking cocktails. Yeah. And I think there's there's like
(21:23):
a larger sort of like like Americans have this like
the sexist sort of like hatred of like or in
disrespect to people who do both care work and a
lot of creative work both. And then simultaneously there's this
sort of like you know, the there's there's there's a
resentment to people who get to actually do something that
(21:44):
helps people. And you know, I think right now we're
seeing just the most toxic fusion of that, which is
that like, yeah, I know, like these like you know,
instead of like you know, recognizing the enormous amount of
work that that's going into all like this going into
into teaching, like the amount of sort of like the
(22:05):
care and love that's going into the creativity. It's going
into it. And just like the people people's willing to,
like you're willing listen to make like enormous sacrifices to
try to keep these kids safe, they're just like no,
Like the teachers are lazy, they don't want to work,
they're going on strike, like and it's you know, and
and it's like they're doing this and it's like yeah,
like you you were like they're killing their own kids.
(22:27):
It's just like it's it's this weird fusion of like
we we I've had. The spaces is like a combination
of like feminized care labor, emotional labor, and UM that's
sort of like like intelligence, yeah, like professional white collar
(22:50):
intellectual kind of thing. And then also we're teaching a
UM more introductory level of our subjects, so we're seeing
as like discount intellectuals who are also women who do
care work. So it's it's very frustrating, and I don't
think a lot of people understand the amount of UM
skill and expertise it takes to be a teacher and
(23:12):
be effective at it. Like, it's not just I need
to know social studies to the level that a twelfth
grader would know it. It's I need to know social
studies beyond that level and know how to communicate it
to a high school student. And also I need to
know a lot of stuff about like child development. It's
it's really it's something and um, I you know, I
find that to be fun and challenging, but I wish
(23:34):
it was respected and you know, and then you're talking
about like people are sacrificing their own kids. I want
to point out a lot like I think there's a
racial component to this. Um, the people who are in
wealthier schools and who are mostly white know that their
kids are gonna be fine, Like they are in schools
(23:57):
that actually do have the resources to distance, that have
air filters, that have good ventilation. Um, they're vaccinated, their
kids are probably going to be fine. The kids that
aren't going to be fine are low income students of color.
And it has always been this way. It's always been
this way with schools. Like when schools were desegregated, we
(24:18):
started with private school vouchers and we started with all
of these like uh, state testing requirements and withholding funding
from schools that don't meet those you know, test standards
and all of these like um, this extra oversight owned
teachers like that stuff all comes back to white people
(24:40):
don't want to have to worry about black people's kids.
That's it. And you know they will move their kids
out to the north side or the suburbs or whatever.
Notice that all of those suburbs schools have flipped. Noticed
that Lory Lightfoot's kids are in a charter school that
is not remote well and more than Lightfoot. Light Lightfoot
realm not put herself in a room with the with
(25:03):
the same number of people like to go to every day.
She won't. And she was telling people at the press
conferences they had to wear their masks, and then she
wasn't wearing hers, which is very charrange to me. Like
that's what they like when when you when you get
to the politician level, they know it's dangerous, Like they
know they they you can tell right, yeah, like they
(25:23):
won't do it, but like no, no, they're they're perfectly
willing to just send to send you off the die,
to send all these kids off to die. And it's just, Yeah,
sometimes I feel I get kind of dumer and I
wonder if, like, if that's not the plan, Like is
it that? I mean, I don't really believe that. I
think what it really is is this just like malicious neglect.
(25:45):
Like if you're somebody who's a policymaker and someone comes
to you and it's like, I need you to care
about this population here that doesn't have a lot of
money and needs a lot of things, and you, the policymaker,
are going to be like, oh, that sounds like so
much work. And then somebody else is going to come
to you and be like, I need these things over here,
(26:07):
and I do have a lot of money, and I
do have a lot of influence, and I'm gonna make
your life difficult if you don't do what I want.
They're gonna do with that other side once. And what
the other side once right now is for kids to
get back into school so they can have free daycares,
parents can go to work, and that's and that's it.
And teachers are standing here being like, I didn't get
a master's degree, and do you know countless hours of
(26:28):
professional development to be a babysitter? You know, and no,
not to knock babysitters. I was in nanny for a
long time. That is hard work. But um, I didn't
get a master's degree to be a babysitter. I got
a master's degree to be a teacher. And I'm in
an environment right now where I can't really teach effectively
and all I'm doing is babysitting. They want to wear
(26:49):
house kids. That is what we're doing with the schools.
That's why they want them open. And it's you know,
it's it's hard not to feel like they just are
doing it because they hate us, even though I know
it's not. It's just mean, it does feel that way.
I will like, I will say that, like you're so
if you become elected as the mayor of Chicago, like
(27:10):
your job is to break the teachers union, Like that's
that's like, that's that's that's that's like the role you're
auditioning for. And they have been they have been trying
to do this for literally my entire lifetime. They've been
trying to do this, like since before I was born.
Like that's and honestly, like, wouldn't surprise me if this
was another part of this was just them once again
trying to break the teachers union. Oh absolutely, like and
(27:32):
if and not even just that, like yeah, you know,
like not just on the sort of political level, like
on the incredible cynical level of we'll just kill them. Well,
it's it's a labor thing. Like, it's not just a
Chicago teachers union or even a teacher's union thing. It
is a labor movement across the board thing that. Um,
the largest, I think the largest unionized workforce in the
(27:53):
country is teachers, and we on top of that are
a union of workers who have the power to absolutely
bring our economy to a grinding hole if we want to.
We could all go on straight right now, and nobody's
going to do ship until we go back to work.
Um they could if they, you know, they could try
to replace us with like people who are basically like
(28:14):
hall monitors and give kids like canned curriculums. But they
wouldn't really be learning very well, and parents wouldn't be
happy with it, and they wouldn't be entering the workforce
with the skills they need to make money for the economy,
to you know, make money for the almighty Tao. So um.
The it has been a project for decades in this
country to try to break teachers unions because teacher unions
(28:37):
occupy this space where they allow other unions to happen. Um,
we have, you know, enough influence on politicians that they
can't just disband the labor board and make unions illegal,
which they would absolutely fucking love to do. And if
they could just get rid of these damn teachers unions,
maybe they could do it. Um. So, you know, and
(28:58):
that's what you see with the edge cation reform movement,
where you have all these people advocating for bouchers and
charter schools and it's you know, they want to break labor.
And I see a lot of I mean, now I'm
gonna I'm gonna scold some of my comrades, but I
(29:18):
see a lot of leftists who are really skeptical of
teachers and don't want to support the teachers union. And
I get it, like, there are a lot of teachers
who really suck, and there's a lot of teachers who
are not radical, like most teachers are not radical, a
lot of them are pretty conservative. But at the same time,
if you were to abolish schools immediately right now and
(29:42):
break up the teachers unions, and all that you're gonna
get end up with. Rich people go to school, poor
people don't. If your poor, your kid goes to work,
probably won't be in a coal mine, but you know
they'll probably be like soldering my computer chips or coded
or something for like pennies an hour. And I don't
(30:03):
want that world. And if you actually care about labor,
then you need to support teachers unions because um, the
public schools are central to all these communities that we
want to be reaching, and the unions are the only
thing making sure that they stay public. Yeah. Yeah, that's
like I almost like again like to to to to
(30:24):
anarchist comrades were anti school. It's like yeah, like okay,
I hate school. I'm for a d D. Schooling is great,
but we need to do other things first. Yeah you
have to And like again like that you need to
like like support the workers, not the institution. Like it's
like it's like saying I'm a vegan, so I'm going
(30:44):
to go after McDonald's in place, like just like like
so like I I my high school was like all
the th much like incredibly conservative, but everyone was still
in the union. That was like the one that was
the one thing that was like, well, okay, there there
there were two counter failing forces. One was that I
(31:04):
the Christians didn't seem to understand what liberation theology was,
so occasionally they'd accidentally hire leftist because they were like, oh,
you're a Christian, You're fine, you're from America. We're not
going to question you further. The second thing was that
even everyone, everyone was in the Union, and that was like,
that was that was literally the only those are the
only two left wing. Like I've gotten into so many
teaching spaces by talking about how I like critical pedagogy
(31:28):
and I didn't understand Fry was a conference, yeah, or
being like, oh, I'm really really really into Chicago history.
I especially love the history of like labor in Chicago
because it's it's huge people here about it and they
don't get that like I'm an anarchist, you know, And
(31:49):
and a lot of the like um sort of like
education reform language. I think it's very funny. It is
just lifted from radical like sociologists and anthropologists and educators
who are trying to find ways to um dismantle like
authoritarian structures in schools, and so they'll come up with
(32:12):
these like Um, you know, like restorative practices and all
this stuff, and then they kind of get they make
their way up to the Ivory Tower and then get
repackaged in this It's it's like, I don't know, it's
like a machine or something that like sucks up radical ideas,
brings them up to the academy, repackages them to make
them nice for politicians, and then spits them back out
(32:35):
And it is exhausting and I hate it. It makes
me so mad. I'll never forgive people for what they
did to the term restorative justice. Yeah, do you have
anything else that you want to make sure that people
like understand about what's happening in the schools right now? Um,
I guess just the biggest thing is I want people
(32:56):
to understand that like it. This is a question of
when and under what conditions are we going to be
forced into a remote learning situation. This isn't like we
want remote learning because we like it because it's fun.
It's because it's going to happen if you like it
or not. The schools are going to close if you
like it or not, because the unless you're okay with
(33:19):
just like people are going to get sick and die
and or going to work sick, which I think most
of us agree that's insane. Um it is there are
you We're going to be in a situation where we
don't have enough staff to keep buildings open. So either
we can try and mitigate that now and keep that
from happening, or we can just start our hands up
(33:41):
and say, fine, let's let the schools collapse. I don't
want the schools to collapse, So, um, if we could
just go remote for two weeks and get some good
testing in and have a vaccine requirement, And personally, I
would like to advocate for remote as an option for
parents who want it. I don't think that's on the
table right now, but um, I think more parents out
(34:03):
there should be demanding it. And I also would like
to say to parents, you have a lot of power
that you don't understand. Um. The school districts listen to
the parents so much more than the teachers. One parents
voice is worth like ten teacher voices. So if you
see something going on in your schools that you're not
comfortable with, if you have questions, contact your principles, contact
(34:28):
the district, talk to people, talk to the other parents
that you know, organize yourselves. Um, if we had you know,
strong parent organizations on our side, we would be absolutely
unstoppable and we could have the school system that we
want and that our kids deserve. Yeah, and I think
I like the right figured this out a long time
(34:49):
ago that you absolutely, Yeah, look at what they're doing
to the school board meetings with CRT. We could have
that for people who are actually good people who care,
like there's no there's no reason that all the other
parents couldn't be going and saying I want my kids
to learn about race, and I want them to be
wearing masks, and I want everybody to be vaccinated. Yeah.
So I think I think I think that's a good
(35:10):
note to end on. We you know, we can make
this better. We just have to, you know, work together. Yeah.
Do you have anything that you want to plug, Like,
do you have a way to support the teachers who Um,
I think I'll send you a flyer that we have.
It has some information for contacting Alderman, getting COVID tests
(35:31):
and our petition to sign um. If you could post that,
I would really appreciate it. I definitely can definitely do that. Awesome,
Thank you, Thanks coming on. Yeah, good talking to you.
It could Happen Here as a production of cool zone
Media or more podcasts from cool Zone Media. Visit our
(35:52):
website cool zone media dot com or check us out
on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to podcasts. You can find sources for it
could Happen Here, updated monthly at cool zone Media dot
com slash sources. Thanks for listening.
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Hosts And Creators
Robert Evans
Garrison Davis
James Stout
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