Education Policy and Teachers Unions

The Chicago Teachers Union has approved a resolution calling for May 1, 2026 to be a day of “Civic Action and Defense of Public Education” with “No Work, No School, and No Shopping,” urging teachers and students to skip classes and normal activities to protest what it calls an unprecedented national assault on public education by “MAGA politicians,” billionaire donors and corporate interests aligned with President Donald Trump. The union says the day should be spent on voter registration, “know your rights” sessions, mutual aid work and “mass resistance training,” and is asking Mayor Brandon Johnson and the Chicago Board of Education to back the plan, including using an Illinois law that allows excused absences for civic events. CTU Vice President Jackson Potter framed the move as necessary “if we still want to have democracy in the midterms this November,” accusing Trump of acting as an “authoritarian billionaire in Washington” and linking the action to opposition to school privatization, book bans, attacks on civil‑rights protections and immigration enforcement by ICE. The resolution explicitly supports keeping ICE out of cities and calls for taxing the rich, tying local school activism to broader national fights over immigration and economic policy. Johnson called May Day an “important demonstration of collective power” but told Fox News Digital that participation will be up to individual families and pledged to work with Chicago Public Schools to avoid loss of instruction time, highlighting early tensions over how far the city will go in endorsing a politically charged, school‑day shutdown.