CHICAGO — The Chicago Public School Board of Education held its first meeting Thursday night since Mayor Brandon Johnson asked CPS CEO Pedro Martinez to resign.
Martinez is fighting for his job while the district is also in contract negotiations with the powerful Chicago Teachers Union.
The Board of Education can force Martinez out, but that was not on the agenda Thursday. However it was on everyone’s mind.
As CPS and CTU continue to push forward to find some sort of contract compromise, Martinez is pushing back on calls for him to go and campaigning to save his job.
“Right now we have 23 aldermen signed on. By Thursday, we’ll have 26. That’s half the city that supports the job that Pedro Martinez is doing,” said Ald. Gilbert Villegas.
Ultimately, it will be up to the Chicago Board of Education to decide.
The CTU has made their case against Martinez and issued a vote of no-confidence in his leadership. It cites a hypothetical school closure list and other documents the union has obtained to force him out.
Community leaders and parents of CPS students held a heated rally ahead of the meeting to discuss the rumored school closings list which they said they obtained from a credible source within CPS.
“We will not stand for one school closure. Not this year, not next year, or the next, or the next,” community organizer Jitu Brown said.
It is a sensitive subject after 50 schools were closed in 2013 under Rahm Emanuel’s leadership.
“We’ve been traumatized by closing lists that have been mistakenly given to us in the past and then they are pretend to be theoretical and become a harsh reality,” CTU Vice President Jackson Potter said.
Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez under fire amid ongoing contract talks with Chicago Teachers Union On Wednesday, CTU President Stacy Davis Gates sat down with WGN Political Reporter Tahman Bradley.
When Bradley asked Davis Gates if she thought Martinez ordered the district to produce that list, Davis Gates said, “I can’t tell you who ordered it, I just know that it exists.”
Martinez said he is the victim of a disinformation campaign and he is asking the school board to pass a resolution promising no school’s will be closed until 2027.
Davis Gates is waiting to see it in writing, as well as bargaining to fill 1,200 teacher vacancies, smaller class sizes, and greater assistance for bilingual students.
The district is offering four to five percent raises over the next four years. With talks moving slow, the union has not ruled out a strike.
“We shouldn’t have to go on strike, we’ve been right. This idea that the contract can’t be paid for, Tahman I think we have a bigger issue in Chicago,” Davis Gates said.
She said Martinez needs to secure more funding from Springfield.
During Thursday’s meeting, some rallied against Martinez, while others supported him.
“His true backers are business elites and former Rahm Emanuel allies, not the Latino families and educators suffering under his current administration,” CPS teacher Anna Acosta said.
The Board of Education eventually voted unanimously to approve a resolution to place a moratorium on any school consolidations or closures until after the 2026-27 school year.
Concerned parents say they still have worries about closures as the resolution was not binding, meaning it was essentially a message of good faith to the community from the CEO.
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