By Ben Velderman
EAGnews.org
    
CHICAGO – Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis reportedly achieved “rock star” status among labor supporters for leading her union into the city’s first teachers’ strike in 25 years.
    
But Lewis is much less popular among rank-and-file CTU members, many of whom think she bungled the strike by being too moderate in her demands.
    
It may end up costing Lewis her presidency. Tanya Saunders-Wolffe, a school counselor and member of CTU’s United Progressive Caucus, has emerged as Lewis’ main challenger in the May union election.
    
The challenger and her supporters say Lewis didn’t use the strike to get enough from the district – including a guarantee not to close any existing schools, according to the Chicago Tribune.
    
“We did our part. We spent weeks on the street, rallied and gave Lewis all the power she needed,” said Saunders-Wolffe, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. “What did we get? Firings, closings, lower pay; her leadership is one without backbone or foresight. It’s time for a change. Our leadership is one that cannot only get headlines but results.”
    
Saunders-Wolffe and the other malcontents claim the 7 percent pay raise in the new three-year union contract – which also contains raises for longevity and advanced education credits – is inadequate.
    
CTU members began their strike by demanding a 30 percent pay hike.
    
The group also claims that Lewis “gave away too much on issues involving teacher seniority and teacher evaluations,” the Tribune reports. 
     
But the biggest rap against Lewis is that the new contract doesn’t prevent district leaders from closing a number of half-empty schools.
    
Last October, the Chicago Tribune reported there are 100,000 empty seats in schools throughout the district, which serves 400,000 students. Officials want to consolidate schools, in order to help the financially struggling district stay afloat. But that would lead to teacher layoffs, something the CTU opposes wholeheartedly.
     
Jesse Sharkey, Lewis’ second-in-command, issued a thinly veiled threat to Chicago school board members, should they proceed with their closure plans.
     
“We’re here to serve notice to the appointed board that if you close our schools, we are coming after you!” Sharkey said during a rally last November.
    
But that threat was not radical enough to satisfy Lewis’ critics. 
     
CPS will issue its list of school closings by the end of March, which means the issue will be front-and-center during the union’s May elections, the Tribune reports.
    
Despite the growing chorus of critics, Lewis is not without admirers in the union. They say Lewis’ leadership during last fall’s strike inspired a beleaguered national labor movement, reports the Tribune.
     
“Union members understand what a strike represents,” Xian Barrett, a Lewis supporter, told the newspaper. “Everyone was looking at Chicago and wishing they had that. We saw the corporate privatization of education coming and hurting our children, and we took a stand.”