Free Republic

DOGE: While teachers scrape by, union "executives" like Randi Weingarten gorge themselves on salaries nearly eight times higher, raking in close to $600,000 a year. They neither teach a single child nor train a single teacher. They are not educators, they are parasites, draining a system they pretend to serve. ... She also flies in a private jet.

Chicago Teachers Union members have overwhelmingly voted to ratify their new contract agreement with Chicago Public Schools, making official a deal that notches improvements for educators and students but leaves political turmoil in its wake. After almost a year of negotiations, 97% of members who voted late last week approved the contract, according to the union. About 85% of the CTU’s 27,000 eligible voting members participated. Voting took place by paper ballot in schools and voting locations across the city on Thursday and Friday, and counting wrapped up over the weekend. The Board of Education will likely vote to approve...

The Illinois school district that faced national scrutiny for allegations of forcing middle school girls to change in the same locker room as a transgender student has been referred to the Department of Justice. The law firm America First Legal (AFL) made the criminal referral of the district Deerfield Public Schools 109 to the DOJ on Tuesday, urging the department to investigate the district and middle school where the allegations occurred for potential violations of federal and state law. AFL alleged the district violated Code § 241, also known as the "Conspiracy against rights" statute, which makes it a federal...

Radical socialists who back anti-Israel groups and alleged CEO killer Luigi Mangione are steadily making inroads into one of the city’s most powerful labor unions, sources warn The Post. Candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America are polling strongly in elections to lead the United Federation of Teachers — who represent nearly 200,000 educators and manage a welfare fund with $1 billion in assets — which take place next month, according to a source. The progressive political movement, which backed Vermont governor Bernie Sanders during his presidential campaign in 2016 and was behind New York Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio...

Quite the statement, eh? Let me explain. I’m well into my 60s and for my entire adult life I’ve heard that public school teachers are underpaid. It has been repeated as a mantra for decades. Ignoring for a moment whether it is true or not -- and the answer to that is generally, it depends -- let’s accept the mantra and analyze why public-school teachers are still underpaid after all these years. It’s not spending. As most voters know, it seems that every stinking year there is some ballot initiative or measure or legislative move to increase spending for our...

Thousands of teachers in California are at risk of losing their jobs due to the state's budget cuts going into the 2025-26 school year, according to the California Teachers Association (CTA), which represents 300,000 school employees. Why It Matters Schools are experiencing layoffs due to limited budgets, overstaffing and declining enrollment. Many federal coronavirus relief funds were also used to increase school budgets, but those funds are now drying up five years later. What To Know The majority of the 2,300 school employees being let go are credentialed school staff, which include teachers, school nurses and librarians, according to the...

The U.S. Department of Education announced Monday it cut over $600 million in grants spent on training teachers in “social justice activism,” critical race theory, and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) ideology. The grants were used to fund institutions and nonprofits involved in training teachers on concepts like “anti-racism” and claims about white privilege and white supremacy. The grants also helped fund discriminatory staff recruiting strategies that targeted candidates based on their race. “It’s hard to overstate how radical these teacher trainings are — we are talking about forcing teachers to talk about their race at work, asking educators to...

For an idea of how well liberals are taking Trump’s success, let’s have a look in the classroom: A teacher at an all-boys Catholic high school on Staten Island resigned after going on an anti-President Trump tirade during class that descended into calling one of his students a “punk a–” during an unhinged outburst, according to a recently leaked video clip. The unnamed teacher at Monsignor Farrell High School was recorded last Wednesday by a student while speaking vehemently against Trump — criticizing the president’s order to release billions of gallons of water in California to fight the Los Angeles...

A left-wing, vampire-obsessed after-school program teacher is accused of sexually abusing two young girls for years at a Harlem school in New York and filming child sex abuse material, according to a new lawsuit reported on by the New York Post. “Miles McNeal, 26, an after-school program teacher whose online alter ego pushed communist propaganda and fetishized vampires, allegedly touched and photographed young students’ naked bodies, had them assume sexual positions, and showed them pictures of the genitalia of other kids while threatening them to stay silent, the victims said in court papers,” the report states. The lawsuit further alleges...

A group of teachers at a New Jersey high school sparked outrage by wearing Gulf of America T-shirts to class — in what some have called an attempt to bully Latino students in the majority Hispanic school. Donned by a small cluster of Belleville High School teachers on a recent dress-down day, the shirts are a reference to President Trump’s executive order declaring the Gulf of Mexico should instead be called the Gulf of America, NJ.com reported. But the overt political statement has others crying foul in the suburban township of about 35,000 perched 15 miles west of Manhattan. “Our...

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Tonight, Action News Jax learned about a federal indictment that claims the former leaders of the ‘Duval Teachers United’ stole more than $2.6 million from the union they spent decades leading. DTU Former President Terrie Brady and Former Executive Vice President Ruby George each face eight counts of wire fraud and three counts of mail fraud. Brady is also facing two counts of money laundering charges. The indictment alleges that between 2013 and 2022, Brady and George conspired to steal more than $1.2 million each from the union by selling back leave time that they did not...

A New Jersey law that removes a requirement for teachers to pass a reading, writing and mathematics test for certification will go into effect on Jan. 1, 2025. The law, Act 1669, was passed by Democratic New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy as part of the state’s 2025 budget in June in an effort to address a shortage of teachers in the state... Individuals seeking an instructional certificate will no longer need to pass a “basic skills” test ... Just months earlier, Murphy signed a similar bill into law that created an alternative pathway for teachers to sidestep the testing requirement....

The combined cabal of woke and the teachers’ unions have struck again. This time, the target was New Jersey. Effective Thursday morning, public school teachers in New Jersey no longer must pass even the most basic educational skills test. The test was not for complicated subjects such as calculus. This now abandoned test verified teacher’s ability to read, write, and calculate simple math problems.Jersey governor Phil Murphy approved eliminating even these most basic requirements for teaching applicants in those three essential areas. Democrat state senator Jim Beach sponsored the bill, further dumbing down the state’s educational system. Beach said, “We...

‘Why is it that all we hear from CTU is demands for more, but we never hear anything from the union about what its members owe the taxpayers (and parents) of this city,’ city newspaper asks Chicago public school teachers continue to demand high raises – despite 41 percent of them being deemed “chronically absent” from work. The Chicago Tribune editorial board recently criticized the Chicago Teachers Union, which continues to negotiate for a new contract. Initial versions had demanded free abortions, transgender surgeries, and even weight loss drugs. State records show 41 percent missed 10 or more days of...

Imagine my unpleasant surprise when Trump nominated a woman to be Secretary of Labor who can count American Federation of Teachers head Randi Weingarten among her fans. Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.) is the worst Republican Trump could have picked for Labor. ... For any conservative who had high hopes for the Trump 47 administration, Weingarten's approval of Chavez-DeRemer's nomination undoes a lot of the goodwill that had been built up. That's not the worst thing about this choice, however. Chavez-DeRemer (an annoying name to type repeatedly, by the way) is one of only three Republicans in the House to support...

Teachers at a Berlin school have issued an urgent plea for help, citing escalating violence, severe educational deficits among students — largely attributed to challenges from mass immigration — and a lack of systemic support... Teachers at the Friedrich Bergius School in Berlin’s Schöneberg district have issued a stark warning about escalating issues they say are exacerbated by the city’s approach to mass immigration and integration. In a seven-page letter to the district council, the staff described an environment of increasing aggression, violence, and educational struggles that has left them overwhelmed and desperate for support. The letter highlights a central...

Five people have been charged in Texas with organizing and participating in an illegal cheating scheme that certified more than 200 unqualified teachers and helped the plot’s “kingpin” rake in more than $1 million, prosecutors said. In the scheme, people would typically pay $2,500 to have proxies take certification tests for them at two testing centers in Houston. The scandal involved bribing a testing proctor to allow test applicants and their proxies to switch places... Investigators noticed a pattern, they said: Numerous teacher certification candidates who previously failed certification exams would drive from faraway Texas cities to the Houston area...

The United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA), the major teachers’ union in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), passed a resolution last week backing an arms embargo against Israel proposed by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). The resolution, obtained by the Los Angeles Times, calls upon California’s Sens. Alex Padilla and Laphonza Butler, both Democrats, to back Sanders’s resolution in the Senate’s “lame duck” session after the November election. The Times reported: Union materials prepared for a board of directors meeting, which were obtained by The Times, state the rationale for taking such a stand: “the arms named have been used...

A union representing roughly 1.8 million teachers and other educational workers used taxpayer-funded dues to book a trip to a famous casino and to pay for meals at luxury restaurants. The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) spent over $370,000 on expenses at Caesars Palace, a luxury hotel and casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, disclosure forms show. In addition, the AFT also used dues collected from its members to help pay for trips to Europe and South America, as well as to pay off five-figure tabs at upscale restaurants. “My suspicion is that this is a case of ‘rank hath its...

SPRING, Texas (KHOU) - Parents of preschoolers in Texas say they are shocked after finding out their children were given sleep aids by their teachers. They said their children told them they were given “sleepy stickers” that would make them fall asleep. The patches in question are sleep aids containing melatonin, among other ingredients, and intended for adults. One of the children at the school, 4-year-old Layne Luviano, broke the case open in September when she snuck one of the stickers out of the classroom. “She kind of pulled up her little shorts and said, ‘Mom, look this is my...