Action Alert: Call on CPS CEO Pedro Martinez to fully staff our schools and prioritize smaller class sizes.

Overcrowded classrooms are unsafe. As educators, we know that students struggle in a chaotic, overcrowded classroom. When classrooms have more students than we can serve, we end up in a constant crisis: we have to serve too many students at once, each with different needs, making it harder for our students to learn effectively.

Despite this, CPS has released its proposed budget for the 2024-2025 school year, which calls for the elimination of nearly 300 teaching assistant and support staff positions. We cannot lose these essential teachers from the classroom.

In 2019, we were forced to strike to get more funding for smaller class sizes. That successful advocacy effort, along with federal funds invested in our schools during the pandemic, helped Chicago students achieve some of the highest math scores and the largest post-pandemic gains in reading scores of any urban district in the country. We must continue to support our students as they make important progress.

Paraprofessionals and teaching assistants are critical to providing this type of student support in the classroom. The majority of CPS paper professionals and teaching assistants are Black and Latino women and are the backbone of our schools. Eliminating these positions would only make learning even more difficult for our students.

Funding issues are the responsibility of both CPS leadership and Springfield lawmakers, who had a chance to stand up for students and schools this week when they passed their budget, but instead chose not to fully fund our schools.

To truly learn, our students need smaller class sizes to receive one-on-one instruction and facilitated group learning and real guidance from educators who can help them the way they need it, no matter what’s happening in class. That’s why our contract demands include a librarian and library in every school, robust arts instruction, safe and healthy schools, a better school day for elementary and middle school students, and investments in early childhood education.

While any long-term solution to CPS’s budget problems rests in the hands of Governor Pritzker and the General Assembly, CPS must find a way to correct its budget to protect these vital jobs and ensure support for our students and our schools.

Tell CEO Pedro Martinez: Keep our teaching assistants and support staff! Now is the time to fully staff our schools and fund librarians and libraries, safe and healthy schools, a better school day, and smaller class sizes for our students.

Tell your story

Write CEO Martinez a message now. In the body of the message, add that he should know how teacher assistants and other PSRPs benefit your classroom and what it would mean for your school to lose them. Fill out your information, click “START WRITING” below, then click in the message to add your story!