Scab 'chess coach' expelled from Chicago Teachers Union despite publicity from Chicago's corporate media -- and possible support from Obama...
Question: How many teachers, coaches, and sponsors of extra curricular activities in Chicago's more than 500 public schools honored picket lines and participated in the April 1, 2016 one-day strike and day of action? Answer: All but one. Question: How many of those dedicated teachers, coaches, and sponsors of extra curricular activities received major treatment as media heroes for scabbing on April 1, 2016? Answer: One -- the Earle school "chess coach." Why? Because since the first CTU strike during the 1960s, Chicago's corporate media has always chosen a scab or two to supposedly highlight "good teachers" in a silly media game of "Good teacher Bad teacher." In order to provide the podium from which a scab can preach, reporters face a serious problem, since for every scab there are hundreds of teachers on the picket lines -- most of them better teachers by far than the lone scabs featured on TV or in print.
On June 22, 2016, the Chicago Teachers Union made it official, via a press release and statement from the union's attorney. A highly publicized scab, elementary teacher Joseph Ocol of Earle "STEM Academy", had been expelled from the CTU because he scabbed during the one-day strike on April 1, 2016. Ocol received all of his rights under the union's constitution and by-laws -- despite a great deal of self-serving publicity and even indirect support from the Obama White House.
Ocol is a math teacher at Earle elementary school (currently called "Earle STEM Academy" courtesy of Mayor Rahm Emanuel's propaganda machines). Ocol claimed that the only way he could serve his students was by scabbing on April 1, while the vast majority of his co-workers were on picket lines and then in demonstrations downtown. (Disclosure: This reporter is a retired teacher and union delegate whose wife is associate union delegate at Steinmetz High School, and whose two sons attend Chicago public schools. Sharon Schmidt helped organize and lead the picket lines on April 1. Sam Schmidt, a Whitney Young High School student and member of the baseball team, notes that his coaches and teachers were all on strike on April 1. And Josh Schmidt, a fifth grader at O.A. Thorp Elementary School, adds that his teachers and band coach were also showing their true concern for their students by being on strike that day -- not scabbing).
When a handful of corporate news reporters decided to try and make scab Joseph Ocol into a kind of hero, neither DNA Info Chicago or CBS News bothered to ask how many other coaches -- the number was several hundred -- refused to cross the union's picket lines during the one-day April 1, 2016 strike. Ocol had generated publicity for himself and about his one-day scabbing despite the fact that hundreds of other coaches -- including chess coaches -- had honored union picket lines at the time of the April 1 strike. One news report, on local television, even included praise for Ocol from Mayor Rahm Emanuel. The work of all the other coaches, club sponsors, and rank and file teachers and PSRPs, who did not scab on April 1, has been ignored.
U.S. Representative Danny Davis, once a strong supporter of unions -- but recently a promoter of charter schools and most lately, of scabs -- had even proposed that Ocol and his chess team be feted by President Barack Obama at the White House. Davis did not suggest that the hundreds of public school coaches -- virtually all of them CTU members -- receive the same special treatment. Davis's family was once hard core union, and his family members have honored picket lines since the 1970s, when Davis's wife worked as a clark at a west side high school. Davis himself began his political career while a CTU member.
For reasons unexplained, some members of Chicago's corporate media decided that a division within the union at the time of the vote on the April 1 strike meant that a huge number of union members would scab. The actual number who scabbed on April 1 was fewer than 200, Of those, about 60 were documented by the union and offered the right to appear before a union trial. Under CTU rules, anyone who crosses a picket line is listed as an "SB" on school membership lists unless the member successfully appears before a CTU trial board. Those who appear can reinstate themselves into union membership by apologizing and paying a fine equal to the amount they were paid on the day (or days) of the strike.
The CTU press release stated as follows:
CTU attorney statement on member’s expulsion from the Union for crossing April 1 picket line
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Stephanie Gadlin. June 22, 2016 312-329-6250
CHICAGO—Chicago Teachers Union attorney Robert Bloch released the following statement today regarding the expulsion of Joseph Ocol from the Union:
“Mr. Ocol, like all members known to have crossed the picket line and worked on April 1, was sent a notice of charges and invited to attend a hearing to contest the charges. Had he attended the hearing, he could have explained the unique circumstances he faced on that day.
“Mr. Ocol refused to respond to the notice or attend the hearing, and because he did not contest the charges or provide an explanation, the charges against him were sustained and he was expelled.
“Expulsion from the Chicago Teachers Union does not result in the loss of any employment benefits or rights—only membership in the Union. It cannot affect his standing as a teacher. He cannot be fired because of it, and the district’s broadcasting the suggestion that he would lose his job leaves people with the impression that the Union can cause teachers to be fired for unfair reasons. This is not the case.”
The Chicago Teachers Union represents nearly 27,000 teachers and educational support personnel working in the Chicago Public Schools, and by extension, the more than 400,000 students and families they serve. The CTU is an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers and the Illinois Federation of Teachers and is the third largest teachers local in the United States and the largest local union in Illinois. For more information please visit CTU’s website at www.ctunet.com.
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DNA INFO publicity given to the scab on May 23, 2016
Englewood Chess Coach Who Crossed Picket Line Faces June Hearing With Union, By Andrea V. Watson, May 23, 2016 4:59pm
WEST ENGLEWOOD — The standoff between the Earle STEM Academy chess coach and the Chicago Teacher’s Union is heating up.
Math teacher Joseph Ocol’s decision to not join his teachers on the picket line during a one-day strike April 1 has jeopardized his membership with the union. He is being asked to give the pay he received for working that day to the union or say why he shouldn't have to at a June 6 hearing.
Ocol said he worked that day so he could be with his students.
CTU’s strike policy specifically states that members who go against the union and who are found guilty by a jury of their peers will have their membership suspended, said CTU spokeswoman Stephanie Gadlin.
“A strike breaker will be given the option to pay a fine equal to the member's net earnings while working in order to be reinstated, if they so choose,” she said in an email. “If they choose not to pay the fine they will be expelled from the Union.”
Even with that knowledge, Ocol is trying to appeal, seeking an alternative action. He said he will offer up his pay if it’s guaranteed that it will go to the students, not CTU. He wants the money to help his chess champions travel to the White House.
Right now, the team is awaiting confirmation for an early June visit with President Obama. He can only take the all-girls chess team, who took home a national championship trophy last month, but there are 35 members on the team, not five.
Ocol said in a letter Monday saying that he has decided to not attend his June 6 hearing because he has practice with his students.
“I do not wish to be absent because I have always promised the kids that I shall always try to be with them after school even if I do not get paid,” he said in the letter he shared with DNAinfo.
He said that CPS doesn’t have the resources to pay coaches or mentors for any of the afterschool programs, which is why he has been volunteering his time from 4-6 p.m. for chess practice. The hearing is scheduled for 6:15 p.m. and he refuses to leave his students early to get there, he said.
Ocol also said he’s tired of the bullying he has been receiving from other union members. He filed a complaint last month. People have been sending him “nasty” messages saying that he should leave CPS and work for a charter school.
