
Just six months after a strike shut down city schools for more than a week, Chicago teachers and Mayor Rahm Emanuel are embroiled in another bitter fight.

Chicago Public Schools officials said Thursday they plan to close 54 schools in an effort to address a $1 billion budget shortfall and improve a struggling educational system — a plan that drew the ire of parents and teachers.

By refusing to administer a district-mandated test to their students, teachers at a Seattle high school have sparked an "anti-testing movement" that is picking up steam by the day.

It sounds so innocuous -- the Protect Our Jobs amendment. At a time of high unemployment, who wouldn't find such a concept appealing? So union leaders are pulling out all the stops to get this measure, better known as Proposal 2, approved by Michigan's voters on Election Day.

The grueling teachers strike is over. Now comes the hard part for Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

With Chicago's ugly strike behind them, teachers unions are regrouping with a public relations blitz, meant to both repair their image and rally members who are under more fire than ever.

In the wake of the strike by the Chicago Teachers Union, many people wonder what the union is complaining about.

Chicago children returned to school Wednesday, less than a day after teachers ended a seven-day strike that disrupted the daily routines of thousands of families and made the city a flashpoint in the debate over union rights and efforts to overhaul the nation's public education system.

Students prepared to return to class Wednesday after Chicago teachers voted to suspend their first strike in a quarter century, shutting 350,000 children out of school, disrupting the daily routines of thousands of families and making the city's schoolyards a flashpoint for union rights and public school reforms across the country.