News and Advocacy

Kia Banks Addresses Chicago Board of Education

Good morning, I don’t have to tell you school leaders in Chicago Public Schools are busy people.

CPAA Thanks Chief Education Officer Bogdana Chkoumbova on Her Next Chapter

The Chicago Principals and Administrators Association (CPAA), the union representing Chicago’s principals and assistant principals, extend

DOE’s Withholding of $6.9 Billion in FY2025 K-12 Funding Threatens Student Success and Paralyzes School Systems Nationwide

School leaders now face the impossible task of opening schools without knowing whether the federal funds they relied on will arrive—or when.

Hotels Using COVID-19 to Stop Cleaning Rooms

Hotel rooms should be cleaned every day. It's what guests expect and pay for.

But using COVID-19 as an excuse, Hilton is ending automatic daily housekeeping, trying to forever change the guest experience and cut housekeepers' jobs. Many travelers might not know that when rooms don't get cleaned, housekeepers lose out on the jobs they depend on to raise a family. 

"Hilton is trying to take advantage of pandemic disruption to cut services like automatic daily housekeeping," says D. Taylor, international president of UNITE HERE.  

Unionization Cut Poverty Rate

It may be stating the obvious, but a new study of U.S. wage data over decades reveals unionization cuts poverty rates by more than two-thirds. Only 5.9% of families with at least one union member lived in poverty, compared with 18.9% of families without union members, it says.

AFL-CIO Elects New President

The AFL-CIO Executive Council elected current Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler, the federation’s acting president, to hold the top job through its convention next year. 

Shuler, an Electrical Worker from IBEW Local 125 in Portland, Oregon, becomes the first woman to officially head the nation’s largest labor federation. In its Aug. 20 session, the council elected Steelworker Vice President Fred Redmond to succeed her as secretary-treasurer.

Universal Masking a Must for Now

Based on the evolving variants and the new findings of science, we are in full support of all mitigation methods recently recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka Dies at 72

The labor movement, the AFL-CIO and the nation lost a legend today.

New Survey of Parents on Return to School

RAND researchers surveyed 2,015 parents of children age 5–18 in May 2021 about their willingness to send their children to school in person in fall 2021. They also asked parents about their support for various health and safety practices at school, including getting their children tested for coronavirus disease 2019, and whether they would get their children vaccinated if a vaccine were available. The results are intended to inform school districts' and health officials' planning for operating schools in fall 2021.