Sanctuary Lessons: How Chicago Teachers Are Defending Their Students

“At the end of the day, we protect our students, period,” says educator Silvia Gonzalez.

Sanctuary Lessons: How Chicago Teachers Are Defending Their Students
Photo credit: Chicago Teachers Union
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On Monday, Chicago teachers, community members, and some elected officials participated in “walk-in” actions at more than 100 Chicago public schools. Participants rallied to show support for marginalized students—including undocumented youth and queer and trans students—amid Trump’s attacks on immigrants, trans people, and the honest discussion of history in schools. The walk-ins were part of a national day of action, ahead of the Senate’s consideration of President Trump’s nominee to lead—and aid in dismantling—the Department of Education, billionaire Linda McMahon.

Recently, “border czar” Tom Homan complained that the city’s residents were “well-educated” and had effectively prepared communities to resist US Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE] raids. At the street level, that preparedness has included widespread Know Your Rights trainings and the work of rapid response teams who investigate reports from community members about the presence of ICE. However, Chicago’s preparedness is also taking place within its schools, where teachers are forming “Sanctuary Teams” to respond to threats against undocumented students. The Chicago Teachers Union has been building a framework for this kind of community defense since the first Trump administration, and those efforts have become more urgent, now that the Trump administration has rescinded guidelines that previously reduced the risk of ICE raids at “sensitive locations,” such as hospitals, schools and healthcare facilities.

I recently spoke with Stacy Davis Gates, president of the Chicago Teachers Union [CTU], about how CTU is responding to the threats students and staff face in the second Trump era. Davis Gates stressed that the union’s preparedness has been a longstanding, community-based effort. “We've availed ourselves of more of a community coalition approach to unionism,” she said. “We've engaged with [the issue] over time and we've engaged with it with people who were experts, in coalition,” she said. “We have been led by those who know better than we do, which is an important part of being in coalition with organizations beyond yourself.”

Chicago educator Silvia Gonzalez echoed that sentiment. Gonzalez, who is an artist and an educator in the Chicago Public School system, in addition to being a member of the Chicago ACT Collective, pointed to the work of Organized Communities Against Deportations [OCAD], whose community defense efforts have had a profound impact in Chicago. “OCAD was born from undocumented youth who wanted to stop deportations, back in 2012, and it was led by directly impacted folks. So, the protection of undocumented youth has been part of the Chicago conversation for some time.”

Davis Gates noted that the union’s current strategy was initiated during the first Trump administration. She said that, during Trump’s first term, “our members noticed severe attendance issues in spaces where immigrant families resided.” Gates said educators realized that “a different way of engaging, supporting and protecting” students was called for. After analyzing the dilemmas teachers and families were facing, CTU began to work in coalition with community groups to provide Know Your Rights Trainings, and fought for contract language around maintaining sanctuary policies at the school level.

Gates noted that this contract language mirrors the law in Chicago, which is a sanctuary city. “We also have contract language around special education that mirrors the law, because when the law is not being complied with, the contract gives us a process, a system in which we can address it,” Davis Gates explained. “It is an accountability document with the district. It is a way in which we can exert our power to make them do something that they might not ordinarily do. We get the implementation of the training, we get the synergy and the policies and the rules.”

CTU is currently involved in heated contract negotiations, but Davis Gates stressed that the union’s approach is not limited to contract proposals. “It’s also about how we are organizing and engaging our members.”

The defensive framework educators have established was tested on January 24, when government agents attempted to gain entry to Hamline Elementary School on Chicago's South Side. Hamline Elementary's student population is 92 percent Latinx. The school’s staff believed that the agents were with ICE, and sanctuary protocols were enacted to protect students and prevent the agents from entering. Local media would later report that the agents were with the Secret Service. In a statement, Chicago Public Schools explained the confusion, saying, “Two individuals showed up at the school door and presented identification that includes the name Department of Homeland Security, the federal agency that oversees ICE.”

Since that incident, I have spoken to teachers who suspect that claims about a Secret Service investigation were merely a cover story to get federal agents inside the school. The teachers cited collaboration between federal agencies in Trump’s recent raids in Chicago, and Trump’s slipshod approach to the law. Davis Gates argued that it ultimately “doesn’t matter” which federal law enforcement agency was attempting to gain entry to the school. “What mattered most was that there was a system in place to protect people and that was the entire point of it. Whether it was the Department of Homeland Security, the Secret Service, or ICE, none of those people should be in schools.”

As educators and parents around the country brace for ICE raids and other federal incursions targeting students and teachers, Davis Gates urged educators to cultivate and practice solidarity. “The way these four years are not simply survived, but turned into a transformational moment, is only going to be through solidarity,” Davis Gates said. “I encourage people to broaden their definition of sanctuary, broaden their definition of worker, and create teams to protect people and to support people.” Gates stressed that safety and collective power can only be built “through the solidarity of humanity and by organizing against inhumanity.” 

Davis Gates explained that unions cannot have a limited vision of what it means to protect their membership, but must serve the interests of all workers. “If workers belong to the working class and the working class is the union movement, then we can't just see the kids in our classrooms' parents as parents. We have to see them as fellow workers as well.”

CTU has embraced this philosophy by “bargaining for the common good,” which means the union has used contract negotiations to pursue concessions from the city beyond the realm of wages and benefits. These pursuits have included increased public services for the broader community and district policies that dovetail with community efforts to protect vulnerable populations—such as the union’s sanctuary school efforts.

Gonzalez stressed the importance of community collaboration. “It's really important to connect with organizers right now,” she said. “It’s important to attend Know Your Rights trainings, to post very visibly that your space is a safe space, and to remind folks that you are there to protect them.” Gonzalez emphasized that teachers should educate themselves about what rights and protections they and their students can assert, and have a plan to enforce them. “Know the difference between judicial and administrative warrants and how to respond,” she said. Gonzalez urges educators around the country to draft scripts and rehearse for tense moments. “Be prepared to tell government agents, ‘We do not consent to the entry of immigration and customs enforcement. We do not consent to entry and we are not authorized to review court orders. As a school, we have the right to deny entry until legal counsel arrives. Please wait outside while the school administration contacts legal counsel.’"

Gonzalez also encourages educators to review CTU’s Sanctuary Toolkit, which offers guidance on developing Sanctuary Teams for local schools. Sanctuary Teams assign roles and establish protocols for multiple scenarios, from ICE agents attempting to gain entry to a school to agents having somehow obtained access to the building. Rather than prescribing hard and fast rules for every situation, the toolkit provides educators with a template that can be adapted for each school. Gonzalez has also created a Google Drive folder that includes the toolkit and other resources that may be helpful to teachers who are developing sanctuary plans to protect their students. The folder includes Know Your Rights materials, a deportation defense manual, movement art posters, and other resources.

Gonzalez’s folder has continued to expand as teachers in other areas have contributed materials. The real-time growth of Gonzalez’s resource sharing is fitting, given the expanding threats students and teacher’s face under the Trump administration. Amid Trump’s attacks on trans youth, “gender ideology,” and any accurate accounting of history in public schools—which reflects an anti-Black and anti-Native agenda—all marginalized students are clearly under threat. Gonzalez believes teachers must be ready to defend students against every manner of attack. “At the end of the day, we protect our students, period,” Gonzalez said. “This is non-negotiable. We protect all of our students. Every effort we wage is going to have to reflect our sanctuary response, which means tapping into our local communities, and working with community organizers, whose efforts have been ongoing.”

Davis Gates also noted that the defensive efforts of educators must continue to expand. “We are all going to need sanctuary,” Davis Gates said. “Trump is only centering himself and people who look like him, period.” Davis Gates noted that the shifting political terrain means teachers will have to fight for added protections for marginalized students. “We use our contract to make the district follow the law, and now, we may have to leverage our contract in place of the law,” she explained.

Davis Gates says Chicago educators view sanctuary and the demands of this moment expansively. “You don't get to just fight for Black history, you also have to fight for the sanctuary of our immigrant families. You also have to fight for protections for our trans and queer students, and our SPED [Special Education] students as well, because Title IX leaves all of them vulnerable. You don't get to pick and choose who is a protected class in Trump's America.”

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