Chicago Teachers Won't Vote on Contract Deal Chicago teachers union delegates declined to vote today on a tentative agreement reached in negotiations this week, so the city's first teachers' strike in over two decades will now continue into a second week. Karen Lewis, the president of the Chicago Teachers Union, said at a news conference held after a meeting of the union's delegates that the earliest public school classes will take place will be Wednesday. The delegates will meet again Tuesday. A clear majority wanted to stay out. That's why we're staying out," Lewis said of the delegates at today's meeting. "Our members are not happy," she said. They want to know if there is anything more they can get. There had been hope that the strike would end this weekend after a five-day lockout full of heated negotiations resulted in both sides reaching a "tentative agreement" that could put about 29,000 public school teachers and 350,000 students back in the classroom Monday. Representatives from both the teachers' union and the city announced Friday that they had agreed on the framework of a deal and that they hoped to finalize it by Sunday, at which time the union's members would vote on it. That sentiment was echoed by David Vitale, the president of the Chicago Board of Education, who noted that "the framework" of a deal was in place. "We had what we think is pretty good movement, but of course the board always has to do a little bit of backsliding," Lewistold reporters Thursday outside the Hilton on Michigan Ave., the site of the negotiations. That is just what the district did Friday, reducing the emphasis on student testing and making the evaluation system more forgiving for teachers.