Chicago teachers strike reverberates nationwide, in presidential race Teachers in Chicago went on strike for the first time in 25 years on Monday in a bitter dispute with Mayor Rahm Emanuel that is reverberating across the country as the issues at the core of the conflict - teacher evaluations tied to student test scores, a longer school day and other education policy changes - are being hotly debated from Hawaii to Maine. The fact that the fight revolves around Emanuel, a former chief of staff to President Obama, has pushed the municipal labor fight into prime time and complicated the political calculus. Obama is relying heavily on the support of unions in his reelection bid, and the Chicago strike immediately figured into the landscape of this fall's political campaigns. Video The Chicago Teachers' Union announced on Sunday night that it is going on strike for the first time in 25 years. The union announced that talks with the city school district failed Sunday night. More news about education Get updates from around the region as local students return to the classroom. Emma Brown For the first time this year, applications for most D.C. charter schools will be due on the same day - part of an effort to simplify the process for parents. Thousads of seats change hands as students leave one D.C. school for another. T. Rees Shapiro About one-third more students are projected to enroll in English for Speakers of Other Languages than last year. Read more It is also the boldest confrontation yet involving one of a growing number of Democratic mayors who have been pressuring unions to accept policy changes in cities such as Boston, Cleveland and Los Angeles, creating a schism between the Democrats and a traditional ally. "It's not just about the negotiations in Chicago," said Joe Williams, executive director of Democrats for Education Reform. Because of the visibility of the mayor, this is an important stand for the union. They're trying to send a message nationally about what teacher unions are going to tolerate from Democratic mayors. At a news conference Monday, Emanuel said the strike was "totally avoidable." "This is a strike of choice, and it's the wrong choice for our children and it's not necessary," Emanuel said. The labor dispute lays bare a Democratic Party with significant tensions over the direction of school reform. Major figures such as former D.C. schools chancellor Michelle Rhee and former New York City schools chancellor Joel Klein have pressed for tougher teacher evaluations and an end to "last in, first out" hiring practices that are part of many union contracts. On the other side are labor leaders and other interests convinced that the reforms are union-busting by another name. While Obama has maintained close ties to teachers, he has promoted policies many of them dislike. They include the Race to the Top grant competition, which rewards states for evaluating teachers in part by how well their students perform on standardized tests. "There's frustration and growing resistance to these so-called reforms that are being pushed without any evidence that they work," said Lisa Guisbond, a policy analyst for the National Center for Fair and Open Testing, which is opposed to high-stakes tests. Within hours of its start, the strike migrated into the presidential race, providing a tactical opening for Republican candidate Mitt Romney and a sticky political situation for Obama. Romney underscored the president's relationship with unionized teachers and, more broadly, organized labor. In a statement, Romney, who has assailed unionized teachers as an obstacle to education reform, also seemed to be taking a page from the playbook of two Republican governors, Scott Walker of Wisconsin and Chris Christie of New Jersey, who made political gains by taking on public employee unions.