Elmhurst Teachers Union Deletes Posts

ELMHURST, IL — Last August, the Elmhurst Teachers Council, which represents local teachers, was vocal in its opposition to the school district's plan for a hybrid of in-person and remote learning.

At the time, the union wanted to start the year with only remote instruction. It issued daily posts on its Facebook page criticizing the district's plan. In one, it questioned why administrators held a virtual meeting while planning for in-person classes.

In recent times, the Elmhurst Teachers Council, which represents more than 600 teachers, deleted all but two of its posts in the history of its page.

One of the remaining posts is a statement against violence and racism, and the other is about its commitment to students. All the controversial comments are gone.

In mid-August last year, the district decided to go entirely remote for the first few weeks. The union praised the move on Facebook and then went radio silent on social media for three months.

On Nov. 13, the union issued a Facebook statement taking members of the "Reopen D205" Facebook page to task for posting since-deleted suggestions to protest at the house of Max Schoenberg, the union's president.

"Comments made on this Facebook group alleging that Mr. Schoenberg is causing harm to children are offensive and defamatory, as Mr. Schoenberg teaches math at York HS and has served District 205 for 20 years," the union said in the letter. "The repeated efforts to identify Mr. Schoenberg's place of residence as a location to protest are completely outrageous and violate any reasonable boundary of public discourse."

The post was among the many deleted.

In late 2020, the union filed a challenge to the district's plan for in-person learning starting in January, again pushing for entirely remote instruction.

The state educational labor board sided with the district.

The teachers union did not return a message for comment.