Thousands of Teachers Rally on First Day of Chicago Strike

March downtown as parents struggle to make do

Thousands of public school teachers marched in downtown Chicago on Monday and parents scrambled for child care during the first teachers' strike in a quarter century over reforms sought by Mayor Rahm Emanuel and endorsed by President Barack Obama's administration.

Some 29,000 teachers and support staff in the nation's third-largest school system were involved, leaving parents of 350,000 students between kindergarten and high school age to find alternative supervision.

"There's no excuse for either side for not coming to an agreement," said Faith Griggs-York, mother of a first-grader at Agassiz Elementary School, as she dropped her daughter off at a community center a mile from the school.