More than 1,000 students from 11 Illinois high schools will assume the roles of organized labor workers or management officials and try to hammer out a contract as part of a DePaul University workshop to educate youth about the role of labor unions in the workplace.

Started 14 years ago by DePaul’s Labor Education Center in the School for New Learning, the program educates high school students about unions, collective bargaining and labor history. Among those participating in the workshop are Chicago Public Schools students from Kelly High School, Whitney Young High School, Manley Career Academy High School, Lane Technical High School and Hyde Park Academy High School, and suburban students from Oak Park and River Forest High School in Oak Park, Morton West High School in Berwyn, Reavis High School in Burbank, Lockport Township High School in Lockport, Peoria High School and LaSalle-Peru High School in LaSalle. Hundreds of volunteers from organized labor groups, many of them graduates of the Labor Education Center’s three-year labor leadership certificate program, will serve as coaches for the workshops.

“Given the bleak economic situation we’re in, it’s a most critical time to teach future generations about organized labor. Historically, employers have used tough times like this to take away worker rights because they feel they have the upper hand,” said Emily Rosenberg, director of the Labor Education Center. “Organized labor was created out of the Great Depression, and the strongest labor organizing occurred during that time.  When people’s backs are against the wall, they fight back.”

Titled the Regina V. Polk High School Union Program in honor of the late labor organizer, the program includes classroom instruction about unions, collective bargaining and the history of organized labor. Students split into teams and assume either the union or management position in a collective bargaining exercise, coached by an experienced union negotiator. In the spring, they will conclude with a field trip to the Pullman neighborhood, one of Chicago’s most famous union sites, where they will take a walking tour of the “model city” of Pullman.

The Labor Education Center was established in the late 1940s to train Chicago-area union leaders. In 1993, it moved to DePaul’s School for New Learning, where it currently offers a range of courses, activities and scholarships to individuals engaged in representing union members.