The process of school reopenings during the COVID-19 pandemic has garnered a significant amount of attention from various stakeholders including parents, school administrators, teachers, teachers’ unions, and the media. Negotiations over elements of school reopening policies, such as mask mandates and remote-learning options have, in certain school districts, been fraught with contention. The politicization of school reopening policies has been the source of a growing body of research, which tends to analyze policy decisions in conjunction with COVID data. However, a large gap in the literature has appeared concerning the politicization of school reopenings and the impact of the media, especially lacking a focus on the portrayal of teachers and teachers’ unions by the media in the intense reopening policy negotiation process. Using a method of nonparametric automated content analysis, this thesis analyzes the media's portrayal of school reopening policy negotiations in the Chicago Public School District, Los Angeles Unified School District, and New York City Public School District, which are the three largest school districts in the U.S. The results indicate a broadly negative framing of teachers unions by the media, especially in school district with stronger teacher unions such as Chicago Public School District. The 2019 strikes by the United Teachers of Los Angeles and the Chicago Teachers Union were stark examples of the negative rhetoric in the media concerning teachers and teachers unions in the media. However, there were instances of heightened positive responses in the media to school reopenings during the COVID-19 pandemic.
","abstract_html":"<p>The process of school reopenings during the COVID-19 pandemic has garnered a significant amount of attention from various stakeholders including parents, school administrators, teachers, teachers’ unions, and the media. Negotiations over elements of school reopening policies, such as mask mandates and remote-learning options have, in certain school districts, been fraught with contention. The politicization of school reopening policies has been the source of a growing body of research, which tends to analyze policy decisions in conjunction with COVID data. However, a large gap in the literature has appeared concerning the politicization of school reopenings and the impact of the media, especially lacking a focus on the portrayal of teachers and teachers’ unions by the media in the intense reopening policy negotiation process. Using a method of nonparametric automated content analysis, this thesis analyzes the media's portrayal of school reopening policy negotiations in the Chicago Public School District, Los Angeles Unified School District, and New York City Public School District, which are the three largest school districts in the U.S. The results indicate a broadly negative framing of teachers unions by the media, especially in school district with stronger teacher unions such as Chicago Public School District. The 2019 strikes by the United Teachers of Los Angeles and the Chicago Teachers Union were stark examples of the negative rhetoric in the media concerning teachers and teachers unions in the media. However, there were instances of heightened positive responses in the media to school reopenings during the COVID-19 pandemic.</p>","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["King, Sarah"],"institution":null,"degree_name":"Master of Arts (MA)","degree_level":"Masters Thesis","degree_discipline":null,"degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Iliyan Iliev","Joseph Weinberg","Joshua Hill"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2022,"date_issued":"2022-05-12T07:00:00Z","date_published":"2022-05-12T07:00:00Z","updated_at":"2026-07-24T05:45:33Z","subjects":["education policy","COVID-19","media","text analysis","agenda-setting","American Politics","Mass Communication","Models and Methods","Social Influence and Political Communication","Social Statistics"],"languages":[],"rights":[],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://aquila.usm.edu/masters_theses/901","outbound_label":"Repository record","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Iliyan Iliev","Joseph Weinberg","Joshua Hill"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["King, Sarah"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date.available","label":"Dc Date Available","values":["2022-07-01T07:00:00Z"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Masters Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Master of Arts (MA)"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["education policy","COVID-19","media","text analysis","agenda-setting","American Politics","Mass Communication","Models and Methods","Social Influence and Political Communication","Social Statistics"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://aquila.usm.edu/masters_theses/901"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["The process of school reopenings during the COVID-19 pandemic has garnered a significant amount of attention from various stakeholders including parents, school administrators, teachers, teachers’ unions, and the media. Negotiations over elements of school reopening policies, such as mask mandates and remote-learning options have, in certain school districts, been fraught with contention. The politicization of school reopening policies has been the source of a growing body of research, which tends to analyze policy decisions in conjunction with COVID data. However, a large gap in the literature has appeared concerning the politicization of school reopenings and the impact of the media, especially lacking a focus on the portrayal of teachers and teachers’ unions by the media in the intense reopening policy negotiation process. Using a method of nonparametric automated content analysis, this thesis analyzes the media's portrayal of school reopening policy negotiations in the Chicago Public School District, Los Angeles Unified School District, and New York City Public School District, which are the three largest school districts in the U.S. The results indicate a broadly negative framing of teachers unions by the media, especially in school district with stronger teacher unions such as Chicago Public School District. The 2019 strikes by the United Teachers of Los Angeles and the Chicago Teachers Union were stark examples of the negative rhetoric in the media concerning teachers and teachers unions in the media. However, there were instances of heightened positive responses in the media to school reopenings during the COVID-19 pandemic.
"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["The Politicization of School Reopenings: Media Coverage of Teachers Unions"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Iliyan Iliev","Joseph Weinberg","Joshua Hill"],"dc:creator":["King, Sarah"],"dc:date.available":["2022-07-01T07:00:00Z"],"dc:description.abstract":["The process of school reopenings during the COVID-19 pandemic has garnered a significant amount of attention from various stakeholders including parents, school administrators, teachers, teachers’ unions, and the media. Negotiations over elements of school reopening policies, such as mask mandates and remote-learning options have, in certain school districts, been fraught with contention. The politicization of school reopening policies has been the source of a growing body of research, which tends to analyze policy decisions in conjunction with COVID data. However, a large gap in the literature has appeared concerning the politicization of school reopenings and the impact of the media, especially lacking a focus on the portrayal of teachers and teachers’ unions by the media in the intense reopening policy negotiation process. Using a method of nonparametric automated content analysis, this thesis analyzes the media's portrayal of school reopening policy negotiations in the Chicago Public School District, Los Angeles Unified School District, and New York City Public School District, which are the three largest school districts in the U.S. The results indicate a broadly negative framing of teachers unions by the media, especially in school district with stronger teacher unions such as Chicago Public School District. The 2019 strikes by the United Teachers of Los Angeles and the Chicago Teachers Union were stark examples of the negative rhetoric in the media concerning teachers and teachers unions in the media. However, there were instances of heightened positive responses in the media to school reopenings during the COVID-19 pandemic.
"],"dc:identifier":["https://aquila.usm.edu/masters_theses/901"],"dc:subject":["education policy","COVID-19","media","text analysis","agenda-setting","American Politics","Mass Communication","Models and Methods","Social Influence and Political Communication","Social Statistics"],"dc:title":["The Politicization of School Reopenings: Media Coverage of Teachers Unions"],"thesis:degree_level":["Masters Thesis"],"thesis:degree_name":["Master of Arts (MA)"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T05:45:33Z"}