GEM Campout at the Board 2/24

Grassroots Education Movement (GEM) activists campout in front of the Chicago Board of Education headquarters to guarantee a chance to speak out the following day against pending vote to close sixteen public schools...

Click below on "comment" for full story,
or go here for photo essay and story.

CPS Recinds Closure of Six Schools, Protests Still On

This is from Chicago Public Schools:

"FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

February 23, 2009

CPS WITHDRAWS PROPOSALS FOR PEABODY, YALE, LAS CASAS, HOLMES, GLOBAL VISIONS AND HAMILTON

Officials Cite Compelling Community Testimony & Improved Scores

Chicago Public Schools CEO Ron Huberman announced today that six schools have been taken off the list of school closures, turnarounds and consolidations, after community groups and parents provided compelling arguments in support of the neighborhood schools and their performance levels...

Moratorium on Renn 2010- HB0363

On January 30th, State Representative Cynthia Soto introduced HB0363 into the state legislature. Highlights of the bill include:

1. Placing a one-year moratorium on school closings, turnarounds, phaseouts and consolidations, retroactive to the current closings.

2. Establish a Joint School Facilities Subcommittee consisting of three members each from the State House and State Senate Education Committees.

3. Institute and equitable process for school openings, closings, repairs, turnarounds, phaseouts and consolidations with wide community involvement, which would be in effect once the moratorium ends.

The bill can be viewed here.
Important! To check the bill status, go here
Substance article here

South Chicago 2.11 Wed.

South Chicago's community hearing was held across the street from the school at the Russel Park recreational center. The meeting was held from 5-7pm, by the end 60 parents had arrived. Typical of the "underutilized" schools being closed, consolidated, or phased-out, South Chicago is an amazing school with much student success. Also contrary to CPS Board testimony, the forty current pre-schoolers are an indicator that the six-year old schools numbers are significantly increasing. Parents also made a call out that if under-enrollment was truly the problem,the boundary lines could be enlarged to take students from overcrowded Heroes Ninos and the "new" Sullivan. South Chicago has the full support of their 7th ward alderwoman Jackson and voiced their commitment to fight.

For full picture story and captions go here.

Yale, Fenger 2.10 Tues.

Fenger High School's turnaround is sponsored by CPS' Chief Education Officer Barbara Eason-Watkins and Alan Anderson's Office of Turnaround.

AUSL (Academy for Urban School Leadership) is the proposed turnaround agency for Yale.

Extended "Hearings" Boycotted 2.9.09

A second "hearing" was held for Bethune at Chalmers School. This is one of several proposed additional hearings that are to give the managers of the Turnarounds, Academy of Urban School Leadership the chance to present themselves to the community. The irony, perhaps intentional, is that Chalmers is in a gang area dangerous for those from the Bethune community to enter into.

Aside from two representatives from AUSL, a court reporter and the hearing officer, Fred Bates, there were three representatives of the Grassroots Education Movement, GEM. Two of the educational activists were the only ones to speak at this "hearing.'

For the very complete story on this, go here.

Note: Holmes Elementary also boycotted the AUSL hearing, held Tuesday February 10.

Holmes, Peabody 2.9 Mon.

The Holmes hearing was held at the Board of Ed. This second Peabody hearing was held at Lozano School, 1424 North Cleaver. Holmes is facing an AUSL managed Turnaround and Peabody is facing simple Closure.

Global Vision, Nia Foundational, Princeton 2.7 Sat.

Johnson, Bethune 2.6 Fri.

For an excellent video on Bethune School's hearing, go here.

Dulles 2.5 Thurs.

Dulles is an elementary school located at 63rd and King Drive. It is slated for "Turnaround", which includes firing the administration, teachers, office staff, kitchen staff, engineer and janitors. "Turnarounds" are managed by the Academy for Urban School Leadership. The community of one tentative "Turnaround" school, Holmes Elementary, was told the parents would have no input in the process.

Best Practice, Reed 2.4 Wed.

Both Best Practice and Reed are phase-outs.

Hamilton 2.3 Tues.

Hamilton is a Magnet Cluster school on the city's North Side (East Lakeview) that is accused of underenrollment.

Schiller, Medill, Lathrop 2.2 Mon.

Schiller is being consolidated, Medill consolidated, and Lathrop phased out.

Abbott, Las Casas 1.31 Sat.

CLTV did a piece on Las Casas here.

New Schools Expo 1.31

On Saturday January 31st, Chicago Public Schools in partnership with Parents for School Choice hosted the New Schools Expo. With major corporate funding, this event presented Chicago's charter schools as well as workshops through out the day. The following are reflections by some of the teachers who visited. Full picture story here.

Nia Foundational, Princeton 1.30 Fri.

Feel free to add documentation to comment form...

S.Chicago, Peabody, Carpenter 1.29 Thur.

Feel free to add reports...

Photographs from Carpenter to come...

Community, Teachers Pressure Board, Storm City Hall 1.28

Today over a thousand parents, students, community members and teachers came down to rally at the Chicago Board of Education against upcoming school closures. Under the latest installment of Mayor Daley's Rennaisance 2010 program, 23 public schools are set to be consolidated, phased-our, "Turned-Around", or closed.

The rally came after the public comment portion of today's school board meeting. Board members went into closed session to finalize the list of schools set for closure. A final vote will be taken at the February 25th meeting. There will also be a massive protest on this date.

Click here to see photos.

Davis, Las Casas 1.26 Mon.

From Las Casas;
"Las Casas serves students whose emotional needs cannot be met in a regular public school setting..."

"Las Casas Occupational High Schools has been telling a story of success from over 25 years. This programs has had continued graduation rates of over 95% with all students leaving with actual work experience and over 75% with occupational successes in a private sector. Attendance rate 82%, Truancy is 12%, 24% mobility trained, retention-since we are 100% special ed., all students can be retained until 21 years of age , expulsion 2% and drop our rates are 3%.
The majority of our school population is bussed from as far north as Roosevelt Road, South to 120th street and west to Pulaski Road. Many of our students are either Wards of the State (DCFS); live with family who is on public aid, or live in foster or group homes. The racial makeup of Las Casas is 90% black, 7% Hispanic, and 3% White."

From Davis:
"Miles Davis Magnet Academy for Children's Engineering... The children's engineering program is the first in the Chicago area."

Miles Davis faced closure last year. This year they face consolidation.

Documenting

DOCUMENTERS:
1. Writers; post your text to a comment form. If you published elsewhere, also add a link
2. Video, Audio, Photo; post your files to Chicago.Indymedia.org In the comment form add a link. While YouTube is popular, if you post to ChicagoIndymedia.org, the material will be permanently archived with a more appropriate grassroots social justice project.


It is important to remember that at previous hearings that the Chicago Board of Education, appointed by Mayor Daly, were not present. Indeed, it has yet to be acknowledged that the board even looked at the massive amount of information presented by passionately concerned community and teachers. Much of the information recorded by the lawyers hired to represent the board was not publicaly available until as late as May, 2008.

Still, it is important that we, the grass roots do not let the efforts of community go to waste. We shall do our own documentation to the extent our resources allow and make it available to the public at large. Please also be aware that the corporate-driven/mainstream coverage of these hearings have been minimal at best.

To more fully understand the privatization-driven motives behind the "school reform" plan of Rennaisance 2010, please look at SubstanceNews.net. Please also refer to CORETeachers.org. Look also for further installments on this website as well as amendments to previous posts as the content of this documentation evolves. Thank you.

Schedule of School Closings

CNSLD= Consolidated
CL= Closed
PO= Phased Out
TA= Turnaround

Monday, Jan. 26
3-5pm Davis CNSLD CPS, 125 S. Clark
5:30-7:30pm Las Casas CL CPS, 125 S. Clark

Thursday, Jan. 29
3-5pm S. Chicago CL CPS, 125 S. Clark
5:30-7:30p Peabody CL CPS, 125 S. Clark
8-10pm Carpenter P/O CPS, 125 S. Clark

Friday, Jan. 30
3-5pm Nia Found CL CPS, 125 S. Clark
5:30-7:30p Princeton CL CPS, 125 S. Clark

Saturday, Jan. 31
9-11am Abbott CNSLD CPS, 125 S. Clark
10-12p Las Casas CL Ninos Heroes, 8344 S. Commercial


Monday, Feb. 2
3-5pm Schiller CNSLD CPS, 125 S. Clark
5:30-7:30p Medill CNSLD CPS, 125 S. Clark
8-10pm Lathrop P/O CPS, 125 S. Clark

Tuesday, Feb. 3
3-5pm Hamilton P/O CPS, 125 S. Clark

Wednesday, Feb. 4
3-5pm Best Practice P/O CPS, 125 S. Clark
5:30-7:30p Reed P/O CPS, 125 S. Clark

Thursday, Feb. 5
3-5pm Dulles TA CPS, 125 S. Clark

Friday, Feb. 6
3-5pm Johnson TA CPS, 125 S. Clark
5:30-7:30p Bethune TA CPS, 125 S. Clark




Saturday, Feb. 7
9-11am Global Vsn. CNSLD CPS, 125 S. Clark
9-11am Nia Found. CL Cregier, 2040 W. Adams
11:30-1:30p Princeton CL Tonti, 5815 S. Homan

Monday, Feb. 9
3-5pm Holmes TA CPS, 125 S. Clark
7:30-9:30p Peabody CL Lozano, 1424 N. Cleaver St.

Tuesday, Feb. 10
3-5pm Yale TA CPS, 125 S. Clark
8-10pm Fenger TA CPS, 125 S. Clark

Wednesday, Feb. 11
5-7pm S. Chicago CL Russel Square Park, 3045 E 83rd St