So Many Stories So Little Time

There’s a lot going on in Chicago, Springfield, and Mackinac Island today.   I’m going to try and be concise, but a lot of this will really impact students, parents,and teachers alike.  I really recommend this Reuters article on the huge invasion of privacy that Illinois is only one of three states going along with.

School Database Loses Backers as Parents Balk Over Privacy

“Parents and civil liberties groups concerned about potential privacy breaches quickly began to sound the alarm and rallied opposition in social media.”

Illinois Senate Defeats House-Backed Pension Reform Bill

“The proposal pushed by House Speaker Michael Madigan failed Thursday evening, with 16 voting “yes” and 42 voting “no.” The vote left lawmakers without a solution to the pension issue with only one day left before the Legislature’s scheduled adjournment.”

Warning to Chicago Parents About Student Privacy

“Yet she also revealed that Illinois plans to expand inBloom data sharing and data mining to 35 districts serving half a million students starting in 2015.  http://shar.es/wbnTF”

Mayor Rahm’s Great Plan for Education: Bankrupt the Schools!

“Of course, an idea being dumb won’t stop Illinois state reps and senators from approving it, as they move heaven and earth to avoid receiving a profanity-laced late-night phone call from our tempestuous mayor.”

The Lunacy of DePaul’s New Basketball Arena

“Municipalities across the nation are suffering from the quixotic whimsy of their elected officials when it comes to publicly financed sports venues. When you mix in this particular city’s budget, this particular team’s fortunes and the way these numbers don’t seem to make any realistic sense at all, it’s understandable why people in Chicago are upset.”

Trumbull Parents Not Happy About Uptown Welcoming School

“My wife is saying ‘absolutely no’ [to McCutcheon] she doesn’t want our kids to go there at all,” Weisgard said. He added: “It’s in a bad neighborhood. We live in Uptown and we purposely take our kids out of Uptown to go to school.”

Enrollment Drive After Closing Shows Mixed Results

“But a breakdown of enrollment numbers by school shows wide variation among parents declaring where they will send their children in the fall. At King on the West Side and Parkman and Bontemps on the South Side, fewer than 10 percent of parents enrolled their children in new schools. At Stockton on the North Side, where the building is not closing but Courtenay’s staff is taking over Stockton’s building, nearly everyone enrolled, according to CPS data.  “

South Side CPS Parents Demand Enrollment at Wicker Park Magnet School

“Meanwhile, parents from three schools slated for closure are demanding their children be allowed to attend a Wicker Park magnet school.”

Eulogy for 50 Schools

“and i wondered if my old school was sad. if the classroom where Ms. Johnson read us books and showed us letters, was sad.
i wondered if my school didn’t understand. didn’t understand where everyone went.
i wondered if Lester was still there, with his mop and that big bucket when the bell rang.
i liked Lester. he always said hello to me. every single day.”

The Biggest Irony in Chicago’s Mass Closing of Schools

“As it turns out, according to WBEZ,  the three schools that Duncan first closed and revamped are all being “shaken up” as part of the newly announced closure of 50 public Chicago schools, the largest mass school closing in U.S. history.”

Day 2 on Mackinac Island

“If I had any doubts about the education reform movement, Michelle Rhee deftly erased them all.  She repeated her often used statistic that this would be the first generation in this country that was less educated than their parents.  As the number of  U.S. college graduates hit a record high in 2012, it’s clear that Ms. Rhee sees a very precipitous decline to get the numbers down from 30 percent to the 22 percent level of 1990. “

 

 

Is Our Children Learning Part II

UNO Can’t Whitewash this Scandal

“This week wasn’t the first time that UNO has created waves. There have long been whispers — at some points, escalating to shouts and finger-pointing — around UNO’s work in clout-building through electioneering, endorsements and cronyism. The fact that these activities are allegedly taking place in an institution whose stated mission is education is particularly egregious, even in a place like Chicago, where citizens are hardened by regular reports of political sleaze and fraud.”

Jeb Bush talks Education at Mackinac, Pushes Michigan’s Questionable Charter School Sector

“That study, released in January by Stanford University’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes, found that while students in Michigan’s charter schools are raising their test scores more quickly than their peers in public schools, they are still performing at much lower levels. Charter school students in the state gain about two months of reading and math knowledge over their peers each year — but 80 percent of charter schools perform below the 50th percentile of achievement in reading, and 84 percent perform below that threshold in math..”

Our Report from the Mackinac Island Conference

“Hello and a sunny welcome from beautiful Mackinac Island, Michigan where the beautiful people of the education reform set have all penciled in this beautiful island made famous by Esther Williams in the movie Grand Hotel, for their Spring getaways.  It’s Mackinac Island Conference Week and if there’s one thing on the menu besides Chianti Chef Keith Shockling’s Semolina Dusted Lake Huron Whitefish, it’s education reform.

When Black Kids Want to Learn and the World Tells Them No

“There are black children who don’t value education. Not because they are black, but because they are children and that’s what children do. The more tragic and infuriating thing is that they grow up in a society that doesn’t value educating black children and is hellbent on doing everything it can to stop them from learning.”

George W. Bush asked the famous question, “Is our children learning?” when he was President.   It seems that his brother Jeb also believes that public schools are misunderestimating our children’s capacity to learn.  Today, we have a little national news in with the usual CPS closing stories.

BBB Tells Everyone to Move On, For Parents It’s Not that Easy

“Meanwhile parents are confused about the enrollment process, have been told they have until the end of this week to figure it out, and some welcoming schools are not even informed about their role in this process.”

UNO and Green Dot, Meet Ethics

The Tribune recently had an editorial entitled UNO Meet Green Dot.   While the editorial showed up on Google as being written today, the byline listed the date as May 13th.  Evidently, the big threat to UNO isn’t its own web of nepotism and corrupt management, but the possibility of a unionized teaching force.

The danger is that UNO will not be able to keep its innovation if it has to grant due process to employees.   Just think how crippled UNO would have been if it could not have immediately dismissed David Corrall after he reported sexual assault taking place at one of UNO’s schools.  Not only that, but I’m sure union contracts would severely eat into Juan Rangel’s $260,000 contract.

The Tribune solution is that UNO needs to learn from Green Dot.  I must say, at first glance Green Dot seems to have quite a lot in common with UNO — namely ethics charges.  UNO, however, has completed an internal investigation and decided   As, you read today’s UNO story, it’s clear their innovations aren’t taking place in the classroom, but in the fields of spin and damage control.

Embattled UNO Charter School Leader Steps Aside, Stops Short of Resigning

“But saying he still has much to contribute, Rangel will remain CEO of UNO, which includes the day-to-day management of the schools. He insisted that an overhauled board with new, independent members will keep him accountable. UNO named Martin Cabrera, Jr., founder and CEO of Cabrera Capital Markets, as the new chairman of the community organization’s board.”

Chicago to Shutter 50 Public Schools: Is Historic Mass Closure an Experiment in Privatization

“ALEX LYONS: I am very, very disappointed and upset in the rubber-stamp vote that was taken by the CPS Board of Elections to take our kids from the classroom and put them on the front row of killings, murders, war zones, seeing things that a kid should not see to go to school.”

Chicago to Close 50 Public Schools While Spending $100 Million on a Basketball Arena

“Of course, the city is justifying such a large public investment by claiming that constructing the arena and it’s accompanying event center will bring “huge opportunity” to the city of Chicago by attracting business and tourism.

How much opportunity will this deal provide the city of Chicago if, in 20 years, its streets are riddled with uneducated college-age adults?”

The Problem with Chicago’s School Closings

“At the end of this year my city, Chicago is closing a total of 49 Elementary Schools which is the largest in the city’s history. The largest source of revenue for the district, 40% comes from local sources (mostly local property taxes). The state provides 31% of funding via the general state aid (GSA), based on a complicated formula set by the state legislature and finally the Federal government provides 24% of the funding through the Title 1 program and paying for the free & reduced lunch program. Illinois ranks second lowest in the nation for the level of funding that the state provides for education. As a teacher, it is abominable how low education is on the list of funding priorities.”

Happy Memorial Day

The evolution of Memorial Day to Veterans Day with barbecue bothers me.   While I never was a member of the military, I’ve had many family members who did.  On the other hand, none of my direct relatives ever died in their service to our nation, though one was seriously injured for most of his life as a result of a wound suffered preparing to go to Italy in World War II.  This isn’t their holiday.  Veterans have their day.   Today, is a day to remember those who fought and gave the ultimate sacrifice.  I think this should be the day that all of us who didn’t serve, remember just how steep the price of war is, before we support military action as anything, but an absolute last resort.

Paper Mache Schools ‘Protest’ Hits Millennium Park

“It’s a non-protest protest, just very chill,” said event organizer Ellen Gradman, a visual artist and teacher of 30 years.

Gradman’s influence as an artist could be seen in the laid-back event — paper mache flowers and art supplies were part of an program that also featured communal discussions focused on how kids felt about their schools closing.

“It’s a time for us to breathe. A time to just be with our kids,” Gradman said.”

Are We Becoming Like the City of Chicago

“As hard as educational leaders and teachers are working in the city’s public school, the future for Chicago Public School and many of its students does not look bright. In 2013, Chicago public schools are more de facto segregated by race and social-economic status than ever before with approximately 80 percent of the city’s white middle and upper class students in private schools. Most Chicago children live in poor neighborhoods and attend schools in these poor neighborhoods and are likely to have few friends from classes and races different from their own.”

Parents Paid to Circulate Propaganda for ‘Won’t Back Down!’

“Alfonso’s telling everybody’s ‘you’re going to have luxurious houses, drive fancy cars and live the kind of life you’ve always wanted,'” Morales said. “Around late October, they came back and said the movie didn’t make that much and backed out of the deal.”

NBC Nightly News Online Report on CPS Closings

“Raise Your Hand helped to coordinate interviews for a piece on NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams last week. Unfortunately, the story was bumped twice and ended up online only.”

Walking the Tightrope

One problem with writing a blog on CPS is that so much of the news that I consider necessary is undeniably negative.   We’ve all been very focused on the school closings and I don’t for a second intend to ignore the schools as they try to fight for survival even while their students have to register elsewhere.  However, I’m also going to try to find some more positive stories and stories about things other than the closings.  However, let’s face it, it’s what everybody’s talking about and with good reason. 

CPS 9 Year Old 1, Rahm 0

“Consider Derrick Blakley’s gullible “report” in which he repeats CPS assertions without vetting, including:

* “With CPS planning to close and consolidate many half-empty schools to help eliminate a projected $1 billion deficit, one of the two nearby schools had to go, and CPS brass targeted Garvey.”

Jersey Jazzman Shows the Love for the Indomitable Karen Lewis

“She is a larger than life figure who is not only unbossed and unbought, but unbeaten. (I am paraphrasing Shirley Chisholm here, the first black woman to run for President).

Karen explains the importance of collaborating with parents and local communities.”

The Day They Closed My School

“I live in Chicago, and one of the 50 neighborhood schools slated to close is an excellent school named Miriam Canter Middle School. I like to think I came into the process with an open mind– I’m not averse to school closing, if necessary–but I was so disgusted with the town hall meeting that I made a very short video concerning the process.”

All In: Emanuel Closes 50 Public Schools

“Chicago Public Schools announced Wednesday the largest school closing in the history of the country, because Rahm Emanuel claims the city is too broke to keep them open. Chris Hayes and an Up Panel discuss what this means – both for education in Chicago, and the students that count on it.”

Smiley and West – Karen Lewis, Chicago Teachers Union

“Chicago Teachers Union president Karen Lewis critiques the largest school closing plan in U.S. history, approved this week by the Chicago school board. “

A Time of Heroes

Photo credit: Sarah Jane Rhee/loveandstrugglephotos.com.

The Tribune editorial called on us to be heroes like Newton and Moore where heroes stood up to death for the students.  We could be heroes by stepping down and leaving our students to poverty, both literal and intellectual.   We could be heroes by isolating the parts of our city most in need.   We could be heroes by shutting our mouths and collecting our paychecks.   We could be heroes by rolling over in the face of powerful forces destroying the most vulnerable in our society, but that’s no hero I’ve ever seen and I have seen heroes:

I saw a 9 year old boy standing on a metal folding call down thunder with his voice, open up the skies and show us a future worth believing in at a time when if felt like the future was being ripped out of this city.

I saw 17 year old high school student holding a bullhorn with tears dripping down his face, who showed us all how to be a man, when some of Chicago’s wealthiest citizens were too cowardly to make their votes public.

I saw one mom silenced and hauled off for daring to speak the named of the condemned lest we begin to remember the children inside the schools being destroyed.

I saw 20,000 parents speak with such eloquence and passion to a blank wall of empty stares while CPS officials checked their email on their smart phones.

I saw 25 brave men and women have to be scolded by a white haired police officer for showing too many solidarity with their chants in the back of the paddy wagon.

I saw a union leadership that ended their election victory celebration to put on their walking shoes and take to the streets to stop this maddening change.  

150 people tonight signed up to register voters and give voice to the voiceless.  They are heroes too.

I can remember
Standing, by the wall
And the guns shot above our heads
And we kissed,
as though nothing could fall

And the shame, was on the other side

Oh, we can beat them, forever and ever

Then we could be heroes just for one day

                                                    —David Bowie

Marching to Save Chicago Public Schools

“After months of public protest, including a three day community march across the city, the Chicago Public Schools Board of Education voted to close 50 schools on May 22, 2013… the largest school closing in US history. The fight is not over. This is a movement. Use your voice to protect our public schools and the future of our children. Our City. Our Schools. Our Voice.”

Our Children in Cleveland our Underperforming

“During an interview on Good Day Chicago, Bennett declared that the Chicago Public Schools’ decision to close 50 schools was “not made haphazardly. It was made with children in mind and not adults, and it was made so that we could level this platform for the children and move forward. I mean, our children in Cleveland are underperforming on every measure.”

We Began Talking of Moving; It’s Heartbreaking
 “We are the typical Andersonville family. For the first time last week, we began talking about moving. It’s a heartbreaking decision. We just moved back to Chicago a couple years ago, and love living in the city. We love our neighborhood and have invested in our schools and our community. Andersonville has become a part of our family. We thought we would raise our children here. If Trumbull closes we face the uncertainty of our son getting into Peirce, and therefore we don’t know that we can stay. We are one of numerous other families in this community who are also being forced to rethink their future in Chicago because of this proposal. Our lives are being turned upside-down.”

 

Transferred Highland Park Teacher Resigns in Impassioned YouTube Video

 

“In the 10-minute video, entitled “In Pursuit of Happiness,” fourth grade teacher Ellie Rubenstein addresses the transfers and “false accusations” that have been leveled against some teachers in the school. She also laments the test-driven state of the education profession.”

 

Rahm Emanuel’s Zombie Pigs vs. Chicago’s Angry Birds

 

“I have nothing against basketball and nothing against DePaul. But Rahm Emanuel and his upside-down priorities disgust me. In a deeply segregated city like Chicago, the gun violence that’s been all over the national news is the result of systematically tearing apart communities. Gentrification is not the answer for this city. The answer is decent jobs, social services, quality affordable housing, access to health care and fully funded schools, not another round of corporate welfare.”

 

Today We Organize

 

“Some of us are working for an elected school board and others are thinking about a Financial Transaction Tax pegged to +3% of the sales tax. Some of us are focused on our aldermen and thinking about what they will have to support to not draw a challenger who will beat them because next time around it will take more than 20% of the city send Mayor Emanuel back to the 5th Floor. Some of us are registering voters. Some of us are pulling together conversations about freedom schools and student strikes and creative actions that can only come from communities with nothing to lose but their fear, apathy and chains. Yesterday we raged against the machine but today we are organizing to dismantle this evil one nut and bolt at a time.”

 

The Rev. John Thomas: No Act of God Caused Chicago School Closings

 

“Unlike the teachers in Moore, Chicago teachers’ schools are not gone because of some capricious act of nature.  They are gone because of decades of very deliberate decisions by public officials, corporate interests and ordinary citizens that have eviscerated the neighborhoods of Chicago, displacing people with the demolition of public housing, gutting communities with foreclosures and the elimination of jobs.  The schools are gone because they have been replaced by charter schools, the darlings of politically well-connected school reformers making a profit on tax money while public officials eliminate the inconvenience of teachers unions. “

Today I Mourn, Tomorrow the Fight Goes On

Finally, Somebody Who Isn’t Afraid of Rahm

 

Those of you who were at yesterday’s rally downtown saw a star in the making.   Asean Johnson is a 9 year old from Marcus Garvey Elementary School.  He also highhandedly destroys Mayor Emanuel’s argument that these schools need to be closed for the good of the children.  Any school that produces a student like this is doing something right.  If only more adults could show his courage and his fire, Rahm would be a one term mayor for sure.   We can’t hid behind a 9 year old forever.  The adults who know that what Rahm is doing is wrong, need to step forward and be counted.

I was driving home from work today listening to WBEZ when I heard Rahm Emanuel speak about the closings.  I resisted the urge to accelerate into a nearby wall.  He talked about people saying he’d take a political hit, but that didn’t stop him from standing up to the teachers when they struck and he got a longer day.   That’s a nice bit of revisionist history.  He imposed the longer day before the strike and there was nothing the teachers could do about it.   The longer day has also been a disaster.   Our LSC was just talking about how much they hated it, and how much small children can’t take the long day, and how absenteeism is up at all schools in our network.   Just like he’s doing with the closings, Rahm made his edict and then left the teachers to pick up the pieces.  Sadly, the stakes are much higher this time.   As Jitu Brown said, “This didn’t start with a Board vote and it’s not going to end with a Board vote.”

Parents Win Battle, Manierre School Won’t Close

“Sources close to the Chicago Public Schools confirmed Tuesday that Manierre in Old Town has been removed from the list of 54 schools set to close as part of the largest school consolidation in U.S. history.”

What I Learned in Chicago

This has seriously been the most indescribable past 48 hours of my life. Chicago students, teachers, parents, & community organizers, it was empowering watching you all over the internet since September, but having the privilege to march alongside you, cause disruption, exchange “WTFs” when we heard an elementary school was put on lockdown & surrounded by cops so they couldn’t walkout to join the march, hugging our civil disobey-ers after they were released from arrests for occupying City Hall, and being in the heart of the education revolution with the most fearless people in the world…that was something else.

Chicago School Closing Battle: Protesters Clash with Cops

“I came [to the rally] because CPS specifically asked us not to,” Montre Caref, a 15-year-old Westinghouse College Prep student told HuffPost Chicago. Caref’s former school, Mayo Elementary in Bronzeville, is on the list of proposed closings.”

Rahm’s Latest Plan: Close the Schools, Build an Arena

“So far, no luck. The mayor says he has to close the schools because the city’s too broke to keep them open. Tough times requiring tough measures, and all that.

Of course, as broke as we are, there’s still $55 million lying around to buy up some land and hand it over to private entities that don’t need it.”

Child Mental Health Experts Raise Serious Concerns about School Closings

“According to Erika Schmidt, director of the Center for Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy, “School communities are built on a network of important relationships. While the primary relationship is between the child and teacher, other relationships within the school – the principal, assistant principal, classmates, older and younger students, the security guard – all these people provide an integral role in supporting children and helping them thrive. The continuity of these relationships is critical for children whose lives may be frequently disrupted by trauma or loss. Without this kind of stability and continuity, children have a difficult time engaging in learning or even feeling like learning matters to them.”

Police Shut Down Trumbull Book Fair

It’s nice to see that CPS’s war on literacy is still going strong.

Rahm Pushing Showdown without Compromise

“The full agenda for the May 22, 2013 meeting of the Chicago Board of Education shows that even though several federal and local court judges, thousands of teachers, students and parents, and the editors of one of the city’s two major newspapers now oppose the massive school closings ordered by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the mayor’s appointed school board and “Chief Executive Officer,” Barbara Byrd Bennett, will go through with all of the controversial and unprecedented actions at the Board’s May 22 meeting. The full Board agenda, published by law on May 20, 2013, shows the facts.”

 

I Feel Like I’m Living in a Dystopian Movie

2012 – Rahm Emanuel shuts down the mental health clinics

2013 – Rahm Emanuel closes the schools

2015 – Newly reelected Mayor Emanuel announces that he will be removing all public services from the South and West sides of the city in a cost cutting move

2016 – After bands of teens raid downtown shops and restaurants, Mayor Emanuel announces the construction of a large wall to keep resides of Chicago’s poorer neighborhoods from coming to the more well to do sections of the city.

2017 – Mayor Emanuel begins using red light cameras and drone technology to beef up security in the no man’s land of South Chicago

Will it get to this?  Probably not, but it sure seems like the beginning of some horrible science fiction action flick like Escape from New York or the French movie District 13.  If there’s one thing I’ve learned from watching this kind of film, there’s always that moment when people say, “if only we had fought him earlier”.   Please, let’s not say that.

CPS Limits Coverage from Closing Schools

“Since the recommended list of closures was announced in March, the city has been in a heated debate about whether some schools should be taken off the list. Media access to these buildings has been almost impossible, and some worry decisions will be made without a thorough inspection.”

Chicago Teachers Union Overwhelmingly Re-Elects Karen Lewis’s CORE Caucus

“The CTU will likely continue to serve as an example for such unionism. Fittingly, there was little time for union leadership to savor their re-election victory: just a few hours after the election results came in, the union was leading a three-day march to each of the fifty-four schools slated for closure throughout the city, culminating in a mass rally in downtown Chicago today at rush hour. Outside Bannecker Elementary, one of the schools slated for closure in the Englewood neighborhood on Chicago’s South Side, CTU President Karen Lewis told me she feels optimistic about the prospect of such unionism spreading”

As Closings Near, Questions Remain on Money, Academics, Safety

““My son is upset,” she says. Miranda’s son has a disability that includes learning and speech difficulties and she’s afraid that he will simply “shut down” if he has to transfer to a new school.”

Serial Trespasser’s Arrest Brings Union Election Results into Doubt

“I think we all must ask themselves what is a teacher like this going to teach students besides how to do their own prison tattoos (Mayle apparently has several), how to make a shank, or ferment their own Pruno from CPS orange juice and ketchup packets.  Sadly, this is not even the only criminal CTU member.  They have an organizer who loves to assault reporters by ridiculing their underdeveloped male equipment.   For shame CTU.  For Shame.”

CPS School Closings: Protestors Block Elevators, Rally Outside

“”We are not going down without a fight,” said Asean Johnson, a 9-year-old third-grader at Marcus Garvey Elementary School who rallied the crowd at Daley Plaza with cries for student safety while speaking atop a folding chair placed at the lectern.”

Special Episode of  At the Chalk Face from the CPS March

“If few in the mainstream will cover the CPS marches and rallies, we will. So, we’re going to be joined by Chicago teacher and activist Joshua Marburger live from events in the Windy City.

We’re on 5PM EST or 4PM Chicago Time. Join us. Chat’s open, livetweet @thechalkface, using the hashtag #cpsclosings.”

Giving Rahm a Week to Remember

This week has been insane.  In my personal life, in my social life, and in my career I am facing a ridiculous number of challenges this week, but there’s also some real coming out of it.  I am reminded of A Christmas Carol, where a miserly old skinflint who cares more about money than about people learns an important lesson about what’s really important in life and changes his ways.  I am hoping that this will be a week like that for Rahm Emanuel.

The Ghost of Education Past is none other than Karen Lewis and the entire CORE caucus.  Rahm’s poll numbers may have been damaged by his attacks on the teachers, but Karen was reelected with a resounding 80% of the CTU vote.   CORE isn’t going away for the rest of your term and hopefully, it will be your only term.   The teachers are unified and they will fight you.

The Ghosts of Education Present is the old fashioned long march that CTU has organized through the streets of Chicago.   Even the corporate media is starting to get the message.  As the marchers make their way down the streets of this city, they’re being greeted with signs of support and some people are leaving their homes to join the marchers.

The Ghosts of Education Future Tomorrow students across this city are organizing a boycott to protest what Rahm is doing to them.   All this activism is making it’s way down to a new generation, but as has been pointed out before, the youth always lead the change in CPS.

Tomorrow at 4PM at Daley Plaza all the marches will meet up with a good deal of the boycotters.  Already, CPS has begun sending out emails and robocalls to parents warning them of the dangers of letting their students participate,   This will be a historic moment and every voice needs to be heard.  If you can make it, please be there to give your support to these schools facing termination.

WBEZ Fact Checks Chicago School Closings

“CPS says 30,000 children will be impacted by school closings. But the district’s plan  actually  will touch more than 46,000 children. A WBEZ analysis shows that if the 54 proposed school closings, 6 turnarounds and 11 co-locations are approved by the Board of Education, 46,147 current students at 132 schools will be affected.”

Toni Preckwinkle Rips Emanuel, Says CPS Closure Plan Weakens our Public Schools

“What was the point of having public hearings?” Preckwinkle said during a 20-minute interview in her office. “Was it all a charade? If you weren’t going to pay any attention to the outcome of the public hearings or the recommendations of the public hearing officers, why would you bother to waste everyone’s time?”

Special Report: CPS Closings Create School Zone, Danger Zone

“His current school, Yale, is enveloped by homes and an adjoining playground.

At Harvard, though, the neighborhood near the school boasts a liquor store attracting the sort of men early in the morning that no parent wants children to encounter while walking to school.

Lately, parents and a crossing guard say, there’s been a man exposing himself to students across from Harvard school.”

Karen Lewis and CORE slate Re-elected in Landslide

“The vote count as of ten p.m. showed a victory margin of nearly 80 percent for CORE versus the other group, which called itself the “Coalition To Save Our Union”. The vote for president with 99 percent of the votes tallied was 12,316 to 3,291.”

CPS School Closings: Opponents Begin Three-Day March Against Closures

“”We can’t sit still,” said Michelle Gunderson, a teacher at Nettelhorst Elementary School in Lakeview and a vocal opponent of the closures. “It helps people visualize where these schools are. It helps give people a vision of what these schools mean to their communities.”