The Chicago Teachers Union reports that the system leadership starved the schools it wanted to close, depriving them of the resources and personnel they needed to succeed. Those at the top should be held accountable when schools fail. It doesn’t happen accidentally. They are responsible.
New Report Cites Past Disinvestment By CPS in
Schools Targeted for Closure
A history of trauma and neglect exposed in “A Tale of Two Schools: The Human Story Behind Destructive School Actions in Chicago”
CHICAGO—The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) issued a report examining the upheaval at two elementary schools slated for closure in recent years by Chicago Public Schools (CPS). The study, titled A Tale of Two Schools: The Human Story Behind Destructive School Actions in Chicago, uses testimony from parents, staff, administrators and community leaders to address district neglect, barriers to improvement, low student morale and other concerns at Simon Guggenheim Elementary and Jacob Beidler Elementary schools, and examine the overall causes and effects of school actions.
“This report presents an autopsy of a school community undermined and destroyed by this school district,” said CTU President Karen Lewis. “CPS starved Guggenheim for years, demonized the teachers, paraprofessionals and clinicians and demoralized the administration and students so it could place this school under arrest, read it its last rites and slate it for execution. Now they are targeting Beidler and 53 other existing school communities in the same manner.”
Located in West Englewood, Guggenheim, 7141 S. Morgan, successfully fought a closing attempt in 2010 before a new CPS-appointed administration presented a number of systemic obstacles to school improvement, epitomized by the mishandling of the school’s homeless student population and a 42-student third-grade class at the start of the 2011-2012 school year. After throwing the school into utter chaos CPS then used the poor test scores and the hostile school climate that it created through years of disinvestment and destabilization to justify the school’s closure in 2012.
“They broke the family bond,” said former Guggenheim teacher Kimberly Walls.
CPS announced its intentions to close Jacob Beidler Elementary School, 3151 W. Walnut, in 2011 and turn the school’s building over to a charter school. Appalled by CPS’s decision, the East Garfield Park community rallied, marched and organized against the closing and CPS withdrew the proposal. Two years and three CEOs later, CPS once again placed Beidler on a hit list of schools targeted for closure in 2013.
“I think that kids need a stable environment, and this is one of the few stable environments that many of these kids have, where they have familiar faces and people who care about them,” said a Beidler staff member. “It’s going to be a traumatic situation for them to lose many of the people who have been their support system, in addition to their home.”
Anger and fear returned to the Beidler community, which once again had to fight for its school’s survival. Another successful campaign spared Beidler—one of only two East Garfield Park elementary schools to avoid direct impact from 2013 proposed actions.
“What the communities at Guggenheim and Beidler experienced is an example of why there is zero trust in the mayor’s plan to see this plan through honestly and effectively,” Lewis said about CPS’s proposal to close 54 schools, the largest mass school closing in U.S. history.
A Tale of Two Schools presents first-person testimony of CPS’s policy-driven causes and harmful effects of school actions at Guggenheim and the culture of fear created by closure threats at Beidler. Through case studies, the report identifies the obstacles that schools threatened with closure face, and examines how CPS addresses these difficulties. The report also investigates the support available at schools fearing closure and lists the additional resources that could help them succeed. The case studies also address the effectiveness of CPS transition plans and the value of community input at school actions hearings. Each element of these case studies is based on testimony from multiple sources.
Many of the improvements at Beidler mirror the 5 Essential Supports (5 Essentials). Based on more than 20 years of research, the University of Chicago’s Consortium on Chicago School Research found that the 5 Essentials consistently correlate with school improvement and provide a more comprehensive approach to school evaluation than simply using scores on standardized tests or “value-added” measures. They are:
· Effective Leaders
· Collaborative Teachers
· Ambitious Instruction
· Supportive Environment
· Involved Families
While Beidler excels or is making significant progress on these 5 Essentials, Guggenheim was denied the opportunity to develop these supports. After a thorough investigation of Guggenheim, A Tale of Two Schools concludes that CPS did not provide teachers and staff with the necessary assistance to improve the school. The district, in fact, imposed policies that weakened all five of the Essential Supports. After defeating the 2010 closing attempt, CPS restricted Guggenheim even more, creating serious barriers to the school’s proposed action plan. Then, two years later, CPS came back to Guggenheim and completed the systematic destruction of the school, shuttering its doors for good.
“People feel a disinvestment in the school, the principal changes mid-year, how good is that?” said Rene Heybach of the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless. At the end of 2011, 91 Guggenheim students qualified as homeless, according to the school’s homeless liaison, paraprofessional Sherri Parker.
“All this conflict starts happening, it makes you feel like your school is disintegrating, and guess what, it is disintegrating,” Heybach said.
Research for A Tale of Two Schools was supported by a grant from Communitas Charitable Trust, a family foundation funding education and community groups that are committed to empowering people in their schools and communities to establish institutions with the capacity to execute collaborative and democratic practices.
“We fear that this massive school closings plan by CPS will destabilize and destroy communities, thus we chose to help CTU develop this project because CTU has demonstrated its ability and commitment to supporting teachers, parents and community develop strong cooperative actions within their schools and their communities,” Communitas said in a written statement.
CPS is creating a vicious cycle of disinvestment and population suppression that severely limits the ability of African-American communities on the South and West sides to reemerge as thriving neighborhoods. Eighty-eight percent of the students affected by school actions from 2001 to 2012 were African-American. Out of the 54 schools proposed for closure in 2013, 88 percent are African-American and only 125 of the 16,119 total students—0.78 percent—are white.
By closing neighborhood schools, Mayor Rahm Emanuel and CPS are declaring these communities dead zones that are unworthy of targeted investment. But at each school proposed for closing, consolidation, co-location or turnaround, there is a story, a story that involves real students, teachers, staff and administrators who are inextricably linked to their school. Schools are not just a building for students and staff; they are a second home. It is easy to lose the human element when applying complex data, but we cannot let these stories be forgotten when considering destabilizing school actions.
Instead of closing neighborhood schools, CPS must target resources to strengthen existing programs, add support, remove inequities, provide schools with stable leadership and ensure that teachers have what they need to educate and nurture their students. Schools cannot be saved by closing them, and communities cannot prosper without high-quality schools. CPS is contributing to a vicious cycle of disinvestment and population flight that severely hinders the possible revival of established African-American and integrated communities.
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Beidler has a new building and a great campus. CPS tried to evict them once before to give what was theirs to a charter, and it looks as though that’s the plan again. I wonder if their alderman, Mr. Burnett, will go to bat for them again or if he will just cave in to Rahm.
The corporate reform movement works the same across the nation, this same starving schools thing happen in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. After reopening the schools they basically set them up fro failure. Then they claimed that they needed to “save” them and made them charters. It is amazing what the power of of the dollar can do in America, especially with the African-American communities.
For the reality-based readers of this blog who think outside the edubully-bubble, this is the CTU website homepage:
http://www.ctunet.com
For the article referenced in this posting, please click on:
http://www.ctunet.com/blog/new-report-cites-past-disinvestment-by-cps-in-schools-targeted-for-closure
Click on this link for the pdf file of the full report:
Click to access A-Tale-of-Two-Schools_case-study-report.pdf
Turns out teachers and unions don’t run school districts.
Who knew????
Wow, I’m speechless…and that takes some doing.
What is described here is not a fairly recent development. I taught in the late seventies at one of the 54 schools slated to be closed. I was a special education teacher who was provided with very little resources and some students who were not properly diagnosed. I tried to tell my principal and appointed psychologist about this but no one seemed to care. It came to a point that I could no longer in good faith continue because I could not handle what the CPS was doing to my students. They really wanted to learn and I feel that I made some gains with them but it seemed that the school system did not want this to happen. My hope and desire is to see that positive changes do occur. The students are the most important part of this equation. It is my belief that all children really have the desire and ability to learn. It is only the system that intentionally or unintentionally does not want to see this happen.
DonnaJoy–and sounds like what they are trying to do to Beidler they are doing to Trumbull. Recently, The Sun-Times ran an article that described a tour of Trumbull by an LSC member. More pictures could be viewed online. That school has a beautiful auditorium and a very nice computer lab. The woman explains that the school is not, indeed underutilized. The school has a very large special ed. population (oh, sure, move the special ed. kids all over the place, too…and these are kids who have the MOST trouble adjusting to changes in environment and routine).
Friend have told me that a charter school is looking for a home in a north side neighborhood after being rejected from one such community.
My crystal ball tells me that a charter school will be inhabiting Trumbull very soon.
Proceed With Caution When Closing Schools: Districts must address school closures comprehensively
If closings are to continue as a policy prescription for our most challenged school districts, there needs to be equal commitment to act on the issues that can ameliorate adverse impacts and slow a wrenching trend that challenges communities, strains the capacity of already-overworked central offices, and disrupts the work of teachers and students.
Read more here: http://bit.ly/ZsC05W
EdWeek Commentary piece from Research for Action’s Executive Director, Kate Shaw, and Senior Policy Analyst, Adam Schott. http://www.researchforaction.org/