Archives for category: Emanuel, Rahm
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Day #11, Dyett Hunger Strike

By dianeravitch
August 27, 2015 //
10

In day 11 of the Dyett High School hunger strike, health professionals warned that the situation was dangerous and urged the mayor to accept the strikers’ petition.

“”This is truly an emergency,” said Dr. Linda Rae Murray, chief medical officer for the Cook County Department of Public Health, as she delivered a letter Thursday signed by 17 local doctors and nurses to Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s office on the fifth floor of City Hall.

“We consider the current situation to be a deepening health emergency in our city,” the letter states. “It is one you can abate by reaching out to the strikers, entertaining their grievances and accepting their proposal.”

“We’re here as medical professionals to inform the public to call on the mayor to take action immediately,” Murray added….”

“This has become a really serious issue,” Raether said. “We believe the mayor needs to respond to a health emergency.”

Yet Emanuel hinted Thursday the entire Dyett reopening may be in doubt.

“While saying that his newly appointed Board of Education President Frank Clark and CPS Chief Executive Officer Forrest Claypool are “going to work through a number of issues as it relates to the Dyett High School, its future and its part of the community,” he immediately pointed out there are 10 high schools within a three-mile radius of Dyett.

“Within about a mile of the school is King College Prep,” Emanuel added during an impromptu news conference Thursday morning. “So there’s a lot of high schools in that area. How do you talk about another one when even some of the high schools within the three-mile radius are not at capacity yet?”

Categories Chicago, Emanuel, Rahm

Rahm Picks a Non-Educator as CEO

By dianeravitch
July 19, 2015 //
68

Rahm Emanuel picked an experienced technocrat to lead the Chicago Public Schools, after misfortunes with out-of-town educators J.C. Brizard and Barbara Byrd-Bennett.

Catalyst, the Chicago education publication, says that Emanuel is reverting to “the Daley way” by choosing a non-educator, in this case one who is known for cost cutting.

“Today, Emanuel opted for his own chief of staff and the former president of the Chicago Transit Authority, Forrest Claypool — who has no experience in education and says his first priority will be “making the system as efficient as it can possibly be.”

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Chicago, Emanuel, Rahm

Chicago Principal Asks What Matters Most: Children or Business?

By dianeravitch
July 11, 2015 //
2

Troy LaRaviere, principal of Blaine Elementary School in Chicago, challenges Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s claim that he could not avoid layoffs and could not fund educators’ pensions.

Not true, writes LaRaviere.

“However — as I understand it — we do not want to stop at just
being functional. We want to be effective. We want to be excellent.

“For that to happen, we need early at-home interventions for preschool-age children from low-income households, smaller student-to-teacher ratios, thoughtful training for teachers, a competitive compensation and benefits package to attract skilled professionals. We need a rich arts curriculum, exceptional educators whose efforts are focused on the children who come to us less prepared than their peers, a rigorous curriculum tailored to local student needs and the thoughtful use of technology in schools.

“The 2013 budget cuts meant that many of our students lost some of those things — the resources that move a school from being functional to being excellent. The 2015 budget cuts will mean that my students — and students across Chicago — will lose even more.

“Politicians frame this as pension payment vs. classroom investment — as if those were the only two expenses our tax dollars are used for and one of them has to be sacrificed. This is patently false. City Hall has had many opportunities for sacrifice in other areas, but it has refused to make those sacrifices.

“Mayor Rahm Emanuel had a chance to sacrifice the diversion of $55 million in taxes to a hotel near McCormick Place. He could have invested some of that tax increment financing money in the pension system instead.”

LaRaviere lists other savings that were there for the Mayor, but he never asked business to sacrifice. Only the children.

He writes:

“Emanuel says one thing, but his behavior says another. He has put investor profits over investing in our teachers and their classrooms.

“He wants us to get used to that. I will never get used to that.

“And neither should you.”

By the way, the tag line on Principal LaRaviere’s email is: “You can’t put students first if you put teachers last.”

Categories Budget Cuts, Chicago, Democrats, Education Industry, Emanuel, Rahm, Funding, Scandals Fraud and Hoaxes

Rahm is So Clever: Don’t Try This at Home

By dianeravitch
July 2, 2015 //
24

Mike Klonsky updates us on Rahm’s financial hustle. 

Rahm Emanuel, who learned his creative financing tricks, like “scoop and toss” bond financing while working for Bruce Rauner at GTCR, plans to borrow $500M from the Chicago Teachers Pension Fund, one day after paying the Fund $634M in overdue required city contributions.

The real cost of this trickery is felt right in the classroom with 1,400 teachers and staff being hit with lay-off notices yesterday.

That is what is called “chutzpah.” He pays the pension contribution, borrows from the teachers’ pension funds, and lays off 1,400 teachers.

Categories Chicago, Emanuel, Rahm, Pensions

Chicago: Barbara Byrd-Bennett Resigns. Who Is Next?

By dianeravitch
June 2, 2015 //
19

Mike Klonsky speculates on who might replace Barbara Byrd-Bennett, who resigned in the midst of a federal investigation of a $20 million np-bid contract to SUPES, a principal training program that BBB once worked for.

Will it be the return of Paul Vallas? A businessman?

MIke says it doesn’t matter.

“Meanwhile, the media debate is all about whether Rahm should appoint another career educator like BBB or J.C Brizard, or another non-educator business guy? I don’t think it makes a damn bit of difference so long as either one, along with the hand-picked school board, are mere puppy dogs. It’s mayoral control of the schools that’s the real issue here. The fact that Rahm is shopping for Chicago’s 6th CEO in 6 years following Huberman, Mazany, Brizard, Byrd-Bennett, and Ruiz, makes my point. Instability is the name of the game and when things go south, like a major scandal or a teachers strike, they are all easily replaceable.

“We need an elected school board and an end to autocratic rule over the schools.”

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Chicago, Emanuel, Rahm

Chicago: No-bid Contract, $20 Million, Anyone Accountable?

By dianeravitch
May 27, 2015 //
5

News from Chicago about what happens when the Feds start digging and turn over rocks.

Michael Klonsky tells the story here

The cast of characters: Rahm EMANUEL, Paul Vallas, Barbara Byrd-Bennett, and more.

Business as usual in Chicago? Crony capitalism? A city with a big deficit, so big it closed 50 schools. .

Categories Accountability, Chicago, Emanuel, Rahm

CTU Will Picket to Oppose Charter Expansion

By dianeravitch
May 26, 2015 //
5

NEWS ADVISORY

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CONTACT: Stephanie Gadlin
May 26, 2015 312-329-6250

CTU to lead picket before Chicago Board of Education meeting calling for halt to charter school expansion

CHICAGO—The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) has organized a picket line before the Chicago Board of Education meeting on Wednesday, May 27, to highlight the hypocrisy of the district’s insistence on expanding charter operations throughout the city while claiming a $1 billion budget deficit. The financial “crisis” for Chicago Public Schools is the result of the district’s own fiscal irresponsibility—hundreds of millions of dollars mired in scandal, swap deals and failed, privatized outsourcing. By allowing the unchecked growth of charter schools, including some into closed neighborhood school buildings, CPS continues its plan to weaken communities by creating a culture of chaos that the district will use to justify cutting school budgets, closing schools and laying off thousands of CPS educators and education support staff.

Four Points of CPS Charter Hypocrisy

· Lying to the Illinois General Assembly that there would be no charter schools placed into any school building that was part of the mass school closings in 2013. CPS is “selling” the Peabody Elementary School building—closed in 2013—and putting Rowe Charter into that building.

· Expanding charter operations—a Noble Street charter school moving into the Uptown neighborhood; Rowe moving into the Peabody building; a Perspectives charter school moving to 85th & Lafayette—as the district claims a massive budget deficit

· Ignoring community opposition to place a Noble Street charter school into a community that has voiced outrage over the proposal. “They told my mom what she wanted to hear to get me and my brother to go there, but she realized after a few years of struggle, that the school doesn’t live up to its promise,” said a former Noble Street student who is now attending a neighborhood high school in Uptown. Another student added: “Noble schools don’t work with kids to do better—they just kick them out to their neighborhood schools.”

· Rewarding an ally of Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Alderman Howard Brookins with the lucrative placement of a Perspectives charter school into the Rev. Charles Jenkins’ Legacy Project development, with no disclosure of how the project is being financed.

WHO:

CTU teachers, community partners and allies

WHAT:

Picket line before the Chicago Board of Education meeting

WHEN:

Wednesday, May 27, 2015, at 6:30 a.m.

WHERE:

Chicago Board of Education
42 W. Madison St.
Chicago

Categories Charter Schools, Chicago, Emanuel, Rahm

BREAKING NEWS: Rahm Emanuel Re-Elected Mayor of Chicago

By dianeravitch
April 7, 2015 //
63

Rahm Emanuel was re-elected to a second term. Preliminary estimates show a 56-44 win. He had a huge financial advantage over his opponent, Jesus “Chuy” Garcia.

This is a defeat for the progressive wing of the Democratic Party and a big win for the Status Quo corporatist wing.

“The mayor raised about $20 million through last week, easily outpacing Garcia, who brought in about $4 million. The hefty cash advantage enabled the mayor to run a steady stream of ads that raised questions about his challenger’s résumé and his plan for remedying the city’s problems.”

Categories Chicago, Emanuel, Rahm

The Big-Money Guys Behind Rahm

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2015 //
12

The Network for Public Education took a look at who is financing the candidates for Mayor in Chicago.

Not surprising. Chuy Garcia is sustained by small donations. The big money is betting on Rahm.

Categories Chicago, Emanuel, Rahm

Who Is Rahm’s Constituency?

By dianeravitch
April 4, 2015 //
9

Anthony Moser writes a guest column for EduShyster, asking and answering some questions about Mayor Rahm’s campaign: Who is funding it? Who benefits most from the mayor’s determination to make (or keep) Chicago “a world-class city”?

Moser looks at the city’s TIF (Tax Incentive Fund):

“This, presumably, is the justification for Rahm’s obsessive focus on downtown. Nearly half of the money collected in TIF districts has gone to the central business district. In case you are unfamiliar, TIFs are a means of diverting property taxes from their normal destinations, like schools and parks, and instead earmarking the funds for *development.* As originally enshrined in Illinois law, they were tools for improving blighted districts. Of course the Loop does not fit most definitions of *blight,* but the complicated rules of TIFs allow money to be shunted around between adjoining districts, so that money collected in Englewood can fund development downtown. Wealth does not flow from the prosperous center to the impoverished fringes, but instead the growth of downtown is financed by the parts of our city most in need….”

“Our mayor came into power after living in the city for less than a year with a campaign funded by powerful, wealthy people across the country. He has rewarded them with city contracts and privatization schemes even as he fired ordinary working folks like teachers and janitors by the thousands. He sues to curb pension benefits, while turning over those same pension funds to his friends and donors. He stands before the national media, taking no questions, to celebrate investment by and for the richest among us (and, given his ties to New York, Washington and LA, not among us). The campaign contributions Mayor Emanuel accepts in a week are more than many of the city’s residents could earn in a lifetime.”

For the links to sources, read the article.

Categories Chicago, Corporate Reformers, Emanuel, Rahm
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