Chicago Reporter (https://www.chicagoreporter.com/author/lvforte/page/2/)
Lorraine is the executive editor of The Chicago Reporter. Email her at lforte@chicagoreporter.com.
The PARCC is designed to tell all of us–schools, principals, teachers, parents and students–what we know and don’t know about whether students are learning, what we are doing well and what we need help with. That’s a good thing, right? So what’s all the fuss about?
At least 40 states have one or more districts implementing competency education, and that number is growing, according to one 2013 report. In Chicago, Juarez High is using an approach called “benchmarking.”
Of 42 buildings left vacant after the 2013 school closings, CPS immediately found new uses for four. Altogether, 33 are still vacant with no firm repurposing plans. Since the closings, property crimes have gone up in some cases.
Suspensions in CPS are on the decline, and teachers and students say they feel safer, according to a new report. But a lack of data on charter school suspensions, which some advocates say leaves a big question mark in an otherwise positive trend.
Advocates for state-funded child care programs were among those who spoke out at an Illinois Senate hearing in Chicago Monday, joining nearly a dozen organizations that sharply criticized Gov. Bruce Rauner’s proposed $6 billion in budget cuts for 2016.
When we live in the city, pay taxes here and send our kids to public schools, our students will see that despite any differences, we share many common bonds–most importantly, the desire to improve the city that we all call home.
Chicago remains the only city within the nation’s 50 largest school districts to require public school teachers to live in the district. Since 2000, cities have been abolishing their residency requirements for teachers. Chicago needs to follow suit.
With support from the non-profit OneGoal and a lot of hard work and long days during high school, Breyana Floyd made it from her rough Austin neighborhood to quiet Monmouth College, a tiny liberal arts school in western Illinois. Reading her story, you hope and pray she makes it to senior year and graduation. If she does, Breyana will become an all-too-rare success story.
A central tenet for charter schools is freedom from administrative red-tape, which gives these schools the power to determine their own curriculum, tests and school calendar. As it turns out, they also decide on health and safety standards for students. One legislator has already proposed a law to change that. A recent study by the Chicago Medical-Legal Partnership for Children found that because of a legal loophole, only 10 percent of Illinois health and safety laws explicitly apply to charter schools. The study identifies a host of state and local requirements for medical precautions—including vaccinations, food allergy safety and concussion treatment—that don’t apply to charter schools.
Under CS4All, 40 high schools now offer at least one computer science class. Officials say the district is on pace to bring courses to all 96 high schools by 2019.