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Chicago schools got $5,000 and $10,000 grants to buy computers, improve security systems or offer new programs. The transportation department got $200,000 for new stoplights.
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Fri Mar 14, 2008 at 10:31 AM
Friday Morning News
A residential school. Interesting. CPS and other agencies shouldn’t balk at the price tag. You know, government will “pay now or pay later” for poor young people in dysfunctional or homeless families.
Wonder how well these operations would be run, coordinating between the residential and school elements, considering the shambles that has been made of CPS’s special education process and services. These students, by definition, will be high needs and likely to require intensive services in academic, social, emotional and function arenas.
What repulses me is the way the Chicago education reports always insert their limited “college-as-holy-grail” line in their stories about poor children and youth! Why don’t we hear/see a more complete line about all real options for young people, especially poor kids, in these stories? Instead, why don’t these reporters reflexively mention “training for skilled trades, military or national service, and business entrepreneurship” in addition to their limited mention of “college”?
Wonder how well these operations would be run, coordinating between the residential and school elements, considering the shambles that has been made of CPS’s special education process and services. These students, by definition, will be high needs and likely to require intensive services in academic, social, emotional and function arenas.
What repulses me is the way the Chicago education reports always insert their limited “college-as-holy-grail” line in their stories about poor children and youth! Why don’t we hear/see a more complete line about all real options for young people, especially poor kids, in these stories? Instead, why don’t these reporters reflexively mention “training for skilled trades, military or national service, and business entrepreneurship” in addition to their limited mention of “college”?
Fri Mar 14, 2008 at 11:22 AM
Friday Morning News
I agree with college-Bound...while there needs to be work done in terms of letting students know about options and getting them involved in the process of applying to college, I think it's ridiculous to think that all students need or want to go to college.
I'm always interested in how in depth some of these "college-completion" studies are conducted. The stupendously high cost of attending four-year colleges is often a deterrent and an obstacle to finishing school for some people. You need money to pay for books or to contribute to tuition, so then you go get a part-time job. Then the part-time may turn into a full-time job and you like the money and school becomes a distant thought. I've seen that happen time after time with smart young folks who just had other priorities... just something to think about.
Also- skilled trades are a great and necessary component of keeping local economies humming. Frankly, I've thought about going to get training for a skilled trade even though I have an MBA. Let's be real there are also lots of folks who go to college like it's an end-sum game. 4-year College is not the end and there are too many students in college who haven't thought about application of skills and how they will actually make a living once they leave a school.
I'm always interested in how in depth some of these "college-completion" studies are conducted. The stupendously high cost of attending four-year colleges is often a deterrent and an obstacle to finishing school for some people. You need money to pay for books or to contribute to tuition, so then you go get a part-time job. Then the part-time may turn into a full-time job and you like the money and school becomes a distant thought. I've seen that happen time after time with smart young folks who just had other priorities... just something to think about.
Also- skilled trades are a great and necessary component of keeping local economies humming. Frankly, I've thought about going to get training for a skilled trade even though I have an MBA. Let's be real there are also lots of folks who go to college like it's an end-sum game. 4-year College is not the end and there are too many students in college who haven't thought about application of skills and how they will actually make a living once they leave a school.
Fri Mar 14, 2008 at 12:02 PM
Friday Morning News
CPS has had residential schools before, one was called the Chicago Residential School and it was located on west Irving Park Rd year ago. When it was started it was supposedly state of the art with strong support from CPS, by the 1960s CPS could not afford the program. There began to be major problems in the dorms, some of which were reported in the media, the school was eventually closed.
Initially the long term funding of such a project is one of my concerns. There are very complex issues relating to special education students who may be in such a residential school that at this time I do not want to enter in to. The fact that North Lawdale Charter is being initially proposed to run one of the schools according to the Tribune is odd, because NLCS in 2007 did not meet the adequate yearly progress standard for either math or reading for its juniors on the State Report Card.
The NLCHS graduation rate listed in the State Report Card for students with disabilities in 2007 was only 27.3%, while nearby Manley Career Academy had a 45.9% graduation rate for its students with disabilities, and the city wide average graduation rate for students with disabilities was about 42.7%. This also concerns me.
Rod Estvan
Access Living
Initially the long term funding of such a project is one of my concerns. There are very complex issues relating to special education students who may be in such a residential school that at this time I do not want to enter in to. The fact that North Lawdale Charter is being initially proposed to run one of the schools according to the Tribune is odd, because NLCS in 2007 did not meet the adequate yearly progress standard for either math or reading for its juniors on the State Report Card.
The NLCHS graduation rate listed in the State Report Card for students with disabilities in 2007 was only 27.3%, while nearby Manley Career Academy had a 45.9% graduation rate for its students with disabilities, and the city wide average graduation rate for students with disabilities was about 42.7%. This also concerns me.
Rod Estvan
Access Living
Fri Mar 14, 2008 at 3:13 PM
Friday Morning News
The Tribune article on Boarding Schools postively mentions the SEED Boarding School in Washington DC. What follows is part of an opt-Ed that appeared in DC last year relating to SEED it was written by Lee Glazer.
At this point, a few words about SEED charter school are in order. SEED receives over $25,000 from the city per student enrolled, more than twice what DC public schools receive. Records provided by the Public Charter School Board, which granted SEED’s
charter in 1998, show that SEED has spent over $60 million in its eight-year history, with over $39.5 million from DC tax-dollars and the remainder from federal funding and grants from private donors such as the Walton Foundation (controlled by Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton’s family). The result of this $60 million: 41 graduates. While SEED boasts that all of its graduates have gone on to college, their promotional literature doesn’t mention that their graduation rate is only 58.6%, well below the average for DC public schools.
Even more serious, though, than this profligate use of public money is the question of what has happened to the 41.4% of the SEED students who didn’t make it to graduation day. Although the school presents itself as a nurturing, academically rigorous alternative
for low-income, “high risk” children, SEED has an unusually high rate of suspension and expulsion. Many more students voluntarily leave the school after spending three or four years without advancing to ninth grade. These students leave SEED without a single Carnegie unit toward high school graduation. Former SEED students have reported
feeling traumatized and needing treatment for depression. In one incident that borders on the criminally negligent, one former student reported that he lost consciousness at school – and school authorities did not inform his mother until the next day.
At this point, a few words about SEED charter school are in order. SEED receives over $25,000 from the city per student enrolled, more than twice what DC public schools receive. Records provided by the Public Charter School Board, which granted SEED’s
charter in 1998, show that SEED has spent over $60 million in its eight-year history, with over $39.5 million from DC tax-dollars and the remainder from federal funding and grants from private donors such as the Walton Foundation (controlled by Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton’s family). The result of this $60 million: 41 graduates. While SEED boasts that all of its graduates have gone on to college, their promotional literature doesn’t mention that their graduation rate is only 58.6%, well below the average for DC public schools.
Even more serious, though, than this profligate use of public money is the question of what has happened to the 41.4% of the SEED students who didn’t make it to graduation day. Although the school presents itself as a nurturing, academically rigorous alternative
for low-income, “high risk” children, SEED has an unusually high rate of suspension and expulsion. Many more students voluntarily leave the school after spending three or four years without advancing to ninth grade. These students leave SEED without a single Carnegie unit toward high school graduation. Former SEED students have reported
feeling traumatized and needing treatment for depression. In one incident that borders on the criminally negligent, one former student reported that he lost consciousness at school – and school authorities did not inform his mother until the next day.
Sat Mar 15, 2008 at 5:53 AM
Friday Morning News
As the note above on SEED shows, there needs to be a lot more "transparency" in the operations and finances of Chicago's charter schools before anyone should jump on the bandwagons for these intertwined plans (since if North Lawndale College Prep is involved, this thingy is both charter school and "residential" school). Right now, our colleagues in the media have been letting Arne Duncan get away with burying the actual expenses and budgets for Chicago's charter schools in "Contractual and Other Services" at the time of the annual budget presentations. It's been going on for several years, and nobody (except a couple of us) has demanded that Duncan be forced to provide the details of charter funding -- all of it, including the stuff that's controlled by Eden Martin from various private entities -- before any of this nonsense moves ahead.
As Rod Estvan points out, Chicago has always had residential schools. Usually, these are specialized places (Lawrence Hall, for example) that serve (or are supposed to serve) young people with very special needs.
The other major category is Nancy B. Jefferson and Consuela York schools (at the Juvenile Detention Center and Cook County Jail, respectively).
Before anyone goes around jumping for joy about the latest Duncanian duplicity (even if it is leaked to the public via editorial board feedings at the Tribune and then recycled as "news" above the fold on page one), let's hope there will be some close examinations of the underlying needs for these things (if any exists at all) and then whether that need can best be filled by North Lawndale Charter Preparatory High School (or any of the other off-the-books privatization schemes Duncan's been promoting for the past seven years).
Not that I expect much from the remaining "reporters" on this beat. After all, when the general line of every news story is set by Arne Duncan's Power Point presentations to the editorial board, why should we expect to get any unscreened information in the news columns?
As Rod Estvan points out, Chicago has always had residential schools. Usually, these are specialized places (Lawrence Hall, for example) that serve (or are supposed to serve) young people with very special needs.
The other major category is Nancy B. Jefferson and Consuela York schools (at the Juvenile Detention Center and Cook County Jail, respectively).
Before anyone goes around jumping for joy about the latest Duncanian duplicity (even if it is leaked to the public via editorial board feedings at the Tribune and then recycled as "news" above the fold on page one), let's hope there will be some close examinations of the underlying needs for these things (if any exists at all) and then whether that need can best be filled by North Lawndale Charter Preparatory High School (or any of the other off-the-books privatization schemes Duncan's been promoting for the past seven years).
Not that I expect much from the remaining "reporters" on this beat. After all, when the general line of every news story is set by Arne Duncan's Power Point presentations to the editorial board, why should we expect to get any unscreened information in the news columns?
Sat Mar 15, 2008 at 6:06 AM
Friday Morning News
There is also a Josef Nurek angle to this whole thing about having ongoing pajama parties with the children, whether at CICS, North Lawndale, or the "Sherman School of Excellence" and AUSL.
Fans will remember that Josef Nurek became the 21st Century poster child for high level predators in Chicago's public schools by having a live in child boyfriend at his northwest side apartment as well as participating avidly and actively in an international _____ ring while serving as Principal of CICS "Belden Campus" a couple of years ago.
Of course, Nurek was only following in the footsteps of one of his more famous predecessors from the previous century, Chicago high school principals James Moffat. Moffat, once a friend of the Daley family, was found guilty of having preying on five boys and girls while serving as a public school principal in CPS during the 1980s. Moffat had counted on his clout (and, among other things, his friendship with the Daley family and the fact that Anne Burke -- yes, that Anne Burke -- was his lawyer at the trial) to get him off. Instead, he became the most powerful predator ever to be found guilty of such crimes in the history of public education (a former Deputy Supt. who had been demoted to principal).
Despite the fact that Education Week always leaves the Moffat story out of its roundups on s____ predation in schools, it's still a fact of history.
Now to the guess what.
If Arne Duncan allows a deregulated thingy like North Lawndale College Prep to take over the slumber parties (we've already seen an example of this in the partly regulated AUSL nonsense out at Sherman, as reported over the Labor Day weekend 2006 in the Tribune), can we really expect things to remain clean and well policed?
Give me a break.
All you have to do to get a charter school teaching job in Chicago is repeat all those mantras about how you believe "All children can learn" and maybe thrown in a few talking points from the particular nonsense on the particular charter school's website (if it's current; most falter within a year because the cost isn't sustained, so be careful).
All that stuff about how you "love children."
Yeah. Like Josef Nurek of CICS Belden in the 21st Century and James Moffat of major Daley family clout back during the 20th Century.
Of course, it won't be Arne Duncan's daughters that are caught up in some nasties during those slumber parties. It's usually (not always) the victims of society (as in poverty, racism, and generalized neglect) that take that hit.
Fans will remember that Josef Nurek became the 21st Century poster child for high level predators in Chicago's public schools by having a live in child boyfriend at his northwest side apartment as well as participating avidly and actively in an international _____ ring while serving as Principal of CICS "Belden Campus" a couple of years ago.
Of course, Nurek was only following in the footsteps of one of his more famous predecessors from the previous century, Chicago high school principals James Moffat. Moffat, once a friend of the Daley family, was found guilty of having preying on five boys and girls while serving as a public school principal in CPS during the 1980s. Moffat had counted on his clout (and, among other things, his friendship with the Daley family and the fact that Anne Burke -- yes, that Anne Burke -- was his lawyer at the trial) to get him off. Instead, he became the most powerful predator ever to be found guilty of such crimes in the history of public education (a former Deputy Supt. who had been demoted to principal).
Despite the fact that Education Week always leaves the Moffat story out of its roundups on s____ predation in schools, it's still a fact of history.
Now to the guess what.
If Arne Duncan allows a deregulated thingy like North Lawndale College Prep to take over the slumber parties (we've already seen an example of this in the partly regulated AUSL nonsense out at Sherman, as reported over the Labor Day weekend 2006 in the Tribune), can we really expect things to remain clean and well policed?
Give me a break.
All you have to do to get a charter school teaching job in Chicago is repeat all those mantras about how you believe "All children can learn" and maybe thrown in a few talking points from the particular nonsense on the particular charter school's website (if it's current; most falter within a year because the cost isn't sustained, so be careful).
All that stuff about how you "love children."
Yeah. Like Josef Nurek of CICS Belden in the 21st Century and James Moffat of major Daley family clout back during the 20th Century.
Of course, it won't be Arne Duncan's daughters that are caught up in some nasties during those slumber parties. It's usually (not always) the victims of society (as in poverty, racism, and generalized neglect) that take that hit.
Sat Mar 15, 2008 at 6:09 AM
Friday Morning News
The reason for my using s____ and similar evasions above is that the censors here at Catalyst don't like using certain words, even when they are necessary to explaining an important story. Maybe that's why Catalyst and Education Week have never gotten around to noting that the two most widespread s_____ scandals during the past 25 years both took place in Chicago and both involved male principals who preyed on, among others, male students.
An incomplete history is dangerous, especially now that anyone can Google it and think they know something.
An incomplete and dishonest history is even more dangerous.
Catalyst and Ed Week are guilty of both.
Why is for someone else to answer.
An incomplete history is dangerous, especially now that anyone can Google it and think they know something.
An incomplete and dishonest history is even more dangerous.
Catalyst and Ed Week are guilty of both.
Why is for someone else to answer.
Sat Mar 15, 2008 at 5:05 PM
Friday Morning News
To whom this may concern,
I read the following article in the Tribune today: No small plan: Public boarding schools for Chicago: School chief wants to launch first residential program as early as 2009. By Carlos Sadovi and Stephanie Banchero.
I think this is a great idea and would love for it to move forward. I am currently enrolled at Concordia University in River Forest in the Masters in Teaching program and would love to be involved in such a project.
I have read about these types of schools and know the positive outcomes related with such an endeavor.
If this does move forward, I will be first in line to apply.
I wish you the best of luck and will continue to look for updates.
Rory Utter
I read the following article in the Tribune today: No small plan: Public boarding schools for Chicago: School chief wants to launch first residential program as early as 2009. By Carlos Sadovi and Stephanie Banchero.
I think this is a great idea and would love for it to move forward. I am currently enrolled at Concordia University in River Forest in the Masters in Teaching program and would love to be involved in such a project.
I have read about these types of schools and know the positive outcomes related with such an endeavor.
If this does move forward, I will be first in line to apply.
I wish you the best of luck and will continue to look for updates.
Rory Utter
