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Local school councils have not figured prominently in the efforts of schools chief Paul Vallas to improve Chicago's public schools. He's clashed openly with a number, mainly over principal selection, and routinely belittles LSC advocacy groups.

At the January 1999 School Board meeting, he said, "Tonight, we've heard about quite a few principals that have been doing a good job, but then they are fired [by their LSCs]. We're going to take a look at that."

Subsequently, Vallas drew up legislation requiring LSCs to renew the contracts of principals who had been rated...

When President Bill Clinton visited Mayer Elementary School in October, he was favorably impressed. "I want what is happening in Chicago to happen all over America," he said, 10 years after then-Secretary of Education William Bennett proclaimed Chicago's school system the worst in the country.

There is widespread evidence that the accountability push got just about everyone working harder. However, critics contend that the work has been narrowly focused on basic-skills tests that bear little resemblance to the academic standards that the School Board itself has adopted and is now...

In fall 1987, then-Mayor Harold Washington's bid to reform the city's schools was blessed with the city's longest teacher strike. The 19-day walkout triggered the community outcry that resulted some 15 months later in the Chicago School Reform Act.

In the fall of 1994, Mayor Richard M. Daley's bid to control the city's schools was blessed with a Republican take-over of state government. With the GOP in charge of the Senate, House and governor's mansion, Daley not only got control of the school system some seven months later, but also got its finances untangled and its unions...

Asked what she might have done differently in 1993, Chicago Teachers Union spokesperson Jackie Gallagher doesn't hesitate: "I'd turn around and walk out the door."

As the union's mutilated three-year contract ran out in August, the board faced a $400 million deficit-almost 15 percent of its budget. The board, the union and the Legislature each wanted the others to foot the bill. Months later, they all swallowed hard, the board cutting still deeper, the union agreeing to a net decrease in take-home pay and the Legislature OKing a massive borrowing package.

In the meantime,...

Cuando la Legislatura de Illinois había realizado su aporte para ayudar a la Junta Escolar a cumplir con el primer contrato de tres años que firmó con el Sindicato de Maestros de Chicago, los dirigentes escolares y sindicales aclamaron una nueva era de paz laboral.

En noviembre de 1990, mientras los legisladores regresaban a sus hogares después de meses de argüir sobre un llamado proyecto de ley de fianza, la presidenta del CTU, Jacqueline Vaughn, proclamó: "El contrato de tres años puede ser puesto en práctica, los programas de educación y los consejos escolares locales que se...

1 Alcalde Richard M. Daley, Director Ejecutivo en Jefe de las Escuelas Paul Vallas y Presidente de la Junta Escolar Gery Chico:

Estos tres mosqueteros dominaron la última mitad de la década con una fuerza inexorable e irresistible de poder político, tacto financiero, arte de venta estelar y una resuelta determinación por alcanzar las metas.

2 G. Alfred Hess Jr. y Donald R. Moore:

Como los directores del Panel de Chicago sobre Política Escolar y Designs for Change (Diseños para el Cambio), respectivamente, Hess y Moore fueron los principales creadores...

Lots of things troubled Pamela Price during the first blush of school reform. The first chairman of the local school council (LSC) at what is now Piccolo Specialty School, Price was concerned about low-performing students, the decrepit building and the rancor that existed between Principal Linda Sienkiewicz and James Stewart, head of the newly split-off middle school.

But she fretted most about the lack of parent involvement. "I was living at the school morning and night," recalls the mother of three. "There I'd be on school property, sometimes with a bullhorn. I'd shout out...

1 Mayor Richard M. Daley, Schools CEO Paul Vallas and School Board President Gery Chico:

These three musketeers dominated the last half of the decade with a juggernaut of political brawn, financial finesse, stellar salesmanship and gritty, get-it-done determination. Balancing budgets, buying labor peace, finding billions for school buildings, ending social promotion and putting schools on probation sit atop a long project list.

2 G. Alfred Hess Jr. and Donald R. Moore:

As the directors of the Chicago Panel on School Policy and Finance and Designs for...

Chicago's tumultuous first year of school reform rocked Spry Elementary School to its core. "Reform or Racism?" blared one newspaper headline as the media—both local and national—zeroed in on the city's most contentious sites. At Spry, two teachers who helped dismiss a long-standing principal sank into a nightmare.

Ten years later—after threatening late-night phone calls, sleepless nights, a smashed car window—that time is still painful to speak of. "I'm not going to say it wasn't worth it, but it left scars," says Mary Cavey, one of the teachers, who years later became Spry's...