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The best way to deter violence in schools is to develop relationships with kids, says Tio Hardiman of the Chicago Project on Violence Prevention at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Hardiman, who spoke candidly of running away from home as a teenager and eventually moving to another side of town to avoid gangs, advocates using former gang members to work with kids. He talked with Senior Editor Elizabeth Duffrin.

How can schools prevent gang violence?

CPS REORGANIZATION Central office will undergo yet another reorganization, this time in an effort to cut $25 million in administrative costs. To streamline the bureaucracy, Chief Executive Officer Arne Duncan will have fewer people reporting to him directly. The top management position held by David Vitale, who serves as chief administrative officer, will be eliminated. He will serve instead as a senior adviser. When the reorganization is complete this summer, central office will have trimmed its management hierarchy from nine layers to five.

WHO CONDUCTED IT: W. David Stevens, senior research analyst for the Chicago Consortium on School Research; Joseph Kahne, education professor at Mills College in Oakland, Calif.

WHAT THEY STUDIED: Researchers evaluated the quality of professional development at seven of 23 small high schools that are part of the Chicago High School Redesign Initiative. During 2004-2005, they interviewed 59 principals and teachers, observed 47 staff meetings and conducted case studies at three schools.

Next year, it will take more than number crunching to determine which schools are placed on probation. For the first time, district officials will allow for judgment calls that will likely land fewer schools on probation.

Attendance boundaries for four Little Village high schools will remain as currently drawn despite a recently passed referendum that calls for changing them, say officials of Chicago Public Schools.

Last month, voters passed an advisory referendum that calls for CPS to redraw attendance boundaries for the high schools and limit enrollment to Little Village residents. Existing boundaries for the schools encompass the western portion of Little Village, a Latino neighborhood, and a slice of North Lawndale, a predominantly African-American community.

On the frontlines of public education, three new teachers are singing the praises of those who helped them learn the ropes. Derrick Kimbrough, a new 5th-grade teacher at Tarkington Elementary, credits a teaching coach who visits and keeps in touch regularly for helping him do a better job teaching language arts and reading.

At Castellanos Middle School, 7th-grade teacher Julie Voynovich says she relies on her "troubleshooter"—a retiree with 23 years of teaching experience—whenever she needs to know anything.

Los activistas de comunidad en Pilsen aprendieron del trato a finales de Marzo, aproximadamente un mes después de que el distrito lo aprobó y tres meses después de que la UNO oficialmente solicitó que el bordo amplíe su carta para acomodar más dos escuelas, un en Pilsen y un en Avondale. Actualmente, la UNO dirige dos escuelas primarias de carta: Octavio Paz en Lawndale del norte y Rufino Tamayo en Brighton Park.