catalyst-chicago.org

Up to 30 Chicago public schools with great ideas about how to use a longer school day this fall will receive an extra $100,000 per school under a new, privately-funded “innovation grant’’ competition announced Wednesday. (Sun-Times)

Chicago Public Schools, which has handed out more than $7 million in incentives to teachers and schools willing to lengthen their school days this year, will distribute another $3 million in grants to 30 schools that show ingenuity in how they use the extra 90 minutes. (Tribune)

Parents say over winter break school the staff at Guggenheim Elementary on the South Side made phone calls and house visits with papers to transfer students out. Chicago Public is proposing to close Guggenheim Elementary school, which district officials have called “the worst elementary school in Illinois.” (WBEZ)

The well-heeled education advocacy group Stand for Children on Wednesday group announced that it is launching a radio campaign to “educate Chicagoans about the value of public turnaround schools.” (Catalyst)

IN THE STATE

Illinois high school juniors this year will need to sweat through the grueling college entrance exam twice in order to apply to many top universities, a consequence of the state shelving the high school writing exam to save some money. (Tribune)

Contract talks have broken down after nearly 11 months of negotiations between administrators and teachers at West Chicago’s Community High School. Members of the West Chicago High School Teachers Association late Wednesday filed a notice of the impasse with the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board. (Daily Herald)

IN THE NATION

For the first time, New York City is closing a charter school for the offense of simply being mediocre, and the action could have widespread implications. (The New York Times)

New York City and state education officials announced on Tuesday that they plan to close an entire network of charter high schools in Brooklyn that have had management and financial problems for years. (The New York Times)

In Pennsylvania’s troubled Chester Upland School District, unionized teachers and others, including bus drivers and cafeteria aides, have agreed to work for free because there isn’t enough money to meet the payroll after Wednesday. A combination of drastic budget cuts, poor management, student attrition to charter schools and other factors have left the immediate future of the traditional public schools in doubt in this district. (The Washington Post)