PRINCI-PALS: Although CPS is asking principals from closing schools and receiving schools to work together, the plans to shut schools have created friction between some principals and staffs at some schools. But two principals two Far South Side elementary schools have forged an unlikely friendship. (Tribune)

REVAMPING SEX EDUCATION: A proposal one step from Gov. Quinn's desk would require that birth control information be included by Illinois schools that choose to teach about sexual activity. Under the bill, schools that teach sex education in grades 6 through 12 would have to emphasize abstinence, but contraception and sexually transmitted disease awareness would be part of the curriculum, too. (Tribune)

CHARTER CHANCES: More than 100 suburban school board members voted against an online charter school in April that was proposed to serve students from Algonquin to Plainfield. But even with such unanimous opposition throughout the region, local educators fear the State Charter School Commission may find reason to overturn the local school boards' decisions. (Daily Herald)

IN THE NATION
TOP JOB OPENINGS: At least 17 well-known districts are facing superintendent vacancies, and the turnover may bring big changes in some school systems. Schools chiefs or interim superintendents will be leaving this year or next in at least 17 well-known districts, including Baltimore; Boston; Clark County, Nev.; Indianapolis; and Wake County, N.C. (Education Week)

WEALTH AND ACCESS: A growing number of teenagers from wealthy families in China are attending schools in New York City, seeking an advantage in admission to American universities. (The New York Times)

CHARTER SUPPORTERS RALLY: Scores of members of Charter Parents United and supporters converged on downtown Wednesday near the Chicago Public Schools headquarters making their demands known to the school district. The group wants CPS to provide “all families with the choice of a high-quality and safe public school.”  The group also lambasted the dozens of Chicago aldermen who support a moratorium on the number of charter public schools in the city. (Chicago Defender)

IN THE STATE
PENSION PROPOSAL: Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan made it clear Thursday that he will pursue a proposal to shift the cost of Downstate teacher pensions away from the state and onto local school districts. (State Journal-Register)

IN THE NATION
HYBRID SCHOOL: D.C. Schools Chancellor Kaya Henderson is seeking to merge a long-struggling elementary school with a high-performing charter school, creating what she describes as a first-of-its-kind partnership between the two types of schools. (The Washington Post)

The announcement comes just days after scandal prompted the state to cut off capital funding to UNO charter schools, and it means the city's charter teachers union will roughly double in size. According to the Illinois Federation of Teachers, more than 20 percent of charter teachers in Chicago will now be union members.

Chicago Alliance of Charter Teachers and Staff (ACTS) began an organizing drive in earnest at UNO charter schools after the charter operator signed a “neutrality agreement” last March. On Wednesday, under the terms of the agreement, an arbitrator began tallied cards signed by union supporters to verify that a majority of teachers wanted the union.

Jessica Hanzlik, an 8^th-grade teacher at UNO Soccer Academy, says that the drive to organize UNO teachers began six weeks ago when the school announced the neutrality agreement with Chicago ACTS.

For years before that, she said, ACTS had done outreach but not a specific organizing campaign.

“They always would periodically call charter school teachers to see if we were happy with our jobs, how things were going,” Hanzlik says.

The organizing drive has given teachers an opportunity to talk about “big-picture education issues,” Hanzlik adds, like strengthening the teaching profession and advocating for students.

Hanzlik hopes a union will help UNO put in place some kind of “peer accountability” system, such as peer evaluations. “Teachers feel a lot of pressure and accountability from above, and we want to start thinking about how to hold each other accountable,” Hanzlik says.

She says a union could also strengthen teachers’ voice in how the school is run, particularly when it concerns school climate.

“We have been working really hard to figure out how to help teachers feel a sense of ownership over their work,” Hanzlik notes. “I think that when this idea was brought to (UNO’s administration), they saw it as an opportunity.”

Historical roots

Emily Rosenberg, director of DePaul University’s Labor Education Center, says that teachers in charter schools are organizing for the same reasons as the public school teachers who first formed unions.

“It’s back to the 1900s,” Rosenberg says. “They don’t have any control over their working conditions, over their class size, whether they get positions they are supposed to get, whether they get raises, whether they get vacation days. This is just history revisiting itself.”

The biggest issue, Rosenberg says, is unfair treatment on the job. “It’s the very tentative nature of your work,” she says.

Before Wednesday’s card tally began, Rosenberg heard that “the cards are flying out of the hands of the reps” for teachers to sign and show their support for a union.

“This neutrality agreement has made all the difference in the world in terms of teachers feeling safe to go ahead and organize,” Rosenberg says.

Dan Montgomery, president of the Illinois Federation of Teachers, says that the agreement has been key to getting a foot in the door at UNO.

Without the agreement, recent rulings that charter schools aren’t covered by the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Act mean that the union would have had to conduct a secret-ballot election after a campaign period during which both employers and the union can set out their perspectives.

“[Employers] will hire anti-union law firms, they will hold captive-audience meetings. Often they will intimidate or fire [teachers],” Montgomery says.

Union expansion uncertain

Chicago ACTS’ ability to unionize other charter schools may be limited for that reason. Years of legal battles have kept it from gaining a foothold at Chicago Math and Science Academy, and at Latino Youth High School.

An April 18 secret-ballot vote at Latino Youth, which was 10 to 1 in favor of a union, may put an end to the strife, says Chris Baehrend, a teacher at the school who is also vice president of Chicago ACTS.

“We’ve gone almost three years without a proper say in how the school is run, how the budget is run, having a salary scale. It’s dispiriting,” Baehrend says.

In Sept. 2010, Baehrend says, a majority of teachers signed union cards. But the school asked the National Labor Relations Board to intervene, claiming that the state educational labor relations law didn’t apply because Latino Youth is a charter school.

But now that the vote is wrapped up, Baehrend says, “we have our letter ready to demand to bargain” as soon as the results are certified by the National Labor Relations Board.

Baehrend says working conditions, turnover and firings prompted teachers to unionize. He says that a month after he was hired at the school in fall 2009, his pension match was cut, requiring him to fork over the entire 9 percent of his salary to the Chicago Teachers Pension Fund. His health insurance premium went up 50 percent. 

“We didn’t get any new textbooks,” Baehrend says. “We were taken to a place called SCARCE in Glen Ellyn--schools dump off old textbooks and educators can go there to pick them up. There were no computers for classroom use. The photocopier often didn’t work. It was like, how do you teach like this?”

He wants to see teachers represented on a committee that makes hiring and firing decisions at the school. He’d also like to see teacher-led professional development and more advance notice for teachers regarding whether their jobs will continue from year to year. In one case, he says, he was notified a week before school started. “We have lost so many great teachers because we don’t even know if we have a job,” Baehrend says.

Montgomery says charter unions may continue to grow.

“If people think that somehow the path ahead to better schools is to deprive teachers of the ability to organize, they are deeply misguided,” he says. “Unions will change the way they look, but you are never going to get rid of people seeking a collective voice in where they work, whether it’s Starbucks, Boeing, or schools. That’s the way human beings work--they want their issues addressed.”

DANGER ZONES: Nearly half of the 1,054 youths murdered in Chicago during the past five years were killed within census tracts where schools are closing, according to The Chicago Reporter. But CPS says it's preparing safety plans to address potential problems related to gang turfs and street violence. Its Safe Passage program, which stations adults along routes that students take to school to oversee their safety, has been budgeted a nearly $8 million increase in funding next year and will be implemented at all of the receiving schools.

CHARTER GREEN LIGHT: A charter group's bid to open a school in McKinley Park cleared a big hurdle Tuesday, when the city's zoning board approved a switch to convert a vacant factory into one of the city's newest charter schools. "Everything is ready to go," said Salim Ucan, vice president for Des Plaines-based Concept Charter Schools, which operates 27 schools across the Midwest, including the Chicago Math and Science Academy in Rogers Park. (DNAInfo.com)

FROZEN MEALS: Dozens of Chicago Public Schools food service workers rallied Tuesday afternoon to call for an end to quickly prepared frozen meals that can be readied in smaller kitchens by fewer workers. According to Unite Here Local 1, which organized the rally, 25 percent of CPS schools serve prepackaged meals that arrive at the schools frozen. In a statement, the district said sites that serve frozen meals often "don't have full kitchens or their space doesn't meet code standards to prepare food." (Tribune)

CHARTER BARTER: Several area school district superintendents are asking parents and others to support legislation that would impose a one-year moratorium on the creation of new virtual charter schools.
The move follows the recent rejection by 18 suburban school districts of a proposed online charter school for children in kindergarten through high school. (Tribune)

GAME'S ON—AGAIN: The baseball game between Walter Payton College Preparatory High School and Gwendolyn Brooks College Preparatory Academy was rescheduled again, this time for May 11. Last weekend, Payton's baseball team forfeited the originally scheduled game. Payton's coach William Wittleder told several news outlets that parents didn't want their sons to travel to Brooks' home field in the Roseland neighborhood on the city's Far South Side. (Tribune)

IN THE NATION
RHEE FINANCED: The Walton Family Foundation, a supporter of school choice and parent-empowerment causes, announced today that it would invest $8 million in StudentsFirst, a school improvement advocacy organization led by former District of Columbia Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee. The foundation's $8 million in funding, which will be doled out over the next two years, is an increase from the $3 million the foundation has given StudentsFirst since 2010. (Education Weekly)

But the district is proposing 11 co-locations, eight of which involve charters moving into buildings with traditional neighborhood schools. The proposals have reignited fears among some activists, parents and even school staff--not only about the logistics of space-sharing but that the co-locations are just a back-door way of kicking out a traditional school.

There’s precedent for their anxiety: Co-locations in CPS have not worked out smoothly and have been marked by tenuous relationships between students and staff. In some cases, charter schools have taken over.

Still, concern about co-locations is not just about sharing buildings with charter schools. Teachers and parents at Marshall Middle School are also alarmed at the prospect of sharing a building with Disney Magnet 2 High School.

Beginning of the end?

Two high schools also appear to be in a particularly precarious position: Bowen and Corliss.

Both schools are in similar straits—located in tough South Side neighborhoods, struggling to lower dropout rates and raise test scores. Both have the building capacity for about 1,000 students but have enrollment of only around 500.

CPS proposes to have both Bowen and Corliss share buildings with Noble Street charter schools. Noble Street charters have an average of 50 percent of students meeting or exceeding standards on the Prairie State exam, compared to a district average of 32 percent. And though students do not take entrance exams for charters, Noble Street expects students to attend an orientation to pick up an application in order to be part of the admissions lottery (a step that critics say makes the charters selective, in comparison to neighborhood schools).

Noble Street leaders have not completely signed on to the co-locations yet and are still looking at the option, said Angela Montagna, the charter operator’s director of external affairs. A CPS official said charter schools could turn down the offered space, but won’t be offered alternative.

Chris Goins, slated to be principal of the Noble Street at Corliss, said he is recruiting students from the Pullman neighborhood and engaging the community to sell them on the school.  

Corliss Principal Leonard Harris said he doesn’t see Noble Street as a threat, but rather as offering more opportunity to students in the area. “I am not fearful,” he said. “Corliss is a good school.”

However, three teachers from Corliss showed up at a public hearing in April to voice their concerns.

Eva Dervin said she and other teachers want to know if the co-location is a precursor to a phase-out.  “If so, we should be told that at the beginning instead of being told two years down the line,” she said.

Mandy Walker-Edwards added that students who don’t meet the expectations of Noble Street will land at Corliss.

“Now, instead of us getting selective enrollment status like Noble Street, we will still be a [neighborhood] school,” she said. “We have to take whatever student at whatever academic status. It is like you are pitting one school against the other. One gets selective enrollment and you tell the other, take whatever [student] is out there.” 

“Nothing to help our students”

At Corliss, the principal is putting a positive spin on the co-location. But at Bowen, Principal Jennifer Kirmes talks about her trepidation at the prospect and her dismay at not being consulted before the plans were drawn up.  

The exterior of Bowen’s main building is a gracious, red brick. But inside, it’s age show. Some ceiling tiles are missing and paint is crumbling. The school will get some repairs because of the co-location, though CPS proposes to put Noble Street in an annex. Noble Street receives a lot of private donations and usually does a complete renovation before moving in, and Kirmes wonders how this will make her students feel.

Kirmes is also upset she was never consulted before the plans were drawn up. She recently won funding, through the city’s Ready to Learn program, to open a preschool in a part of the annex that once housed one. “It has little toilets and little sinks, so it doesn’t need a major renovation, just a little elbow grease,” Kirmes says.  

She plans to offer Bowen students the option of career education courses in early childhood, giving them the chance to do an internship at the preschool. The early childhood program will go forward, but Kirmes doesn’t have the money to renovate another space and doesn’t know where she will put the preschool if the annex is occupied.

Kirmes also points out a safety concern. Noble Street schools do not, as a practice, have metal detectors. The charter’s students will have to use a gym in the main building, and Kirmes says security staff are worried about students being in the main building without having been screened.

“I want to be cooperative and collaborative, but I also want us to survive,” Kirmes says.

Bowen recently experienced a dramatic shift in 2011, when it was consolidated back into one school after being split up into four small schools. Teacher Magen Kilcoyne points out that the current crop of juniors started freshman year at a small school, went to a consolidated school their sophomore year, got a new principal their junior year and now will face having a “completely remapped building.”

“It does absolutely nothing to help our students in terms of much needed resources and the overall quality of their education,” Kilcoyne says. “It does, however, tell them that they are not a priority and are very much dispensable to those at the top. What picture does this paint, when another fully functioning, [highly] resourced school takes up their space? It seems quite clear that this is just the first step in slowly destroying this public school.”

A third high school that will co-locate with a charter is Hope, which will share its building with a new KIPP middle school. Several Englewood residents attended public hearings to say they wanted KIPP to come to their neighborhood and no Hope representative came to oppose it.

Ironically, however, Hope used to have middle grades, with a 6^th through 12^th grade configuration. At that time, Hope was the highest-scoring school, at those grade levels, in the area.

When Englewood High School was closed to make way for Urban Prep and Team Englewood, Hope was turned into a receiving school for high school students and was stripped of its middle grades. Since then, its test scores have plummeted.

Not just concern about charters

Charter takeover remain the biggest concern among some activists and parents, in particular those at Wadsworth Elementary in Woodlawn.  CPS is proposing that the University of Chicago Charter High School-Woodlawn take over the Wadsworth building that both schools have shared for several years. The charter will take in 60 more students.

“Do you think it is fair for Wadsworth school to relocate to another building just because the University of Chicago wants to expand their charter school?” said Wadsworth LSC chair Pamela Jernigan, sparking applause at a public meeting in April. “CPS, if you really want to make a strong impact and impress us all, then put a moratorium on all charter school actions. They are only options and not solutions to the public school fiasco.”

Later, Jernigan said the experience of building-sharing has not been good. For one, it has provided a sharp contrast between a school that has a wealth of resources and one that does not.

From the day it opened in 2006, the charter school had a lab of brand new Apple computers. Students also had laptops. But up until last year, Wadsworth had a room of outdated computers, Jernigan said. “It sends the wrong message to children.”

Jernigan also doesn’t like the fact that Wadsworth’s students are being sent a few blocks west to Dumas, into an area along 67^th Street that is considered more dangerous. “If it weren’t for the charter school, Dumas would likely be coming here,” she said.

But Shayne Evans, director of the University of Chicago Charter Schools, insists that the charter school didn’t request and doesn’t need the rest of the building, even with the additional students.  He also notes that he and the school’s staff have not assessed the rest of the building, nor have they inquired about how much it would cost the charter in facilities rent paid to CPS.

Though specific plans have not been developed, Evans says it might be better to build a new high school, rather than try to make an old elementary school work.

Yet Evans says he would like the school to enroll more students. As one of the few charters with an attendance boundary, the school got about 700 applications this year for a class of 160 students.

“We have a huge demand and we are trying our best to serve it,” Evans says.

The initial complaint against UNO was filed by PURE and members of the Pilsen Academy local school council and parent community on Jan. 17, 2013. "That complaint called on the EIG to investigate how the politically connected organization has been able to amass $98 million in legislative earmarks and nearly $70 million in tax-exempt bonds without proper oversight of what seems like a complicated financial shell game," the news release said.

GOLDEN APPLE WINNER: TEAM Englewood Community Academy freshman English teacher Katherine Dube was the first of 10 2013 recipients of the Golden Apple Award for Excellence in Teaching to be announced this year. Gov. Pat Quinn, a media swarm, Dube’s family and a host of other well-wishers poured into Dube’s classroom Monday morning to make the surprise announcement. She was nominated by her principal. Each award winner receives a tuition-free, spring quarter sabbatical to study at Northwestern University as well as $3,000 in cash. (Sun-Times)

IN THE NATION
SHORT TIMERS: About half of the first-year teachers that Florida's Duval County Public Schools recruits are gone within five years, according to a study released Monday by the Jacksonville Public Education Fund. A combination of low pay, too much paperwork and a lack of voice in district and state education decision-making are the main reasons for the turnover, the study shows. (Florida Times-Union)

CORE CRITICISM: As public schools across the country transition to the new Common Core standards, which bring wholesale change to the way math and reading are taught in 45 states and the District of Columbia, criticism of the approach is emerging from groups as divergent as the Tea Party and the teachers union. (The Washington Post)

PRESCHOOL FINANCING FALLS: Spending on state-funded preschool dropped by more than half a billion dollars in the 2011-12 school year compared to the year before, creating a hole that some states are only now attempting to fill, according to a report out today from the State of Preschool 2012 produced by the National Institute for Early Education Research, based at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J (Education Week)

TESTING SCRUTINY: Amid an escalating battle over standardized testing that included a “play-in” protest at CPS headquarters last week and a student boycott of the Prairie State Achievement Exam on Wednesday, CPS officials are undertaking a broad review of testing in the district. (Catalyst)

DUNCAN'S SECRET LOG: WBEZ has obtained a redacted copy of the "secret log" that former CPS chief Arne Duncan kept to manage requests by public officials and other connected Chicagoans seeking to get their children into the city’s elite grammar and high schools, many of which admit students only by test score or lottery. Recent figures show that at some of the schools there are 20, 30, or even 50 times more applications than available seats.

EXEMPTING THE YOUNGEST: Chicago Public Schools says it's taking a closer look at testing, for now removing assessment tests for kindergartners and first-graders this school year. (Tribune)

INTEREST WANES: The final round of public meetings over Chicago's decision to shut down scores of schools has often been sparsely attended and overcast by an air of futility. Community leaders say some people are simply burned out, while others feel their efforts are pointless after Mayor Rahm Emanuel's administration decided to shut down 54 schools after months of protest and public engagement.  (Tribune)

IN THE NATION
SCHOOL SAFETY LEGISLATION: Education Week has compiled an interactive analysis of nearly 400 bills related to school safety filed in the days, weeks, and months after the Newtown, Conn., shootings, finding that legislators have proposed solutions that include arming teachers, adding guards or police officers, and shoring up the security of school buildings.

UNEQUAL TEACHER QUALITY: Less-experienced teachers and teachers with degrees from less-competitive colleges are often assigned to teach lower-achieving students in Miami-Dade County Public Schools, according to a new report, "Systematic Sorting: Teacher Characteristics and Class Assignments" by Stanford University. Past research has shown that students’ academic achievement depends on the quality of their teachers, however not all students have equal access to teachers with experience. This then leads to an achievement gap largely affecting students of color nationwide. (BET)

Carlos Azcoitia, a former principal who has been on the board since November, voted against the establishment of a KIPP Charter School in Englewood. He also voted against renewing and expanding KIPP’s ACT campus and Chicago Virtual Charter School. Board member Mahalia Hines, also a one-time principal, joined Azcoitia in voting against the Chicago Virtual Charter School item.

Considering that the board is in the midst of deciding whether to close 54 schools, Azcoitia said he did not think it was the right time to add seats at schools. He did vote in favor of some of the charter school grade expansions because they are existing schools or adding high school grades. CPS is only planning to close elementary schools this year.

“Before we open new schools, I think first we need to know the impact on our communities of school closings,” said Azcoitia after the meeting. “I just did not think this was the right time.”

Among the charter networks set to expand are Noble Street, Aspira, and UNO's Rogers Park campus, which is adding a high school.

Azcoitia and other board members also questioned and raised concerns about the schools that CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett has recommended for closure. The vote on the closures will take place at their next meeting on May 22.

Board members are trying to visit every closing and receiving school. “We learn something on each of these visits,” Board President David Vitale said.

Vice President Jesse Ruiz added that his school visits have resulted in several questions and he is hoping CPS officials take time to address them. Azcoitia said he wants the board to be briefed on each individual school action with information on academics, safety and facilities, as well as what was learned at community meetings and by hearing officers.

Hines made the strongest statement. She said she had driven many of the routes from closing schools to schools that students will be sent to, and that she was not convinced they were safe. She was particularly concerned about the trip between Melody and Delano.

“It is not a route that I would send my child and there is no way I am voting for anything that I would not send my child [to do],” she said.

Hines also said she was worried about the fact that CPS officials did not account for special education students in their utilization formula. Underutilization is the key factor in deciding what schools are to be closed.

Hines visited Trumbull Elementary School, which has 116 special education students this year. Trumbull parents have said that their utilization rate would be higher if CPS had taken into account the special education students, who are supposed to have smaller class sizes.

“How are we going to address the needs of special education students?” Hines asked.

Special Education Director Markay Winston said her team was taking steps to make sure receiving schools have the  services needed, but Hines indicated that the questions are about more than services.

Board members made their comments after public participation, during which speakers once again insisted that their school stay open. One of them was Asean Johnson, a 3rd-grader at Garvey Elementary School.

He said that Byrd-Bennett and Vitale visited his school recently. Addressing Byrd-Bennett directly, he said, “Why would you take Marcus Garvey away from us? You loved how quiet it was and how we were all at work. You tried to surprise us, but we were ready. “

Another strong statement was made by Jalainea Leslie, a mother whose children attend Parkman.  She said there’s no way she will send her child to Sherwood Elementary School, some six blocks away.

Recently, she said, someone got shot near Sherwood.

“I want to protect my kids,” Leslie said. “57^th Street is too far. I know you have a heart. This is not a right thing because they won’t make it there.”  

Before the board meeting, dueling rallies showed the deep divide that exists on the charter school and school closings issue.

Students from several high schools marched chanting: "Rahm Emanuel has got to go" Many of the students were juniors who were supposed to take the second part of the Prairie State exam on Wednesday, but boycotted it. They said they wanted to show their displeasure at using test scores in decisions to close schools and to evaluate teachers.

Brian Stirgus, a student at Robeson High, said he was at the rally to speak up on behalf of his elementary school, Banneker. Banneker is slated for closure and its students will be sent to Mays.

“These school closings are racist,” he said. “We refuse to sit back and let you destroy our neighborhoods.”

In the background, Chicago Parents United, a new pro-charter parent group, also chanted. The parents, whose children mostly attend UNO, Noble Street and Chicago International charters, said they wanted CPS officials to hear their voices and for charter schools to get equal funding.

STUDYING CITY COLLEGES MODEL: A World Bank delegation is traveling to Chicago on Wednesday and Thursday to participate in a “learning journey” to explore the City Colleges of Chicago’s College to Careers initiative. The delegation of 15 senior World Bank staff will connect with leaders of the College to Careers program, launched in December 2011, to learn about its design and implementation of the program. The delegation hope that the model can be instructive for designing education and workforce development programs elsewhere around the nation and the world. (Press release)

BOARD MEMBER INTERVIEW: Retired president of Northwestern University Henry Bienan, talks with Chicago Magazine's Carol Felsenthal about the "ups and downs of serving on the CPS Board." Other than saying he's "positively inclined" toward charter schools and admitting to be a "social friend" of Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the interview isn't that revealing.

IN THE NATION
COMMON CORE BACKLASH: Republicans have launched an attack on the Common Core State Standards, an initiative that more than 45 states and the District of Columbia signed onto but that has been facing increasing opposition in recent months from both right and left. (The Washington Post)

TEST SCORING ERRORS: Nearly 2,700 New York City students were wrongly told in recent weeks they were not eligible for seats in public school gifted and talented programs because of errors in scoring the tests used for admission, the Education Department said on Friday. (The New York Times)

TEST TAKER, TEST MAKER: An eighth grader from upstate New York designed a standardized test that makes fun of standardized tests “because teachers are always teaching to the test instead of teaching stuff that would interest us or that they are good at teaching," she said. (The Washington Post)

CHEATING CHARGES: Michelle Rhee, head of an influential education advocacy group that backs using student test scores to evaluate teachers, last week fended off accusations that she failed to pursue evidence of cheating when she ran the District of Columbia school system. (Education Week)

This post has been updated to correct the name of Charter Parents United.

After CPS rejected Concept Charter School’s proposal to open two schools, the operator turned to the Illinois State Charter School Commission, which was created two years ago to handle appeals when proposals are turned down. The commission last month approved Concept’s plan to open two kindergarten-through-12^th grade schools.

 District officials considered a legal challenge to the approval, but eventually decided against it, says CPS spokeswoman Becky Carroll. Still, it is not clear that the district will just accept the decision. The district "is engaged in ongoing discussions to determine next steps in response to their actions," she says. The deadline to file a challenge was last Friday.

Concept Schools already operates the Chicago Math and Science Academy, a Level 2 school in Rogers Park that opened in 2004.

The approval of the Concept proposal means a new reality is taking hold in CPS, one in which the district does not have total control over charter school decisions. Because the operator was approved through the state commission, the charters will receive their funding through the state. The state, in turn, will deduct the money from the district’s funding.

Concept Charter is seeking to get a building in the North Side neighborhood of Bowmanville--typically called Lincoln Square--rezoned to allow the school to locate there. A slew of residents showed up at a community meeting to speak against the zoning change.

The other Concept school is planned for McKinley Park, and has the support of the alderman.

At full capacity, the new Concept Schools will only enroll 1,450 students, a small number. But eventually, a number of Chicago students could end up attending charter schools that have no connection to CPS.

Money, politics

Charters approved through the commission receive a tuition rate of $9,120 per student, about $1,600 more than the per-pupil funding that CPS gives charters. Commission-approved charters also get state and federal funding for special education and low-income students directly, rather than through CPS.

Greg Richmond, executive director of the National Association of Charter School Authorizers and a member of the commission, says charter operators think they will fare better financially by getting the funds directly, but it is unclear whether this is true. CPS subsidizes special education services at charter schools, making up the difference in what the services cost and what the state provides. CPS-approved charters also get stipends to help pay for facilities.

But Salim Ucan, executive director of Concept Schools, says that the additional per pupil funding given by the state end up significantly higher, especially when multiplied by more than 1,000 students. He says thinks it is more than enough to run the schools.  

Yet he emphasizes that his charter school management company has a good relationship with CPS and that he considers the district as a partner.

Charter operators in Illinois have always had the power to appeal to the Illinois State Board of Education if a proposal is denied, says Richmond. Over the past decade, about a dozen made such appeals, but in only three cases—none of which were in Chicago—did the state board override a district.

In 2011, when lawmakers first considered the bill creating the commission, “the discussion was about how to reduce the politics involved in the process,” Richmond says. Because charter schools are a hot-button issue in education, politics and ideology often come into play whether it is a school district or the state board of education approving a charter.

All but five states that have charter schools have a non-district authorizer, Richmond says.

The commissioners include an Evanston science teacher; a retired Joliet superintendent; the founder of Target Area Development Corporation, Patricia Van Pelt-Watkins; and Angela Rudolph, policy director of Democrats For Education Reform.

Richmond says the commissioners look mainly at the merits of a proposal and try not to get mired in other details.  Members also look at the need in the community. Richmond says he and others were convinced the Concept Charter Schools are needed because of the low graduation rates of nearby high schools.

Questions of performance

Exactly why CPS denied the Concept Charter proposal is unclear. The charter school mistakenly uploaded an incomplete narrative with its application, and because the deadline had passed, CPS officials would not allow them to resubmit. Evaluators subtracted points based on the incomplete proposal.

Evaluators also said that Concept’s current campus, Chicago Math and Science Academy, is not among the highest-achieving schools in the district and is not out-performing other schools in its area network—two of the criteria for replicating a charter, according to the district’s Request For Quality Schools proposal form.

CPS officials also questioned whether the charter management company had enough money in its budget for teacher salaries. According to hearing documents, CPS officials were worried that the schools would not be able to compete for good teachers.

The average teacher salary in the district is $74,839, according to data on the CPS website.  But at Concept, the most a teacher can earn is $50,000, Ucan says. However, he says the starting salary in Concept schools is not all that much different than in CPS.

Ucan says Concept Schools does not have problems finding quality teachers. The charter management company runs 27 schools for 10,500 students across the Midwest.

He also says conflict with the Bowmanville community stems from delays caused by CPS. Originally, the second Concept campus was to be located in Belmont-Cragin. Ucan says his staff reached out to the community and had strong support.

But CPS board members did not vote on proposals until February. By then, the lease on the original building in Belmont-Cragin had expired.

Recently, they were able to find a new location in Bowmanville.

Ucan is confident that once Concept Schools is able to do more community outreach, people will like what they hear. Concept Schools are focused on providing a strong math, science and engineering base. Students also do more project based learning than at traditional schools.

“All the design elements prepare students for college,” Ucan says.

CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett will recommend that 54 school programs be shut down. Nearly 90 percent of the students in the closing schools are black, though African Americans make up only about 40 percent of the district’s entire student population.

The impact of school actions on black communities has been a major factor driving opposition among activists as well as the Chicago Teachers Union, which held a press conference attacking the actions. 

Under this proposal, the communities that would have the most closings are: West Town, Auburn Gresham, Austin, West Englewood and West Pullman.

In addition to the 54 shut-downs, 11 schools will co-locate with another school, eight of them with charter schools. Two severely underutilized high schools—Bowen and Corliss—will share their buildings next year with new Noble Street charter high schools. CPS officials said this will give people in the area two “good, strong” options in one building, but some community members and others are likely to worry that the charters will drain away more students from the neighborhood schools. 

Finally, the non-profit Academy for Urban School Leadership will get six more schools to “turn around,” a process that entails replacing virtually an entire staff. AUSL is a politically-connected teacher training program that has won national recognition from U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. One AUSL school, Bethune Elementary in East Garfield Park, will be closed. Also, Dodge and Morton, two AUSL school, will co-exist in the Morton building. 

The board is set to vote on this proposal at its May 22 meeting. Before then, CPS will hold three hearings on each recommendation, two in the affected communities and one with an independent hearing officer at its downtown headquarters.

Cost savings, teacher layoffs

Initially, these moves will cost CPS money but over 10 years, the district will save about  $1 billion, said Chief Transformation Officer Todd Babbitz. The savings are a combination of $560 million in capital costs and $430 million in operating costs.

Critics will likely argue that less than $1 billion in savings over 10 years is not a lot of money, considering CPS has a $5 billion yearly budget.

But Babbitz and other officials said the school district is not only closing schools to save money, but also to make the remaining schools better. 

At the welcoming schools, CPS plans to make $155 million in capital investments and spend $78 million in “up front” operating costs. 

The initial investment is high as CPS officials have spent the last week announcing the various things they plan to provide for welcoming schools. Each will get air conditioning,  a library, a science lab and computer lab, as well as a social worker and other social supports for students. In addition, safe passage workers will watch over students as they make their way to their new school. Students at a handful of schools will get bus transportation.

CPS leaders earlier today announced that 19 schools will get specialty programs, such as International Baccalaureate or fine arts programs. These will be magnet cluster programs, which maintain an attendance boundary, but can take students if they have space. Officials could not say on Thursday how many extra staff these schools will get for these programs.

Spokeswoman Becky Carroll argued that the district is prioritizing these welcoming schools, many of which will become the neighborhood schools. 

“These are communities that have been under-resourced and underserved for years,” she said. “We want to give them all the things that they need that they do not have now.”

At the Chicago Teachers Union press conference, President Karen Lewis lambasted Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who reportedly is on vacation with his family. “This is not going to save money, it is going to cost money and it is going to leave abandoned buildings,” she said.

CPS officials could not immediately say how many teachers will be laid off as part of the upheaval. As part of the new teacher’s contract, those teachers from closed schools get to follow their students to a new school, if they are tenured and highly-rated.

But at the press conference, little was said about the fate of teachers. Lewis, parents and teachers said they worried most about the students.

Kohn lunchroom attendant Takeeva Thompson said that at her school, a 7-year-old was killed and other students have been shot. She said the school is a haven for students. “We are either giving them a gun or a book,” she said.

Nina Gibbs, a parent of a student at Mahalia Jackson, said the plan calls for her daughter to go to Fort Dearborn Elementary. “That is on the other side of the tracks,” she said. “What kind of safety and security are they going to have? You have already got a lot of children here been shot, beat up, kidnapped. What about the parents who will no longer be [in] walking distance from the school?”

Safety a top concern for parents

Adam Anderson, the district's officer of portfolio, planning and strategy, said that officials took into account the concerns about safety that parents and residents expressed at the 28 community hearing held this winter. 

Among the things that CPS officials heard were that people want a school in their area and they don’t want children to have to cross barriers, such as railroad tracks, to get to school. Anderson said it also was important to him and other school leaders that children were sent to better facilities and better schools. 

But all these criteria created quite a puzzle for CPS leaders and this is evident by the plan they laid out. In several situations a school program closes, meaning the administration is displaced, but the children stay in the building. The principal and staff from a better-performing school take over that closed school program, leaving their building empty.

For the first time perhaps ever, CPS will try to combine three schools into one building and, in at least one case, the district will split children from one closed school up between two schools.

These unusual combinations left some people in the community with their head spinning. Dwayne Truss, an activist in Austin, said he was trying to get his head around all the proposals for his community. 

“Some of this is just crazy,” he said.

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At the same time, the district will provide charter schools with the same amount of funding, on a per-pupil basis, as traditional schools—a practice that charter supporters have long advocated for. But with the exact amount of per-student funding still to be determined, it is unclear whether the move will be a boon or a detriment to charters, said Illinois Network of Charter Schools President Andrew Broy.

The new practice, called student-based budgeting in the education world, might seem merely a technical change. But in reality, it could have a far-reaching impact on the composition of teaching force and the equity of programs among schools.

CPS officials hailed the move as a way to give principals more power over their budgets and emphasized that the switch is not being done to save money. In the past, officials curtailed plans to adopt the practice because they were concerned about how it would work in a time of shrinking budgets.

Gray Elementary School Principal Sandra Carlson, whose school has been part of a per-pupil budgeting pilot program since 2006, said she is worried, considering the district is facing a projected billion deficit.

“I am waiting to see my new budget,” said Carlson. Yet she added that having more control over her budget has allowed her to respond better to past reductions in funding.

Student-based budgeting is touted as a way to give principals the flexibility to spend money in the way they see fit to best meet the needs of their students. Done well, advocates say, student-based budgeting can also bring more parity and transparency to school budgets. As it is now, the district’s funding formula is complicated and weighted so that it is difficult to figure out if one school is making out better than the other.

“I loved it when I was a principal,” said CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett, who said the practice allowed her to add an art teacher at her school. Byrd-Bennett and Budget Director Ginger Ostro unveiled the new system on Monday.

Pitfall for veteran teachers?

But there are potential dangers. One is that principals will veer toward hiring inexperienced teachers to save money, or contract out programs, such as the arts, rather than hire a certified teacher. In 2005, Catalyst wrote about the pitfalls of per-pupil funding in 2005, when then CPS CEO Arne Duncan was looking at making the shift. 

CPS officials stressed that they don’t want to provide a disincentive to hiring experienced teachers and are creating a pot of money to help offset the salary cost to schools that have more than the average number of highly experienced teachers. As yet, it’s unclear how much money the district will provide to offset veteran salaries or whether it will be maintained as time goes on.

In a press release, the Chicago Teachers Union called the extra funding a "stop-gap measure." It "in no way compensates for the destructive, long-term, and systemic consequences of this program.”

There’s also concern that principals could misspend money. In the past, CPS officials have hesitated to move toward student-based budgeting because it meant that they lose control of budgets.

Byrd-Bennett said she believes that principals generally do what is best for their school, but that there will be safeguards in place. As is the case now, she said principals will have to get their budgets approved by the network offices. Also, the budget office will monitor for any unusual spending.

Currently, the district provides a regular classroom teacher for every 28 students in primary grades and one teacher for every 31 students for 4^th grade and up. In addition, for every 750 students, the district provides an assistant principal, an art or music teacher and a librarian or gym teacher. Schools with smaller enrollments get part-time positions.

Questions of extra resources, charter benefit

Under student-based budgeting, principals will get a special amount of money per student and will have to decide how many teachers, clerks, art, gym and music teachers they need. While principals could decide to have extra-small class sizes and forego other things, they can’t raise class sizes beyond the limits established in the teacher’s union contract (28 for primary grades and 31 for upper elementary grades and high school).

Carlson said that student-based budgeting has had another big benefit for her: stability. Now, a school’s budget is based on the number of teachers for a projected enrollment. But if a school gets fewer students than expected, they stand to lose a teacher or two. For years, principals have complained about how disruptive this practice can be to students. In the past, Carlson has made the decision to reduce her equipment and supply budget rather than lay off a teacher.  

As they roll out student-based budgeting, CPS is side-stepping the thorny issue of how to handle the additional funding that schools get for low-income students, special education and bilingual students and for magnet and selective enrollment schools. This money will not be folded into the per-student allotment, but rather doled out based on the complicated formula currently in use.

Yet Ostro said that extra money and positions given to schools this year to implement the longer school day will be included in the per-student allocation.

Another question is how CPS will take into account the district’s high mobility rate.  Byrd-Bennett said that detail has not been worked out yet. In other districts with student-based budgeting, the money follows the student, up until a certain point in the year, at which time, the original school keeps the money, Byrd-Bennett said.

The district’s charter and performance schools have been funded using student-based budgeting since their inception. But they have always complained that they have gotten less than traditional CPS schools. Even after a boost in funding last year, they currently get 80 percent of the core costs, so Monday’s move could end up providing another boost in funding for them, Broy said.

Not only is it unclear whether the new per-student allocation will be more than the current amount charter schools get for each student, but Broy said that he doesn’t know how CPS officials plan to deal with the things charters pay for and traditional schools don’t. The biggest additional weight on charter school budgets are facilities and operations, he said.

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The Northside POWER group, which hosted the meeting, invited Moore, but spokeswoman Kristi Sanford said Moore told the group he was out of town.

POVERTY IS THE PROBLEM: In a forceful essay in the Chicago Reader, Steve Bogira writes: "The most significant problem CPS faces is not too few kids, but too many poor kids