catalyst-chicago.org

To understand the identity crisis in Uptown, walk down the 900 block of West Wilson Avenue, just off of Lake Shore Drive. Just past Clarendon Avenue stands Uplift Community School, one of the first to open under Chicago Public Schools' Renaissance 2010 initiative. A sign in front reads "Arai," the name of the middle school in the same building that is being phased out this year.

State Rep. Mary Flowers remembers fondly growing up in Englewood in the 1960s. Working two-parent families lived there, she says. So did notables such as journalist Vernon Jarrett, former state Sen. Charles Chew and Richard Stamz, then a popular personality on black radio. People looked out for other people's children.

"We were like a family," says Flowers, who lived on West Normal Parkway, across the street from a teachers college that has since moved and been renamed Chicago State University.

Overcrowding is often considered to be primarily a concern in Latino schools and neighborhoods, but a small yet significant number of overcrowded elementary schools are predominantly African American, according to a Catalyst Chicago analysis of CPS data for the current school year.

About one out of four, or 32, overcrowded schools is majority-black the analysis found. About half are predominantly Hispanic; largely white and integrated schools make up the remaining one-fourth.