Last day of City Hall Sit-In
This is Just the Beginning! was the word. On January 9, 2012, a small group of parents, LSC Leaders, KOCO members, grandmothers, Occupy Chicago activists, and community members held the last day of the sit –in- at City Hall. Although the group did not have the opportunity to meet with Mayor Emmanuel, they did meet with a person who was identified as Emanuel's "Education Secretary" in Emmanuel’s office. They said they gave him a copy of the "Bronzeville Global Achievers Plan" to read and he plans to get back to them later this month.
The Bronzeville community is not finished yet, according to the Sit-In leaders. The next step is meeting with state and federal officials to present their data and plan. Rev. Paul Jakes, a pastor announced that a meeting has been called of pastors with attorneys to discuss the possibility of filing a Civil Rights law suit against The Board of Education and the City of Chicago.
One of the most dynamic speakers was the Reverend Krista Alston. Alston is a parent of a Price Elementary School student and a parent leader of KOCO. Alston discussed an article in Catalyst Magazine (dated Dec. 6) which stated that 18 percent of the schools that have replaced closed neighborhood schools are "high performing" schools. This is roughly 1 out of 5 and of those schools half are magnet or selective enrollment schools.
The Catalyst article exposed the fact that over 40 percent of these new schools, despite the attention and resources given by CPS, are what CPS this year calls "Performance Level 3" — which is CPS’ lowest rating. Alston stated, “When CPS says they no longer can stand by the status quo, they forget that they are the Status Quo. All the reforms that the schools have endured for the last 20 years have been top down. CPS actions that ignore the voices of the people most directly impacted.”
Examples of status quo are: School probation, student retention, social promotion, direct instruction, school reconstitution, re-organization, school closing, high school re-design initiative, instructional delivery systems, curriculum inclusion and school turnaround. Alston states that all of them have failed.
Another speaker was Bettie Dancy who is a grandmother of two students at Price and a student at Dyett High School. She said she is concerned that her grandson lives right across the street from King High School but can not attend it. He now goes to Dyett and she does not want him to attend a school that is too far away for safety reasons. She is also concerned because the schools do not have enough teachers, counselors, social workers and nurses. Dancy said she wonders why money is going to charter schools when it could go to helping students recover from the trauma of having their schools and communities destabilized. Dancy also pointed out that many students have problems in their lives that need to be addressed now. Dancy said that parents were told that on the first day of school to walk their child to school and then more money would be given to the school. Where did that money go? It was not put into our school.
Dancy believes that by creating charter schools which most neighborhood students can’t attend, this will force people out of the neighborhood and that will leave choice real estate up for grabs by the highest bidder.
