Students add voices to protests against Board of Eduction's cynical neglect of the city's real public schools... before Board votes to continue expanding charters.... the Board is locking the public out of 'Public Participation' and the Board's supposedly public meetings...
Protesting students and parents were blocked from attending the October 28, 2015 meeting of the Chicago Board of Education, as the Board, under CEO Forrest Claypool and President Frank Clark, continues to strangle public participation and refuses to meet anywhere but at the Board's cramped Loop headquarters. Substance photo by David Vance. Hundreds of Chicago public school students from across the city added their voices to the protests outside the headquarters of the Chicago Board of Education at 42 W. Madison St. on October 28, 2015, despite the Board's hard work to block critical speakers from getting inside the meeting and speaking out against the privatization policies of the Board and the latest "Chief Executive Officer," former mayoral Chief of Staff Forrest Claypool.
During the days prior to the meeting, critics of the Board noted that the Board has been systematically shutting out anyone who tried to sign up to speak critically at the Board's monthly meetings. The ability of the "public" to sign up for public participation at the October 28 meeting lasted less than two minutes before the Board's computers shut down further speakers. The sign up has to be done electronically and was begun at eight a.m. on October 19, 2015. Five minutes later, the computers locked out anyone who wanted to attend the meetings.
The protests were not only against the proposed expansion of the city's charter schools, which was listed on the agenda for the meeting. Students, parents and teachers were also assembled to protest against looming cuts at the schools, which the mayor and school board have threatened, claiming that the Illinois General Assembly is the only place where Chicago schools can get more money.
Protesting students, teachers and parents were blocked from attending the October 28, 2015 meeting of the Chicago Board of Education at the Board's downtown headquarters in the old Sears Store at 42 W. Madison St. The Board, under CEO Forrest Claypool and President Frank Clark, continues to strangle public participation and refuses to meet anywhere but at the Board's cramped Loop headquarters. CPS officials had earlier said they would meet in the "community", but have refused to do so, hiding inside what many are now calling their "bunker" in a room that is the smallest Board Chambers in history.
Above, some of the members of the appointed Chicago Board of Education recite the "Pledge of Allegiance" as the Board meeting begins on October 28, 2015. Left to right (rear) Mahalia Hines, Gail Ward, Father _____, CEO Forrest Claypool, and the Board's (briefly) Acting Chief Attorney Cheryl Coulston. (Coulston was replaced by a crony of Claypool's at the end of the meeting). In the foreground (left) is Board Secretary Estela Beltran, who makes sure that Board critics are limited to the absolute minimum speaking time during the so-called "Public Participation" portions of the meetings. Substance photo by David Vance."Here we go again," said one observer. "Another rubber stamp Rahm Emanuel Board of Education. They stand at attention giving the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag, but their real pledge is of fealty to the Mayor, standing above them. They know they can be replaced at any time he decides. This Board is completely new except for Jesse Ruiz and Mahalia Hines. The head master now running the schools' day-to-day operations is Forrest Claypool. His qualification for running the schools? Years ago, he was running the trains. Now he is running 600 schools and a $5.5 billion dollar budget..."
The majority of the protesters who came from all over the city were barred from even entering the building for the supposedly public meeting of their city's school board. The Board and supporters of the city's charter schools had made certain that the agenda for "Public Participation" was packed with those who spoke in favor of the city's charter schools' continued expansion. When the vote was taken on the controversial proposal to further expand the charter schools during a year when the city's real public schools are being choked off, Frank Clark, the Board President, recused himself from voting. He is a long-time supporter of the Noble Network of Charter Schools, which was on the agenda to get another "campus."
Supporters of Noble Charter had the most speakers, but KIPP came out also. "My Child My Choice" was catchy slogan they repeated over and over. Speakers trashed the public schools (as usual, without naming them) and claimed that their children would have been doomed were it not for the charters.
Most Substance readers know that charter schools are overrated. Noble, KIPP, and other charter schools dump out their "bad" students -- student they do not want. They then make the receiving schools -- mostly the city's general high schools -- the dumping place. Receiving schools are the real public schools that are forced to do the education work that charter schools refuse to do. CPS has no problem with the public money going into charter schools.
Patrick Brosan, director of the Brighton Park Neighborhood Association (BPNC) was one of the few critics of the latest charter expansion to get signed up to speak before the speakers were again choked off by CPS officials. He spoke about how they were excluded by CPS. Their opinion was never wanted. He stated that BPNC is opposed to the Noble charter as it will take away from the existing schools in the neighborhood. BPNC helped organize and lead a protest of nearly 1,000 community residents and students against the expansion of the charters into the Southwest Side two days before the Board meeting, but the Board members not only ignored the community, but excluded most of those who wished to speak or attend the October 28 Board meeting from the supposedly "public" meeting. Substance photo by David Vance.At the time when CPS is claiming that it will have to make further cuts if it doesn't get another $480 million from Springfield, millions of additional dollars went to the charter school operators in the current budget. Then as CPS cuts funding for real public schools they are forced to remediate, re-socialize and raise up the hard to educate young students, as the protesters who were barred from the public meeting noted before the meeting began. A phalanx of police and CPS security kept most of the public away from the public's business on October 28, 2015.
