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* Sen. James Meeks has been railing at the public establishment for quite some time, but he’s amped up his criticisms lately. Today’s Sun-Times has an article about how Meeks is pushing legislation to strip Chicago’s local school councils of their power to pick principals and provide for vouchers for kids in some targeted schools…
“I think they are radical changes,'’ the Chicago Democrat said Wednesday of the two bills now in Senate committees. “Isn’t that what the president ran on — change? America has voted for change.'’
Some school activists were stunned by Meeks’ proposal to convert elected local school councils into advisory bodies. No longer would LSCs select and fire principals and approve school budgets, as required under the 1988 Chicago School Reform Law. […]
Meeks — pastor of Chicago megachurch Salem Baptist — said Chicago Schools CEO Ron Huberman and his predecessor, now U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan, have told him that “principals are the most important people'’ in a school while complaining that “we don’t pick the principals.'’ The bill would “eliminate that excuse,'’ Meeks said. […]
Meeks said he also plans to amend a voucher bill he introduced last fall so that students in the 15 lowest-scoring CPS high schools and the 50 lowest-scoring CPS elementary schools would be eligible for tuition vouchers to private or parochial schools.
The Catholic Conference of Illinois is “highly enthusiastic'’ about the idea, said executive director Robert Gilligan.
* Meeks talked about his voucher plan at length to the conservative Illinois Policy Institute. I have posted the audio on YouTube for ease of listening. Check it out…
Some relevant quotes for those who can’t watch at work…
What we don’t understand is the voucher movement seems to be born, or seems to have been started, by Republicans. It was a Republican idea. That’s the way the Democrats look at it. That’s the way black lawmakers look at it. This is a Republican idea. This is what the Republicans want to push on us, and public schools are working in your area.
Meeks went hard after his fellow African-American legislators for being “owned by the unions”…
However, if we’re going to build a coalition, if we’re going to give black lawmakers and people who are owned by the unions, because most of these elected officials are owned by unions. And when I say owned by unions, I simply mean this: you’re coming to us and you have us going anti-union and going against the most, what we allege to be, the most powerful people, or those who hold our elections in the palm of their hand.
So you’re coming to African American legislators, who, they got $500 at most in their account, and you’re trying to get them to take an anti-union position.
And then he explained his idea…
Let’s then have, and this is what my bill will do, let’s have vouchers for failed schools first. Let’s take the top 50 failing elementary schools and the top 10 or 15 failing high schools — the ones we use the statistics for — and let’s say to those lawmakers, hey, if this bill passes the kids who go to this school, Fenger, and Harper, and Harlem, and Marshall, and Austin, let’s give the parents in this area a choice and let the parent take the kid to any school they want to go to.
Now, it will be hard, I’m hoping, for legislators to argue against that. It should be hard for African American legislators to argue against it.
When I was in Haiti, one of the things I realized and recognized…they started with the critically injured first. Those are the people you (treat?) when you come on the scene. You always start with the critically injured. You don’t start with the guy with the scrape on his head. You start with the person with the crushed lungs, and the crushed head. Let’s start with the critically injured.
Let’s have vouchers for the critically injured. Let’s rescue the kids at the bottom. Let’s get them a voucher. Let’s get a voucher in their hand. And then as we see that it’s working for them, and it’s fair for them, or right for them, then in the next phase, let’s help some more people. And let’s help some more people.
But unless we are committed to helping those who we use the statistics, unless we’re willing to help them first, I don’t think it’s going to be an easy sell to lawmakers because we are asking them to put their political careers on the line for an idea that they really don’t get, that they really don’t understand. But when it’s their school, and only their school, they’ll get it, I believe. And I believe they’ll understand it.
Thoughts?
* Legislative news roundup…
* Engineers give Illinois infrastructure low marks
* Video gambling? New Lenox taking ‘wait-and-see approach’
* Tribune: Video poker extortion
* Why some lawmakers want anti-gambling communities to pay up
* Anti-smoking group wants another $1-per-pack tax
* Make politicians explain their state budget strategies
* Reduce plates to get in front of cost cutting
* Moody’s Downgrades Illinois Universities On Payment Delays
* New bill would let board borrow money
* U of I Extension may see layoffs
* House panel defeats bill to change license plate system
* Illinois legislature taking on teen `sexting’ controversy
* Bill would require insurers to pay for anti-smoking help
* Senators Dale Righter, Chris Lauzen Push Bill to Limit Political “Robo” Calls
* Senator John Millner Pushes Red Light Camera Bill, Claims Public Safety Boosted; Senator Dave Syverson Disagrees
* Red means stop; cameras would drive that home
* Madigan pushes timely sex assault evidence
posted by Rich Miller
Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:21 pm
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If Meeks’ voucher plan will allow children from failing Chicago schools to go to Wheaton, or Naperville or Barrington, I’m all for it.
Comment by Yellow Dog Democrat Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:25 pm
What YDD said.
Comment by Ravenswood Right Winger Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:28 pm
Rich, just so you know, in the transcript the name of one of the schools is misspelled it is “Fenger”, not Fanger
Comment by disgusted in chi boogie Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:34 pm
Thanks. Fixed.
Comment by Rich Miller Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:35 pm
Meeks is absolutely on the right track. Look at the pilot program in the DC schools allowing vouchers for low income students in poor performing schools. Of course, recently the Obama Administration and Dick Durbin have taken steps to de-fund that program, so Meeks better look fast.
And, why does Meeks’ plan need to allow CPS students to go to suburban schools? There are plenty of high performing CPS schools and high performing private schools. Of course, CPS is going to have to be serious about doing away with the political perk system of admitting students to the highest performing public high schools in order for that to happen.
Comment by SangamoGOP Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:37 pm
I’m willing to support Meeks’ ideas now. IMHO he lost a lot of cred by snugging up to Blago in 2006, but its time for me to stop judging him for that.
I think Meeks is right. It is time to rock the system. We can’t just keep doing the same things in CPS.
LSCs get in the way.
In the suburb where I live, the PTA moms and the school board don’t pick the principals. The Superintendent does. It’s not a perfect system, but good principals matter a great deal.
Comment by siriusly Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:38 pm
The kids shouldn’t have to be bussed so far away from their homes. CPS should/must do better or cease to exist and be replaced by something better.
If the kids attend schools in wheaton, naperville or barrington then they should live in those areas. the TOTAL environment needs to be changed, not just the schools the children attend.
I thought meeks was an independent? the article refers to him as a dem. whatever.
Comment by Will County Woman Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:38 pm
Sen Meeks is using the term “vouchers” to confuse Republicans, as he intimates (not that this would take much effort..) But the plan (an only slightly revised version of his New Trier foray) is straight out Gary Orfield’s regionalization of education from the 70’s by way of Milwaukee’s voucher experiments in the late 80s and after. Very old wine, not really new bottle.
The move to kill the LSCs, on the other hand, seems almost personal - don’t understand how this fits into his agenda or with his natural allies.
Comment by erstwhilesteve Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:41 pm
I assume these vouchers would cover the $13,000+ tuition in full for every Fenger, Harper, Austin, etc. student to attend a private high school?
And then all those schools will magically have room for all of them?
Comment by George Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:54 pm
And if you are talking CPS - most of those high school students can already apply to go to a different high school in the city WITHOUT a voucher.
Comment by George Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:56 pm
Providing vouchers to the worst 50 elementary schools and worst 10-15 high schools will just make those schools fail faster. Why? The students most likely to take advantage of the vouchers are the best students — precisely the students that would lead the way to improving the school. I just don’t understand how we can make a school better by taking out the best students; shouldn’t we be working to lift the achievement level of the other students?
And the triage in Haiti analogy doesn’t quite work. In a disaster area, triage also consists of segregating those injured victims who will not make it so that scarce resources will be used for those victims who can survive. I seriously doubt that Rev. Sen. Meeks really means to say that we should abandon the worst schools and students, the ones who are most likely to fail.
Comment by the Other Anonymous Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 2:56 pm
And my (hopefully) last point - all these underperforming high schools and elementary schools are poised to get a significant chunk of cash to “turnaround”, close, “transform”, or change to a charter through the $3 billion in School Improvement Grants coming from the feds this year.
Comment by George Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:00 pm
We should look at the property tax structure before we do anything with education. You’ve to a ton of downstate schools, along with some in the City of Chicago, who’s property tax base isn’t high enough to fund their schools. In order to make our schools work, we first have to find an equitable way to fund them. A lot of these failing schools would do better if they were properly funded.
What Meeks fails to address is that it’s not just a problem with the schools, but also a problem with the environment. A lot of schools are failing because the students are not driven to succeed because of the environment in which they live. Schools, and students, succeed when placed in an environment conducive to success.
Comment by anon Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:06 pm
As a lifelong Democrat and lefty progressive I finally came to the conclusion in recent years after working in government that government does a terrible job at many things and education is at the top of the list. I firmly believe that if we decentralized and privatized the schools allowing every kid to have vouchers in Illinois with a safety net for parents that can’t afford private tuition to subsidize their kids and allowed new types of teaching philosophies such as Montesorri charter schools and such that we would do far better by our children. The current system is set up for total failure and is a disaster that benefits unions alone. John Gatto is the former three time NY State and NYC public teacher of the year and he says public education is a joke and parents should never send their kids to public schools if they can help it. He should know.
Comment by Illinois Outsider Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:07 pm
I think I understand Meeks’ frustration and thinking on this one. We’ve been hearing administration after administration tell us that school reform is a major issue, only to see the CPS continue to fail. If vouchers provide kids with an opportunity to succeed and there is a way for a voucher program to be funded, I don’t see the harm in trying something different.
Comment by Frank Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:11 pm
How about Meeks for Lt. Gov. He could become the point person on education reform. Or would he be willing to take the pay cut?
Comment by KC Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:12 pm
=And if you are talking CPS - most of those high school students can already apply to go to a different high school in the city WITHOUT a voucher.=
How does it work? It sounds you know the criteria. Can you explain it?
Thank you.
Comment by Brennan Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:17 pm
Mr. Meeks knows what his constituents face every day. He’s known this for decades. He has built up a church to address the challenges in their lives.
How about listening to him for a change?
His voucher idea sounds reasonable. Nothing else has worked, has it? Let’s try it! What can we lose? Kids are being forced to attend hell-holes instead of places of learning. Let’s triage those kids with a future out of them.
Hey - I hated the school I was forced to attend. That was years ago, and it has gotten worse! I can’t imagine how much it sucks to be forced to go there now.
Save our kids! Get them OUT of these prison preparatory schools! We had to do something for years. Enough. Save our children!
Comment by VanillaMan Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:18 pm
Some how you have to separate the children who want an education from those who do not want one. The abuse heaped on those who are willing to learn is amazing.
The so called Milwaukee experiment is actually a roaring success with hundreds of successful graduates who were freed from the tragedy of an abysmal educational system there. It should be repeated in Chicago.
Comment by Plutocrat03 Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:22 pm
Or maybe de-certify all private schools, or make all private educational institutions (K-16) pay something like a corporate tax to operate, and use the tax to supplement, not supplant, public funds going to public schools.
Comment by Captain Flume Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:22 pm
i’m with the dog on this one…
Comment by bored now Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:24 pm
I’m with will county woman it’s not barrington’s fault the chicago public schools suck so much, nor is it barringtons responsibility to fix the problem. The cost of transportation is a total waste of money. What mr. meeks should do is hold the politicians and educational leaders in the underachieving communities responsible, fire who they need to fire and make do with what they have.
There is a mayoral election in the city of chicago and i also believe aldermanic election next year. If he is dissatisfied with the quality of work product and services provided, he is welcome to run for mayor.
Any legislator that thinks that he or she can screw in anyway with public suburban education as a way out of fixing the educational problems in his or her own community better have an updated resume ready because it is the fastest way out of office.
looking at you schoenberg,nekritz,garrett,bond.
Comment by shore Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:27 pm
Boy has he been sold a bill of goods. “Unions own legislators” may be the most ill advised statement in the whole piece. It only undermines his legitimate policy proposals and completly exonerates the CPS administration that is bloated inefficient and incompotent.
Comment by Obamas' Puppy Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:35 pm
I’m firmly in favor of Meeks’ plan for the school councils. I think, more often than not, that parent power of this nature tends to lead to parent protection of loutish, disagreeable, lazy and disruptive kids — up to and including cliques of parents going so far as to force out reform-minded principals or pressure teachers to get off their kids’ backs no matter how bratty the kid in question actually is. It’s important to retain parent input, but it needs to be filtered in some way. And here is Senator Meeks offering a way.
I’m not so sure about the voucher idea. It’s an intriguing possibility; its localized nature enabling the district to more quickly break up the truly awful schools and having the practical effect of placing marginal schools on notice that they’ll be next for the voucher treatment. But many of the problems in Illinois are at the districtwide or even state level, and for vouchers to work effectively they are going to need to be accompanied by broader reform because transferring a student from “terrible” to “bad” isn’t good enough — we need “good”. In the end, we need to weed stupid and/or insane principals and administrators out of the system, we need to lay down higher expectations of teacher and administrator performance, we need to sharply raise the general level of discipline in the schools to combat everything from mouthing off to serial truancy to violence, and we need to do something about the serious inequities in funding that you get with a system that depends on local, rather than state, taxes.
Some of these changes are exceptionally hard to implement. There’s a national shortage of principals and superintendents, so there are a lot of bad ones in circulation drawing big salaries and leaving trails of destruction in their wake. Producing more and better administrators will take recruitment, reform of pedagogical “Education” degrees and so on. Standards of discipline in US schools in general, never mind Chicago, are abominable, and so often people simply don’t know what’s needed for a good learning environment, never mind how to get there. And you don’t see ongoing arrangements for supervision or mentoring of teachers and administrators; just a very adversarial relationship between unions and senior management. Where do you begin? How do you implement?
I see the Meeks plan, given its pilot scheme nature, as a good way of getting the process started, but legislators should not be under the illusion that this is the solution — it’s just a start.
Comment by Angry Chicagoan Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:39 pm
First: Amen, Pastor, Amen…
Secondly: It seems the attitude of some of the folks who think this is a bad idea is that well there are not enough spots for everyone in private schools. So then if you can’t help everyone then help no-one.
YDD, even though my kids are in the Oswego school district and not Naperville’s I would be fine with some Chicago kids coming here for school. If the parents are that motivated to get the kid to a better school then we should be helping them. Also give my kids a chance to exposed to people who are not necessarily yuppie spawn.
Finally, we have tried tossing money at the school problem and it has not seemed to have helped much. What do we have to lose if we at least try this.
Comment by OneMan Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:40 pm
In CPS, you are guaranteed a spot in your “neighborhood school.” If you want to go to a different school, in Chicago, you have several options:
1) Apply to an open enrollment school - you are selected by lottery, but neighborhood students are given first priority. (This would be the most common for the students Meeks is talking about).
2) Apply to a Charter school. Again, there is a lottery if there are more applications than slots.
3) Apply to a Contract School. Same - application and lottery.
4) Apply to a magnet school. Same - application and lottery.
For those students who have good test scores and other academic success, they can also apply to competitive schools - Career Academies, Military Academy, and Selective Enrollment schools.
There are many good schools in Chicago that surpass their Catholic school counterparts in the city.
The reason many students DON’T take advantage of this is because they can’t get in due to space limitations (would be the same with private schools), can’t get to another school, or prefer their neighborhood school.
So, students who want to go to a school other than these have the same option to do it now that they would under Meeks’ plan.
The people who would take advantage of the vouchers are those who most likely are already taking their children to a private school - people who can afford it.
Comment by George Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:42 pm
Can’t we try mandatory high quality teachers and classroom discipline via 1 teacher + 1 aid in a manageable sized class, seeing that studies have shown this has dramatic effects for low performing schools (HQT by such derided measures as college GPA’s and entrance exam scores have correlated to improvement more than many other factors) first? I don’t have a philosophical problem with public school choice, but I fear it will just mean more private schools for the bordering suburbs or anyplace else this would cause significant numbers of low performing students to migrate.
Comment by lake county democrat Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:45 pm
Horray for Meeks! Somebody is speaking truth to power about the ongoing moral outrage of poor kids assigned to failing state (Daley) run public schools. Time for competition and choice.
Comment by Dem observer Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:45 pm
=== I don’t have a philosophical problem with public school choice, but I fear it will just mean more private schools for the bordering suburbs or anyplace else this would cause significant numbers of low performing students to migrate.===
In other words, white flight part deux?
Comment by Rich Miller Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:52 pm
That’s what you’re saying right? Send those black kids out here and we’ll all put our kids in private schools?
Comment by Rich Miller Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:55 pm
Meeks owns a parochial school that charges tuition. Guess who stands to make out from his voucher plan? If he really wants to make a difference in students’ lives maybe he should lower his tuition so more neighborhood kids can attend.
Comment by Bill Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:55 pm
He could deduct the lost revenue from his “love offerings”.
Comment by Bill Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 3:59 pm
LCD — Teach for America has done extensive research into what makes a great teacher. It appears your ACT score and college GPA don’t make the list. The Atlantic had a great story about some of the findings
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/201001/good-teaching
Just a bit from the article
== Right away, certain patterns emerged. First, great teachers tended to set big goals for their students. They were also perpetually looking for ways to improve their effectiveness. For example, when Farr called up teachers who were making remarkable gains and asked to visit their classrooms, he noticed he’d get a similar response from all of them: “They’d say, ‘You’re welcome to come, but I have to warn you—I am in the middle of just blowing up my classroom structure and changing my reading workshop because I think it’s not working as well as it could.’ When you hear that over and over, and you don’t hear that from other teachers, you start to form a hypothesis.” Great teachers, he concluded, constantly reevaluate what they are doing. ==
Comment by OneMan Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:17 pm
Believe it or not, I have a measured view of it all. I see pluses and minuses with voucher programs. I think the competition that a voucher system will bring to and among public schools is for the good of society and the children. As an orthodox (small-o) Roman Catholic, I would prefer, however, that Catholic dioceses not participate in these programs b/c the inclusion of children whose parents are not committed to the Catholic faith can dilute the Catholic identity & mission of the schools. [I have this view regarding wealthy non-Catholics who can pay parochial tuition as well.] Further, by taking government money to educate non-Catholic children, the Catholic schools risk the government placing conditions on the schools which inhibit their Catholic identity and teaching as well. [If you don’t think that Catholic or other religious schools are at risk of religious freedom in taking government money, please see the plans of the very anti-religious make-up of Obama’s successor to Bush’s “faith-based initiative” about which I had similar worries under Bush.] Catholic dioceses perform a great charity when they agree to educate non-Catholic children in their areas–or educate poor Catholics who cannot afford tuition. They do this out of their Catholic mission.
Good on Rev. Meeks for taking a brave stand. It will be interesting to see what Card. George has to say.
Comment by Peggy SO-IL Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:17 pm
George: Thanks.
Bill: Lower it below $4,150? This is half the cost per pupil for CPS students.
I’d prefer if Meeks stepped out of politics. I don’t like him holding elective office while operating a church and a school. I see conflicts of interest and faith.
Comment by Brennan Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:19 pm
FYI: Steve Levitt conducted a study of the impact of school choice in Chicago when there was a lottery to attend different (I guess magnet?) public schools. Unfortunately, the text is not publicly available. Here’s a summary page:
http://econpapers.repec.org/paper/nbrnberwo/10113.htm
Levitt does reference it in Freakonomics.
–
Meeks’ conflicts are interesting to note.
Comment by Peggy SO-IL Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:24 pm
Hey Rich, thanks as always putting the information out there. I wanted to know in what audience was Meeks making these remarks?
Comment by Lazy Intern Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:24 pm
That’s what you’re saying right? Send those black kids out here and we’ll all put our kids in private schools?
i can’t speak for anyone else, but if one does feel/think that way, what’s so wrong about that? i understand that on the surface it may seem racist/prejudice, but a position like that is not entirely without merit. if we take the racial aspect out and look at it for what it really is: incompatiable values and vastly different socio-economic backgrounds making it hard to relate to one another.
you will find that properous minorities can and do hold similar views, for example when they say things like “we worked hard to get out the city,” or “we want better for our children than what we had.” so for them its clearly a class issue, rather than a racial one. but the point is that it is an issue of “those people.”
also just from my observation / experience, white suburbanites are generally comfortable with non-white suburbanites they know or have known for sometime (because of shared values), but less comfortable with urban transplants/transients.
Comment by Will County Woman Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:26 pm
Think about this in the context of how Senator Meeks operates. He is someone who is passionate about better outcomes for children (particularly poor children, and black children. His modus operandi is to put pressure on the system to do things differently, recognizing (correctly) that the current education system is failing a lot of kids.
I don’t think any of these reforms, individually or collectively, are necessarily his endgame. I think he’s open to vouchers because nothing else is working and they’re a provocative strategy that has had some success elsewhere. If the pressure caused by these bills prompted some sort of massive restructuring of Illinois education that would likely lead to better outcomes for poor black kids but didn’t include vouchers, my guess is he’d be for it.
So I give him a lot of credit. Even if you don’t agree with his policy solutions (and I don’t always), the guy is willing to put his neck out for what he believes in. Let’s not miss the larger point that here’s a guy who’s correctly identified a problem and is aggressively seeking a solution, even when some of the possible solutions are politically unpopular. How many legislators are willing to do that?
Comment by Kyle Boller's Clipboard Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:27 pm
@Illinois Outsider,
Powerful statement. I have been on the inside for 20 years and that experience has caused me to rethink alot of assumptions I held dear for most of my adult life. Still working thru alot of it. Thanks for your insight.
Comment by dupage dan Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:29 pm
*also just from my observation / experience, white suburbanites are generally comfortable with non-white suburbanites they know or have known for sometime (because of shared values), but less comfortable with urban transplants/transients.*
So it is not about race, it is about class. Got it. Blacks and whites hand-in-hand against the poor. Well that makes it all o.k.
Comment by Montrose Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:36 pm
My problem with Meeks’ position on this is his contention that “we should try this because what we are doing hasn’t worked.”
The problem is that “what we are doing” hasn’t worked because we haven’t funded “what we are doing”.
If we have vouchers, those will cost lots of money. We won’t fund those either, so they likely won’t work either.
And we will be funding “what we are doing” even less.
Comment by George Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:42 pm
I was at the seminar where Senator Meeks spoke, and got to speak with him following lunch.
Besides being surprised that he was so “vertically challenged” (I always pictured him as being much taller)I believe that he is sincere in what he says.
One important aspect of a “voucher” or equally funded “education tax credit” program is that it provides accessible competition for the local public school system.
According to the experts at the panel discussions, virtually the only voucher program that didn’t provide the impetus to improve the competing PUBLIC system after instituting vouchers was DC.
It is surmised that the reason DC public schools didn’t improve was that they were “held harmless” in funding regardless of how many students fled their dysfunctional and overpriced system.
I also concurred with him about abolishing the LSCs.
For about 5 years I consulted for facilities in CPS under Tim Martin and I got into about 100 schools in that time, meeting most of the school’s principals.
Most were chosen by Local School Councils for their willingness to hire political cronies and family members of the LSC, and racial politics was more of an issue than competence.
All too often I met $150K/year principals who couldn’t compose a coherent paragraph. English grammar was like a foreign language to them.
Many shouldn’t have had any more job responsibility than to ask, “Do you want fries with that?”
One got into a fist fight with an LSC member, and another was arrested for filing a false police report claiming that one of her students was threatening the school with a gun to get faster response.
Both kept their jobs.
Their “mandate” from the LSC was to hire their friends for custodial staff after driving out the Eastern Euorpean building engineers, and intimidate non-minority teachers to transfer out.
I recall one building “engineer” who was hired that said she couldn’t be expected to open or close a valve because she,”might break her newly polished fingernails”.
I remember one engineer at a HS, hired by the LSC, who was paid overtime whenever there were contractors in his building. Funny thing. Whenever we looked for him, he was rarely in the school and was only available by cell phone even though he was punched in.
The fact is that there are MANY incredibly dedicated educators out there who can work wonders for the kids, Like St Elizabeth’s in Obama’s old ‘hood, if they just had a fraction of what is wasted in CPS.
Right now there is no “engine for improvement” in suburban and city schools.
Only losing jobs and cash will motivate the bureaucracy to improve the kids education, and vouchers and tax credits are the best way to get that engine running!
Only Nixon could go to China.
Perhaps only Meeks can go to school choice.
Comment by PalosParkBob Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:47 pm
I have a problem with the attitude that middle class and higher people don’t share values with the poor so it wouldn’t work to have an influx of the poor to these areas for education. The problem is that according to most of the studies I’ve seen it is the very fact of economic segregation that causes the achievement gaps. I can see putting limits, so you don’t just move pockets of low SES students elsewhere and overwhelm another school, but economic desegregation is really where the gains are to be made. Particularly at the elementary school level where attitudes are more malleable.
In all honesty, I don’t think CPS is in as bad a shape as some of the south ‘burbs.
I also have little interest in subsidizing Christian schools as I’m not a Christian.
Comment by cermak_rd Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:56 pm
== The problem is that “what we are doing” hasn’t worked because we haven’t funded “what we are doing”. ==
George, I am going to have to ask you to prove that. How is ‘what we are doing’ not funded?
I refer you to per pupil spending in a GAO report from 2002 (pg 45 & 46 of the PDF)
Or using the state school reportcards (all districts I reference are K-12)
Chicago
$7,052 per pupil on instruction
$11,536 per pupil on operating costs.
Oswego 308
$4,763 per pupil on instruction
$8,885 per pupil on operating costs.
Indian Prarie (Naperville/Aurora)
$6,028 per pupil on instruction
$9,698 per pupil on operating costs.
Everyone likes to pull out New Trier as an example, but realistically there are school districts all over chicagoland that are doing a better job spending less per student.
Comment by OneMan Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 4:58 pm
The proposed voucher program sounds similar to Magnate Cluster schools and these schools are abysmal at best.
At the end of the day, Sen. Meeks needs to push for hard reforms within his own community and that consists of demanding more parent/community involvement. Policies such as these tear communities apart because the parents most motivated to provide a better life for their children take full advantage of the programs, which essential removes their kid and themselves from any community involvement surrounding local schools.
While those kids with less engaged or not engaged at all parents, to no fault of their own are left behind. When this happens, whether in the suburbs or city, the whole school falls.
This policy yields small marginal gains at best.
Sen. Meeks should think about how this policy will divide his own community and start building it up by asking for more state revenues so that his community has adequate revenues, and they can begin to build something in which they are proud of.
If he proceeds with this policy, he only proves that his community is inept and unable to build great schools. Continuing to perpetuate the issue of poor performing schools.
I loved the exchange that he sponsored between New Trier and Chicago students. One day was nice, but not nearly enough time to get the suburbs on board with reconfiguring how schools are funded. If he had picketed New Trier for over a year, the suburbs would have been on board with change, with New Trier leading the pack.
Comment by I get it, but Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 5:09 pm
While I generally disagree with Meeks, I think that he is right on with both concepts. For those that disagree with him, I say that, when you are at the bottom, you change something. You have nothing to lose. You can’t go down from the bottom.
Comment by Silent Majority Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 5:10 pm
In 1988, Democrats in the state legislature were up in arms about how CPS was broken and it needed to be fixed - so they passed a sweeping decentralization act that created LSCs. Student performance failed to improve in any meaningful way.
In 1995, Republicans who now controlled the state legislature were up in arms about how CPS was broken and needed to be fixed - so they passed a sweeping centralization act that handed near-complete authority over the system to Mayor Daley and his hand-selected Board. Student performance failed to improve in any meaningful way.
The lesson? The system may be broken, but rushing to pass sweeping legislation for largely political reasons is not the solution. There is no “quick-fix” to the fact that tens of thousands of young people in this city never graduate from high school. We need to take incremental reform seriously and not rush to completely overhaul the system each decade.
Comment by David Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 5:39 pm
One doesn’t know where to start.
First, it’s nice to see Rev. Meeks having a change of heart. After years of carrying water for the Union-driven public education government-jobs monopoly, it’s a pleasure to see someone realize how awful that system has been to the disadvantaged community.
You can’t serve two masters. If you are engaged in the process of increasing your pay, pension, and payroll expansion to increase the number of dues-paying public employees, then it is axiomatic that you CAN’T be engaged in the process of educating children.
The preceding paragraph explains why vouchers are the only moral way to educate children in the intended context of the US and Illinois Constitutional equal protection clauses.
The moment you divorce the money (100% of the money) from the child, you destroy equal protection. That is why the district system is defacto enforced educational apartheid.
No amount of money dumped into CPS or East St. Louis “districts” will “equalize” outcomes with New Trier. (it’s been tried) The moment you tie the money to the child (and nothing else), you create the opportunity for every child to find an educational institution that may meet their needs - even in the “worst” areas of Illinois.
The interesting thing about all the center-left commentary here is that it merely regurgitates the shibboleths about politics, unions, political clout, taxes, spending, and all the interests that have made public education a money laundering scheme for powerful interests.
If you shed all that dross, you would realize that improving the education of our kids is a moral imperative the must supersede these interests. If you are against school choice, charter expansion, and money following the child, you are basically defending morally illegitimate financial interests.
Today’s defenders of the current system are the moral equivalent of the segregationist against King, the British Empire against Gandhi, and the USSR against the West. You may have political power, but you are morally compromised beyond the reach of credibility.
You have no right to be here. Lest you think I’m a right wing nut-job ranting in the wilderness, I offer the following.
The educational system I promote…
(outlined here, but in need of an update)
http://extremewisdom.com/wp-content/uploads/fundamental_execsumm.pdf
…has been successfully implemented in New Zealand in the 80s and more recently in Sweden. These are hardly “red states.” They are “progressives” that had the good sense to throw the bureaucrats and unions off the bus.
I also offer (again) the opportunity to openly debate these issues with Rich, YDD, Ralph Martire, Rev. Meeks (who might be on my side now), DJ Weinberger, or even the illustrious Steve Schnorf, or anyone else who might want to defend the current morally illegitimate education system.
Fund Chidren, not politically powerful and economically unsustainable bureaucracies.
Have a great weekend.
Comment by Bruno Behrend Thursday, Feb 11, 10 @ 11:07 pm
The real crux of the matter is who is in control and what are their priorities? Back in the day when the CPS appointed principals, some, not all, were merely political hacks. Today, some LSCs function fairly well to serve the students’ best interests. Others are dominated by powerful groups in the community with their own agendas. Sadly, I don’t think there is an optimal solution. I just wish the incentives were more oriented toward student achievement. That goes for personnel and students.
My $0.02 and worth it.
Comment by Old School Teacher Friday, Feb 12, 10 @ 6:38 am
If Meeks really cared abou the kids he could introduce a bill to lengthen the school day and the school year. Chicago has one of the shortest school days and school years in the country. The kids are set up to fail because they just arent in school enough to recieve a good education. The teachers union does own many lawmakers. Teachers make a great salary for what amounts to a part time job and will never give up their 3 months off in the summer, two weeks for christmas, a week in the spring every holiday, 7 “teacher institute” days, Chicago schools are 5hours 40 mins a day which includes lunch and time between classes these kids will not be able to compete in the world.
Comment by fed up Friday, Feb 12, 10 @ 9:28 am
–Hey - I hated the school I was forced to attend.–
That’s obvious in your posts. You call them “prison preparatory schools?” That’s a disgusting stereotype. A lot of kids work hard and do well despite the environment.
They can at least spell and string together a coherent sentence, unlike some on this blog.
Comment by wordslinger Friday, Feb 12, 10 @ 11:13 am
It’s late in the day, so no one is reading anyhow. But I have to say, James Meeks is one of only perhaps a half-dozen guys in the General Assembly of Illinois for whom I have any respect. People ought to listen to the man and at least consider what he has to say.
Comment by Skirmisher Friday, Feb 12, 10 @ 5:55 pm
I’m a Downstater, and remember thinking several years back that Sen. Meeks was just a publicity hound, feigning anger at what the kids in his area had to endure to get to class every day and then what they had to endure in classes every day. However, the more I read, and the more I thought about how I would feel if my children had had to navigate through gang turf every day just so they endure endure a second rate learning environment, I began to wonder why more Chicago politicians weren’t angry about the educational opportunities for their constituents. Yeah, his voucher idea is radical, but when the only other option available is more of the same, why not try radical?
Comment by Treeboy Monday, Feb 15, 10 @ 9:18 pm