Black Schools Matter – Chicago Protestors Go on Hunger Strike to Save Their Last Neighborhood School

[A Real Human Bean]

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Somewhere in Chicago tonight, Mayor Rahm Emanuel may be sitting down to his favorite desert – warm pecan pie with vanilla ice cream.

Across the city in the South Side neighborhood of Bronzeville, 11 parents, teachers and community members aren’t eating so well. Their meal – a few sips of coconut water to keep their strength up.

These brave men and women are on the third day of a hunger strike to save their last open enrollment public school.


If the Emanuel administration has its way, this mostly black community will have to choose betweensending their children to a failing charter school or a failing public school run by a private company – all while the neighborhood’s historic Walter H. Dyett High School is closed.

Nat King Cole, Dinah Washington, Red Fox and Bo Diddley are all alumni of Dyett.

Why close such a vibrant connection to the community’s proud past?

It’s the same excuse lawmakers used in 1988 to take away local control from Chicago residents throughout the city. Most Americans have the right to vote for the people who run their local public schools. But not in Chicago, Philadelphia, New Orleans or many other places dark complected people live. The poorer the people and the darker their skin, the more likely the state will swipe away their right to self government on the excuse that their neglected and underfunded schools are “failing.”

Chicago, the third largest district in the country, is a prime example of this kind of disaster capitalism.

While schools in wealthier neighborhoods had all the amenities, Dyett students had no honors or AP classes and no art or music. Even physical education classes had to be taken on-line.

No wonder test scores were low! These children didn’t have nearly the same resources as other richer, whiter kids.

Despite such unfair challenges, academics were actually improving prior to the board’s decision to shutter the school.

In 2008, there was a 30% increase in students graduating. The improvement was so spectacular it was even recognized by then Mayor Richard Daley and Chicago Schools CEO Arne Duncan (soon to be U.S. Secretary of Education).

Likewise, in 2009, a community program helped decrease out of school suspensions by 40%.

However, by the time Emanuel took office, this wasn’t enough for the city’s Board of Education – all of whom are appointed by the mayor.

Emanuel has already shuttered 50 Chicago City Schools – 46 of which served mostly black students.

But not Dyett. At least, not yet.

The South Side community has been fighting to change the board’s decision for years. About 7 months ago, it seemed to have some success.

Eleven community members chained themselves to a statue of George Washington outside Emanuel’s office demanding the board reconsider. It did. But once the protesters removed themselves, the board decided to take bids on how to keep the school open.

Three plans were submitted – two to privatize and one to keep it an open enrollment public school.

That last plan submitted by the community, itself, would transform the facility into the Dyett Global Leadership and Green Technology High School. This would be a district run school for up to 600 students mostly from the Bronzeville area.

The plans to charterize the school have strengths and weaknesses, but the biggest problem with both privatization schemes is they disconnect the new school from the community and its history.

If either charter school plan is enacted, Bronzeville children may or may not be able to attend it. They could apply, but the entire student body will be selected by lottery. So it’s a roll of the dice whether they could go to their neighborhood school.

Community children not selected would be sent to Phillips Academy – a public school being run by a private management team. Phillips has a worse academic record than Dyett did in it’s darkest days. In 2012, less than 1% of Phillips students passed the state math test and just 8% passed the reading test.

Student prospects aren’t much better at a new charter school. Countless studies – even the Walton Family Foundation-funded CREDO study – have shown charter schools don’t provide better educational outcomes than traditional public schools. In many instances,they do much worse. And students uprooted from community schools rarely improve academically. However, Emanuel and other policymakers like him continue to push for the creation of more charters despite any track record of success or justification beyondincreasing the corporate profits of the companies running them.


The best solution seems to be the plan created by and for the Bronzeville community to keep a public school in place. But when a public hearing was abruptly cancelled this month, they suspected the worst – the board was trying to sidestep a democratic vote.

That’s when community members started the hunger strike.

Protesters vow not to eat unless there is an emergency meeting on Dyett and a final vote taken.

The activists say they’re starting to feel tired and a bit light headed but severe hunger has not set in yet. They are getting daily checkups from a nurse to ensure they’re healthy enough to continue.

Meanwhile, where is the national media?

The Rev. Jesse Jackson visited the hunger strikers Tuesday and vowed to join them in their quest for justice.

But even this hasn’t brought national attention.

How typical! While black schools are closed and black communities gutted, White America yawns and the band plays on.

But some of us are committed to the idea that black lives matter.

Black schools matter.

Black communities matter.

Are you?

 

[godkiller]

Why is Chicago closing schools anyway? Why?

 

[thekingsmen]

Rahm Manuel is a parasite.

 

[wheywhey]

In 2014 Dyett High only had 12 students on the first day of school. Chicago High School Has 12 Students Enrolled

Chicago like most cities has many options for high schools so good students are no longer trapped at their local high schools. That leads to the worst students being grouped together at an open enrollment high school, like Dyett, that is forced to take everyone.

These kids were denied an education in K-8. High school is too late for most of them. According to US News, 6% of the students at Dyett were proficient in reading and 7% in math.

Charters schools have been around for 20 years. Simply pick a network that has produced results. While KIPP is ok, Success Academy in New York City produces scores that are 3x better in reading and 2x better in math. Roughly 70% of Success Academy K-8 are proficient in reading and 95% in math.

 

[theworldismine13]

*yawn*

all public school in black neighborhoods should be shut down and replaced with charters and vouchers

 

[thekingsmen]

*yawn*

all public school in black neighborhoods should be shut down and replaced with charters and vouchers

It's been proven charter schools do nothing .

 

[Madvillain]

It's been proven charter schools do nothing .

every thread on issues affecting Black people he waltzes in with these same smug magic bullet buzzwords
"build wealth" "capitalism" "businesses" "charter schools" "vouchers"

 

[↓R↑LYB]

*yawn*

all public school in black neighborhoods should be shut down and replaced with charters and vouchers

All that will happen is the same people who run those public schools will run those charter schools. Ain't shyt gonna change.

 

[A Real Human Bean]

In 2014 Dyett High only had 12 students on the first day of school. Chicago High School Has 12 Students Enrolled

Chicago like most cities has many options for high schools so good students are no longer trapped at their local high schools. That leads to the worst students being grouped together at an open enrollment high school, like Dyett, that is forced to take everyone.

These kids were denied an education in K-8. High school is too late for most of them. According to US News, 6% of the students at Dyett were proficient in reading and 7% in math.

Charters schools have been around for 20 years. Simply pick a network that has produced results. While KIPP is ok, Success Academy in New York City produces scores that are 3x better in reading and 2x better in math. Roughly 70% of Success Academy K-8 are proficient in reading and 95% in math.

Why the emphasis on charters considering their poor educational outcomes? Why not just properly fund and support the existing public schools? Privatization of education has negative effects on students and faculty alike.

Public schools reflect their communities. Some are great and some struggle because they serve impoverished communities. And the U.S. has an especially backwards way of funding these disadvantaged schools:

The United States is one of few OECD countries where schools that serve affluent families have more resources than schools that serve poor families. A 2010 OECD report noted:

In 16 OECD countries, more teachers are allocated to disadvantaged schools to reduce the student-teacher ratio, with the objective of moderating disadvantage (OECD, 2010). This is particularly the case in Belgium, Italy, Ireland, Spain, Estonia, Iceland, Portugal, Japan, the Netherlands and Korea. Only in Turkey, Slovenia, Israel and the United States are disadvantaged schools characterised by a higher student-teacher ratio.

In 2013, Andreas Schleicher, who runs the OECD’s international educational assessments, told the New York Times: “The bottom line is that the vast majority of OECD countries either invest equally into every student or disproportionately more into disadvantaged students. The US is one of the few countries doing the opposite.”

In a country where the top 20 percent of the population earns eight times as much as the bottom 20 percent, this inevitably leads to two distinct and parallel systems of education, one for the rich and one for the poor. It’s not that “money doesn’t matter” for reforming the education system, or that technology can be a substitute, but that children from working-class and poor families score lower on standardized test scores than their wealthy peers — and America has many more poor families than rich.

 

[Street Knowledge]

If the public schools are failing they should be shut down

 

[wheywhey]

Why the emphasis on charters considering their poor educational outcomes? Why not just properly fund and support the existing public schools? Privatization of education has negative effects on students and faculty alike.

Public schools reflect their communities. Some are great and some struggle because they serve impoverished communities. And the U.S. has an especially backwards way of funding these disadvantaged schools:

To clarify, I don't know why people in Chicago mention charter schools because the ones they want aren't any better than traditional public. I mention one charter network out of the entire United States that works. Their methods are draconian, but they get results. It is up to each family to decide what they want for their child. Dyett only had 12 students last year.

Unlike this artice, I said the emphasis needs to be on K-8. You don't wait until 9th grade to teach someone how to read.

Why not just properly fund and support the existing public schools?

I will repeat. With today's school choice, only the worst students wind up at the local high school that is forced to accept everyone. Chicago has 11 selective high schools, plus magnet schools, and charter schools for good students to choose from.

New York City has the same phenomenon. I have commented quite a bit on Boys and Girls High in Brooklyn which is close to being closed down. http://www.thecoli.com/threads/brooklyns-boys-and-girls-high-school-fights-failure.253545/

Can you name a low-achieving high school that was turned around in the last 20 years with proper funding and support that served the same demographic, black and low-income? I don't believe it exists unless they added a magnet program and bused in whites and Asians.

 

[wheywhey]

@A Real Human Bean I read the OECD information that you posted. The countries that provide resources equally to all students don't claim to have closed the income achievement-gap. Low-income students still score lower on standardized tests than higher-income students.

 

[wheywhey]

Robert is from Calumet City, a Chicago suburb. His high school choices were awful so he decided to live with his father in Chicago and go to a selective high school. Here he is on a tour of the school at 2:46

 

[theworldismine13]

It's been proven charter schools do nothing .

Actually it's been proven that they work for black kids

 

[thekingsmen]

Actually it's been proven that they work for black kids

Ummmm no.