Chicago Public Schools officials plan to open 12 new charter schools over the next two years on the city’s South and West sides, where district officials have also proposed to overhaul several traditional schools.
The proposed charter contracts, which will be voted on by the Board of Education Wednesday, are the latest step in Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s push to increase the private sector’s role in improving the public school system.
According to district officials, Noble Charter School Network will open four new high schools, the United Neighborhood Organization (UNO) and LEARN Charter School Network will open three new elementary schools each and Catalyst Schools will open a new elementary school. Additionally, the early childhood development non-profit Christopher House will open it’s first elementary school, which is expected to house a family resource center, in the Belmont-Cragin neighborhood.
Two of the charter operators have close ties to the Emanuel administration. UNO, which is led by Emanuel’s mayoral campaign co-chairman Juan Rangel, is the most politically influential Latino group in Chicago. The organization has been entangled in a political fight over a charter campus it plans to open on the far Northwest Side next school year.
Oliver Sicat, the CPS chief portfolio officer, was formerly principal of UIC College Prep, a Noble Network Charter School.
About 44,000 CPS students, nearly 11 percent of the district’s enrollment, attend charter schools.
Earlier this month, district officials unveiled a plan to close four elementary schools, phase out two high schools, and turnaround 10 schools by firing existing staff and changing the school curriculum and culture.
That plan called for six schools to be operated by the Academy for Urban School Leadership, a move that was criticized by Chicago Teachers Union officials in part because top members of Emanuel’s education team have close ties to the organization. Chicago Board of Education president David Vitale was a member of AUSL’s board until joining the city’s school board and CPS chief operating officer Tim Cawley was a managing director at AUSL before coming to the school district. (AUSL was founded by Martin Koldyke, who is on the board of the Chicago News Cooperative.)
Emanuel has dismissed claims that he is turning over CPS schools to AUSL because of personal connections.
“There would be a conflict of interest if I didn’t do it,” he said last month about the district’s plan to expand AUSL’s portfolio. “If I refused to do what was right because of politics.”
If reform means handing tax dollars to private corporations than Emanuel has joined the likes of GW Bushes greed based educational reform. Emanuel is doing what is right for destroying public education. He keeps hiding behind what is “right”. What he means is he is doing what the “Right” wants.