Education

Education | Features

The Last Hail

Closing Queen of Peace High School

by 5 months ago 7 Comments

Lizzie Smith

The popular image of a private all-girls Catholic high school usually evokes ideas of strict nuns, enforced uniformity, and fierce standards of discipline rather than notions of female empowerment. And yet at Queen of Peace High School, many alumnae, students, and even staff members would insist that progressive ideas were the foundation of the school. Again and again, the women I spoke to used the words “feminist” and “voice” to describe the fifty-five-year-old all-girls high school located on a fifteen-acre tract of land in Burbank, Illinois, a few blocks west of the Ford City Mall in West Lawn.

Education | Faith

When a Door Closes

The shuttering of St. Columbanus School marks the decline of Black Catholic populations in Chicago

by 5 months ago

Jenna Johnson

For everything there is a season—innocence, adolescence, first love. One major life experience, though, is not temporary, but changes along with the seasons of life: learning. A solid grammar school education can set a solid foundation for life. For many years, St. Columbanus School served that role in the predominantly African-American neighborhood of Park Manor, providing a culturally rich, warm environment, as well as an academically rigorous one. According to St. Columbanus alumna Leslie Cain-Cauley, who graduated with the class of 1980, what made St. Columbanus special was that it was a family; parents were friends with each other outside of the school and supported the teachers, and the students had pride in the school. In 2015, however, St. Columbanus had to close its doors and merge with St. Dorothy School due to low enrollment. The merged schools became the Augustus Tolton Catholic Academy, which has a STREAM curriculum (Science, Technology, Religion, Engineering, Arts, Math). The new school not only marks the end of an era in this community, but points to the variety of changes in the Catholic community as a whole—economic, educational, and social.

Activism | Education | Politics

Students United in Power

High school activists in Brighton Park continue a familiar fight in the Trump era

by 6 months ago

In the summer and early fall of 2015, all eyes in Chicago’s education community were on the campaign and thirty-four-day hunger strike organized by community organizers, families, and educators, that successfully led to the reopening of Dyett High School in Washington Park as an arts school. Among the activists in the “Save Dyett” campaign were Dyett alumni and students, many of whom mobilized after feeling their communities and schools were being undervalued by city officials.

Education | Politics

Stumbling Blocks for Public Preschool

What’s behind the drop in CPS pre-K enrollment?

by 6 months ago 2 Comments

Turtel Onli

This school year, Chicago Public Schools saw a shocking enrollment loss of 1,882 students in its preschool programs, nearly six times greater than last year’s enrollment decrease. The drop in preschool enrollment accounted for seventeen percent of all attrition in the district—the largest decline in preschool enrollment since 2008. This dramatic change coincides with the introduction of a universal online application for Chicago public preschool programs, echoing a similar drop in preschool enrollment after a 2013 shift to a universal in-person application system.

Education | Politics

Unfair at the Front Lines

CPS teachers protest furlough days, cuts to teacher training

by 7 months ago 1 Comment

Ellen Hao

On Friday, February 3, Paula Wyatt should have been at her school on Chicago’s Northwest Side, where she works as a librarian for 1100 students. This particular Friday was scheduled as a coveted (and contractually required) staff professional development day. Wyatt should have attended a discussion of LGBT issues in schools with staff from Lurie Children’s Hospital and a presentation by a bilingual specialist.  She should have attended a curriculum-planning meeting, a grant-writing seminar in order to apply for library refurbishment funds, and a meeting with Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) mentors regarding the implementation of new Next Generation Science Standards. Her colleagues should have been engaging in other training and development opportunities or using the day for grading and meetings. But instead, on February 3, Wyatt’s school remained closed, like all the 516 other schools operated by Chicago Public Schools (CPS). This district-wide closure left over 31,000 CPS employees without pay and over 320,000 students unable to reap the benefits of those teacher-training programs.

Chinatown | Education | Englewood | Politics

A New High School for Englewood

Emanuel announces major investment following skepticism and debate about location

by 7 months ago 1 Comment

Jasmin Liang

Chicago Public Schools (CPS) revealed late last year in their 2017 capital plan that a new seventy-five million dollar high school would be coming to the South Side. Initially, CPS did not release the location of the new high school, and several neighborhoods, such as Chinatown and Englewood, had been organizing and campaigning to be involved in the decision-making process.

Education | Politics

An Existing Problem Made Much Worse

A new report tracks Illinois’s longtime disinvestment in higher education

by 7 months ago

This graph shows the decrease in state funding for five public universities in Illinois between the 2015 and 2017 fiscal years. Funding this year went up from last year, but still remained well below funding from 2015, the last year Illinois had a comprehensive General Fund budget (Ellen Hao)

Illinois’s public universities are facing a virtually insurmountable funding crisis. According to a report recently published by the nonpartisan Center for Tax and Budget Accountability (CTBA), higher education in Illinois suffered a 67.8 percent cut in its allocations from fiscal year 2015 to fiscal year 2016, receiving approximately one-third of the recommended budget proposed by the Illinois Board of Higher Education (IBHE). Because of the state legislature’s failure to approve a complete budget for higher education, public universities operated on the minimal funding from the $627 million stopgap budget, a short-term budget that appropriated a small amount for expenditures in higher education through January 2017.

Agriculture | Education

Fair and Fowl

Urban Livestock Expo shines a spotlight on Chicago’s backyard livestock

by 7 months ago 1 Comment

A trio of children inspect one of Lidia Andronic's chicks. (Benjamin Unger)

The animals at the fifth annual Urban Livestock Expo, unlike their wilder counterparts, are indifferent to the fact that it’s an unusually warm and sun-drenched winter day. They have been convened in the ventilated lobby of the Chicago High School for Agricultural Sciences (CHSAS) by local nonprofit Advocates for Urban Agriculture for an event intended to showcase the urban livestock community and to educate would-be urban farmers. Many of the presenters at last Saturday’s event are on double duty, discussing their livelihoods with attendees before dashing into classrooms to teach workshops.

Education

Boots on the Ground

Parents organize Friends of Kenwood to fill budget gaps

by 7 months ago 1 Comment

Danielle McDaniels, Chairperson of the Kenwood Academy Parent Advisory Council and board member of Friends of Kenwood (FOK), spoke in the Kenwood Academy library to parents about the launch of FOK (Hafsa Razi)

On February 2, at Kenwood Academy High School’s library, Kimberly Harding announced the launch of a new parent fundraising organization, Friends of Kenwood (FOK), along with a plan for an army of committees under the organization. Harding is the president of the board of the nonprofit group, which aims to “ensure the future of Kenwood [Academic Center] & [High School] as the premier education Academic Center and Academy in Chicago and the world.”

Education | Politics

Universities Get Political

Chicago’s universities respond to Trump’s immigration policies

by 7 months ago 1 Comment

Jasmin Liang

Donald Trump’s aggressive immigration policies have upended the lives of people around the world, and if his administration follows through on promises made on the campaign trail, the futures of both documented and undocumented immigrants in the U.S. may face additional threats in the years to come. As a result, American universities and their communities, which rely on student talent from all over the world, are among the institutions that stand to lose because of Trump’s policies. In Chicago, many universities and colleges are taking steps to respond to these policies.