Chalkbeat

Chicago’s first day of school brings excitement and concerns about possible budget cuts

2026-08-24T20:57:10+00:00

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Eleven-year-old Carter Darling was so excited Monday morning that he was awake before his mom and the sun.

By 6:45 a.m., Carter was wearing his backpack and the school uniform he typically hates: a black cardigan with the school’s name embroidered on the upper left corner, a white collared dress shirt, a plaid tie, gray slacks, and black sneakers.

“I feel good,” he said, smiling, before embarking on the two-block walk to his first day of sixth grade at Robert A. Black Magnet Elementary School in the Calumet Heights neighborhood on Chicago’s South Side.

Carter is one of more than 300,000 Chicago Public Schools students who returned to the classroom Monday. It’s a big year for the nation’s fourth largest school district. Mayoral control is set to formally end in January and be replaced by a fully elected school board that will manage a $10 billion budget, oversee district leadership, and set the vision for the city’s more than 600 public schools.

The school board’s decisions directly affect schools like Carter’s. Last month, the current board approved a budget that assumes CPS will get $150 million more in state funding than Illinois lawmakers allocated in May. The additional money would help reverse summer layoffs, but schools could face midyear cuts if it doesn’t come.

Before Mayor Brandon Johnson rang the first bell Monday at George Leland Elementary School in the Austin neighborhood where he lives, he repeated his push for Illinois to implement a state millionaires tax to fund public education.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson walks Chicago Public School students to their first day of school at George Leland Elementary School on Aug. 24, 2026.

“We’re going into a season where we have to demand more from those who have the ability to give more to actually do more,” Johnson said. “You have politicians that have greater expectations of third graders than they do of themselves.”

Back on the South Side, Carter’s mom, Jaciel Cathey, recounted taking a photo of Carter shaking hands with Johnson last year when he visited his school alongside then-interim CPS CEO Macquline King.

Cathey learned more about the district’s budget situation during one of the district’s family webinars last week but said she still doesn’t know what it will mean for her child’s school.

“Why are we including money in the budget that is not set in stone?” she said. “You’re depending on money that is not there.”

Cathey hopes to use her new role on the school’s Local School Council to help address funding and resource gaps, including securing money to fund a crossing guard for the small but sometimes busy streets around the school.

She and Carter are also trying to remain focused on what they can control.

Carter will probably take an admissions test this fall for sixth graders interested in attending the district’s selective middle school programs, known as Academic Centers.

The family is no stranger to navigating CPS through periods of instability. Cathey grew up in the Woodlawn neighborhood and graduated from CPS schools before becoming a CPS teacher and later changing careers.

When Carter turned 3, Cathey enrolled him in a full-day preschool program at Holy Angels, a Catholic school near her Bronzeville home, with hours that allowed her to work.

Before Carter entered kindergarten, CPS schools saw midyear cuts, then received a historic funding commitment from the state. In 2019, the Chicago Teachers Union went on an 11-day strike. Cathey said this unpredictability made her want to keep him at Holy Angels through eighth grade.

“You knew they would have the staff, you knew they would have the resources,” Cathey said of the private school, which costs about $7,000 annually.

Jaciel Cathey walks her son, Carter, to school on Mon., Aug. 24, 2026 in Chicago, Il.

But Cathey felt Holy Angels focused too heavily on the arts and disciplining students and not enough on reading and math. When it was time for kindergarten, Carter applied and was admitted to Walt Disney Magnet School, a coveted public magnet school on the North Side.

They liked the school. But at the end of first grade, a white child called Carter a racial slur on the playground, Cathey said. According to an incident report reviewed by Chalkbeat, staff planned to hold a “restorative conversation” with the other child. She didn’t feel the school was being responsive enough to her or handling the situation well, so Carter returned to Holy Angels for second grade.

“Let’s put him in CPS, see what happens — well, he gets called the n-word,” Cathey said during an interview last week. “OK, let’s go back to what we know.”

CPS now has a Black Student Success Plan, meant to improve outcomes and the school experience for the city’s Black students. But the Trump administration is investigating CPS in part over the plan, claiming that it discriminates against students who aren’t Black.

By the end of second grade, the Cathey family had moved further south to Pill Hill. Black Magnet was just a five-minute walk from their new home. The state has labeled the close-knit, small school “commendable,” and students last year outpaced their peers across the district and state in math and reading proficiency.

Carter enrolled at Black Magnet in fourth grade and in the two years since, hasn’t looked back. He likes the staff, has made friends, and enjoys learning — especially the “pretty fun” projects in science, he said.

Cathey said Carter will stay at Black Magnet through eighth grade if he doesn’t get into an Academic Center. But she wants him to have “consistency” as he prepares for college, and that means leaving CPS for high school, she said.

“We need for him to get the most support that he can get and the most rigorous education that he can get without, you know, Mr. Johnson teaching math on Monday, then Mr. Johnson is laid off because Springfield didn’t send the money,” Cathey said.

As the mother and son walked up to Black on Monday morning, Cathey reminded Carter about their annual tradition of getting ice cream after school on the first day. She gave him a hug and sent him into the building with a tote filled with paper towels and tissues for his classroom.

Mila Koumpilova contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

The Chicago Board of Education voted to reverse layoffs, but CPS says not all positions can be restored

2026-08-12T21:06:13+00:00

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Despite a directive from the Chicago Board of Education to reverse hundreds of layoffs across Chicago Public Schools, district officials said they can’t afford to reinstate every position cut earlier this summer.

The board’s 11-7 vote revised CPS’ proposed budget, assuming the district will get an extra $150 million in state funding, with $100 million of that going to help reverse hundreds of layoffs, including teachers and support staff. Even if that money comes through, it won’t be enough to bring back everyone who was cut, district officials said Tuesday night.

While students will see many reinstated teachers and other staff on Aug. 24, the first day of school for most students, not all laid-off educators will be able to return. CPS has not said how many employees will get their jobs back.

CPS sent out surveys Tuesday night to principals asking about their most pressing staffing needs related to students and academics and separately asked laid-off teachers if they’re interested in returning to their schools. The surveys, which Chalkbeat obtained, provide the clearest information educators have received on next steps since the board adopted its revised budget roughly two weeks ago. Teachers will be notified of possible reassignments between this weekend and the first day of school, according to the teacher survey.

Principals, whose budgets were finalized in June and likely have scheduled classes, will not have to reopen their budgets, district officials said. Instead, the district will use the survey results to hire back “selected positions” centrally and assign them to schools, the district’s acting Chief Talent Officer Jerry Taylor wrote in the survey.

The rehiring process excludes positions meant to reduce class sizes or those associated with special education, CPS said, which has a separate appeals process, Taylor wrote to principals.

During a Tuesday night webinar for families, Chief Education Officer Karime Asaf said officials are working to implement the adopted budget, but it will take time.

Asaf added that “every decision we make will always put students first, and we will always be honest with you about what is happening.”

One CPS principal addressed the school board Wednesday to decry the uncertainty and disruption that attempting to reverse layoffs is creating. Jeff Finelli, the principal at Edison Park Elementary, said restoring some positions, particularly those of assistant principals in small schools, is worthwhile. But he said kicking off the year takes months of “meticulous, relentless planning,” and rethinking staffing at this late stage is a “massive, unnecessary distraction.”

“Instead of focusing on our students and staff, principals will be forced to navigate logistical nightmares with no current answers,” he said. “This breeds confusion and takes our focus away from what’s most important.”

CPS had warned the board against revising the budget to include more money than expected, because a funding shortfall could result in midyear cuts. Securing more state funding this fiscal year would require a three-fifths majority approval from state legislators in both the House and Senate during the November veto session.

Hundreds of employees received layoff notices last month before the budget vote, including Andrew Feigenbaum, who taught third grade math and science and led an after-school club at Oscar DePriest Elementary School in the West Side’s Austin neighborhood.

CPS says 65 to 85% of laid-off teachers typically get rehired into vacant positions at other district schools. Feigenbaum said he’s applied to about 30 schools since learning of his layoff in mid-July but hasn’t heard back from any.

Feigenbaum, who has taught in CPS for two years, said he had received almost no clarity about next steps between the board vote and the district’s survey Tuesday night. He hopes to be rehired at DePriest.

Feigenbaum said he was frustrated that teachers were laid off before the board’s vote — which is typical at CPS — and wished the district would decide on a budget earlier in the spring. After teaching for more than a dozen years in other districts, Feigenbaum said the layoff experience at CPS has “kind of soured me to the district.”

“This is, like, all you see on the news — ‘the board voted to rescind the cuts’ — (but) what does it actually mean?” Feigenbaum said. “Now we fill out some survey so that maybe we’ll get our old job back, and maybe we won’t.”

Two of the major unions representing CPS workers are split on the board’s decision.

The Chicago Teachers Union pushed board members to revise the budget to pressure the state to boost dollars for CPS, which the state considers to be 70% adequately funded, and pointed to supportive statements from some key state lawmakers. On Wednesday, the union held a press conference to continue pressuring state officials for more money.

But SEIU Local 73, which represents thousands of support staffers, is skeptical more funding will come and warned that midyear cuts would devastate its members and students. Earlier this week, the union formally requested a detailed plan from CPS leadership and the board by Aug. 27 outlining what cuts would take effect without state funding and what protections it would provide to workers and families.

The union also asked state legislators, including House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch, who previously said he would push for more school funding, to make concrete commitments and provide detailed plans for approving additional CPS funding during the fall veto session.

Mila Koumpilova contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Despite state funding increase, gap to adequately fund schools widens in most Illinois districts

2026-08-08T00:07:47+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools is further away from having enough money to meet its students’ needs as defined by the state, according to new data released by the Illinois State Board of Education.

Under ISBE’s calculations released Friday, CPS is now considered a little over 70% adequately funded, compared with 73% last year. CPS isn’t alone in that shift. More than 700 school districts regressed from hitting the state’s target of 90% funding adequacy, a metric reached by assessing a district’s student population and ability to pay for a variety of common cost factors.

The backslide is due, in part, to the state changing how it counted low-income students. Officials said they decided to count students “who were eligible for federal social programs as of July 1,” including Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition and Assistance Program, or SNAP.

The widening gap in funding adequacy for hundreds of districts, including Chicago, adds fuel to the Chicago Teachers Union’s argument that the city’s schools need lawmakers to commit more money. The Board of Education echoed this sentiment when they recently passed a budget assuming the state will increase funding during the fall veto session in November.

Illinois Federation of Teachers and Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates called the funding distribution a “wake-up call” to the state. However, amending the state’s budget now would be hard and require a three-fifths majority vote.

Illinois’ way of funding schools assumes students with higher-needs cost more to educate. Adequacy targets for each district fluctuate annually based on the students being served, which is why an increase in low-income students raises the cost the formula says is necessary to reach adequacy.

Identifying low-income students for the formula is likely to change further next year. Illinois lawmakers put $200,000 in this year’s budget for the state education department to come up with a new way to count low-income students in response to the Trump administration’s “Big Beautiful Bill,” which cut funding for many social programs.

There was a 43% rise in low-income students this year, according to ISBE. That coupled with lower property tax revenues and increases in teacher salaries and instructional material costs are what is driving districts away from being adequately funded, state Superintendent Tony Sanders told reporters in a webinar Friday.

Schools get at least the same amount of money they received the year prior. Districts furthest from achieving adequate funding are first in line to receive more money. Lawmakers added $350 million — the typical annual funding commitment — this year as part of the state budget.

Despite more districts faltering in their march toward adequate funding, total state spending on K-12 schools totals over $9 billion. That’s up by more than $2 billion since evidence-based funding was introduced in 2017.

Notably, that money is unrestricted. So districts do not have to use the money exactly in line with where the state identified heightened needs.

Zooming in on Chicago’s state funding this year

Chicago Public Schools remains one of the neediest districts in Illinois.

Overall, CPS will get about $1.9 billion from the state for the 2026-27 school year. That’s nearly $66 million – or about one-fifth — of the $350 million increase in state education funding. But it falls just short of the $2 billion the Chicago Board of Education hopes to get.

Last week, the school board passed an amended budget that increased the amount it expected to get from the state through the evidence-based formula, from $1.9 billion to $2 billion. Additionally, it assumes $50 million more from a separate pot of state funding that’s meant to reimburse CPS for other services, such as special education and student transportation costs.

The board also directed CPS CEO Macquline King to reverse hundreds of staff layoffs as part of its new budget.

If the funding doesn’t come through, schools may be forced to cut staff or programs in the middle of the school year. While King urged the board not to assume more funding than CPS was expecting, she and board members have said they will press the state to boost its support during the Illinois legislature’s November veto session, which would require three-fifths of lawmakers in the state House and Senate to approve.

“We will be working with our government partners at both the city and the state level to secure the additional funding that our schools need, and we really hope that you stay tuned so that we can inform you how you can help us with that advocacy for additional school funding,” King said Thursday evening during a webinar for the public.

If lawmakers agreed to give CPS more money, Sanders said ISBE would advocate that all districts get a funding increase.

Disbursements of funds to districts should start Monday, according to ISBE.

Makiya Seminera is a reporter covering how the state and federal government affect education in Chicago and across Illinois. Contact Makiya at mseminera@chalkbeat.org. Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

These Chicago school board incumbents face no opponents. What does that mean for voters?

2026-08-07T20:27:06+00:00

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Katrina Kasten, a mother of two CPS students on the North Side, remembers a lot of political flyers and canvassers at her door two years ago when the city’s first school board elections were underway. That year, the North Center resident had six candidates competing for her vote.

Now, there’s just one person running in her district: incumbent Ellen Rosenfeld.

“I always appreciate when there’s more than one candidate on the ballot, because it brings to light conversations — people are forced to share their plans a little bit more than when it’s just an unopposed slate,” Kasten said.

Instead of courting voters at block parties and farmers’ markets as she’d originally planned, Rosenfeld said she doesn’t have a campaign operation because no one filed the 500 signatures needed to run against her.

She isn’t the only incumbent who entered the race without any challengers. Angel Gutierrez, who represents parts of the Southwest Side, also is running unopposed. Petition challenges have knocked even more candidates off the ballot, leaving three additional districts uncontested.

This November, Chicago voters will for the first time choose all 21 members of the Board of Education, ending more than three decades of mayoral control. But after a yearslong fight to establish an elected school board, the lack of competition in some districts raises questions about how often voters will be able to choose who represents them — or if the new board will favor insiders and incumbents.

Nine of the dozen people interviewed for this story who live in Rosenfeld’s or Gutierrez’s districts said they wished they had more choices in November, even those who liked the incumbents.

A combination of factors likely led to both races being unopposed: Gutierrez and Rosenfeld easily won their districts in 2024 and are backed by powerful officials and organizations, possibly scaring off potential opponents. Serving on the school board is similar to a part-time job but it’s unpaid, which could deter people who would otherwise run.

Some competition is good in electoral politics, said Joanna Klonsky, a political consultant who helps run Democratic campaigns and is currently working on elected board member Jessica Biggs’ run for school board president.

“It’s better for our democratic system (and) it’s better for the candidates because it requires them to engage in robust debate,” Klonsky said, adding that election season can be an opportunity for unopposed candidates to build a following for years to come.

Gutierrez and Rosenfeld won big in the 2024 election

Rosenfeld and Gutierrez, who are running in vastly different districts, each dominated in the 2024 election.

Last election, 10 of the 21 board members were elected, and candidates ran in larger districts. Rosenfeld competed against five others in district 4 and won almost 42% of the vote. Gutierrez won his district with almost 63% of the vote against a teachers union-backed candidate.

Now, each candidate is only running in the half of the district where they live. A Chalkbeat analysis of last year’s election results at the precinct level show signs that both Gutierrez and Rosenfeld could have put up a strong fight if they were opposed this year. Gutierrez won double the number of votes as the second-place winner in precincts that overlap with the subdistrict he’s running in now, while Rosenfeld won by a margin that was almost as large.

“Other potential candidates probably looked at that and decided to pass,” said Andrew Broy, president of the Illinois Network of Charter Schools.

INCS says it supports both candidates.

Gutierrez described himself and Rosenfeld as “physical representations” of their districts.

Gutierrez’s Southwest Side district, 8a, encompasses the Ashburn, Chicago Lawn, West Lawn, Clearing, and Garfield Ridge neighborhoods. It is more than 60% Latino, more than double the share of Latinos citywide, according to data analyzed by the University of Chicago’s To&Through Project, which uses the most recent available U.S. Census data. Roughly a quarter of people have college degrees, less than the city as a whole. About 40% of households earn $100,000 or more, and 83% of high schoolers in the area attend CPS schools.

In Rosenfeld’s district of 4b, 75% of residents are white, more than double the rate of the city overall. They’re also wealthier and more educated than the city as a whole: 62% of people earn more than $100,000, and 86% have a college degree. Just over half of high schoolers attend a CPS school.

Gutierrez’s district is more politically conservative while Rosenfeld’s is more liberal. But they have one similarity: During the 2023 mayoral runoff election, voters in both areas rejected Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former teachers union organizer and progressive, and voted for Paul Vallas, the more conservative candidate and former CPS CEO.

Gutierrez and Rosenfeld have been criticized by the Chicago Teachers Union. CTU did not respond to a request for an interview about not backing a candidate in these districts this election.

Because of Rosenfeld’s and Gutierrez’s commanding wins in the 2024 race, the political makeup of their districts, and who they were backed by in the last election, opponents may have decided it wouldn’t be worth their resources to jump in, according to multiple Democratic political consultants and other observers.

Rosenfeld and Gutierrez were endorsed by organizations other than the union, such as the anti-CTU Chicago Democrats for Education, and many local elected officials. In 2024, Rosenfeld was endorsed by more than a dozen elected officials, including state lawmakers who helped create the elected school board, the Chicago Federation of Labor, and the 44th and 47th Democratic Ward Organizations, the latter of which her husband leads. Gutierrez was also backed by many elected officials, including powerful 13th Ward Ald. Marty Quinn, and the Chicago Laborers’ District Council.

Unpaid nature of the job may have scared off competition

The lack of candidates could be because many people still don’t know about Chicago’s elected school board, political consultants said.

One survey of more than 1,300 Chicago adults found that two-thirds didn’t know the school board will be fully elected next year. Several voters in Rosenfeld’s and Gutierrez’s districts who spoke with Chalkbeat for this story couldn’t remember who they voted for in 2024 or didn’t know there was an election this year.

Being on the school board is an unpaid job with long hours, which could deter people who can’t afford not to work or don’t have flexible jobs that allow them to take on the extra responsibilities of board member.

Nicole Woods, whose 4-year-old daughter will soon attend Francis Parker, a private school in Lincoln Park, was surprised to hear no one else is running, given how strongly the community pushed back this spring against Parker’s plans to expand.

“With so many people fired up about that, it’s kind of interesting that no one is fired up about being on the school board,” she said.

But as Woods and her young daughter hustled to a piano class on a recent weekday afternoon, she considered her packed schedule and said with a laugh, “I mean, I don’t think I would want to do it.”

It’s costly and labor intensive to run a campaign. Even if a candidate collects enough signatures to get on the ballot, they may face a challenge alleging their signatures aren’t eligible, which can require hiring expensive attorneys, causing some people to drop out. And if candidates make it on the ballot, they must spend months hosting events, talking to voters, and collecting donations to pay for mailers, websites, and campaign staff.

It can also be difficult to run without the backing of special interest groups with money and resources, like charter school advocates and the teachers union.

Voters say they want a choice

About half of the residents Chalkbeat spoke with said they either recognized Gutierrez or Rosenfeld or found the names familiar. None knew about the candidates’ track records or voting history while in office.

Rosenfeld said she thinks voters view her as accessible and saw the lack of a challenger as “a big compliment.”

“I believe that’s because the voters have watched me on this board the last couple of years and seen me remain moderate, remain reasonable, remain calm,” she said.

Gutierrez said he tries to represent all kinds of interests. He highlighted his “yes” vote on last year’s budget plan that the union and mayor’s office opposed and his approval of the latest teachers union contract.

“I represented this district, and everybody, everyone — the unions, my residents — very well, I think,” Gutierrez said.

Voters in Gutierrez’s district, he said, value local elected officials who are responsive and can deliver on “constituent services,” like making sure the streets get plowed after a snowstorm.

One of those voters is Rose, a mother of three in the Garfield Ridge neighborhood near Midway Airport, who said she met Gutierrez on election day in 2024.

Rose, who declined to share her last name, said she told Gutierrez about her concerns with safety at Kennedy High School, where her daughter was a junior at the time. Gutierrez told her he’d look into those concerns if he was elected.

Since then, Rose’s daughter graduated, but Rose doesn’t feel that safety at the school has improved.

Gutierrez said he’s heard some reports of bullying at Kennedy and it’s “on his list” to think about solutions. He noted, however, that his job is to help set the direction for the district and “not really interject myself into the day-to-day operations of schools.”

What matters to Rose is that she doesn’t feel like her safety concerns were addressed. As she stood on her porch with a Class of 2026 Kennedy High School sign piercing her front lawn, she said, “I think we should have another voice.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

15 more Chicago campuses join Sustainable Community Schools program

2026-08-03T22:05:41+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools will open 15 more Sustainable Community Schools this upcoming school year, meaning roughly 10% of district schools will receive extra funding to partner with nonprofit organizations and provide wraparound support for students and families.

Mayor Brandon Johnson announced the expansion Monday morning at Malcolm X College, where he was joined by allied Chicago Board of Education members, Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates, and several educators whose schools are part of the program or are joining this year.

There are now 51 schools in the program, which CPS launched in 2018 with the CTU. A Chalkbeat analysis last year found the schools have mixed outcomes and have left millions of dollars unspent. The district’s contract with the union requires 70 schools to join the initiative by the end of its contract in 2028. Of the city’s roughly 630 public schools, which includes charters and others run by independent operators, 520 are run by the district.

Schools in the program receive $500,000 annually to work with a community-based organization and provide extra programming and support for students and parents, such as hiring more mental health professionals. Schools must apply to join.

Johnson said the expansion connects to his vision of creating more resources for communities, such as more affordable housing and “holistic solutions” to violence.

“This model provides more than an education,” he said. “It is the hub of wraparound, academic, and social support that’s extended to the entire community.”

The expansion is a sign that the “days of school closures, consolidation, and privatization has ended officially,” Johnson added — a potential nod to candidates for school board he doesn’t align with, who may be interested in closing schools in response to CPS’s dipping enrollment.

District officials, the union, and school leaders have described the program as a godsend for schools with lots of students from low-income families. The office that oversees the Sustainable Community Schools program is slated to spend about 57% more than it budgeted last year, from about $24.6 million to $38.6 million, according to the district’s latest budget book.

But since the program’s launch, schools and their partner organizations have left more than $6.6 million unspent, according to a Chalkbeat analysis last December. Chalkbeat also found that internal tensions and staff turnover sometimes strained partnerships between schools and nonprofit organizations.

Student outcomes are mixed. Schools that originally joined the program now have higher graduation rates than schools that didn’t get into the program. Suspensions dropped among all schools in the program, as they did at similar schools outside the program. But chronic absenteeism is higher, and enrollment is lower, at participating schools.

To combat some of these challenges, CPS changed how schools join the program, said Megan Hougard, chief of college and career success at CPS.

Previously, schools and organizations did not meet before schools applied, she said.

This year, CPS expanded the list of nonprofits that schools can partner with. Interested schools then met with the organizations, picked which one to work with, and applied together, Hougard said.

Now, she said, “there’s shared expectations, and then there’s just a checkpoint of, ‘Is this the right match?’”

One of the new schools in the program is Gage Park High School on the Southwest Side. Mike Norwood, a physical education teacher at Gage Parktold the crowd at Malcolm X that he “almost started crying” when his principal told him the 300-student school had been selected. He said the school has a strong environment but “needed a miracle” to help boost resources for its neediest students.

The opportunity will allow the school, which is partnering with the Southwest Organizing Project, to create more clubs and activities for kids, such as job training, he said.

“It takes a village to raise a child,” he said. “Now, it takes a school to raise a community.”

Becky Vevea contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago’s school board rescinded many layoffs with uncertain money. What’s next?

2026-07-31T23:38:15+00:00

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A divided Chicago school board passed a nearly $10 billion budget late Thursday that preserves jobs but relies on an additional $150 million in state funding that may not materialize.

Chicago Public Schools CEO Macquline King, whose proposal included cuts that the board amended, swiftly sent an email to parents sounding an alarm and floating the possibility that school may not start on time Aug. 24.

“As it stands right now, though, we do not know if we will be able to secure the short-term financing needed to pay our employees in September, which would effectively shut down the district just as staff and students are set to return,” King said in her Thursday night email to families.

Multiple financial experts say that is unlikely because the district should be able to secure a short-term loan, albeit with high interest.

Last year’s budget avoided cuts to the classroom. This year’s budget drama is set against a larger political backdrop. CPS has long argued that the state underfunds the district under Illinois’ school funding formula. A majority of board members, most appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson, are betting the state will act. But state lawmakers and the governor have already approved a budget, and changes now would be difficult.

Coming months before a November election in which every seat on the school board will be on the ballot, competing views over the budget could prove to be a core campaign issue.

Here’s what parents should know about what’s happening, what it could mean for schools, and what might happen next.

Will school start on time?

CPS did not respond to questions about why schools might not open as scheduled. But a delayed opening is unlikely and unprecedented.

Previously, CPS said that passing a budget Thursday would allow the district to secure short-term borrowing by Sept. 2, just in time to make the Sept. 4 payroll.

CPS needs the loan to make up for late county property tax payments. That loan, designed for government bodies facing short-term cash flow needs, would help cover a missing $400 million of $700 million the district needs for operations in September, according to a memo CPS sent board members this week that Chalkbeat obtained.

Experts said the district will probably be able to secure loans in the time frame it needs.

But, it’s going to cost the district more in interest.

“It’s probable, if not almost a near certainty, that they’ll end up paying more for it because of the budget as well as the short time frame,” said Lisa Washburn, managing director at Municipal Market Analytics, Inc., a market and credit analysis research firm.

Lenders may want to scrutinize CPS’ finances more than usual because the approved budget relies on uncertain money, which could slow down the process, said Justin Marlowe, a municipal finance expert at the University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy.

“(Investors) haven’t done that so far, but a budget that assumes a bunch of state revenue that may or may not arrive is good reason to ask tough questions you’ve never asked before,” Marlowe said in an email.

What if CPS doesn’t have the cash it needs to pay staff?

There are legal consequences for missing payroll, including violations of multiple state labor laws and union contracts that could result in lawsuits and criminal charges, the district wrote in its memo.

It could also mean no school.

“Because employees cannot be compelled to work without compensation, missed payroll will likely result in immediate strikes, walkouts, or work refusals that will halt district operations,” the memo said.

The district could ask its unions for grace on paychecks. CTU and the principals union supported the modified budget plan, but SEIU Local 73, which represents thousands of support staffers who are among the district’s lowest paid, opposed it.

In 1980, Chicago Public Schools was locked out of the bond markets and failed to make payroll multiple times. Then-Gov. Jim Thompson convened city leaders, school officials, unions, and bankers to broker a deal to bail out the troubled school system. They created a separate body known as the School Finance Authority, which could access the markets and get the district the money it needed. This became the precursor to mayoral control in 1995.

Now, CPS is transitioning back to local control, with a hybrid school board made up of 11 mayoral appointees and 10 members elected in 2024. All 21 seats are also on the ballot this Nov. 3, adding a layer of electoral politics to the tensions.

What are the chances the state sends CPS more money?

Revising state revenue for Chicago schools upward by $150 million would require an amendment to the state budget, which passed in May. Any changes require a three-fifths majority of state lawmakers. That’s 36 votes in the Senate and 71 votes in the House, including legislators who don’t represent Chicago and would likely seek funding for their districts, too.

Gov. JB Pritzker said Friday that state funding for school districts is already a “known quantity,” and that if Illinois House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch has a plan for adding supplemental funding, as he implied Wednesday, the governor hasn’t seen it.

“He seems to have a plan or is planning to put something together, and so I look forward to seeing that,” Pritzker said.

It’s not clear whether there are enough votes for such a measure to pass during a veto session in November. Even if it did, that money would likely come through later in the school year.

Pritzker noted that the state has increased K-12 education funding by about $3 billion since he took office in 2018. CPS has seen state revenue increase by nearly $1 billion in that time. The district’s budget has grown from about $6 billion in 2018 to just under $10 billion this year.

CTU and aligned school board members argue that the state’s formula for distributing money to schools, which changed in 2017 before Pritzker took office, promised to get all schools to an adequate funding level by 2027. The state is not on track to hit that goal but the union is putting pressure on Pritzker, Welch, and other state lawmakers to do so.

Will teachers who were laid off from my school be rehired?

The modified budget plan calls for spending $100 million to rescind layoffs that happened earlier this month. Another $50 million would go toward easing a hiring and spending freeze later in the school year.

Nelsen Gerew, chief of internal and public affairs at the Chicago Fund for Public Education, said CPS could give money back to schools and let them handle rehiring, or the district could reverse its own cuts, which would be more complicated.

“Is the idea that we’ll try to get schools back to where they were (last school year)?” Gerew said.

Principals have been working with budgets approved in June and have likely rearranged class schedules for the upcoming year. Teachers who were laid off may have been rehired elsewhere. The CTU contract allows a tenured teacher who has been laid off to return to a school within 10 months if there’s a vacancy and they’re rated proficient or higher.

Will there be midyear cuts at my school?

If the money the school board is expecting from the state doesn’t come through, schools may be forced to cut staff and other resources in the middle of the year to make up the difference.

However, other sources of revenue could increase. Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson could declare a larger surplus from special taxing districts known as TIF, or tax increment financing, meant to spur economic development. Last year, he did, and CPS got $576 million. This year, CPS initially projected $200 million in TIF surplus and revised it earlier this week to $285 million. This revision allowed them to remove furloughs from its initial budget plan.

Johnson faces reelection in February 2027, although he has yet to announce his intentions.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Seeking to reverse layoffs, Chicago school board approves budget, assuming more state money will come

2026-07-31T01:50:09+00:00

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Bucking warnings from Chicago Public Schools CEO Macquline King, the school board amended and narrowly passed a roughly $10 billion budget proposal Thursday that assumes the district will receive $150 million more in state funding than projected.

Eleven board members voted to reverse hundreds of school-based staff layoffs included in King’s proposal, heeding the demands of the Chicago Teachers Union and the principals union.

Appointed board members Anusha Thotakura, Debby Pope, Cydney Wallace, Angel Velez, Ed Bannon, Emma Lozano, Karen Zaccor, Michilla Blaise, and Norma Rios-Sierra, as well as elected board members Jitu Brown and Ebony DeBerry voted to increase the state funding projection of $2.78 billion by another $150 million.

Elected board members Angel Gutierrez, Carlos Rivas, Che “Rhymefest” Smith, Ellen Rosenfeld, Jennifer Custer, Jessica Biggs, and Therese Boyle voted no. Elected board member Yesenia Lopez abstained.

District officials pushed the school board to approve the budget this week so they could secure short-term borrowing by Sept. 2 — two days before paychecks go out — and avoid a “de-facto shutdown” of schools. In a statement after the vote, a spokesperson said the district “cannot guarantee that CPS will receive financing in time for the September 4 payroll” given the board’s changes.

“Failing to meet payroll is unacceptable,” the statement said. “This places the District at significant risk of being in violation of the law and collective bargaining agreements. It may also damage our credit rating and severely restrict our future borrowing capacity for capital projects and operational needs. Most critically, any disruption in pay directly threatens the stability of our schools, impacting our students, families, and dedicated staff.”

The vote came after hours of public testimony and an unusual two-hour recess. During that time, CPS lawyers provided legal advice about amending the budget, according to multiple sources.

Earlier this week, after a push from SEIU Local 73, CPS took furloughs out of its proposal by increasing the amount it expects to receive in special taxing district dollars, known as TIF surplus dollars, which are controlled by the mayor and City Council.

But board members and the Chicago Teachers Union want more pressure on state lawmakers, who have not yet fulfilled a goal to fund all schools to what it considers 90% adequacy. The state considers CPS funded at 73%.

“If we’re not including the state in this conversation, we are fooling ourselves and we are robbing our kids of opportunities,” said appointed board member Michilia Blaise, who introduced the plan to revise King’s budget. “Let’s make it clear to our students that cuts to school communities will not come lightly.”

With the state’s veto session scheduled for November, it’s not clear any new money would come in time for this school year.

Some key Democratic lawmakers have promised to help boost school funding, including House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch. At the board meeting, State Senator Robert Martwick, who represents parts of the Northwest Side and some suburbs, told board members he will fight for more funding.

King warns of consequences to revising her budget proposal

Before the vote, King defended her budget plan, noting that CPS has lost 45,000 students in the last seven years but has hired 10,000 more staffers. Despite school-level cuts, she noted most laid off staffers are rehired in other vacant positions and highlighted an increase in special education and bilingual staff.

She also warned of the risks of assuming more state funds will come through. King recalled her time as a principal in 2017, when CPS had adopted a budget expecting more state funding than previous years that didn’t come through after then-Governor Bruce Rauner vetoed related legislation. CPS imposed big cuts, and King had to lay off staff at her school.

“This was severely disruptive to my students,” King said. “Those are the faces that I see. Those are the conversations that I recall, and that is why I put forth the recommended budget that I did.”

School board has a heated debate

Board members were starkly divided.

Several elected board members not aligned with the teachers union and Mayor Brandon Johnson underscored the risks of assuming there will be more state money.

Elected member Jennifer Custer called the idea of expecting a $150 million increase in state money a “hallucination.” Elected board member Che “Rhymefest” Smith said he will help advocate for more funding from the state and the city.

Smith, a rapper and songwriter, recited a poem he crafted in response to one delivered during public comment by a CTU member: “They say the mayor owes a billy, give it again and again, and don’t make us look silly,” referencing the $1 billion in TIF dollars the mayor and City Council surplused last year, of which CPS got $577 million.

Board president Sean Harden warned TIF surplus is not a guarantee either.

At least a dozen school staffers, clad in bright red CTU shirts, urged the board to revise the budget and push the state to pay up. Several teachers said teacher layoffs mean bigger class sizes and breaking relationships with students.

CTU President Stacy Davis Gates acknowledged the difficult decisions King and her team faced and laid the blame on state lawmakers, including Gov. JB Pritzker. She said the union will help CPS pressure the state.

“Let’s assume that doing this together makes it impossible for people to keep telling us no,” said Davis Gates, who is also the president of the Illinois Federation of Teachers. Board member Jitu Brown also said he believes the “political will” to boost state education funding is there.

Dian Palmer, president of SEIU Local 73, which represents 16,000 support staffers, remained skeptical that a majority of state lawmakers will agree to increase CPS funding.

“Unsecured revenue cannot pay our (Special Education Classroom Assistants) rent in September,” Palmer said. “It cannot guarantee a bus aide on the bus when school opens. Our students do not get to wait for Springfield to make up its mind, and neither should this board.”

Kia Banks, head of the principals union, supported an amended budget. She said she was encouraged that Illinois House Speaker Welch is interested in boosting funding.

“If (funding) doesn’t come through, like in 2017, it’s devastating, and I don’t think they would want that on their record,” Banks said of state lawmakers.

But Justin Marlowe, director of the Center for Municipal Finance at the University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy, said the state now has “far less” incentive to act. If the state can’t come up with the money, “CPS will have to own the consequences,” he said in an email.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema atramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools’ lunchroom staff move closer to strike

2026-07-30T23:21:56+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools’ lunchroom workers are taking steps toward a possible strike, their union announced Thursday.

Unite Here Local 1 delivered a letter to the school district Thursday asking to start a fact-finding process in its year-long contract negotiations. In that process, a fact-finder that’s a third party reviews each side’s argument and issues their findings. According to state law, school district workers can’t go on strike until at least 30 days after a fact-finding report has been publicly released.

The escalation comes as the school board is poised to vote on the district’s nearly $10 billion budget plan for the 2026-27 school year, which includes layoffs and other program cuts. Earlier this week, officials revised the plan to eliminate five furlough days for all staff.

A Chalkbeat analysis of the budget plan found lunchroom funds are poised to shrink slightly and some vacant lunchroom positions are set to be eliminated. Unite Here Local 1 represents roughly 1,800 lunch workers in CPS.

During remarks to the board on Thursday, Tawanda Murray, an executive board member of the union, highlighted a union survey of lunchroom workers last year that found 47% of respondents reported struggling to pay for housing, and 22% said their families rely on food pantries.

Last year, CPS reduced kitchen workers and told families that students would get more cold meals and simplified menus.

The union is pushing the district to raise pay for lunchroom workers to at least $40,000 annually and staff up school kitchens. In April, Chicago Police cited about two dozen lunchroom workers during a planned act of civil disobedience in order to raise awareness about its demands.

On Thursday, workers picketed outside of the Board of Education headquarters downtown in front of a giant inflatable rat, a longstanding feature of union rallies.

Jesse Hernandez, a cook at Columbia Explorers Academy, said he makes $24 an hour and has about $300 left in his paycheck after he pays his bills.

He said bartends on the weekends to make ends meet and wishes he had more time to spend with his grandchildren. He said he’s moving soon because he can’t afford his current apartment.

Hernandez said he’s prepared to go on strike in order to secure more pay for himself and his colleagues, adding that his coworkers who are lunchroom assistants are earning closer to $17 an hour.

“That’s why I’m here, fighting for them and for myself,” Hernandez said.

CPS did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Becky Vevea contributed reporting.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools budget conflict revolves around revenue assumptions, timing

2026-07-29T23:46:59+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education is expected to vote on a $9.96 billion budget plan Thursday that would cut hundreds of teachers but beef up special education staff and freeze some spending in 2027.

The board legally has until late August to approve a budget. But CPS officials are pushing for approval this week to avoid missing payroll in September.

Many board members don’t like the cuts in the current spending plan. Some say they’re a painful necessity to balance the budget. Others say the district should keep pushing for more state money, press the county over a tax-revenue issue, and pass a budget that assumes those dollars will come through.

Why does CPS have to pass a budget this week to make September payroll?

Two reasons: the late distribution of property taxes and the need to borrow money.

Local property taxes, which are collected by Cook County and distributed to government agencies such as CPS, make up roughly half of the district’s operating budget. Almost all property tax dollars that end up at CPS go toward running the district’s daily operations, including salaries.

CPS is expected to receive $4.5 billion in property taxes this fiscal year.

But when the money actually gets to CPS depends on when the county collects the tax. In recent years, technological glitches have delayed tax bills, resulting in CPS and other school districts not getting local revenue in time to cover their expenses.

The district used to have billions of extra federal COVID relief dollars to help cushion the delay, said Wally Stock, acting chief financial officer at CPS. It can no longer do that because the relief funding has ended.

Stock said CPS is missing roughly $250 million in spring tax money. The county treasurer’s office says the figure is closer to $70-80 million, and a “significant portion” of it will be distributed to CPS this week. CPS has said that money, which was owed last fiscal year, won’t impact the upcoming budget.

Why does CPS need to borrow money?

When the county is late giving property tax revenue to CPS, the district takes out Tax Anticipation Notes, or TANs, a form of short-term borrowing that’s paid off when tax dollars come in.

Stock said CPS needs a few weeks to secure a loan in order to cover payroll by September, which is why it needs a budget now. Lenders require an approved budget and tax levy, the district said.

But Justin Marlowe, the director of the Center for Municipal Finance at the University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy, said lenders typically want some kind of guarantee that revenue will come through and they’ll get paid back with interest, so it’s possible CPS could find a willing lender without an approved budget. But the district “would get much more favorable terms,” such as better interest rates, with an approved budget, he said.

CPS has a junk bond rating and therefore pays higher interest rates. District officials estimate it’s spent $80 million in interest since 2020 on short-term loans to make up for late property tax payments.

The county is considering extending a bridge loan to CPS. The county has about $300 million to offer in bridge loans, which isn’t enough to cover payroll, and TANs would still be necessary, Stock said.

Can CPS change the revenue assumptions to avoid cuts?

Earlier this week, CPS leaders nixed a plan for five-day furloughs by increasing how much it expects to receive from special taxing districts, known as TIFs. This amount will not be clear until the city passes its own budget in November or December.

On Tuesday, the district revised its TIF surplus estimate from $200 million to $285 million, compared to $576 million last year.

The Chicago Teachers Union and some allied board members have said that CPS should also anticipate getting more money from the state. That money makes up about one-third of CPS’ operating budget. The union and board members argue that despite an increase in school funding every year, lawmakers have not fulfilled a funding promise made a decade ago. The state formula estimates CPS is 79% of the way to being adequately funded.

But the district’s state money projections are more concrete. They’re based on the budget state lawmakers approved in May.

In a public letter in the Chicago Tribune Wednesday, school board vice president Angel Velez argued that the board can pass a budget that keeps central office and other cuts but “budgets for the revenue our students are owed,” including from the state and a county bridge loan, and “can be amended later if our partners in government fall short.”

“If the state ultimately forces us to truly consider reducing our workforce, let it be after every other option has been exhausted and our constituents have seen us try to prevent it,” he wrote.

In an interview, Velez said passing the current budget plan does not “pressure the state to commit” to what it promised.

If Velez’s suggestion works, CPS could avoid some level of its proposed cuts. If it doesn’t, CPS would have to amend its budget and risk midyear cuts or layoffs, something CPS CEO Macquline King said she had to do as a principal in 2017 when anticipated state revenue didn’t come through.

“We will continue to advocate with our partners at all levels of government to get the funding we know our students need,” King said in a statement Wednesday. “But trying to balance the budget on unrealized state revenue at the 11th hour would be a mistake with devastating short-and-long-term consequences.”

Passing a budget based on uncertain revenue, such as state aid, can result in higher interest costs when CPS tries to borrow money, said Lisa Washburn, managing director at Municipal Market Analytics. CPS carries one of the highest debt burdens among the nation’s school districts.

Even if the state approved more funding — which House Speaker Chris Welch said this week he’s interested in — it’s unclear if it would come this fiscal year, she said.

“Anybody can build a budget on hope [but] hope is not a strategy, and it may be that the state eventually does come through with additional cash, but there isn’t evidence that is going to happen anytime soon,” Washburn said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools cuts staffing slightly but special education positions will rise at some campuses

2026-07-28T21:08:38+00:00

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Amid Chicago Public Schools’ budget challenges, the district’s campuses will start the upcoming school year with a less than 1% cut in overall staffing compared with last year, according to a Chalkbeat analysis of school budgets posted last week.

But the cuts vary across the district’s 500-plus schools. More than 200 schools will have more staff positions, mostly driven by hundreds of new special education positions that CPS says are necessary to meet student needs.

At some schools, there are staff increases of as much as 22% compared to this time last year, while others are losing nearly 20% of their positions. The positions affected by the cuts are wide ranging, from counseling positions to teachers meant to reduce class size ratios.

The school-based staffing figures come as the district tries to close a $732.5 million deficit. The Chicago Board of Education is expected to vote on the district’s nearly $10 billion budget plan, which includes hundreds more special education teaching positions but many other layoffs. CPS on Tuesday nixed a plan for five-day furloughs next school year.

At individual schools, the changes in staffing ranges from a single part-time position to 16 positions.

The schools with staffing increases serve an average 70% of students who are from low-income households, on par with the districtwide average. Roughly 270 schools will have fewer staff compared with this time last year. At those schools, three-quarters of students on average are from low-income households, slightly higher than the district as a whole.

Forty-one schools won’t have a change in positions compared with last fall. At those schools, 68% of kids on average come from low-income families.

These budget figures also don’t tell the full story of decisions that principals must make, according to one principal, who requested anonymity to speak candidly. Her school — where students are overwhelmingly from low-income families — is gaining a couple of positions to open a special education cluster program. But the school also had to cut some non-teaching positions in order to keep a teacher, she said.

While she said her school is faring better than many others, she and her staff are “feeling the impact.”

“We had to make tough decisions,” she said.

Chalkbeat’s analysis excludes staffing for charter and contract schools, including a group of former charter and contract schools that will become district schools in the fall, because district data does not provide enough information about their staffing levels.

The district is slated to spend about $18 million less, or about 2% less, on charter schools, according to CPS budget information. However, it has budgeted $27.6 million for the upcoming school year to absorb and reopen five former Acero charter schools and Chicago High School for the Arts — a former contract school — as district-run schools.

The data shows how many positions schools got before the start of the school year compared with the same point in time last year. But the figures don’t capture whether schools gained or lost staff during last school year.

In a fact sheet about school budgets, the district said its goal “is to ensure staff are placed where most needed across the District in an effort to best serve all schools and decrease vacancies in high-need positions and schools.”

Officials said schools’ staffing changes are due to changes to enrollment, student needs, changes to programs, and how individual schools decided to spend their discretionary dollars.

The district also tightened its needs-based formula for funding schools and incorporated enrollment in more.

The formula is largely based on a school’s needs rather than the number of students enrolled, to decide how many positions schools get. It assigns each school an Opportunity Index number based on many factors, including how many low-income students a school serves and the life expectancy in the area.

This year — as overall CPS enrollment dipped again after a couple of years of small gains — the district tweaked its formula by slightly increasing student-to-teacher ratios and the Opportunity Index score needed to warrant some additional positions.

CPS has emphasized that class size limits won’t change and are enshrined in its contract with the Chicago Teachers Union.

The district said it limited cuts to positions. It decided that elementary schools wouldn’t lose more than four “foundational” — or core — teacher positions, and high schools wouldn’t lose more than six, regardless of their enrollment or Opportunity Index scores.

Foreman High School will gain special education positions but lose other teaching positions, and it will lose one position overall.

The school’s Opportunity Index rose, which warded off additional cuts, said Jessica Keirns, a member of Foreman’s Local School Council. Almost 90% of Foreman students come from low-income families, and many are English learners, she said.

The index is protecting “some of the most vulnerable students in our city,” Keirns said.

For Lizette Garcia, the mother of a rising first grader at Nightingale Elementary School on the Southwest Side, hearing of additional cuts is frustrating because the school already feels tight on resources, she said. The school, where 83% of kids come from low-income households, will lose five more positions, or nearly a 5% staff reduction.

The school enrolled 862 students last year. At the time, her son’s kindergarten class had 30 students. Her son was struggling with reading, and she wondered if the class size made it harder for the teacher and her assistant to support students.

The school opened a new kindergarten classroom midway through the year, and his class got smaller, she said.

“But by that time, he was already behind,” Garcia said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools CEO King removes furloughs from the budget proposal ahead of vote

2026-07-28T19:03:58+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools removed its proposal for five furlough days next school year, the district announced Tuesday ahead of the Chicago Board of Education’s Thursday budget vote.

The furloughs would have started in January and applied to all staff districtwide on days when students are already scheduled to be off. The district revised its revenue assumptions to avoid having the unpaid days off.

CPS said the change is in response to feedback from the community but also comes after pushback from some board members, as well as the unions representing teachers and support staff. The latter, SEIU Local 73, demanded Monday that CPS revise its revenue projections for special city taxing dollars, known as TIF surplus, to prevent furloughs. CPS said it will do just that: The district will increase its TIF surplus dollars projection by $85 million — to $285 million.

In a statement Tuesday, Dian Palmer, president of SEIU Local 73, said the union applauds the decision.

The actual TIF amount won’t be clear until the City Council adopts its budget, which typically happens toward the end of the year. CPS’s new TIF surplus assumption is less than half of the record amount it received last year after months of conflict with the mayor’s office. In an interview last week, King said she has been discussing her budget plans with city leaders but hasn’t received concrete TIF figures.

The district’s nearly $10 billion budget proposal would cut hundreds of other staffers, increase special education staffing, and freeze some spending after January.

While the board can legally wait until late August to pass a budget, King is pushing them to vote Thursday so that CPS has enough time to issue short-term borrowing and make September payroll. Eleven board members, or a majority of the 21-member board, must vote yes for the budget to pass.

“It became clear that to alleviate any potential stressors or possible disruption to the start of the school year, we needed to update the proposed budget,” King said in a statement.

Last week, a dozen teachers and the Chicago Teachers Union blasted furloughs and layoffs during a budget hearing.

CTU has for months pressed state lawmakers for more funding but said in an online post last week that the district was “undercounting” how much TIF money the mayor would make available. The mayor has the power to declare a surplus on any money in TIF accounts that is not earmarked for a specific project. By doing so, all taxing bodies get a portion of the funds and by law, CPS is entitled to roughly half of any surplus.

Separately, the Illinois Federation of Teachers is suing Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas on behalf of the CTU and suburban union members to release tax revenue that hasn’t made it to the district.

In a statement, CTU and IFT president Stacy Davis Gates said that the revised proposal still doesn’t include enough staff and urged the board to keep revising or delay a vote “until the budget addresses our students’ needs,” she said.

“What is on the table is still a very rough draft that would cause permanent harm to Chicago’s students,” Davis Gates said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board presidential candidate Hilario Dominguez accused of breaking campaign finance rules

2026-07-23T22:10:26+00:00

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Hilario Dominguez, a candidate for Chicago school board president, is facing a formal state complaint from a challenger who claims Dominguez ignored campaign finance rules.

State election authorities received a complaint last Friday from Hugo Jacobo against Dominguez’s campaign committee, Friends of Hilario, arguing his latest campaign filings reporting nothing raised or spent “cannot be accurate.” Jacobo is working for Dominguez’s opponent Sendhil Revuluri, whose team shared the complaint with Chalkbeat.

Dominguez, who is also the political director of the Chicago Teachers Union, did not directly address the complaint or the allegations but said he’s spending time with “parents, students, and communities.”

“Unlike the billionaires who fought against giving Chicagoans a vote like this, they don’t have a lot of money,” he said in a statement.

His campaign treasurer Kat Zamorran said in a statement that the “campaign is in compliance and more activity will be in the next report.”

Candidates running in the Nov. 3 election were required to file campaign finance reports for the year’s second quarter with the state on July 15. Candidates for school board have raised $1.8 million, $1.2 million of that in the board president’s race alone. Dominguez is one of five candidates for board president and has the CTU’s endorsement.

According to state election law, candidates are required to register a political committee with the Board of Elections when it raises or spends $5,000 in a 12-month period, but candidates can create the committee before reaching that threshold. While Dominguez’s committee was registered with the state on June 4, it does not have to report campaign contributions or expenses until either hits $5,000, so it’s possible the campaign hasn’t reached that number yet. Neither Zamorran or Dominguez answered questions about whether they’ve hit the threshold.

Matt Dietrich, spokesperson for the Illinois State Board of Elections, noted that contributions aren’t considered “received” by a committee until they’re deposited to the bank. For example, if a fundraiser happened in June, but donations weren’t deposited until after July 1, that money wouldn’t show up on campaign finance filings until the next round of reports are due in the fall. There’s one exception: Contributions of $1,000 or more must be reported within five days of being deposited, Dietrich said.

The complaint likely won’t be addressed until the Illinois Board of Elections’ Oct. 20 meeting, according to Dietrich.

The board can “prescribe corrective action immediately” or hold a public hearing over the case if it agrees with the complainant. Dominguez could face a financial penalty, but first-time penalties are waived unless a committee commits another violation within two years, Dietrich said.

Revuluri said he doesn’t think it’s “reasonable” that Dominguez could have run his campaign so far, including with printed materials and a fundraising event, and not have exceeded $5,000 in expenses.

“My concern is less with some kind of punishment, but more restorative action, where the campaign starts telling the truth, where the campaign is being honest about how it’s being financed (and) what they’re doing with that money because voters deserve to have that information,” Revuluri said.

The complaint laid out several spending claims, including that Dominguez’s campaign has created campaign materials, such as fliers and banners, and has a campaign website containing a note saying it was “paid for by Friends of Hilario,” which was visible on the website Thursday. The complaint also names people who helped Dominguez collect signatures to get on the ballot, noting that those people are known paid circulators whom other campaigns have also hired and are paid per signature. WBEZ reported that Dominguez had collected about 9,000 signatures.

The complaint noted that Dominguez held a fundraiser last month but didn’t report receiving any funds in the latest required campaign finance disclosures.

Both CTU’s and Illinois Network of Charter Schools’ PACs are expected to spend big in the campaign but haven’t yet poured money into races. The union’s PAC did report spending money on fending off petition challenges for some candidates.

The state will assign Jacobo’s complaint to a hearing officer, who will hold a hearing with both parties, Dietrich said in an email. After that, the hearing officer will make a recommendation, which the board’s general counsel reviews and adds her own recommendation. The board makes the final decision in a closed session.

“The burden of proof in these proceedings is on the complainant,” Dietrich wrote.

Dietrich noted that the complaints don’t become public unless the board decides they’re justifiable.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Teachers and CTU tell Chicago Board of Education to reject proposed budget cuts, furloughs

2026-07-20T23:02:09+00:00

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More than a dozen teachers and their union pushed the Chicago Board of Education Monday to reject the district’s $9.88 billion budget proposal that includes all-staff furloughs and a spending freeze in the middle of this upcoming school year.

During one of two required budget hearings, teachers discussed how the district’s proposed budget — which also includes staff cuts to help close a $732.5 million deficit — would hurt them and their schools and would exacerbate problems that educators are already facing due to recent budget woes.

For example, a teacher in the Austin neighborhood said Monday that teachers across four grades at her school have already received layoff notices, meaning each of those grades would have just one teacher, and at least one class could have as many as 47 kids, based on current enrollment estimates, she said. That figure would violate the Chicago Teachers Union’s contract with the district.

Another teacher at Funston Elementary School in Logan Square said her school couldn’t get more custodial or pest control help as it dealt with a rodent infestation.

The comments during Monday’s hearing signal sharp tensions over a budget proposal that CPS revealed last week and wants its board to approve in ten days.

The Chicago Teachers Union estimates that the proposed furloughs, which would happen on staff professional development days, would mean a 2.3% pay cut for its members. The union has made two key demands: The state should hold a special legislative session and raise revenue for schools, and CPS should sue Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas for repeatedly late tax bills, which has meant late revenue that CPS and other school districts rely on.

In an interview with Chalkbeat Monday, CPS CEO Macquline King described her budget plan as “very painful.” Proposing furloughs was the hardest decision she and her team made, in part because they would happen on days meant for educators to improve their work with students, she said. King added that she hopes elected officials in a position to help CPS will consider the impact of furloughs when making decisions.

“What I do believe is really important is that there is a sense of urgency in order for Chicago Public Schools to make payroll in the fall,” King said to Chalkbeat. “We really need the budget to pass because ultimately we do not want to disrupt services to our students.”

Emila Zoko, acting CPS budget director, said furloughs and the mid-year spending freeze are “options of last resort” and avoidable if the district gets an additional $200 million in revenue, such as from special taxing district dollars from the city known as tax increment financing — or TIF — surplus. CPS is already assuming it will receive $200 million in TIF surplus in its budget proposal.

The district is already laying off more than 760 teachers and 800 paraprofessionals, most of whom the district expects to rehire at other schools with openings. Overall, the district, which employs about 37,000 people in schools, would cut a net total of 164 school-based employees. The district, where enrollment has declined, also laid off 162 central office and citywide employees earlier this month.

Still, the layoffs mean the neediest students may lose contact with an adult they have come to trust, staffers said during the hearing.

“Think about how this impacts our [unhoused] students — what happens when those people in their lives are not there to make sure they feel safe, secure, and thriving?” said Tiwanda Parker, a college and career coach who said she was laid off.

Board members legally have until the end of August to pass a budget, but district leaders want the board to adopt a plan by July 30. That’s because, in order to make up for late Cook County property tax revenue, CPS needs a few weeks to take out a short-term loan to pay for daily operations, including payroll, at the start of the school year, according to Wally Stock, acting chief financial officer. That process will require CPS to have an approved budget, Stock previously told the board.

CPS says it’s owed at least $250 million from the last round of late tax payments alone. Pappas’ office told the Chicago Tribune the figure is closer to $70 million or $80 million.

The district does not have cash to provide a cushion as it waits for the tax dollars, and in the last year, borrowing to fill the tax-revenue gap has cost CPS about $40 million in interest, Stock has said. On Monday, Stock said he is talking to the county on possibly getting access to an interest-free bridge loan that typically isn’t available to CPS, but even that wouldn’t be large enough to get the district through its bills from September to October.

Board of Education members focused on ways to raise more funding but diverged on how to get there.

For example, Che “Rhymefest” Smith, an elected board member, focused his questions during the hearing on how much more TIF dollars City Council and Mayor Brandon Johnson could send to CPS to avoid furloughs and a midyear spending freeze. Elected member Jitu Brown, however, said it’s not realistic to expect more TIF after receiving a record amount last year, and said the district should instead build in the possibility for more state funding.

Budget officials said their numbers are rooted in historical projections. CPS has received at least $200 million in TIF surplus dollars every year since 2023.

The budget proposal wouldn’t implement a spending freeze and furloughs until January, providing CPS leaders “a window of time” to attempt securing more revenue, Stock said.

CPS held a second budget hearing Monday evening. People can view it on the district’s YouTube channel.

Mila Koumpilova contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools releases $9.88 billion 2026-27 budget amid deepening financial strain

2026-07-15T22:01:12+00:00

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Facing intense financial pressures, Chicago Public Schools officials unveiled a proposed $9.88 billion district budget that includes five furlough days and a spending freeze that could start in January. But they said they hope to avoid those measures by persuading state lawmakers or the city council to steer more dollars to the school district.

District leaders said hundreds of staff layoffs, a push for more revenue, and other cost-saving measures took a $450 million bite out of the $732.5 million deficit the district faced this summer. To help close the remaining gap, CPS is bumping up the amount it expects the city would contribute in special tax dollars for development, known as TIF, from $100 million to $200 million. Last year, CPS received more than $500 million in TIF dollars, a record amount, but district officials said they wanted to be more conservative in projecting this year’s influx.

Unless even more city or state revenue materializes, the district will furlough all staff for five days when students are scheduled to be out of school and teachers are expected to get professional development — a move that would save $85 million. The district also would freeze some hiring and other spending in the second half of the school year.

“This process is painful for everyone all the way around,” said schools chief Macquline King on a call with reporters. “Ultimately, the budget we have presented is one that does its absolute best to meet the diverse needs of students.”

The district’s teachers and principals unions and some school board members decried the cuts, saying they will affect students.

The district is laying off about 760 teachers and 800 school-based support staff this week, though officials said that the majority will likely get rehired to fill vacancies on other campuses.

The district shared budgets with schools in May and finalized them in early June, but it has not disclosed campus budget allocations. More than 160 central office and citywide administrators were laid off on Friday — a move that CPS said will save $18 million. The blueprint presented Wednesday includes spending on pensions, debt service, and central and districtwide staff.

Last year, the district issued layoff notices to 1,450 teachers, support staff, security officers, and other employees. Officials said that in line with previous years, about 75% of them were rehired. District leaders said that while there will be fewer general education teachers after the district increased student-to-teacher ratios by one student, it is boosting the number of bilingual and special education teachers and classroom assistants. That will result in a net school-based position loss of about 160 in the district, which employs more than 37,000 people on its campuses. Factoring in contractual pay increases, CPS is sending $143 million more directly to schools compared with last year.

District officials again stressed the tough financial realities CPS faces: The costs of employee pay and pensions, the district’s massive debt, and upkeep for Chicago’s aging school buildings keep going up. The district added thousands of new positions using federal COVID aid during the pandemic even as enrollment shrank. District leaders have defended the staffing growth, saying it allowed schools to address longstanding staffing gaps and speed up its recovery. Despite significant state funding increases in recent years, CPS remains about $1.6 billion of what Illinois estimates would make for “adequate” funding.

CPS is asking the board to approve the budget by July 30, which officials say will give them enough time to borrow money against its future tax revenue to address cash flow issues amid a Cook County property tax delay.

Wednesday’s budget is the first fully shaped by King, who stepped in on an interim basis last summer when outgoing schools chief Pedro Martinez had already finalized school budgets. King crafted the final $10.2 billion budget, notably declining to take out a high-cost loan to pay into a city pension fund covering some CPS support staff despite pressure from the mayor’s office.

This week’s budget proposal also did not include a contribution toward the Municipal Employees’ Annuity and Benefit Fund. District officials touted the fact that the new budget does not add to the district’s $9 billion debt, with interest and other costs diverting hundreds of millions of dollars that could go toward instruction and support services.

King described the budget as “thoughtful, responsible, and entirely student-centered.” But the proposal left some board members concerned about how cuts would impact schools in their districts.

Anusha Thotakura, an appointed board member who represents the Near North Side and West Town, said many schools have experienced cuts “year after year,” and she wants to see more investments that parents want, such as in early childhood education and dual language programs. At the same time, CPS is in a difficult spot, she said.

“When you start with a pie that is too small and are forced to figure out how to cut it and a way to feed people, you’re never going to win,” said Thotakura, who has advocated for more state funding.

She said she hopes CPS and board members will work extra hard over the next year to secure additional funding, including from the state and city.

In a statement, Stacy Davis Gates, president of the Chicago Teachers Union and Illinois Federation of Teachers, called the proposal “dead on arrival.” Furloughs, she said, are another blow to educators who are already working in schools that are stretched for resources.

The union, along with allied board members, have called on state lawmakers to raise money for schools through progressive taxes and more recently pressed CPS to sue the county treasurer’s office over late tax payments.

“Does anyone in this state other than CPS educators have power to help school children instead of hurt them?” Davis Gates said in the statement. “It’s time for them to use it.”

Kia Banks, the head of the Chicago Principals & Administrators Association, said in a statement the union understands district leaders are in a tough spot. Still, she’s unsure the proposal, which eliminated assistant principals in small schools, represents “the strongest path forward.”

“We are extremely disappointed by the possibility that students could lose resources, programs, and support they need and deserve,” Banks said.

But Danny Vesecky, senior research and policy associate at Civic Federation, said that while layoffs are painful structural changes, they will permanently reduce the district’s expenses. It’s also the “right direction” for the district to move in after federal COVID relief money went away but investments fueled by those dollars, such as more staff, still exist.

“There is unfortunately no way to address that other than unwinding some of the increase in spending that we engaged in in previous years,” Vesecky said.

Vesecky also described furloughs as a reasonable yet temporary solution, since those savings won’t reduce the district’s expenses or deficit in future years.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

CPS lays off 162 employees as it works to close budget deficit for 2026-27 school year

2026-07-13T20:26:41+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools notified 162 central and citywide employees Friday that they will be laid off, the district confirmed Monday.

Half of the employees work for central office departments that focus on districtwide policies and operations. The other half, known as “citywide” employees, help support individual schools.

The layoffs will save the district $18 million, CPS spokesperson Mary Fergus said in a statement.

The layoffs are part of the district’s attempt to close a more than $730 million deficit. Last June, while facing a similar deficit, the district laid off 161 employees who are staffed centrally, in addition to a slew of other cuts.

CPS is expected to publicly reveal a roughly $10 billion proposed budget later this week, which should provide a clearer picture of any additional cuts. Schools, which received their budgets in May, have also been grappling with budget-tightening decisions.

CPS did not specify the specific positions of the people losing their jobs. Many different offices were affected, including Career and College Success, Talent, Department of Principal Quality, Information and Technology Services, Students with Disabilities, Student Health and Wellness, Transportation, Facilities, and Safety and Security, School Counseling, Procurement, Real Estate, and the Office of Sports Administration, according to Fergus and a memo that chief talent officer Ben Felton sent Friday to school board members and district leaders.

Of the 162 people laid off, 38 people are represented by SEIU Local 73, the union that represents support staffers at CPS, such as custodians, and 25 were represented by the Chicago Teachers Union. The unions did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In deciding what positions to cut, the district’s top leaders were “directed to prioritize maintaining critical functions that directly serve students, and protect school-based staffing to the greatest extent possible,” the memo said.

The district tried cutting other expenses first, such as renegotiating vendor contracts and reducing some unspecified central “non-essential” office services. Neither CPS nor the memo said how much money these measures saved.

“These actions reduced a substantial portion of the deficit,” Fergus said in her statement to Chalkbeat. “Even after these measures, targeted central office and citywide staffing reductions remained necessary to protect resources for students and schools.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Johnson-aligned Chicago school board members continue push for more funding from Springfield

2026-07-08T22:17:58+00:00

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Chicago Board of Education members aligned with the mayor again pushed Gov. JB Pritzker on Wednesday to hold a special legislative session to allocate more funding to public schools.

Their calls come as Chicago Public Schools finalizes a roughly $10 billion budget proposal for the coming school year. Officials have been working to close a more than $700 million deficit projected earlier this spring.

Schools had to approve their proposed budgets in early June, but the district has yet to release full details around what might be cut. The Chicago Teachers Union joined Mayor Brandon Johnson-aligned board members at Wednesday’s press conference outside the Board of Education headquarters where they called for state lawmakers to again consider raising education funding through progressive tax policies that target wealthy individuals or corporations.

Khari Humphries, the city’s deputy mayor of education and youth, also joined elected board member Jitu Brown and appointed members Michilia Blaise, Karen Zaccor, Norma Rios-Sierra, Emma Lozano, Angel Velez, Cydney Wallace, and Debby Pope.

Illinois lawmakers attempted to begin the process to raise education funding through a millionaire’s tax, but that legislation ultimately stalled before they adjourned at the end of May.

“If the Hippocratic Oath in medicine says, first of all, do no harm, can the state of Illinois say they have not done harm to Illinois children?” Brown said to reporters.

CPS is expected to publicly reveal its budget plan by mid-July and wants the board to approve it by July 30, but some board members said that timeline feels rushed. A delay in Cook County property taxes has placed extra pressure on the budget, officials said.

The state budget increased education funding for school districts by $350 million this year for a total of $9.2 billion. But many districts, including CPS, are still short of what the state’s evidence-based formula considers as an adequate level of money. Even if lawmakers reconvene this summer, it’s not clear how quickly any extra money would make it to school districts like CPS.

“We are facing decisions that no city should ever have to make,” Humphries said during the press conference.

The district is expecting about $100 million from the city’s special taxing districts, known as TIF dollars, which the mayor and City Council control. That’s a fraction of the more than $500 million in TIF last year for CPS, a portion of which went back to the city for pension obligations.

Brown said board members are asking the city to release more TIF dollars. Humphries said he can’t say whether the city will do so. At a board meeting later Wednesday, acting chief financial officer Wally Stock also said CPS is “not trying to be aggressive” but is also having those discussions with the city.

During Wednesday’s meeting, however, CPS CEO Macquline King said the district is working through “different avenues” for help, including pressing the county for some relief.

“There is a sense of urgency,” King said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board says candidates can’t accept donations from district vendors

2026-07-08T20:30:13+00:00

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As Chicago’s school board election heats up, the current Board of Education voted Wednesday to not allow candidates to accept campaign donations from current or prospective vendors of Chicago Public Schools.

School board members — nearly all of whom are running in the Nov. 3 election – approved a resolution over the matter in a 16-1 vote during a meeting to review the agenda for the board’s full meeting later this month.

Elected board member Che “Rhymefest” Smith voted no.

Board president Sean Harden, who isn’t running, introduced the resolution.

“This resolution seeks to inoculate the board from any sense of impropriety or give vendors the sense that they have to pay to play,” Harden told board members last month when he first introduced the resolution.

On Wednesday, Harden said he asked the Better Government Association for its feedback on the resolution, and the good-government group described it as meeting a “high water mark.” BGA president David Griesing did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The district relies on vendors for a range of services, from academic intervention to student assessments to school lunch.

City law prevents entities that do more than $10,000 of business in a 12-month period with city agencies from donating more than $1,500 a year to a political candidate. Harden’s resolution goes further: It calls on school board members to not accept any donations from current vendors, vendors who have applied to win a CPS contract, or outside lawyers who contract with CPS.

If board members accepted donations from vendors before Wednesday’s resolution, they should either recuse themselves from future votes involving those vendors or return the donation and notify the district’s general counsel and ethics officer, the resolution says.

In a text message, Smith said he voted no because the resolution appears as if it’s “targeting certain donors while allowing the most egregious political financiers and influencers go unchallenged,” referencing PACs and super PACs.

A spot check of Smith’s most recent campaign finance filings show a $250 donation from Cozen O’Connor, a law firm that has a contract with the board. Jessica Biggs, an elected board member who is running for board president, also received a $1,000 donation from the firm on April 30. Both Smith and Biggs had previously voted against increasing payments to the firm last year.

During last month’s meeting, some elected board members said the resolution should include labor unions that have contracts with CPS. The Chicago Teachers Union, through two separate political action committees, has been a major donor in school board campaigns. Harden said his focus was on vendors, and if others want more restrictions, they should introduce additional resolutions.

Smith has also received money from the SEIU Illinois Council PAC, as recently as December. The political arm of that union, which represents support staffers in CPS, also gave to Jessica Biggs, Yesenia Lopez, Jennifer Custer, Carlos Rivas, and Therese Boyle in December.

“I’m saying if we’re going to change the rules to limit the appearance of impropriety, there’s more authentic, effective ways to do it,” Smith said over text.

Illinois campaign finance records also show both Smith and elected board member Carlos Rivas each recently received $1,000 from Anthony Fiore, vice president of Open Kitchens, one of two food service companies with a multimillion dollar contract to provide free school meals in CPS.

Last fall, Fiore gave to a handful of other school board members, including Ellen Rosenfeld, Therese Boyle, and Jessica Biggs, according to state campaign finance disclosures.

Smith said he hasn’t yet decided whether he will recuse himself from future votes or return donations, and Rivas said he must consult with his attorney. Biggs said she won’t return the donations. She will recuse herself from a future vote on the law firm but will consult with ethics officials on whether she should recuse herself from future votes regarding Open Kitchens. Rosenfeld and Boyle did not immediately return a request for comment.

Biggs added that the resolution, which references vendors, feels “performative” and does not prevent individuals like Fiore from personally donating to campaigns. Fiore owns a 49% stake in Open Kitchens and his mother owns the other 51%, according to board records.

School board policy establishes several ethics and conflict-of-interest rules for board members, including that they should recuse themselves from voting on matters that involve contracts with entities that a board member may have an economic interest in. Board members must also file statements of economic interest every year.

Harden said he’s also trying to prevent a situation where so many board members recuse themselves from a vote due to a vendor’s campaign contribution that it becomes impossible for the board to do its job and decide on a given contract.

Still, resolutions are nonbinding, and this one involves the honor system: Board members themselves would be responsible “for confirming that potential donors are not CPS vendors or prospective CPS vendors or outside counsel serving the Board.” Campaign contributions are, however, publicly available on the state board of elections website.

The resolution doesn’t outline possible repercussions for board members who accept donations from vendors.

“I would encourage us to work together again on a comprehensive legislative proposal, take it to Springfield and get it passed, and then it would actually be binding,” Biggs said during last month’s meeting.

Becky Vevea contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago’s school board is supposed to have a noncitizen advisory board. It still doesn’t exist.

2026-06-29T21:00:54+00:00

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When state legislators created Chicago’s elected school board, they also required the city’s mayor to name a noncitizen advisory board, meant to give people without citizenship a more formal voice in school board matters since they cannot vote or run in elections.

But about four months ahead of this year’s school board races — and 18 months after the city’s first elected members were seated — Mayor Brandon Johnson still hasn’t created that advisory panel.

“There is no clarity on this,” Socorro Diaz, a mother of three Chicago Public Schools graduates who is interested in serving on the panel, said in Spanish through a translator. “How is this going to be organized? Because education is too important.”

This year, Chicago will transition from a partially elected school board to a one that is fully elected. The election for all 21 school board seats is Nov. 3.

The panel is supposed to advise the Board of Education on various issues that impact noncitizen children, including on how to create an “inclusive learning environment” and more generally sharing perspectives from noncitizen families. State law maps out almost no instructions for the mayor: It doesn’t establish a deadline for the mayor to create the advisory board, the number of people to appoint, or even whether any of the picks must be immigrants or noncitizens.

For parents who had pushed for this board, its absence felt especially deep last fall during an intense federal deportation campaign in Chicago known as Operation Midway Blitz. At the time, the mayor’s office told Chalkbeat that it was finalizing applications for the advisory board, but it was figuring out how to protect people interested in participating without putting them in the crosshairs of the federal government.

That application still doesn’t exist. The mayor’s office did not answer a question about the status of the application, but in a statement last week, a spokesperson said they hope to create the board by the fall.

“Given the nature of recent immigration enforcement, the Mayor’s Office is working to develop a process that allows community members to participate safely and confidently,” said mayoral spokesperson Griffin Krueger.

Some parents have suggested the mayor’s office can appoint at least some people who may be citizens or legal residents but can still act as representatives for noncitizens.

Kids First Chicago, an education advocacy group that lobbied for the creation of the noncitizen advisory board, had pushed the mayor’s office last year to name the panel, especially as immigration enforcement kept families from sending their kids to school.

Claiborne Wade, a member of Kids First’s Fair Governance Task Force and parent of CPS students, said he can understand the mayor’s office’s concerns, especially with a federal government that is targeting immigrants and noncitizens.

Not having the panel in place, however, means that the board is potentially not hearing from certain immigrant communities whose kids are in CPS, who “do have a voice, too,” he said.

Diaz, who is currently on the Eric Solorio Academy High School Local School Council, first got involved in parent councils almost 25 years ago, when she learned that one of her daughters, at the time a 6-year-old newcomer from Mexico, was not receiving help in understanding English in school, she said. She recalled seeing her daughter set aside in a corner of her classroom, and Diaz repeatedly pushed the principal for help.

Since then she’s participated in LSCs and bilingual advisory councils, too, and believes it’s important for parents to get involved, she said.

When she learned about Chicago’s first school board elections, she felt a mixture of emotions: happiness that parents would get to choose who made policy decisions for the district but sadness that she and others who aren’t citizens wouldn’t be able to cast votes or run for office.

She feels the advisory panel is an advocacy vehicle for parents who can’t be at board meetings or are fearful of revealing their identities. To Diaz, it’s frustrating to not know what’s happening with the panel.

“They need to start being more transparent,” she said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board adopts legislative agenda calling for more funding — after state lawmakers adjourn

2026-06-25T21:30:38+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education unanimously passed a legislative agenda Thursday that calls for more state funding and a millionaire’s tax — even though Illinois state lawmakers passed a state budget last month and have adjourned for the summer.

While some board members were happy with the items in the new agenda, they were also frustrated that it would be adopted after lawmakers had left Springfield.

“This would have been fantastic for us to have in January or even February,” said Anusha Thotakura, an appointed board member who has previously pressed CPS for a legislative plan. “There is absolutely no opportunity for this legislative agenda to result in increased state funds for the upcoming school year — zero.”

Several board members called for the agenda to be a “living document” that CPS could add ideas to. And others wanted more demands of local officials. Elected board member Che “Rhymefest” Smith said he was disappointed the agenda didn’t include anything about pressing the city to send more special taxing district dollars to the district – an amount that can vary year to year.

The agenda is a list of issues that Chicago Public Schools wants to advocate for with lawmakers, typically on the state level. But in recent years the board has not always had an agenda: It last adopted one in early 2024 under former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez, who then didn’t present one in 2025.

The district CEO is charged with creating a legislative agenda and presenting it to the board for approval in January of each year, but the board waived that requirement in January 2024 and January 2026, though not in 2025, according to board records. Those waivers say that the CEO would still be expected to present something early in the year.

Neither CPS nor the school board office explained why this legislative agenda came later in the year and after the state legislative session ended. CPS CEO Macquline King and board members have visited Springfield over the past year to meet with lawmakers, which state Rep. Ann Williams, who represents North Side neighborhoods, described as “very visible and engaging” during public comment on Thursday.

This is King’s first legislative agenda, which asks for more state funding as the district faces a $732.5 million deficit in its budget for next fiscal year, which the district is aiming to finalize by July 30. It also makes several new asks that weren’t in the 2024 list, such as a millionaire’s tax to raise more revenue for education funding and more charter school regulations.

The Chicago Teachers Union is pushing lawmakers to hold a special session this summer to address funding issues.

During a union press conference Thursday morning, CTU vice president Jackson Potter said schools are slated, for now, to lose lots of staff and claimed district officials are considering cutting up to two weeks of instructional time next school year if it doesn’t get more funding to close its deficit. CTU President Stacy Davis Gates relayed a similar message to the union’s executive board in a letter earlier this week.

In a statement, CPS spokesperson Sylvia Barragan disputed that, saying “at no point has the district considered shortening the school year to alleviate financial challenges” and doing so “is not a viable option.” School districts are required to have 176 instructional days, which is the exact number of days for student attendance on CPS’s approved calendar for next school year. Cutting from that now could put the district out of compliance with the state.

The new legislative agenda includes a mix of old asks and new demands. Similar to the 2024 agenda, CPS is asking for more funding through the state’s main education funding formula in order to reach the state’s definition of “adequate funding.” It also wants heftier reimbursements for certain required services it provides, such as transportation for students with disabilities. And, it again calls for the state to help pay for Chicago teacher pensions in the way it does for other Illinois school districts, something one bill aimed, but failed, to do this year. (CPS has a special tax levy to help cover most teacher pension costs, and state money covers about a third of the costs.)

Some of the newer items include language about supporting more regulations around charter schools, in line with a resolution the board passed last year.

It also includes multiple proposals for raising progressive revenue. In its language supporting a millionaire’s tax, the district states that “by capturing a portion of ultra-high incomes, this dedicated revenue source would directly help address structural budget gaps, support classroom investments, and reduce reliance on volatile or one time revenue streams.”

Thotakura said the millionaire’s tax is a “notable” addition and could help the board avoid raising the property tax levy to the legally allowed limit, which it typically does annually.

Ed Bannon, an appointed board member, said it’s possible the agenda “just kind of didn’t get prioritized” early this year as King was still the interim CEO at the time and was navigating a host of issues. Despite the late timing, he said he’s happy a document now exists as the board gets ready to fill a long-vacant position on its intergovernmental team, which helps establish CPS’ advocacy presence in Springfield.

“The state needs to fulfill its obligation to fully fund education, and having an official legislative agenda is a step in the right direction,” Bannon said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

In this fall’s Chicago school board elections, many voters may only have one candidate to choose from

2026-06-12T22:05:12+00:00

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For three decades, Chicago voters have not had a direct say in who represents them on the city’s Board of Education.

And many may not have much of a choice again this fall, despite an otherwise historic election in which all 21 school board seats are on the ballot in November’s general election.

That’s because 17 races could end up with just one candidate if challenges to their petition signatures are successful. That’s on top of the two seats up for election that have just one candidate.

This year, 28 candidates — more than half the current field of 51 candidates — are at risk of getting knocked off the ballot. The Urban Center, a pro-school choice, politically centrist organization, is behind at least 14 of those challenges.

Most of the candidates facing challenges — including four of the five people running for board president — could be wiped from the ballot due to a claim that the way they collected signatures violated election law. Most of The Urban Center’s challenges include this claim.

Known as a dual circulator argument, the challengers say that some people who helped candidates collect signatures were not allowed to do so because they had already circulated petitions for other candidates during the March primary election. Chicago’s school board races are nonpartisan and were not part of the primary.

If the electoral board agrees, they could make a single ruling that would result in thousands of voters across 14 districts having just one school board candidate on their ballot.

For candidates, fighting petition challenges can be time-consuming and expensive, which can cut into campaigning or cause them to withdraw from the race and leave voters with fewer choices. Election attorneys and challengers, however, say the process ensures candidates are following the law and are people who voters want on the ballot.

In 2024, 47 candidates filed to run, and 31 remained on the ballot.

In Chicago, petition challenges are often backed by powerful special interests as a tactic to narrow the race.

The Chicago Teachers Union was behind many of the challenges in 2024, when 10 of 21 board seats were up for election. This year, other special interests are employing the tactic.

Robert Sylvester, vice president of The Urban Center and chair of their political action group, told Chalkbeat and Board Rule his group is working with other political organizations and longtime elections attorney Mike Kasper on their challenges — more than half of which target candidates who are current mayoral appointees on the school board, have previously been backed by the union, or lean politically progressive.

“The democratic process is important to me and Urban Center,” Sylvester said in an interview. “We challenge to make sure people play by the rules.”

Asked if The Urban Center targeted candidates who don’t ideologically align with it, Sylvester said, “We challenged anybody we thought didn’t have the requisite signatures or that they didn’t follow the rules around the circulators.”

The basis for challenging candidate petitions

Candidates for school board running to represent the district they live in were required to collect between 500 to 1,500 signatures on a form known as a nominating petition. Those running for board president, which is a citywide office, were required to collect 2,500 signatures.

But there are very specific rules for what counts as a valid signature: Signers must be registered to vote at an address in the same district as the candidate, they cannot sign multiple petitions for the same race, and, though it may be obvious, the signature can’t be forged.

Victor Henderson, a newcomer candidate running for board president, is facing one of the more serious challenges: Two objectors have accused him or someone on his team of fraudulently altering his signers’ addresses in order to make the signatures valid.

A handful of objections are over more technical matters. For example, one objector claimed that current appointed board member Norma Rios-Sierra, who is running in district 3a, should be knocked off the ballot because she didn’t include a hyphen in her last name on her nomination paperwork. Candidate Marlo Bennet faces two challenges arguing they did not identify the subdistrict they’re running for and should therefore be disqualified.

Nearly two dozen challenges include the “dual circulator” argument and cite a part of election law that says “no person shall circulate or certify petitions for candidates of more than one political party, or for an independent candidate or candidates in addition to one political party, to be voted upon at the next primary or general election, or for such candidates and parties with respect to the same political subdivision at the next consolidated election.”

Another section of election law says that where applicable, the law also applies to nonpartisan candidates.

The point of the law is to prevent “political gamesmanship” or a “sore-loser” situation, such as someone switching to run as an independent in the same election season, said Ross Secler, an elections attorney and partner at Odelsen, Murphy, Frazier and McGrath, who cited previous Illinois Supreme Court rulings over the issue.

Secler, who is representing objectors in two challenges but is not making the dual circulator argument in either of them, said he doesn’t see how dual circulators violated the spirit of the law in this situation. The March primaries were unrelated to local school board races.

Normally, a challenge is resolved once a hearing officer reviews the case, issues a recommendation, and the electoral board takes a final vote on whether the candidate gathered enough valid signatures to be on the ballot.

Connie Anderson is running in district 10b and is one of the candidates facing the dual circulator argument. Anderson’s husband, Clifton, has also challenged the petitions of Anderson’s opponent, Rosita Chatonda.

Anderson is getting legal help from the CTU to defend her petitions — an offer CTU leaders made to all candidates shortly after challenges were made public.

“We are blessed that an organization came in and said, ‘We will help you even if we haven’t endorsed you because we believe in your vision,’” Anderson said. “We align in that way.”

During the 2024 school board races, the union was behind challenges against 19 candidates. A CTU spokesperson said the union did not back any challenges this cycle and could not immediately confirm which candidates the union has offered legal help to.

Julie Metea, a spokesperson for the Electoral Board, said that attorneys involved in cases with the “dual circulator” argument asked the Electoral Board to rule on the issue once instead of having several different hearing officers decide on individual cases.

Metea said that the board is tentatively planning to hold one hearing to decide on this issue, but that isn’t final.

Candidates who escaped challenges breathe sigh of relief

Several candidates facing these objections didn’t return calls or declined to comment on the record about their cases.

Some current and former candidates said they escaped challenges because they did a lot of research or didn’t rely on paid circulators, who candidates pay per signature.

Jennifer Custer, a current elected board member who is running for board president, escaped a challenge, meaning she’s guaranteed to be on the ballot.

“We made sure to just check everything before we even started petitions and make sure that we were following the law,” Custer said in an interview.

When Anthony Hargrove ran for school board in 2024, he largely relied on a paid circulator who was tasked with securing 500 signatures. Then, Hargrove faced a petition challenge and was knocked off the ballot after many of his signatures were deemed invalid. Last time, it cost the father of four expensive attorney fees and time to fight the challenge.

Chicago elections, he said, can feel “like a frat that’s really, really impossible to get into.”

Hargrove is running again this year for district 5a on the West Side, and he changed his strategy for getting on the ballot. He got advice from retired politicians. He read the law. He said he didn’t pay anyone to collect signatures, and instead, he, his wife and others spent evenings and weekends knocking on doors and attending community events to collect hundreds of more names than he needed. Then he went to the county building to make sure his signatures were valid.

Last week, after repeatedly refreshing the Board of Elections website, he saw that no one had challenged his petitions.

“It was like, ‘Oh my god, I made it. Oh my god, I’m a candidate,’” Hargrove said.

Isaiah Pinzino and Norah D’Cruze contributed to this report.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Maureen Kelleher is the founding editor for Board Rule. Contact Maureen at maureen.boardrule@gmail.com.

After delay, Chicago school board renews charters amid revamped oversight

2026-06-10T18:15:14+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education renewed contracts Wednesday with six charter school networks after a controversial move in late May to put off the vote.

The board approved contracts for more than a dozen schools, for terms that range between four to seven years.

Elected board member Yesenia Lopez, who helped pass a resolution last year calling for tighter charter school oversight, was the only person to cast no votes but did not say why. She voted no on renewing contracts for the Acero, Chicago Collegiate, Chicago Mathematics and Science Academy, and Intrinsic charter school networks, and she abstained on the vote for Christopher House Charter School.

These are some of the longest term lengths that the board has approved in recent years, but Chicago Public Schools officials said these new contracts are paired with a revamped oversight process that involves checking in on schools midway through their terms and flagging possible financial missteps earlier than it currently does.

The newer oversight process comes after a year of upheaval and financial turmoil in the charter sector that led to several closures, including the more recent midyear closings of two ASPIRA charter network high schools, forcing hundreds of kids to find new schools months before the end of the year.

The board approved contracts for the following networks with the following renewal terms:

Academy for Global Citizenship for seven years
Acero for five years
Chicago Collegiate Charter School for four years
Chicago Mathematics and Science Academy for four years
Christopher House for four years
Intrinsic for four years

The vote was delayed last week after many board members pushed district officials for more information on how they planned to tighten charter oversight. Those board members, who are aligned with Mayor Brandon Johnson and the Chicago Teachers Union, a sharp critic of charters, raised concerns that a network like Acero would earn one of the longest contract terms after several of its schools closed last year.

That day, other board members decried the effort to delay renewals as children and families needed to know the future of their schools. No school the board was considering was on the chopping block. In an unusual move, both board President Sean Harden and CPS CEO Macquline King pushed the board to approve the renewals and said the discussion about accountability would be ongoing.

Karen Zaccor, an appointed board member who wanted stronger oversight and pushed to postpone the vote last month, praised the district’s new oversight process, saying that it offers “frequent opportunities for intervention if needed.” She believes the new process can help stave off sudden closures, such as at EPIC Academy, which announced its closure plans last spring, just months after the board had renewed the school’s contract.

Still, she said, “This year and this cycle are a test — a test of how well our systems work to flag problems in a timely way and an intervention’s implemented in order to minimize harm.”

The Illinois Network of Charters praised the longer terms and a greater emphasis on academic performance as part of the district’s new oversight measures, but still criticized CPS for waiting until the summer to tell charter families and staff how many more years their schools would survive.

Jodie Cantrell, chief of public affairs for INCS, described the delay as a political move for which “children pay the price.”

Before Wednesday’s vote on Acero, appointed board member Debby Pope said she’s still concerned about how Acero handled its abrupt closure plans last year. The board at the time voted to absorb five of the seven schools Acero wanted to close. Still, Pope said she’s “very glad we have strengthened the provisions for ongoing oversight.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

CPS eighth graders will take a new, longer high school admissions test

2026-06-04T18:14:00+00:00

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Starting this fall, Chicago Public Schools’ eighth graders will take a longer and different standardized test to help determine where they get into high school.

In an email to principals and a letter to families of rising eighth graders, district officials said students will take the PreACT 9 Secure in October in place of the old High School Admissions Test — known as the HSAT. The new test is a precursor to the ACT exam that Illinois high school students are required to take and is used for college admissions.

All CPS eighth graders take the exam during the school day and private school students take it on a weekend. Their scores can determine whether they get into the high school of their choice outside of their neighborhood. The new test will still be administered on Oct. 7, and there are no changes to the timeline for the high school admissions process for next school year.

The exam will be two-and-a-half hours long versus the hour-long HSAT. In addition to English language arts and math, the PreACT 9 includes sections on reading and science. Additionally, unlike the current HSAT, the exam won’t be offered in languages other than English.

CPS says the new exam will allow families and teachers to receive “meaningful information” about student performance as they enter high school — something the HSAT didn’t do, according to the letter to families.

Districts can use the PreACT 9 “for program placement, high-stakes, or accountability purposes while giving students practice with taking the ACT,” according to the ACT.

The district also said the new test will allow more kids to prepare because it’s a widely used test that has “free or low-cost” prep materials, and it has “greater confidence” that this exam won’t be glitchy like the HSAT has been in recent years, requiring make-up tests. It’s not clear if the school board will discontinue its contract with the company that produces the old HSAT exam.

In its letter to families, CPS did not say that the exam won’t be offered in other languages but did explain that change in a letter to school leaders.

In the letter to principals, CPS said its data show that students who took the test in another language “performed LOWER than English Learners who took the test in English with accommodations.”

Gabriel Paez, a seventh and eighth grade bilingual teacher at Haugan Elementary School, told Chalkbeat he was upset to learn the exam will more than double in length and is “disheartened and distraught” by the lack of non-English options for the new exam.

In his experience, he said, English learners who are newer to the country and are still getting used to standardized testing tend to take the exam in their native language, while longtime English learners tend to take the exam in English with accommodations — which could explain some of the data CPS is citing in its letter to school leaders.

“In the past, it was common to say and to think that English-only was the only right way, and now it sounds like the district is going backwards in time and pushing forth the narrative that having this very important exam in multiple languages harmed our English language learners,” said Paez, who also chairs the bilingual teacher committee for the Chicago Teachers Union.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Dozens of Chicago seniors were forced to change schools this spring. Here’s how one got his diploma.

2026-06-03T20:37:38+00:00

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Jonathan Escobar sat among roughly 350 students in royal purple caps and gowns waiting to walk across the stage at Carl Schurz High School as hundreds of relatives and friends periodically erupted in cheers.

Just two months ago, Escobar and about 70 other kids seated around him hadn’t expected to graduate from the Irving Park high school — because until this spring they attended other schools.

Jonathan Escobar, who was forced to leave his old ASPIRA high school after it closed in the spring, holds up his diploma from Schurz High School

Those schools — run by the ASPIRA charter network — abruptly closed midyear, forcing more than 500 students like Escobar to transfer after ASPIRA said it had run out of money. The Chicago Board of Education officially shuttered ASPIRA Business and Finance and Early College high schools in April.

Schurz received the most ASPIRA transfers — roughly 250 – and 73 were in their senior year.

They had to get used to new teachers, new classrooms, and new classmates. Up until his last week, Escobar was unsure he’d pass every class.

The experience could become more common as Chicago’s charter schools experience financial turmoil and declining enrollment, which have resulted in multiple closures in recent years.

Leaving was a ‘big disaster’

Escobar enrolled at ASPIRA Business and Finance because his older sister had gone there, and the school was known to prepare kids for the real world, he said.

He liked his teachers at the school, including Juan Elias, who taught finance and entrepreneurship classes at ASPIRA.

Elias said the school’s final days were “eerie as hell.” Students like Escobar, who Elias taught as a sophomore, were no longer there to stop by his classroom and say hello.

“I saw the tears, uncertainty, especially with our students that needed the most support,” said Elias, who protested the closures. “I saw a lot of stress.”

The two ASPIRA campuses that closed enrolled a total of about 570 students at the start of the school year. By late-March, CPS said more than 500 had transferred out to about 20 district schools, and nearly half had picked Schurz. Another 70 went to Roosevelt and 50 went to Kelvyn Park, CPS said at the time. Ten of the kids went to other charters.

Escobar decided to transfer to Schurz, about a 15-minute drive from his home, because he knew of a classmate already there. The Chicago Teachers Union pushed the district to keep as many students and teachers together as possible.

Having to leave his old school like this was a “big disaster,” Escobar said later.

Schurz principal Heidy Moran had said it was “unprecedented” for her school, which enrolled roughly 1,000 students before the ASPIRA kids came, to welcome this many new students at once. The school created a team of staffers who organized events and initiatives to help ease the new kids in.

Former ASPIRA teacher Juan Elias greets his former students who graduated from Schurz High School.

A mixed transition process

On his first day at Schurz in March, Escobar was nervous about not knowing his new teachers or students and navigating a new building.

Then he saw some ASPIRA students he had known since elementary school and felt some relief. He wasn’t alone.

Some Schurz staffers said the transition went well for some students. Several had even joined sports or clubs.

There were signs, however, that others were struggling.

“Every day I receive emails from my former students asking for help and guidance when I should be receiving emails asking about recommendation letters and exciting updates,” said Stephanie Diaz, a former counselor at ASPIRA Business and Finance, during a Chicago Board of Education meeting in early April. “Others are writing to me about transfer options for next year because they feel like they don’t belong there yet.”

In his first few weeks at Schurz, Escobar wished he could go back to ASPIRA.

Escobar, who describes himself as a shy person, would have lunch with old classmates, and they would crack jokes or talk about their old teachers. But mostly, he kept to himself. He said he didn’t have time to join clubs.

After the closures, Elias began working as a substitute in CPS. During one stint substitute teaching at Schurz, a couple of former ASPIRA students spotted him in the hallway and “sprinted” toward him to say hello. It was a sign, he thought, of how much they missed their old school.

Schurz High School students celebrate graduating by throwing streamers into the air.

Ready to move on

By late April, Escobar was talking to his new Schurz teachers more. He thought his classes were easier than at his old school. He liked when students would work on assignments together in class.

“I’m almost done with high school,” he said in an interview with Chalkbeat about a month after transferring to Schurz. “Just trying to focus.”

By May, graduation was getting closer. But Escobar, who has a learning disability and is entitled to extra support in the classroom, was having a hard time in physics.

The class was difficult to understand. He worried he was at risk of failing and not graduating if he didn’t do well on the final exam.

Escobar said his counselor helped him get some extra attention in the class.

The help paid off: Escobar passed the physics final, bumping his grade to a 76. He got As and Bs in the rest of his classes.

On graduation day, Elias, Escobar’s former ASPIRA teacher, stood in the back of the Schurz auditorium to cheer on his former students. He clapped and yelled when their names were called, then rattled off some facts about each person: Steven was in National Honor Society. Dayana won second place during a Shark Tank competition for ASPIRA students. Oscar loves the Chicago Bears.

After the ceremony, former ASPIRA students spotted Elias and wrapped him in big, tight hugs. One student picked him up.

Later, Elias saw Escobar outside and gave him a high-five. Elias said he was proud of him, and Escobar thanked him.

Of the 156 former ASPIRA seniors who transferred into district-run schools, 154 were cleared to graduate as of this week, according to a CPS spokesperson, who noted that official graduation totals are typically finalized at the end of the summer.

Jonathan Escobar poses for a photo with his mother after graduating from Schurz High School.

After months of longing and adjustment, Escobar, holding his diploma in his left hand, said he was happy to be done. He is planning to enroll in community college.

But something unexpected had also happened: He said he’s going to miss Schurz, where the classes felt easier and his teachers cared about him.

“It was a good school with good people,” Escobar said of Schurz the day after graduation.

About 70 students are expected to attend a voluntary graduation ceremony Saturday for former ASPIRA kids at Lane Tech High School.

Escobar isn’t planning to attend, even though months ago he wished for such an event. He said he is ready to move on.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Here are the 51 people who filed to run for Chicago Board of Education

2026-05-27T16:39:54+00:00

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Fifty-one people are running for a seat on Chicago’s Board of Education this fall — the first time city voters will elect all 21 members.

Candidates had to file petitions with signatures from voters in their district by Tuesday night to appear on the Nov. 3 ballot.

This November’s election will complete Chicago’s transition to an elected school board, ending 30 years of mayoral control in the nation’s fourth-largest school district.

All 10 of the people elected in 2024 are running for re-election and two face no challengers. Ellen Rosenfeld and Angel Gutierrez are the only candidates in 4b on the North Side and 8a on the Southwest Side, respectively. All current mayoral appointees besides Board President Sean Harden are running to keep their seats. Several ran unsuccessfully in 2024.

Harden, who was appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson in 2024, has long said he wouldn’t run in this year’s election.

Five people are running for the citywide position of school board president: elected board members Jessica Biggs and Jennifer Custer, Chicago Teachers Union political director Hilario Dominguez, former appointed board member Sendhil Revuluri, and attorney Victor Henderson.

But there’s no guarantee that all 51 current candidates will make it onto the ballot. That’s because of petition challenges, which allow registered voters in a candidate’s district to challenge the validity of signatures on their petitions. If the Board of Elections invalidates enough signatures, it can remove a candidate from the list. Candidates for board president must collect 2,500 signatures of registered voters in Chicago; all other candidates must collect 500 to 1,500 signatures of voters in their districts.

The challenge process, which typically runs about six weeks, can also be time consuming and involves hiring costly attorneys, which can push newer or less resourced candidates out.

In 2024, more than 45 candidates initially filed to run for school board. By the fall, 31 candidates remained due to petition challenges or people withdrawing on their own.

The deadline to object to a candidate’s petitions is June 2. The Board of Elections will finalize the ballot in late August.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

CPS CEO King subpoenaed to appear at congressional hearing on parental rights, ‘legal abuses’

2026-05-13T23:16:14+00:00

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A U.S. House committee has subpoenaed Chicago Public Schools’ CEO Macquline King to appear at a hearing focused on “attacks on parental rights, inappropriate content, and legal abuses” in American schools.

Rep. Tim Walberg, a Michigan Republican and the chairman of the House Education and Workforce Committee, notified King about the subpoena in a Wednesday letter. It comes about three weeks after the committee first invited King to testify at a hearing titled, “Breaking Trust: Attacks on Parental Rights, Inappropriate Content, and Legal Abuses in America’s Schools,” according to the letter.

Citing scheduling conflicts and an ongoing Office for Civil Rights investigation, King originally declined the committee’s invitation. That hearing was originally scheduled for June 3, but King is now being subpoenaed to appear on June 10.

During the second Trump administration, the district has been under federal scrutiny for compliance with the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Title IX, as well as student privacy laws.

Chicago Public Schools did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

King’s appearance before Congress would thrust Chicago Public Schools into a national spotlight at a time of intense scrutiny from the U.S. Department of Education. The department pulled funding last year from CPS, claiming the district had violated civil rights and sex-based discrimination laws with its plan to boost outcomes for Black students and its policies supporting bathroom and locker room access for transgender students.

Superintendents from San Francisco and Loudon County, Virginia are also expected to appear at the hearing. Both districts have been under scrutiny for progressive policies.

Similar hearings have provided a platform for Republican lawmakers to grill leaders from more liberal communities and institutions. Last year, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and other Democratic mayors forcefully defended their sanctuary policies before a congressional committee. University presidents were called by Congress to testify about antisemitism on campus in 2023.

U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon criticized Chicago about two weeks ago after the Chicago Teachers Union and the district agreed to let students take pre-approved field trips and learn about labor history or civics on May Day.

Walberg’s committee first reached out to King April 16, one week after news that the Chicago Teachers Union and CPS were at odds over closing schools on May 1 — something King opposed.

King responded April 20, declining the invite because of a scheduling conflict and that her testimony would be limited because of the federal government’s civil rights and Title IX investigations into CPS.

The committee then offered six other dates in June, according to Walberg’s Wednesday letter. But CPS General Counsel Elizabeth Barton again cited the ongoing investigations as a reason why King “would not be able to discuss CPS’s policies in detail or share any substantive insight into the process of creating or adopting those policies.”

“We do not believe it would be helpful or informative to the Committee for Dr. King to participate in this hearing given those constraints,” Barton wrote, per the committee’s correspondence Wednesday. “For that reason, she must respectfully decline the Committee’s invitation to testify.”

Neither reason “warrants (King) not participating in the hearing,” Walberg wrote in Wednesday’s letter.

In a separate statement, Walberg said this is the first subpoena during his one-and-a-half-year tenure as chair and does “not take this action lightly.”

“However, the constant refusal to provide testimony blocks the Committee from doing its job of conducting oversight and further deepens mistrust in our education system,” Walberg said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools cut hundreds of custodian jobs last year. Staff say their schools are dirtier.

2026-05-11T10:00:00+00:00

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Last summer, as the district faced a massive budget deficit, Chicago Public Schools cut nearly 500 custodian positions, or close to one-fifth of full-time staffers who cleaned schools, and ended all private custodial contracts.

Then, three months into this school year, complaints rolled in through a district survey of 168 principals and 423 custodians: Three-quarters of principals indicated they didn’t have enough custodians on staff to meet their cleaning needs, and at least 40% asked the district for more staff. Nearly two-thirds of custodians said their tasks were difficult to manage given the size of their buildings and the number of people on their team.

The survey responses from late November, obtained by Chalkbeat through a Freedom of Information Act request, are a window into how the custodial staffing changes have impacted school cleanliness — and the potential challenges ahead in maintaining hygienic environments for kids and staff. Many custodians signaled that they were not equipped to clean schools well. Principals said they were picking up trash and cleaning spills or vomit. A few schools had new pest issues.

“It is so disappointing to observe the current state of custodial service and resource availability at our school, as it directly impacts our students’ well-being and basic dignity,” wrote one principal.

“I have never experienced anything like this in my 14 years in CPS,” they said.

Studies have shown links between school cleanliness or air quality, student health, and attendance. One study found that higher levels of contaminants on student desks were associated with student absences for gastrointestinal problems.

Some people are pushing for change now: SEIU Local 73, the union that represents CPS custodial workers, said the issues highlighted in the fall survey remain today, and it wants the district to hire more custodians.

But that’s a tall ask for a district that’s planning a budget with a $700 million deficit and may be looking at cuts to schools this year without any additional revenue.

The district, which as of April employed about 2,200 custodians, said that it took the survey results seriously and, in response, implemented two rounds of custodial shift changes at schools. More than half of principal respondents said they were satisfied with responsiveness with the district’s facilities management office.

“The District continues to utilize feedback from students, staff and families as a guide to ensure school buildings are safe and welcoming environments,” Evan Moore, a spokesperson for CPS, said in a statement.

District defends cuts to custodial staff

Before the custodial changes last year, CPS directly employed 1,375 full-time custodians — who are represented by SEIU Local 73 — and also contracted out to seven private custodial companies, whose roughly 1,250 workers were represented by SEIU Local 1, according to a district memo last year. CPS’ contracts with those companies came after the district severed ties in 2024 with Aramark, which had for a decade helped manage janitors and cleaning supplies but had been sharply criticized for failing to keep schools clean.

The district’s layoff plans last year meant cutting the 1,250 privately contracted custodial jobs and then filling roughly 750 of those positions.

Both unions protested against the district’s plans, which were estimated to save the district $40 million. At the time, CPS’ chief operating officer Charles Mayfield said direct district oversight, coupled with better training and a mobile app for custodians to upload information about the rooms they’ve cleaned, would help the district ensure schools were clean. Bringing custodial services in house helped meet a district goal to move away from privatized services, CPS said.

Responses to the district’s fall survey, which came two months after the custodial changes went into effect, told a different story.

Custodians, principals describe difficulties with keeping buildings clean

Custodians reported finding it difficult to clean all types of school spaces with less staff and raised concerns with a later start time in the morning — providing a shorter runway to complete certain tasks before kids and staff get in. CPS noted that shifts ranged across schools and started as early as 4 a.m. before the custodial changes. Now, no shift starts sooner than 5 a.m. or ends later than 11:30 p.m.

Many custodians expressed concerns in the survey about being the only custodian on staff during the day, making it difficult to complete tasks or respond to multiple calls for help. One custodian said they’re now the only person on their shift cleaning the two-building campus.

At Walt Disney II Magnet in Irving Park, custodian Johnny Jones, who has worked for CPS for 35 years, said his start time changed from 5 a.m. to 7 a.m., about a half-hour before other staff and students get in. Unlike previous years, there’s no longer a second custodian who joins him.

The school eventually hired an additional custodian for the night shift, which helped get the building ready for the next morning, Jones said. But it can still be difficult to fly solo during the day, he said. He might be cleaning up a spill in the lunchroom and get a call for soap in the girls’ bathroom. Depending on the importance of the task he’s handling — for example, spills can be a safety hazard — a new task may need to wait until the second shift starts.

Keeping the building clean is personal for Jones, who thinks about wanting clean spaces for his own grandchildren, and he wishes the district would give schools more autonomy over shifts.

“Do I want my kid going to a dirty building? Do I want my baby using an unclean bathroom?” Jones asked. “Absolutely not.”

Principals noted various spaces in their schools that are now dirtier, such as classrooms, student bathrooms, and hallways, and many noted that the result is unclean and unhygienic spaces for students and staff.

Several principals reported having to pick up trash or clean up spills on their own. Some said cleaning tasks have fallen to other educators and, in at least one case, students. And a few noted new issues with rodents or cockroaches.

“I feel that the communication, quality of cleaning, and the lack of staffing has put a huge strain on the school resulting in unclean, unsafe conditions for students and teachers alike,” one principal wrote in the survey. “Teachers are having to clean their own rooms in addition to their already large workload.”

One principal said fewer staff custodians has resulted in a “consistently filthy” building, contradicting a CPS goal to provide “a joyous and equitable learning environment.”

“It cannot be a joyous place for scholars or staff when the school is dirty and unsanitary,” they wrote.

As CPS brought on hundreds of new hires, some initial onboarding problems may have impacted staffing, including technical issues that resulted in some custodians not being paid. The district said it has since resolved the problem and issued more than $916,000 in back pay to custodians. But the lack of pay initially led many custodians to not report to work or quit, said Trumaine Reeves, SEIU Local 73’s CPS division director.

At one Southwest Side high school, where the custodial staff was cut by one-third, a teacher has noticed that trash often is not picked up overnight and sneaker scuffs aren’t cleaned off the floor. Those details can make a difference for how comfortable both students and staff feel in the building, he said.

The teacher, who asked for anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak with the press, said veteran custodial staffers who have always been good at their jobs tell him that they now feel stretched.

There are a myriad of challenges that teachers face at his high school, such as supporting students with a lot of needs. Navigating those difficulties, then walking into a dirty classroom “just really hurts your soul,” he said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools gears up for May Day protest

2026-04-30T18:03:11+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools officials say they feel confident schools will be fully staffed Friday amid Chicago Teachers Union push to embrace a national “no school, no work, no shopping” day of protest.

The district did not say how many teachers and staff members requested the day off to participate in May Day activities. But it said it is on track to enlist enough substitutes from a pool of almost 10,000 to cover any absences. The district previously said it might deploy some central office employees to help out at short-staffed schools.

CPS also said officials are reviewing about 45 May Day field trip requests, and so far none have been denied.

The union had pushed to cancel school Friday so students and educators could participate in an afternoon pro-labor, anti-Trump administration protest downtown. But district officials balked at the demand, insisting that May Day should remain a full day of instruction and end-of-school-year activities as designated in the CPS calendar.

The union and district struck an agreement to enable teachers and students to take part in the protest, to provide bagged lunches and transportation to the event for up to 100 schools, and to encourage lessons on civic engagement that morning. But more recently, the district has stressed repeatedly that employees must request the day off with enough notice — and must secure approval from their principals for any materials they use to teach about May Day.

These directives have generated tension with the CTU. The union has insisted that its members have academic freedom to select teaching materials that day without school leaders’ pre-approval. This week, district leaders said principals would only allow materials that “provide diverse perspectives rather than advancing any particular viewpoint.”

Recent meetings between district officials and principals have been dominated by discussion of navigating staff absences and materials for May Day, with school leaders bracing for a day with lean staffing. In a post Wednesday on its website, the union implored its members to join protests and rallies.

“We need you there — because we’re taking on the billionaires who are underfunding our schools, shortchanging our communities, and imperiling democracy,” the union’s leadership team wrote in the message.

But CPS said that schools are fully prepared for the day.

“We do feel confident we’ll be able to cover any absences,” a district spokeswoman said.

The district said previously it aims to have a solid estimate of staff absences at least 48 hours in advance of May Day, but it did not immediately provide that number in response to a Chalkbeat request.

Teachers are preparing for a day focused on civics

Nationally, most urban districts are remaining in session Friday. In North Carolina, multiple districts, including Charlotte-Mecklenburg, announced closures this week as they braced for widespread teacher absences. School in Madison, Wisconsin, was also cancelled for May 1.

CPS said schools that submitted May Day field trip requests had to provide safety plans with transportation arrangements, chaperone assignments, and other information. It said officials have agreed to review some requests that came after a Friday deadline, but that some principals have since cancelled field trip plans.

“School leaders have the autonomy and authority to determine if a proposed field trip meets educational and safety standards,” the district said.

In an email to members last week, CTU urged teachers to alert their union representatives if requests for field trips, curriculum, or days off are denied.

At one North Side school, staff and the principal worked together to decide on lessons related to labor and May Day, said music teacher Kat Zamorran, who is part of several union committees.

Zamorran asked students this week about various roles that made a recent school concert possible, such as security staff and teachers. She then broadened the conversation to talk about the jobs kids notice in their daily lives and telling them that May Day is a holiday to celebrate labor.

“It’s kind of nice to ask, ‘Well, do your parents have a job? What do your parents do when you go to school?’” Zamorran said. “That kind of opens it up for kids.”

In one of Zamorran’s classes, students made art that thanked people for their work. One student drew a picture for her mom, thanking her for caring for her. Another made a poster thanking the school’s custodians for cleaning the stage.

Zamorran said her school doesn’t have a field trip planned, but students may hold a small parade outside toward the end of the day.

Parents have varying takes on May Day protests

The district has stressed that only students with signed permission slips from their parents would be able to go on school-sponsored field trips to the Grant Park protest or other May Day events.

Though the district and the union said their agreement struck an admirable balance, some parents and advocacy groups have continued to voice discomfort with the district’s embrace of a politicized event. Others have welcomed the opportunity for students to engage in civic advocacy.

One group of parents, organized in part by the pro-school choice organization Urban Center, described the union’s push as a form of political indoctrination of students. Some of those parents, flanked by Bill Quinlan, the attorney representing former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez in his ongoing lawsuit against some Chicago Board of Education members, attended a school board meeting last week to express their concerns.

Other parents have more mixed feelings.

Princess Shaw, whose 7-year-old daughter attends DePriest Elementary School in the Austin neighborhood, said she didn’t support cancelling classes on May 1 because she and other working parents wouldn’t have child care options. Shaw helped write a letter that the West Side branch of the NAACP distributed to some board members, asking them to keep school open.

She is relieved that classes will be in session.

“May 1 is for my kid to go to school,” said Shaw, who was recently elected to sit on the DePriest Local School Council.

Still, she supports older students who have parental permission to attend a protest as a learning opportunity on Friday and likes the idea of teaching kids about labor history and civic engagement.

About one week before CPS reached its agreement, the Local School Council at Logan Square’s Brentano Math and Science Academy unanimously approved a resolution supporting the idea of a May 1 “Day of Civic Action” after a request from some teachers, said Andrew Yankech, one of the parent representatives on the LSC.

Yankech said he supports the idea of protesting on Friday due to his school community’s concerns over federal education and social service funding cuts, as well as more aggressive immigration enforcement under President Donald Trump. The latter has created “a climate of fear” for some Brentano families, especially for those whose relatives have been stopped or arrested by immigration agents, he said.

Those challenges were “front of mind for me,” Yankech said of his decision to support the resolution.

Yankech’s daughter will stay home Friday. Her parents have tasked her with writing an essay about the history and significance of May Day and the labor movement.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Two dozen cited as Chicago Public Schools’ lunchroom workers rally for more pay

2026-04-24T01:06:27+00:00

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Two dozen Chicago Public Schools’ lunchroom workers and their supporters were cited for obstructing traffic Thursday during a rally to draw attention to protracted negotiations over pay and staffing levels.

UNITE HERE Local 1, the union representing roughly 1,700 CPS lunchroom workers, planned the rally and civil disobedience outside district headquarters as negotiations over a new union contract have surpassed 10 months. Now, both sides have agreed to get a federal mediator involved, CPS and the union confirmed.

The rally attracted more than 200 participants.

The group first gathered at Daley Plaza around 4 p.m. and chanted slogans such as, “Overworked and underpaid, that’s how your kids’ food gets made.”

By 5 p.m., the large group walked a couple of blocks to CPS headquarters at 42 W. Madison St., where people held up signs, played drums, and chanted while filling up a bus shelter and sidewalk outside of the building. Pedestrians looked on as roughly two dozen people set up metal chairs in the middle of Madison Street and sat down.

After a few minutes, Chicago Police ushered each person away with their hands behind their backs behind a nearby building, where police wrote tickets.

A Chicago police officer writes tickets to protesters for obstructing traffic during a rally for lunchroom workers.

One of the people cited was Stephanie Martin, a lunchroom manager who has worked in CPS schools for 27 years. She said she earns about $1,200 every two weeks. After she pays her bills, she typically has nothing left. As of Thursday, she had 10 cents in her bank account, she said.

“I’m not hopeful about what CPS is going to do,” she said.

Lunchroom workers and their supporters sit in the middle of the street during a rally outside of the Chicago Board of Education headquarters Thursday.

The contract negotiations are happening as CPS faces a possible $520 million deficit next school year. In a statement, the district said it values its lunchroom employees and is committed to reaching “a fair and sustainable deal.”

About 60% of lunchroom workers work fewer than eight hours a day and are not full-time, according to CPS.

UNITE HERE has said its workers are the lowest paid in CPS, and starting pay for their lunchroom attendants is just under $17 an hour, which is about $4 less than starting pay for custodians. The union is pushing for hourly pay that at least matches that of custodial workers.

The union is also trying to beef up staffing. A WBEZ analysis found the district has 20% fewer lunchroom workers compared with five years ago. About half of lunchroom workers surveyed by the union last fall said they have trouble paying for basic needs, and about one-fifth said they have visited food banks.

During her daily six-hour shift, Laura Najera, a lunchroom attendant at Ella Flagg Young Elementary School, prepares bags of breakfast and other snacks for the kids. Sometimes she helps take out trash or does the dishes if other employees are out, even though that’s not in her job duties, she said.

In order to make ends meet, Najera said she works at a dog shelter some days after she gets off work at school. Some weeks she only has about $20 left for groceries after paying her other bills and buys instant noodles for meals.

“I do (the job) because I like being with the kids,” said Najera, who attended Thursday’s rally. “But obviously it would be a lot more helpful if I could also live off of that paycheck.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Board of Education picks Karime Asaf as chief education officer

2026-04-23T20:25:36+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education picked Karime Asaf, who oversees English learner programming at Chicago Public Schools, on Thursday to be the district’s next chief education officer.

As chief education officer, Asaf will be responsible for overseeing the district’s academic vision for schools.

The position has been without a permanent leader since last June, when then-chief Bogdana Chkoumbova resigned. Alfonso Carmona, former chief portfolio officer at CPS, was serving as the interim until earlier this month.

Asaf, who was once an English learner student at Senn High School after emigrating from Colombia, has worked in education for more than 30 years, including as a network chief and bilingual and special education teacher at CPS, according to her biography online. She became the chief of the Office of Multilingual and Multicultural Education in 2023.

“I have learned how important it is to treat people with dignity,” Asaf said shortly after she was hired. “Even during difficult conversations, it’s important to me to stay respectful. As a learning leader, my role is to invite people in, open space for collaboration and innovation, and inspire their creativity and imagination.”

One of her focuses has been to open more dual and world language programs. Under her tenure, the district updated its bilingual education policy with multiple clarifications, including that an English learner’s neighborhood school must provide them with language support even if the school hasn’t provided such support before.

Asaf’s tenure has intersected with major issues that impact English learners. She began in the position about a year after Texas Gov. Greg Abbott began busing thousands of migrant families from Central and South America to Chicago and other Democratic-led cities. She’s also been at the helm as the Trump administration has stepped up immigration enforcement and deportation campaigns. On Thursday, she said her office helped create safety protocols at schools in the face of immigration enforcement.

At Thursday’s board meeting, during a presentation on academic progress, Asaf highlighted the district’s creation of a migrant welcome center in 2023 at Clemente High School in Humboldt Park, which she said has become a hub for providing additional support to newcomer families. Board members Debby Pope and Carlos Rivas praised Asaf and the district’s work as the migrant crisis unfolded, including working to enroll newly arrived children.

But as many newcomers who were learning English as a new language enrolled in schools that historically haven’t enrolled English learners, the district struggled to educate these children adequately, Chalkbeat and Block Club Chicago found in 2024.

Last year, Chalkbeat and Block Club found that while the district’s share of bilingual teachers grew by more than 20% since the pandemic, schools were still struggling to provide legally required bilingual education to students who require it.

Asaf has said her office was concerned about areas in the city without English learner services but that creating robust bilingual programs takes time. On Thursday, she also pointed to a guidebook meant to help educators serve English learners.

Under Asaf, the share of English learners who have met their growth targets toward proficiency in English increased by about 1 percentage point — from 27.5% of English learners in the 2023-24 school year to 28.3% last school year, according to district data. The graduation rate among English learners has remained largely the same at just over 76% compared with 84% of students who aren’t English learners.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Illinois education officials vote to overhaul accountability for schools

2026-04-15T17:40:04+00:00

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The Illinois State Board of Education unanimously approved an overhaul to its system for deciding how well schools across the state are performing.

The changes to the federally required school accountability system include some new labels that indicate how well a school is doing. The new system would also calculate the designations differently.

The proposed changes now go to the federal government for final approval; State Superintendent Tony Sanders said he expects a green light. With federal approval, the new accountability system would go into effect by this fall.

Under the current system, schools were labeled as Exemplary, Commendable, Comprehensive, Targeted, and Intensive, with the latter three that deemed a school needed more support.

The new system has the following labels: Exemplary, Approaching Exemplary, Commendable, Developing, and Comprehensive. Using 2025 school data as an example, officials found that this new system would more evenly distribute schools across these designations, with the Commendable label applying to 23% of K-8 schools and 29% of high schools, versus 73% for all schools currently. More schools also would have been considered “exemplary” under the new system — roughly one-fifth of K-8 and high schools, compared with 10% under the current system.

Schools that earn the lowest designations are supposed to get extra state funding to help improve.

Sanders described the changes as one of his biggest goals, and board members described the public feedback process as a thoughtful one that resulted in tweaks to the original proposal.

“Everybody is not going to be happy about it, and that’s OK,” said ISBE board vice chair Donna S. Leak. “What we’re trying to do is find ways to connect to student achievement in a more meaningful way.”

ISBE officials extended the timeline for getting feedback on its proposed changes, which it unveiled last fall. Still, ahead of ISBE’s vote Wednesday, several education advocacy groups remained opposed to some elements of the overhaul, including the removal of a measure for whether ninth graders are on track for graduation and another measure for capturing student attendance that the groups argue isn’t sufficient.

Federal education law has long required states to craft accountability systems for its schools and required them to administer state tests. ISBE created its current system in 2017 after an overhaul of K-12 education law under former President Barack Obama.

The current system, which ranks schools based on a weighted system, was giving many schools “the wrong signal” that they were doing better than they actually are, Sanders said at an ISBE meeting last month.

“I don’t think there’s anybody that I’ve met in public education that would say that our current accountability has worked effectively at moving school improvement for student outcomes over these past few years,” Sanders said.

ISBE spokesperson Lindsay Record said state officials will share resources such as infographics, short videos, and FAQs with the public ahead of this fall to help the families understand the new system.

To earn the new designations, schools will be scored based on what ISBE is calling “core indicators,” or what it considers the most important markers of academic performance; those include student academic growth, proficiency on core subjects, and graduation rates for high schools.

Under the new system, a school’s label is determined by its strongest core indicator. But if any of the indicators score at the lowest “comprehensive” level, then the school’s designation would be knocked down a level. For example, if an elementary school’s student growth ranks at the exemplary — or the highest — level, but its student proficiency is considered comprehensive, or the lowest, then that school would be given the designation of approaching exemplary, or the second highest label.

Schools can earn higher scores if they do well on “elevating indicators,” including how well English learners are growing and if many students are attending school at least 90% of the time — the opposite of the definition for chronic absenteeism.

Some groups have argued that threshold is too low, citing research that has found students do better academically when they’re attending school more often than 90%. In Chicago, the state’s biggest district, the chronic absenteeism rate was around 40% last school year compared with about 25% statewide.

Some education groups have lingering concerns

The department made some changes between the fall and now in response to concerns, such as clarifying the labels for schools and adding an additional indicator for determining whether high schools are successful, according to its amended accountability plan.

But it didn’t reinsert the 9th Grade On-Track measure, arguing that it is important but not “meaningfully” different from a school’s graduation rate. The measure will still be publicly reported on the state report card.

But some education advocacy groups argued that 42 states measure college and career readiness in some way. They said they hope ISBE will explore a process to consider adding these measures back in somehow.

Weighing school performance based on graduation rates without another readiness measure “can obscure whether students are truly prepared for what comes after high school,” said Hal Woods, chief of policy for Kids First Chicago.

In Chicago, a Chalkbeat and WBEZ investigation found that student absenteeism was growing as the graduation rate grew, even as research shows that absenteeism is linked to lower academic performance.

Perla Santoya, senior government relations associate at Advance Illinois, said losing such an indicator sends “an incomplete message about the experiences and skills we want our young people to have.”

Still, some other educator groups said they were pleased by the changes and praised the state for being open to feedback.

“What you have in front of you today, I believe, is fair,” Emily Warnecke, chief of staff at the Illinois Association of School Administrators. “It is reflective of the great work that is happening in our schools across the state, and it still maintains very high expectations for our students.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools to stay open May 1 during nationwide protest — at least for now

2026-04-09T23:01:09+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools will stay open May 1 for now, despite a push from board members and the Chicago Teachers Union to allow teachers and students to join a nationwide protest that day, in part against the Trump administration.

But it’s still possible schools will close that day, since a majority of Board of Education members support the move.

In a statement issued Thursday afternoon, interim CPS CEO Macquline King — who will begin leading the district permanently July 1 — said she’s recommended that school should stay open. She added that if the board wants to cancel classes, it must convene a special meeting and take a formal vote “as soon as possible.”

“Our staff, students and families need a clear understanding of what to expect on May 1,” she said.

Union leaders have pushed for the day to be a teacher-directed professional development day — for which students are off from school — so that teachers and students could participate in the national day of “no school, no work, no shopping.” The protest is meant to advocate for raising taxes on the rich, reining in immigration enforcement, and more funding for schools, union officials have said.

The disagreement could be an early test of King’s leadership of the district, which is confronting a range of challenges.

Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former CTU organizer and close ally of the union’s, previously said he supports letting students miss school on May 1, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

But confusion over whether the day would be off began Wednesday, after a memo from King leaked to the press. King’s memo, dated Tuesday and delivered to board members, said she wanted to keep classes in session in order to “ensure continuity of instruction, maintain safe and supervised environments, and minimize disruption for families,” including providing access to free student meals, according to a copy of the memo obtained by Chalkbeat.

She also noted that in a recent survey, 113 schools — or roughly one-fifth of all schools — reported a range of activities happening May 1, including field trips, college-decision day events, sports events, and make-up AP testing, the memo said. Just over 100 schools said they had out-of-school activities planned, including prom and senior night.

Those activities, which required “months of planning and financial commitments” could be difficult to reschedule as the district gets closer to the end of the year, the memo said.

Board members are split on calling the day off.

But also this week, the Chicago Teachers Union filed a grievance against the district, claiming CPS had violated its contractual agreement when planning this school year by failing to work with the union to schedule one professional development day for the 2025-26 school year.

In a letter dated Monday, CTU president Stacy Davis Gates wrote that the contractual language was negotiated “with the express purpose of accommodating a day of civic action on May 1.”

King notes in her memo that the provision cited by the union is set to take effect next school year, not this year. The school board adopted its calendar for next school year, when May 1 falls on a Saturday.

The union has also pointed to a state law allowing middle and high school kids to participate in a civic event. But in her memo, King said the law allows those students to take one excused absence a year for such an action and doesn’t allow a district-wide day off.

The grievance and the matter of May Day came up during the board’s closed session on Wednesday, board members said. King asked board members to weigh in and presented them with multiple options, including to keep schools open. A majority of board members, who are aligned with the mayor, voiced support for canceling classes on May 1, and some of those who were opposed stated that King had switched her position after the board’s closed session.

Debby Pope, an appointed board member, said board members shared many perspectives, including concerns for working parents. Pope said she supports closing schools May 1 because the nation is in “unprecedented times” and that “education takes many forms,” including participating in or learning about protests.

Other board members have stated staunch opposition, including Jessica Biggs and Jennifer Custer, both elected board members who have announced their runs for board president.

On X, formerly known as Twitter, Biggs said, “The academic calendar has been set. Key end of year activities are planned. Our teachers are working hard to wrap up the year on a focused note. And our families count on our schools to do what they say.”

Custer started a petition online calling for school to stay open.

On Thursday morning, King joined a call that included leaders from CTU, the city’s principals union, and the mayor’s office so that they could plan for different scenarios, but no final decision had been made, according to Kia Banks, president of the principals union. Banks said all parties are trying to be “aware of our civic responsibilities while preserving or protecting our learners.”

A source close to CTU said it has been in “productive meetings” figuring out plans with the district, the principals union and the mayor’s office.

It remains unclear how staff in other unions, such as those who represent custodians and other support workers, would be affected or if they were included on the Thursday morning call.

Board President Sean Harden issued his own memo to King and some of her top cabinet members on Thursday, expressing the board’s support for King to “operationalize a day of civic action” on May 1.

King responded the same day, telling Harden that she was sticking by her statement that the district’s position “is to remain open May 1.” She also reiterated her call for the board to publicly vote on the matter.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

After debate, Chicago school board denounces Trump-backed push for school choice

2026-04-08T21:32:17+00:00

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As Gov. JB Pritzker weighs opting Illinois into a Trump-backed tax credit scholarship program, the Chicago Board of Education decided after an impassioned debate to push him to avoid it.

The board voted 15-0, with three abstentions, to adopt a resolution Wednesday that denounces the Trump administration’s efforts “to expand and incentivize voucher or publicly funded scholarships for private schools” and criticized private schools as nontransparent institutions.

The resolution comes as more than half of U.S. states — largely led by Republican governors — have opted into the new program. Two Democratic governors have also decided to opt into it. It will provide dollar-for-dollar tax credits to donors who give up to $1,700 to scholarship-granting nonprofits. The funds can go toward certain expenses for students enrolled in private or public schools or home-schooled children whose families make up to 300% of the local median income. For a Chicago family, that means earning less than roughly $233,000 a year.

It’s unclear if districts can directly benefit from the money.

Elected board members Che “Rhymefest” Smith, Ellen Rosenfeld, and Therese Boyle abstained from voting. Smith and Rosenfeld said they felt the matter should be directly discussed with Pritzker and his team, while Boyle is unsure how she feels about the program.

Before the vote, board members debated over whether they should take up the resolution or shelve it and discuss the matter directly with lawmakers. Board president Sean Harden, who is appointed by the mayor, said board members could both vote on a resolution and approach the governor’s office for a discussion.

“[The governor] looks for leaders to make statements around what their values are,” Harden said.

Some left-leaning politicians, including Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza, have embraced the program. Pritzker has privately shared with Mendoza his reservations about opting into the program, the Chicago Tribune reported.

Rosenfeld motioned to postpone the vote because she felt the resolution’s public nature was “politically motivated.” She said she’d rather go to Springfield to ask Pritzker to oppose the program.

Springfield lawmakers have been in session since the start of the year, but the school board has not yet voted on a legislative agenda.

“Politics don’t belong in the boardroom,” Rosenfeld said.

Elected board member Jitu Brown said he couldn’t “disagree more” with Rosenfeld, that the nature of the board is political, and part of that is debate.

“Until we’re able to have honest grown-up conversations about why we have the positions we have, then we’ll play this game (of) ‘I don’t want to do politics,’” Brown said. “If you don’t want to do politics, then you shouldn’t be on the school board.”

Appointed board member Debby Pope said indefinitely pushing the resolution back “totally diminishes” its power.

Boyle said she’s still unsure how she feels about the tax credit program.

“Before being asked to make a decision on this I wish I could hear from the governor and his team – like why is it taking him so long to make a decision?” Boyle said.

Several groups, including the Chicago Teachers Union and Illinois Families for Public Schools, have strongly denounced the new program as a tactic to siphon students and funding from public schools and asked Pritzker not to opt in.

Opponents have pointed to school choice programs in other states to argue why a program to expand private school access in Illinois won’t necessarily benefit low-income students. In states with universal education savings accounts or voucher programs, a large share of participating students are from affluent families. Many attended private school before the voucher program was launched.

There have been some local efforts to push Pritzker to opt in. The libertarian-leaning think tank Illinois Policy Institute pushed for a ballot advisory question on the issue during last month’s elections in more than two dozen counties, most of which are suburban or rural and voted for Trump in 2024. Most voters in those places signaled support for the program.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board names Angel Vélez as new vice president

2026-04-08T17:28:52+00:00

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In a split decision, the Chicago school board on Wednesday chose a diversity, equity and inclusion consultant appointed to the board last year by Mayor Brandon Johnson as its new vice president.

The board voted 9-7 for Angel Vélez to replace former board vice president Olga Bautista, an appointee who stepped down last month. The vice president performs the duties of the board president, such as presiding over meetings, if the president is absent.

Johnson appointed Vélez — who has also studied education policy — last August to fill a vacancy ahead of a pivotal budget vote. Vélez represents subdistrict 9a, which covers South Side neighborhoods that span from Canaryville to Auburn Gresham.

Vélez earned support for his vice presidency from other board members who have been more aligned with Johnson, including appointees Cydney Wallace, Debby Pope, Norma Rios-Sierra, Ed Bannon, Michilia Blaise and Karen Zaccor, as well as elected members Jitu Brown and Ebony DeBerry.

Elected board member Yesenia Lopez was also nominated for vice president and earned votes from elected board members who have been more critical of the mayor’s office: Che “Rhymefest” Smith, Therese Boyle, Ellen Rosenfeld, Carlos Rivas, Jennifer Custer, and Jessica Biggs.

Vélez and Lopez each voted for themselves.

The board did not discuss the vote further.

In a recent interview, Vélez spoke about his desire for more unity on the board. Vélez, who is Black and Latino, said he didn’t sign on to a letter last week pushing soon-to-be permanent CEO Macquline King to hire more Latinos in her cabinet because he felt it was more divisive than helpful. He said it would have been better for board members and organizations to first speak with King about the demands.

“If we unite, we can ask for more funding,” Velez said. “If we stay divided, not a lot is going to get done.”

The mayor currently appoints 11 of the board’s 21 members, including the president. He has not yet named a replacement for Bautista, and his office did not respond to a request for comment.

All 21 seats on the board will be up for election this November, and the board will be a fully elected governing body starting next January.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board to vote on resolution urging Pritzker to reject public funds for private school

2026-04-06T21:19:32+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education plans to vote Wednesday on a resolution urging Gov. JB Pritzker to reject efforts by the Trump administration to support private schools with public funds.

Pritzker, a vocal critic of President Donald Trump who is running for reelection as governor, has not yet made a decision about whether to opt Illinois into a federal tax-credit program.

The resolution doesn’t explicitly name the new federal tax-credit program, but it denounces Trump administration efforts “to expand and incentivize voucher or publicly funded scholarships for private schools.” It also criticizes private schools as bodies without enough guardrails or public transparency.

The federal program would provide dollar-for-dollar tax credits to donors who give up to $1,700 to scholarship-granting nonprofits. In states where the governor opts into the program, those funds can go toward certain expenses for students enrolled in private or public schools (or home-schooled children) whose families make up to 300% of the local median income — or for a Chicago family making roughly $233,000 a year or less.

Federal officials have said public schools can also benefit from the program but haven’t solidified rules for how. For example, it’s unclear whether the money could be used for tutoring provided by public schools or be restricted to outside tutoring groups.

More than half of U.S. states, mostly run by Republican governors, have opted in. Colorado Gov. Jared Polis is the only Democratic governor to officially do so, while North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein said he plans to in the future. A handful of other Democrats who previously opposed the program said they’re now reconsidering.

The board’s resolution argues that “the diversion of public funds for private education weakens not only public schools but other vital public goods and services such as transportation, healthcare and efforts to preserve the environment.”

Such a resolution isn’t surprising from Chicago’s school board. Many board members have taken a stance against the Trump administration in other areas, including its deportation campaign in Chicago in the fall and its cancellation of millions of dollars in federal grant funding for CPS. A majority of the board is also aligned with the Chicago Teachers Union, a major ally of Mayor Brandon Johnson, which is staunchly opposed to the program.

But there have been some splits among Illinois politicians. Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza, who is considering a run for Chicago mayor this year, called for the state to opt in via an op-ed in the Chicago Tribune. While Pritzker hasn’t announced a decision, he has expressed reservations: He texted Mendoza that governors who haven’t yet opted in “are waiting to understand how much of the money can be used for publics and exactly how states can keep the money from supporting schools that teach values that are racist or antisemitic or anti-American,” according to texts obtained by the Chicago Tribune.

For her part, Mendoza wrote in a Tribune op-ed that “rather than funding Trump’s agenda in D.C. or sending more of our dollars to Republican-controlled states already taking advantage of Illinois taxpayers, I would much prefer that an Illinoisan be able to redirect $1,700 to support their own school community.”

Some education advocacy groups have asked Pritzker not to opt in. Additionally, the advocacy arm of Illinois Policy Institute, a libertarian-leaning think tank, persuaded more than two dozen Illinois counties and townships to include a non-binding advisory question on their recent primary election ballots about the program. Most of the questions didn’t mention that the program relies on tax credits, and at least one of those counties incorrectly described the program.

Still, a majority of voters in places with the ballot question approved of Pritzker opting in, according to a tally of results from Illinois Policy. Most of those counties are suburban or rural areas that voted for Trump in 2024. (Cook County, the state’s largest, and Chicago ballots did not have the advisory question.)

The federal program comes three years after Illinois lawmakers allowed a different private school scholarship program to sunset. That program, known as the Invest in Kids scholarship, allowed individuals or corporations to donate to scholarship-granting organizations, which then provided tuition aid to low-income, private school students.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

This program teaches Chicago teens about the risks of gun ownership. It’s changing some minds.

2026-04-03T20:16:39+00:00

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Fifteen-year-old Josiah Owens is considering owning a gun one day because he wants protection. He doesn’t want to suffer the same fate as his best friend, whom he says survived a shooting a couple of years ago.

Owens, a sophomore at Disney II Magnet High School on the Northwest Side, was one of 23 Chicago teens ages 13 to 17 who took part in a recent weeklong program to learn about the risks of gun ownership and how to share those statistics with peers through a flashy social media campaign. He joined after a nudge from his mother, who wanted him to “build connections” with other Chicago kids.

The program, which took place from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. each week day of spring break, was led by nonprofit Project Unloaded in partnership with nonprofit After School Matters, which paid the teen participants $150.

Since 2023, the organization has run a six-week summer program where teens get more time to research gun violence statistics and create catchy social media videos. But the spring break program was a first for Project Unloaded, according to Nina Vinik, founder and president of Project Unloaded.

Project Unloaded focuses on social media creation because that’s where “young people today are going to find information,” Vinik said.

“All of our programs combine firearm risk education for young people with social media skill building, so we’re effectively teaching young people how to use social media as a way to make positive change in their communities,” she said.

Last year, 18.6% of the victims of fatal and non-fatal shootings in Chicago were 19 years old or younger, almost one percentage point higher than the year before but a drop from about 20% in 2023, according to city data.

A 2022 survey of 989 Chicago parents found that more than one-third of their children were exposed to gun violence, ranging from hearing gunshots to being shot. One-fifth of those children experienced mental health symptoms as a result.

Last week during Chicago Public Schools’ spring break, Owens and his peers showed up to the After School Matters offices in the Kilbourn Park neighborhood and learned some gun ownership statistics: People with a gun at home are twice as likely to be killed, according to a California study conducted in the 1990s. According to another study published in 2011, people who owned a gun were four times more likely to be shot during an assault compared with those who didn’t have a gun on them.

The teens then learned how to create effective social media campaigns that direct people to a website with more information on studies related to gun ownership. They spent a day with staff from iO improv theater to “come out of their shells,” said Olivia Brown, associate director of youth engagement at Project Unloaded who led the spring break program. They also watched videos from other content creators to learn that a good video has a hook, a main message, and then a call to action, Brown said.

Olivia Brown, associate director of youth engagement for Project Unloaded, speaks to a group of teenagers who participated in the organization's weeklong program aimed at teaching them about the risks of gun ownership and effective social media campaigns.

“They were like, ‘Oh, it’s kind of like writing a persuasive essay,’” Brown said, who agreed with them. “It’s like, you got to get your reader, aka your viewer, on your side.”

The teens practiced shooting videos with their phones. Then, Project Unloaded’s digital strategist helped them create their final videos with his equipment.

On the Friday of spring break, the last day of their program, the teens presented their videos in groups of three or four. They walked up to the front of the room, some appearing shy, facing their peers and invited guests who included content creators.

Their videos, which lasted less than 30 seconds, will be added to an ongoing advertising campaign created by last summer’s cohort of teens, called “Goofies Got Guns.”

One group presented a video showcasing a fictional “Totally Safe News” network, where one of the participants played a correspondent who initially says owning a gun offers safety. Then, the screen bleeps out, and the correspondent fixes the newscast to say owning a gun doubles the risk of homicide.

“Facts don’t care about opinions,” the correspondent says.

Owens’ group made a video where the camera toggles between the teens playing a video game while they discuss the statistics associated with owning a gun.

In another group’s video, one of the teens says he owns a gun, and his peer walks up and puts a clown wig on him. The audience in the room laughed.

Vinik emphasized that they don’t “tell any young person what to do or what to think or what not to do,” rather, they want to arm them with information “to make the best decision that they can for themselves.”

The program did appear to change some of the teens’ minds: Project Unloaded representatives said they saw a 30% drop among the participants who are interested in owning a gun. One of them is Makayla Mason, 16, who’s a junior at Lane Tech High School, who said she considered buying a gun when she gets older.

“I wouldn’t even want to get one anymore,” she said.

Owens, who wants to be a boxer when he gets older, said the social media skills he learned could be useful in helping to promote himself one day.

As for gun ownership? The program didn’t change his mind: He’s still considering buying a gun one day.

“Now I just know the risks of it, which is good,” he said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools new CEO King faces big challenges. How do Chicagoans want her to tackle them?

2026-04-02T22:39:32+00:00

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Interim Chicago Public Schools CEO Macquline King, who will become the district’s permanent leader in July, has major challenges ahead of her.

The district is facing a projected budget deficit of at least $520 million next school year. At the same time, enrollment is declining, and the chronic absenteeism rate — when kids miss at least 10% of school days — has remained around 40% for the past few years.

Another challenge will be meeting the demands of a diverse community with different ideas and needs. One Local School Council member is vehemently opposed to the closure of her severely underenrolled school, but a parent at a nearby high school wouldn’t mind if their schools combined. Many parents don’t want to see cuts at their schools, but one parent leader said she’s interested in seeing where her child’s school can pare back on staffing in order to save money.

King has said she plans to engage communities around Chicago to shape her leadership on tough issues. While the Chicago Board of Education ultimately votes on major policies and budgets, King is in charge of proposing and implementing changes, as well as a budget plan.

As she settles into the permanent role, parents and members of school leadership teams shared what they would like to see from King.

CPS again faces a budget deficit

Budget woes and how King will tackle them are a primary concern for parents and educators. The deficit could grow as large as $1 billion, King has said, meaning the district will either have to find more revenue or make cuts before approving a budget this summer for the 2026-27 school year.

Overall state funding for CPS has increased nearly $390 million over the past five years. Still, the district is $1.6 billion short of what the state considers adequate funding.

Most Chicago adults want the state to provide more money, according to a survey conducted by Kids First, an education advocacy organization. Of the 1,361 respondents, two-thirds want state lawmakers to provide more money. Three-quarters want the corporate income tax raised, and roughly that same percentage want income taxes raised on people earning more than $250,000.

But Gov. JB Prtizker’s proposed budget doesn’t do those things and would instead provide a slightly smaller increase in funding than usual for K-12 schools.

King has said she will keep fighting for more state money. Earlier this week, she told reporters “everything has to be on the table so that we don’t compromise the progress that CPS students have made.”

On the school level, parent leaders told Chalkbeat they don’t want to see cuts to meals, tutoring, extracurricular activities, and arts programming. One of those parents — Princess Shaw, who was recently elected to the LSC and has a daughter at Oscar DePriest Elementary School in the Austin neighborhood — said she wants to take a closer look at whether the school needs all the staffing it has.

Jessica Keirns, who is on the LSC at Foreman High School in Portage Park, said King should consider more cuts at the central office level and invest in efforts to prevent long-term expenses for remedial help. For example, she wants schools to be able to hire more librarians, noting some research that links librarians to growth in student literacy.

Schools that are well-resourced “should pull [their] weight in the sacrifice,” Keirns said.

The district’s relatively new funding formula has moved away from basing funding on enrollment and provides staff positions based on a school’s needs. Many selective enrollment and magnet programs with higher enrollment had aired concerns about cuts under the new formula.

“When I hear people complain that they can’t keep their four different foreign languages … they’re forgetting about schools that are only offering Spanish in a place where the majority of the students already speak Spanish fluently,” Keirns said.

The district’s growing number of small schools

Chicago Public Schools enrollment has largely dipped over the last dozen or so years, with a nearly 3% drop again last fall. That drop has resulted in dozens of severely underenrolled schools, often in aging buildings that are costly to maintain: 43 schools are at one-third capacity, and roughly half of district-run schools are considered underutilized by district measures.

A Chalkbeat investigation last year found small schools tend to have less access to a variety of courses and extracurricular activities and are more likely to see higher dropout rates and truancy.

But school closures are highly fraught in Chicago, where mass closures in 2013 under then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel left many low-income, Black and Hispanic communities feeling scarred and unheard by the district — and many left the city. Political leaders have since largely avoided addressing the issue.

After the board voted to hire King permanently, appointed board member Michilia Blaise said she wants to craft a vision for underenrolled schools “without just closing doors.” For her piece, King recently told reporters that a solution will require figuring out “the challenges” and how “to ensure that all students have a high-quality student experience regardless of where their school is situated.”

At Douglass High School in the Austin neighborhood, where only 27 students were enrolled at the start of the year, longtime LSC member Catherine Jones said she is “flatly” against a closure or combining with another school, and she wants more resources for the tight-knit campus she loves, such as a performing arts program.

“I would like [King] to sit down and talk to us as LSC members and see what the community would like the school to be,” Jones said.

On the South Side, Cecile De Mello, executive director of Teamwork Englewood, a group that advocates for more investment in the Englewood neighborhood, said King should revamp the CPS facilities master plan, which in part maps out building needs, and consider with school communities how to use vacant school spaces instead of closing buildings.

Jaciel Cathey, a newly elected LSC member for a school on the South Side, said King should focus on retaining teachers within the same school. She believes having familiar, consistent faces can help build trust with families and keep them in the community, she said.

CPS has made various efforts to recruit and retain more teachers within the district, for which rates have slightly improved in the last decade, according to state data.

Still, Cathey, who transferred her son from a private school, said families often “don’t know who’s teaching third grade” or “who’s teaching fourth grade” year after year.

Chronic absenteeism remains stagnant

Before the pandemic, about a quarter of CPS students missed at least 10% of school days — known as chronic absenteeism. Today, roughly 40% of CPS students are chronically absent, a rate that’s remained stagnant in recent years. It’s a critical issue: Lower attendance among middle and high school students is linked to lower grades and test scores, according to a recent study from the University of Chicago Consortium on School Research.

John Boggs, a veteran teacher and now International Baccalaureate program coordinator at Bogan Computer Technical High School on Chicago’s Southwest Side, rattled off a few of the reasons for why kids aren’t showing up: They’re caring for siblings; they’re navigating bad relationships with parents; or they’re just uninterested by their classes.

“When you’re looking at the low attendance rate for a kid, there’s a story there, and you just got to find out what it is,” Boggs, who also serves on the districtwide LSC advisory board, said.

King told WBEZ in January that CPS doesn’t have a strategy to improve attendance but she is talking to a foundation to help fund a plan.

Boggs said under King, the district should work harder to ensure parents know how to access their child’s attendance and grades online so they know when there’s a problem. The district has a web page instructing parents how to use the student information portal, but many families may not know it exists. Several other parents told Chalkbeat that schools should work to build relationships with parents — something the research study links to better attendance.

On the West Side, sophomore Stanley Scales transferred to Austin College and Career Academy from a private school at the start of this school year. Scales said he likes his new school, but he’s noticed some kids regularly don’t show up to school, where last year the chronic absenteeism rate was 87%.

Austin College and Career Academy is pictured on the first day of the 2025-26 school year.

Scales suggested the district should fix up the building, which he’s heard people describe as “depressing.” The nearly 100-year-old building needs almost $90 million in more immediate and long-term repairs, among the costliest bills for West Side schools, according to the district’s most recent facilities master plan from 2023.

A 2016 study in New York linked poor building conditions to lower student attendance.

“Maybe if they fixed the school up and like, make it more likable for students, maybe they would want to attend school more,” Scales said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Dozens of officials call for more Latino representation in Chicago Public Schools’ leadership

2026-04-02T00:43:32+00:00

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Fifty Chicago leaders and organizations, including many Latino elected officials, want Chicago Public Schools’ soon-to-be permanent CEO to fill her cabinet and other senior leadership roles with more Latinos.

The signees issued the public statement Wednesday, two days after the Chicago Board of Education voted to name interim CPS CEO Macquline King the permanent leader starting July 1.

“This is not a question of talent but a reflection of a system that has consistently overlooked highly qualified Latino educators and leaders,” the statement said. “The result is a clear and persistent lack of Latino leadership at every level.”

Several district positions are in flux and currently being filled on an interim basis, including its budget director, the chief financial officer, and the chief portfolio officer who oversees charter schools. Alfonso Carmona, acting chief education officer, is Latino but is leaving CPS.

The makeup of teachers and principals doesn’t match the makeup of the district’s students. Hispanic students make up 46% of students at Chicago Public Schools — the biggest share of any major racial group. But 19% of CPS principals are Latino, the statement noted. Meanwhile, the plurality of principals, 45%, are Black, while 34% of district students are Black. Among teachers, the plurality, or 44%, are white, while just a quarter are Latino and just over a fifth are Black.

The statement also called for King to keep partnering with community leaders to “protect every student’s right to a public education, regardless of immigration status” in the wake of aggressive immigration enforcement under President Donald Trump. Several Chicago Board of Education members have praised her response to the federal government’s deportation campaign in the fall.

Last month, Latino leaders and organizations raised concerns about why none of the finalists for the CEO job were Latino. It’s unclear whether there were Latino candidates who didn’t want to continue through the process to the finalists stage.

The signees included eight of 10 elected Chicago Board of Education members; elected members Jitu Brown and Ebony DeBerry were not on the list. Board members who were appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson also were not on the list.

The list also included Rudy Lozano, a former board member who’d been appointed by the Johnson in 2023, as well as nine alderpeople, and six state lawmakers. Other signees include people who represent community organizations that work with Latino communities, including Brighton Park Neighborhood Council, which provides wraparound services to some district schools under the district’s Sustainable Community Schools model.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Macquline King, interim CEO of Chicago Public Schools, hired as permanent leader

2026-03-30T18:55:05+00:00

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The Board of Education voted Monday to name Macquline King as Chicago Public Schools CEO, ending a rocky yearlong search for the district’s permanent leader.

The board voted 18-1 to hire King, who has been the district’s interim leader since last June, when former CEO Pedro Martinez left after being fired without cause. Elected board member Jennifer Custer voted no.

The board officially picked King last week over Sito Narcisse, the former superintendent of East Baton Rouge Parish schools in Louisiana who was named another finalist earlier this month.

King is poised to face a $520 million projected budget deficit. She’ll also be in place through school board elections this year and when a new, fully elected board is seated.

As interim chief, King has been forced to navigate some major issues during her nine months on the job, including closing a $734 million budget deficit that sparked a fight with the mayor’s office, the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement campaign, and upheaval in the district’s charter sector.

In remarks following the vote, King emphasized that she would build relationships in government and communities and would center students in her decisions. She highlighted bright spots in the district, including more recent student achievement in math, but also acknowledged problems ahead and said she’ll be “the most vocal advocate” in pushing for more state funding for CPS.

“We cannot and we will not allow financial headwinds to jeopardize those hard won victories and our students’ confidence,” King said.

Later, during a press conference, King said that in order to close a budget deficit that could rise as high as $1 billion, “everything has to be on the table so that we don’t compromise the progress that CPS students have made.”

King hasn’t rolled out major policy changes in her time so far, though last fall she was interested in reorganizing the district’s network offices, which help manage principals.

Several board members spoke in support of King ahead of the vote, saying that she’s a homegrown candidate who has earned the full-time role by displaying calm leadership over the past nine months. Board members raised a number of issues they want to work with King on, including budgetary pressures, supporting Black students, and addressing the district’s underenrolled schools.

“What mattered most to me — the fact that there are so many pressures on you, but you’ve always centered students,” said elected board member Che “Rhymefest” Smith.

Appointed board member Ed Bannon nodded to the rocky search for a new CEO that lasted about a year — but said that “the trip was worth it.”

“The path might have seemed a little rough at times, but as the saying goes, this is what democracy looks like,” Bannon said.

In an interview following the vote, Custer told reporters that she voted no because school leaders in her community said they did not feel like King has been communicative enough with them. She said she informed King of her vote ahead of time and wants to “figure out how to move forward.”

King started in CPS as a teacher in 1994, ultimately becoming a principal in 2007 until 2022. During that time, her work was both highlighted in the news and scrutinized by district officials in two incidents, once for failing to immediately report allegations of abuse and another time for failing to do a background check for a volunteer. She has said those critiques, which did not result in formal discipline, are the result of her not having enough staffing and support at the time.

She began working for Mayor Lori Lightfoot as an education policy advisor in 2022 and stayed in that role under Mayor Brandon Johnson until taking the job as interim schools chief last summer.

Union leaders and organizations share support for King

Unions, community organizations and elected officials welcomed King to the permanent CEO role as someone who navigated major challenges in the past year, has been willing to engage with them and, unlike other previous CEOs, rose up through the district’s ranks.

During public comment ahead of the board’s vote, Jackson Potter, vice president of the Chicago Teachers Union, lauded King for overseeing the unprecedented, midyear transfer of students out of two shuttering ASPIRA charter network high schools. He noted other challenges ahead of CPS, including the projected budget deficit and a federal government that has pulled funding from the district.

“We can’t stave off the harm that is on the horizon without being in lockstep in our advocacy and vision,” Potter said. “I look forward to doing more of that transformation together in a moment that requires all of us to do more.”

The city’s principals union has previously shown public support for King. That union’s president, Kia Banks, said Monday that she knows King and the union will not always agree but that King has so far “demonstrated a willingness to engage directly with school leaders,” creating a solid foundation for their relationship going forward.

In an interview last week, Dian Palmer, president of SEIU 73, the union that represents thousands of school support staff workers, said she’s most excited about stability for the district with a leader who worked her way up through the system and understands Chicago’s complexities. Palmer said King has been “patient and kind” about her union’s concerns, even when they didn’t agree.

For example, last summer the district’s budget cuts included laying off hundreds of unionized custodians. At the same time, the union supported King’s plans not to include a short-term loan in the budget in fear that future high-interest repayments would result in staff layoffs.

“I am really looking forward to her working with the union — at least that’s what she says,” Palmer said. “She wants to work with us and really have a positive atmosphere for education, for the students, not just the service workers, who we represent, the custodians, the [special education classroom assistants], but also for the teachers.”

Daniel Anello, CEO of education advocacy group Kids First Chicago, welcomed King’s appointment, noting in a statement that she “has already navigated a number of complex challenges related to the district’s finances, attendance, and more” and has shown “a clear commitment to putting students’ interests first, without yielding to political pressure.”

Anello also supported a three-year contract, which he said will mean stability for CPS as the board transitions to a fully elected body next year.

The national search process started last year with community meetings and a detailed wishlist for what the board would look for in a candidate, including “significant” experience in public education that involves working with students, a record of focusing on equity and improving student outcomes, experience working with labor unions, and financial management experience — an area King doesn’t have formal experience in but oversaw the district’s budget proposal last year.

But after finalist names leaked and one of the candidates dropped out in the fall, the board decided to conduct more interviews. By February, as the board narrowed down candidates, the board’s search firm, Alma Advisory Group, departed and six elected board members said they’d lost confidence in the search, accusing the mayor of meddling, which he’s denied. Those board members called for retaining King as the interim chief until the new board is seated.

King had applied for the job of CEO in 2021, but the board at the time, appointed by Lightfoot, picked Martinez. Then several months into her time as the interim chief, she again applied last fall for the permanent job amid the board’s search to replace Martinez but was not advanced as a finalist.

By then, at least seven board members who are also mayoral allies disagreed with her budget proposal that was ultimately approved. And separately, other board members appeared caught off guard after she pitched a plan to reorganize network offices.

In recent months, some organizations called on the board to keep King in place until at least a new elected board is seated in January. King was then added back into the mix in recent weeks.

Remel Terry, president of the West Side branch of the NAACP, said her organization is “excited” that King will stay. The organization has felt left in the dark about the search process, Terry said, and asked the board twice to pause the search and retain King permanently through next school year. It was disappointing that King was taken out of consideration in the fall even though “she has already demonstrated her ability to lead this district under pressure,” Terry said.

The group will keep a close watch on how the district’s Black Student Success Plan — which has been under federal scrutiny — will be implemented, Terry said. She also expects King to stay as communicative as she has been with organizations like hers, as well as parents, as she takes on the permanent role.

“Having access and being able to speak directly to concerns and issues is a very important piece,” Terry said.

This story has been updated to include comments from Macquline King and members of the Chicago Board of Education.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Board of Education to vote on hiring interim CEO Macquline King as permanent leader of CPS

2026-03-26T17:59:06+00:00

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After a yearlong national search for Chicago Public Schools’ next leader, the Board of Education will vote Monday on whether to permanently hire interim CEO Macquline King, a Chicagoan who rose up through the district’s ranks.

The board’s meeting will start at 10:30 a.m. Monday at its downtown headquarters, where it will consider approving a contract with King with a salary of $380,000, according to an agenda posted on the board’s website Thursday.

If approved by the board, the term of King’s contract would begin July 1 and last through June 2029, according to the board’s agenda. The resolution to approve a contract for King says the board has offered King the job, and she has accepted. .

The vote would also cap a rocky search process that’s been a test for how Chicago’s partially elected board could choose a schools chief differently from the past, when mayors would essentially make a pick without much public input. The board’s search process laid out last year acknowledged that it would seek the mayor’s input on its finalist candidates.

Last month, however, a group of six elected board members — including the search committee’s chair, Jessica Biggs — accused the mayor’s office of sabotaging the search, which Mayor Brandon Johnson has denied.

King has been serving as the district’s interim leader of the more than 316,000-student district since last June, when former CEO Pedro Martinez left after being fired without cause.

Martinez had received a five-year contract with a starting salary of $340,000 when hired in 2021 by a board that was fully appointed by then-Mayor Lori Lightfoot. Martinez made about $360,000 when he left CPS.

The other finalist was Sito Narcisse, the former superintendent of East Baton Rouge Parish schools in Louisiana, who has been trailed by a mixture of controversy and loyal supporters during his nearly 20 years in education.

Meisha Porter, former leader of New York City schools, was also a finalist, but she withdrew her name after the board announced the candidates’ names on March13.

Johnson interviewed King and Narcisse and called the conversations “fruitful” in a press conference earlier this week. His office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Norma Rios-Sierra, a mayoral appointee to the school board who sat on the board’s CEO search working group, said the mayor has given “his blessing” to hire King.

Rios-Sierra said the search process has had its “ups and downs,” but she’s excited to have King on permanently.

“I think she has shown her ability to just kind of take on the work that it is to be the Chicago Public Schools superintendent,” Rios-Sierra said. “We needed someone who understood the city, who understood the complexity of what we’re doing.”

King initially taken out of consideration for the job

King’s inclusion on the finalist list was initially a surprise.

She had applied last fall for the job, but the board did not advance her as a finalist at the time. After finalist names were leaked in November and one of those candidates dropped out, the board conducted more interviews and revealed a new list of finalists two weeks ago, which included King.

Two school board members previously told Chalkbeat they received a call from Board President Sean Harden the day before finalist names were announced publicly, saying King would be added to the list, and that Harden had garnered a majority of support from board members to add her.

If appointed, King will face mounting challenges at CPS, including a projected budget deficit to close this summer for the next school year. She’ll also be in place when a new, fully elected board is seated in January, raising questions about how she’ll build relationships with any new board members, who will have the power to keep or replace her.

But King isn’t new to some of these issues. The former principal and City Hall aide led the district through a bruising battle over how to close CPS’ $734 million budget deficit last summer, in which she opposed the mayor’s plan to take out a loan in order to balance the budget and cover a much-debated pension cost. That budget, however, also saw a slew of cuts, including hundreds of custodians and hot meals for kids.

King has also overseen the city’s schools through the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement campaign, creating a “command center” for schools to call for extra support, the federal government’s decision to withhold millions of dollars in grant funding, and upheaval in the district’s charter sector.

In September, King had considered a massive reorganization of the district’s network offices, which operate as a sort of middle management between the district’s top leaders and schools. But she appeared to pause the plan after pushback from board members and some principals.

She has earned some public support for her leadership so far, including from the principals union and the West Side branch of NAACP.

Rios-Sierra, who voted no on King’s budget proposal in the fall, said she’s been impressed by how King has been communicative with other government agencies, including City Council and the state legislature. She also noted King’s work in overseeing the transfer of hundreds of students out of ASPIRA charter network’s shuttering high schools and her response to increased immigration enforcement.

“When we asked CPS to move with a sense of urgency when ICE was coming, I think she absolutely listened and did everything she could to communicate with parents and principals,” Rios-Sierra said.

King became a CPS teacher in 1994 at Robert Nathaniel Dett Elementary School following a brief stint at a private school. In 2007, King became principal at Alexandre Dumas School, and by 2013 she was principal at Courtenay Language Arts Center in Uptown, where she was highlighted for her participation in a leadership program for new school leaders.

Her first year as principal at Courtenay was when the school merged with former Stockton Elementary, meaning King was tasked with creating harmony between both school communities. While some acknowledged the difficult task ahead of her, others described part of the school as a “war zone” that was marred with student fights, and they accused school leaders, including King, of not doing enough, according to a DNAinfo story at the time.

King then was hired to work on education policy at City Hall under former Mayor Lori Lightfoot and stayed under the Johnson administration until being hired for the role of interim CPS CEO. She had previously applied for the CEO job in 2021, but the board at the time hired Martinez.

King’s personnel records drew some scrutiny before she was hired as the interim CEO. The records did not show any formal discipline but included two memos from district officials about how she should improve her performance. The memos centered on findings that she had not immediately reported allegations of abuse and failed to conduct a background check for a volunteer. The day she was hired as interim CEO, she told Chalkbeat the criticism was fair but that those directives were the result of understaffing at her school.

Board has undergone a rocky search process

The board’s search process to find a replacement for Martinez has been fraught.

Last spring, the board created a working group to lead the process and hired the search firm, Alma Advisory Group. The district held public meetings to collect feedback on what the community wanted to see in a new schools chief.

A survey conducted last summer as part of the search process found that 42% of the more than 2,700 respondents wanted someone with “strong and clear communication.” Thirty-nine percent wanted someone with “innovation, strategic thinking, and problem solving,” and 37% want someone who seeks and responds to feedback from students, parents, and staff.

After conducting a nationwide search, the board received more than 100 applications.

But after finalist names were leaked in November, several board members soured on the process, and by February, Alma parted ways with the district. Biggs and five other elected officials decried the loss of Alma.

Those six elected members that raised questions about the process also called for the board to pause the search process until after school board elections this year and keep King until January 2027, when the new fully elected board will be seated. The West Side branch of the NAACP has also called to keep King in place through the 2026-27 school year, saying they had a “serious concern” about the legitimacy of the board’s search.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Sito Narcisse, Chicago Public Schools CEO finalist, drew praise and controversy in previous jobs

2026-03-25T00:06:40+00:00

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In the three years that Sito Narcisse, a finalist to be Chicago Public Schools’ next CEO, led East Baton Rouge Parish schools, he experienced a rollercoaster of support and backlash in the community.

The board there narrowly voted not to renew his contract in late 2023. His supporters praised his initiatives, including linking high schoolers to college-level coursework, while those who voted no raised concerns over spending fueled by federal COVID relief dollars and low employee morale.

Narcisse has also faced some controversy in other jobs, including criticism of his leadership of a public high school in Boston.

How Narcisse navigated his time in East Baton Rouge and other places provides clues on how he could lead the nation’s fourth largest district.

Unlike the other finalist, interim CPS CEO Macquline King, who grew up in Chicago and rose through the ranks of CPS, Narcisse has worked as an educator and administrator in at least a half-dozen cities and states, including Pittsburgh, Boston, and Washington, D.C., over nearly 20 years.

But like King, he’s had only one superintendent job.

Narcisse did not respond to a request for an interview for this story.

East Baton Rouge is far smaller and less diverse than CPS: It has 12% of the students, and nearly 70% of students are Black. But it has some similar needs: More than three-quarters of East Baton Rouge Parish students were considered “economically disadvantaged” in 2025, compared with roughly 70% in Chicago, according to district records.

Student academic results were mixed during Narcisse’s tenure, which included the pandemic and its aftermath. The share of kids in grades K-3 who scored “at benchmark” on end-of-the-year literacy screeners grew by almost 5 percentage points during his time as superintendent.

But for students in grades 3-8 in in each of those same years, the percentage of students who scored at the “basic” level on their state reading and math tests toggled between 23-24% — with a dip to 22% in math during Narcisse’s last school year, according to district data. In that same time period, CPS students in grades 3-8 who had met or exceeded proficiency in their state reading tests grew from about 21% to 30% and fluctuated from about 16% to 18% in math.

Average ACT scores were 17 during his time, with one increase to 18 — the state average — in the year before he left, comparable to CPS. Graduation rates fluctuated, landing at the same place they were when he started: about 73%. CPS graduation rate went from 79% to 80% during that same time period.

Supporters laud Narcisse’s ideas, but he faced controversy

Michael Gaudet, who was president of the East Baton Rouge Parish school board when it hired Narcisse, described the former superintendent as a “deliberate and decisive” leader who centered the needs of students. He praised Narcisse’s work to add literacy coaches for teachers in struggling elementary schools and help draft a blueprint for literacy.

”The biggest thing that he always emphasized was that to be effective, it has to be done at scale, and it has to be sustainable, and so, you know, that was kind of always one of his guiding principles,” Gaudet said.

His supporters also highlighted his “Pathways to Bright Futures” program, which allowed students to earn college credit and even an associate degree with a local community college.

Not everyone embraced the idea. Some parents and teachers didn’t want ninth graders to be limited to dual enrollment courses, arguing some colleges prefer Advanced Placement, the local newspaper The Advocate reported. District officials later said high schoolers would only be required to take one advanced class, which could include AP.

“That has been one of our landmark programs that our kids are still benefiting from through this very day,” said Dadrius Lanus, an East Baton Rouge Parish school board member and an ally of Narcisse’s who served as board president during Narcisse’s tenure.

Narcisse’s critics point to issues over school transportation and a leadership style that sometimes kept the public in the dark.

In Boston, Narcisse served as the headmaster of the district’s historic English High School from 2009-2012. Under Narcisse’s leadership, the Boston Globe reported, three-quarters of staff left and he instituted controversial changes, including same sex classrooms. The newspaper also reported that state education officials were withholding funding due to a lack of improvement at the school, which had faced academic challenges long before Narcisse.

Storm Matthews, a longtime middle school teacher and education advocate in East Baton Rouge who was previously a delegate for the Louisiana Association of Educators and is highly critical of Narcisse, pointed to an incident when board members were in the dark about Narcisse’s idea to close an alternative middle school — which Matthews discovered while looking through his proposed budget and alerted local reporters, the Advocate reported. After the revelation, Narcisse presented a plan to the school board for the closure about a month before teachers would return from summer break, and the board ultimately rejected it.

Problems with student bus transportation also dogged Narcisse during his time as superintendent. Similar to other districts, including Chicago, East Baton Rouge faced a driver shortage after the pandemic, and the district’s school bus fleet had been in disrepair before Narcisse came to town, according to Gaudet and Lanus. But those issues were compounded by bus driver concerns over pay and working conditions, such as overheated buses, leading to a “sickout” in August 2023.

In response, hundreds of people attended a special board meeting, and some called for Narcisse to resign, the Advocate reported. That day the school board rejected Narcisse’s plan to stagger school start times as a possible solution to create more reliable bus service.

District saved more money under Narcisse, but some criticized his spending

Narcisse was also charged with how to spend more than $200 million in COVID relief dollars from the federal government. Local financial audits found that East Baton Rouge, like other districts, significantly increased spending with the influx of the federal funds, and district officials said in 2023 that they would use about a quarter of the money on expenses that they typically cover with local revenue, the Advocate reported.

Despite that, those audits found that the district had set aside a record amount of money in its reserve, or rainy day, funds, though such spending couldn’t be kept up as the money ran out.

Narcisse also caught heat after some students said that an event called “Day of Hope,” billed as a college and career fair the district put on in partnership with a local organization, had religious overtones and included discussion of suicide and forgiving rapists, while transgender students said they were bullied. At the time, Narcisse said his office had made “exhaustive” efforts to verify the claims but found no evidence. Gaudet said a subsequent investigation did not find evidence, either. Two parents later filed a lawsuit against Narcisse and the board.

School board elections in 2022 brought on new officials who pushed back on Narcisse.

In May 2023, just over a year before his contract with East Baton Rouge was set to expire, Narcisse interviewed unsuccessfully to oversee Broward County, Florida schools. He told board members about the interview but said he was still interested in staying.

But in December 2023, the school board decided not to renew Narcisse’s contract by a close vote of 5-4, and Narcisse resigned the following month.

Two of the members who voted no declined to comment for this story, and the others did not respond to a request for an interview.

The Advocate reported that at least one of the board members who was previously supportive of Narcisse voted no, in part because he was concerned about how much money the district had spent using COVID dollars. Another board member, who was a longtime teacher, said she’d seen employee morale dip during Narcisse’s tenure.

Since leaving East Baton Rouge, Narcisse has launched an education consulting company called SJ Apple, which appears to be based in Florida. Narcisse also hosts an education podcast called Unlearned and Unlimited, through which he’s interviewed former superintendents and experts.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Meisha Ross Porter, former NYC schools chief, drops out of the running for Chicago Public Schools CEO

2026-03-21T17:18:18+00:00

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Meisha Ross Porter, the former New York City schools chancellor, has dropped out of the running to become Chicago Public Schools’ next CEO, according to two school board members.

That leaves two finalists: interim CEO Macquline King and Sito Narcisse, former superintendent of East Baton Rouge Parish schools. The Chicago Tribune first reported that Porter had withdrawn.

Porter had not yet met with Mayor Brandon Johnson or a community panel, meetings expected to happen this week with all the finalists.

During the board’s closed session after its meeting Thursday, one school board member said Board President Sean Harden told fellow board members that Porter “wanted to be able to hit the ground running in Chicago, and she didn’t feel as if having a virtual interview and not meeting stakeholders would allow her to be able to be fully prepared” to take over CPS.

Porter said in an email Friday that it was “humbling and meaningful” to be a finalist but that she decided to withdraw “after careful consideration.” She did not cite reasons.

The school board is expected to hold a special meeting March 30 to discuss finalists and could choose a CEO that day, one school board member said.

The board’s CEO search, which began about a year ago, has been full of twists and turns. Porter was a finalist in the fall, but the search process took a pivot after Porter and another finalist’s names were leaked. The other finalist, Denver Superintendent Alex Marrero, dropped out, leaving only Porter. That prompted the board to do another round of interviews to find more candidates, board members said.

Since then, the board’s search firm, Alma Advisory Group, has parted ways with the board. A faction of elected board members have called for a pause in the search and claimed the mayor has meddled in the search, which the mayor has denied. These board members, who had previously voted not to hire King as interim, now want King to stay on as interim until a fully elected board is seated in January 2027.

The board announced the names of all three finalists last Friday. King, who was previously taken out of consideration for the permanent job, was a surprise addition. She was added in response to demands from the community, a school board member told Chalkbeat last week.

Two other school board members said they received a call from Harden last week, the day before finalist names were announced publicly, saying that King would be added to the list, and that he had garnered a majority of support from board members to add her.

Harden did not return a call for comment.

Earlier this week, the West Side branch of the NAACP issued a public letter calling for the board to pause the search and name King as CEO through the 2026-27 school year. They lauded King for several accomplishments, including seeing the district through a difficult budget process last summer. Remel Terry, the group’s president, sent that letter to Harden, elected board member Jitu Brown, and appointed member Michilia Blaise, who represent Chicago’s West Side.

“This is not a casual disagreement over preference or personality,” Terry wrote. “This is a serious concern about governance, legitimacy, and the public’s ability to trust the people charged with leading one of the most important public institutions in our city.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board formally closes ASPIRA charter network

2026-03-19T22:21:32+00:00

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The Chicago school board formally voted Thursday to shutter two high schools in the troubled ASPIRA charter network, as hundreds of students have moved to new campuses months before the end of the school year.

In a unanimous vote without any discussion, the board revoked ASPIRA’s charter after months of district cash advances to the network and escalating demands for financial information Chicago Public Schools said the charter’s leadership never provided.

About 500 ASPIRA students have migrated to some 20 district and charter high schools. The largest group transferred to Carl Schurz High School in Irving Park, which this week held an in-person event to introduce some of the 235 new students and their families to clubs and other activities.

In addition to Schurz, about 70 students transferred to Roosevelt and 50 went to Kelvyn Park, a CPS spokesperson said. Charters have accepted about 10 ASPIRA students.

At the board’s Thursday meeting, interim CEO Macquline King praised Schurz efforts to welcome students — and decried what she described as an ongoing lack of cooperation from ASPIRA leaders in transferring student records and other issues, a charge an ASPIRA official strongly disputed.

In an unprecedented move earlier this month, the district started moving students out of the network’s Early College and Business and Finance campuses after concluding that the school could not furnish the money needed to complete the year. ASPIRA’s leaders at first struck a defiant posture, arguing the district was undermining the schools midyear, but they eventually moved to lay off all their employees at the two campuses, though the layoff notices indicated the closures could be temporary.

The vote at Thursday’s board meeting made the closure permanent.

Edgar Lopez, the head of ASPIRA, said in an interview that he is exploring legal actions against the board’s vote.

The district’s charter sector has faced a turbulent stretch, with a string of schools closing or turning to CPS for help with making payroll. Citywide enrollment declines hit charters especially hard last fall, putting a strain on campuses whose funding is largely based on the number of pupils they serve. Charter advocates have also blamed a district practice of withholding thousands of dollars per pupil for CPS’ massive debt and pension obligations.

But critics of the industry have held up the case of ASPIRA to argue that financial missteps and insufficient transparency have at least contributed to the crisis.

District officials have said ASPIRA leaders wildly overestimated projected enrollments in budgeting and failed to come up with a feasible plan to finish out the school year, despite $2.5 million in advances from CPS.

On Thursday, King said the district is backing proposals at the state legislature that would empower CPS to monitor charters more closely and intervene more quickly if it has concerns about their finances. She spoke of the “traumatic” disruption to students, families, and staff when charters flounder without much notice.

“We cannot allow this to be the status quo,” she said.

ASPIRA students scattered to other campuses in recent weeks

King said 75% of ASPIRA students have transferred to district schools, and officials are working to ensure the rest have found a new campus. The district has waived all student fees for them and is providing Ventra cards, mentoring, and mental health services, she said. Making sure seniors can transfer all credits and stay on track for graduation is “top priority,” King said.

She said Alfonso Carmona, the district’s acting chief education officer, met with ASPIRA’s board this week, “imploring them to do the right thing” and help students transition smoothly to new schools.

Jennifer Conant, the charter division chair of the Chicago Teachers Union, which represents educators at ASPIRA, said about 50 students remain enrolled in the two network campuses, though few are coming to school.

Lopez called the district’s claims that ASPIRA hasn’t been cooperative a “fat lie.” Lopez said the network held a fair with about a dozen other schools in the area to help kids decide where to transfer. He also claimed district officials have only visited the school once in recent weeks.

In response to Lopez’s claims, a CPS spokesperson said the district and ASPIRA had partnered to host two fairs for students, and CPS staff had made multiple visits to ASPIRA schools over the last two weeks.

Lopez said he was disappointed but not surprised by Thursday’s outcome. He doubled down on his claims that the district has worked against charters, including not providing enough funding to the network, and that a longtime deficit was made worse by ASPIRA’s overprojections of enrollment. He added that high salaries for teachers unionized by the CTU put pressure on finances. Lopez said he approved of pay raises in the last teacher’s contract, in part to avoid talk of a strike, but he ultimately could not afford them.

Asked what his message is for students and families who left ASPIRA, he said, “I’m sorry, even though it’s not my fault, but I’m sorry.”

There is no immediate impact to ASPIRA’s alternative school, which is officially managed by Youth Connection Charter School. A CPS spokesperson said Youth Connection “expressed its commitment” to keeping the school open for the rest of this academic year. But the Youth Connection board would have to decide if it wants to continue its partnership with ASPIRA, and CPS is discussing the matter with the school, according to the spokesperson.

Schurz principal Heidy Moran said ASPIRA students began enrolling on March 6, just a couple of days after she found out through staff that they may receive an influx of kids. That same week, the 1,120-student school received more than 100 calls from parents with questions about the school, prompting her to hold a virtual welcoming event for families.

Schurz High School has stepped up to welcome students

At Wednesday’s event to introduce new students to activities, the school’s staff and students manned booths in a small gymnasium, where families could sign up and ask questions about activities such as sports, craft club, and Gender and Sexuality Alliance, known as GSA. A panel of current Schurz parents and students shared tips with an audience of roughly 50 people in the school’s auditorium about getting acclimated at the school.

Jonathan Escobar, 18, a senior who attended Wednesday’s event with his mother, said his experience so far at Schurz has been “strange.” He didn’t want to leave ASPIRA Business and Finance, but he and his family agreed he had to transfer after hearing repeatedly that ASPIRA did not have money.

He said many of his friends joined him at Schurz, but he still misses his teachers and his old classes. He’s also waiting for confirmation from Schurz officials that he’s on track to graduate. If it was up to him, Escobar would graduate in a small ceremony with just his fellow ASPIRA classmates.

“It’s still sad for me, but we have to move on,” he said.

Jonathan Escobar, a senior who formerly attended ASPIRA Business and Finance High School, poses for a photo during an welcoming event at Schurz High School for new students like him.

Schurz has enrolled 150 transfer students since September who come from other local schools, other states, or even other countries, so to receive 235 more students in a short period of time is “unprecedented,” Moran said. She’s also sensed a feeling of grief among students who miss their old teachers and building and described the transition process for them as “very challenging.”

The school created a “welcoming team” made up of staffers charged with organizing events and initiatives to make the new kids feel more comfortable, Moran said. One of their initiatives was to pair each new student with a more veteran Schurz student, who helps them find classes.

“It’s nice — you see them greeting each other in the hallway afterward,” Moran said.

Moran said that for the most part, credit requirements at Schurz have been “a perfect match” for most ASPIRA seniors, meaning they should be on track to graduate. There are some remaining wrinkles, including ensuring ASPIRA kids who were taking dual enrollment classes can still do so virtually at Schurz. Some students may also need to take credit recovery classes in order to graduate, but Moran did not know an exact number of students.

The Thursday vote left uncertainty for employees at the two ASPIRA schools. Conant, the CTU charter chair, urged the district to hire educators and staff at campuses welcoming ASPIRA students, which she argued would ease their transition.

Cindy Camacho, who has worked at ASPIRA Business and Finance High School for eight years, said she was aware that ASPIRA was grappling with declining enrollment but the impending closure came as a “big shock.”

Camacho, who is still at the high school, said she’s unsure how she’ll manage her finances once she’s laid off, especially since she’s currently enrolled in a master’s program. She said she’s worried about the students — especially seniors — and how they’ll navigate a new environment this late in the school year.

“I think that all of the actions that [CPS] started taking a few weeks ago should have been taking place last semester,” she said in a recent interview.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Three finalists announced for Chicago Public Schools’ top job

2026-03-13T21:54:22+00:00

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Three finalists — including interim CEO Macquline King — are vying to serve as the next chief executive of Chicago Public Schools, the school board announced Friday.

In addition to King, the finalists are Sito Narcisse, former superintendent of East Baton Rouge Parish School System in Louisiana, and Meisha Porter, former chancellor of New York City schools.

Each of the candidates will interview with Mayor Brandon Johnson and participate in a “candidate community engagement” panel, according to a press release from the board office. After that, the board will hold a special meeting to discuss the finalists and vote.

In a statement, Johnson said he will meet with candidates next week and wants to hear feedback from the community panel.

“This is a critical time for our school district and for our nation, and I take this responsibility seriously as we work to ensure the next leader reflects the values of our city and is prepared to meet the needs of our students, families, and educators,” Johnson said.

The board office did not say if board members will do additional interviews with the candidates.

The school board set out last spring to find a new top leader after a previous board appointed by Johnson fired then CEO Pedro Martinez without cause following a clash over district finances. The search has been bumpy at times: As it neared a planned December completion, one contender, Denver Superintendent Alex Marrero, pulled out after his and Porter’s names were leaked to the press. The district search firm, Alma Consulting Group, parted ways with CPS last month, and a group of school board members released a statement charging Johnson with meddling in the process.

King’s inclusion on the list of candidates is a surprise: The board declined to advance King to a previous pool of finalists last fall.

Chalkbeat reported last week that the board had again decided on multiple finalists. Adding King as a finalist was a more recent decision that shows the board is “listening to the community,” said Norma Rios-Sierra, an appointed board member who is on the CEO search committee.

“She has a lot of support from a lot of community leaders, and she had some time to demonstrate how she works,” Rios-Sierra said.

King, a former principal and City Hall education policy advisor under former Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Johnson, has led the district since last June, including through a budget fight that put her at odds with the mayor’s office. The principals union has praised her leadership so far.

Some organizations, including the West Side branch of the NAACP, and a group of elected board members who originally voted against hiring her last year, have called for her to remain in her post until a fully elected school board can pick the next Chicago schools chief when it takes office in January 2027.

King began her CPS teaching career in 1994 and eventually became a principal at two schools, most recently at Courtenay Language Arts Center in Uptown, which involved a difficult merger with another school.

King’s personnel records drew some scrutiny before she was hired as the interim CEO. The records, which did not include any formal discipline, had two memos from district officials about how she should improve her performance. At the time she told Chalkbeat the criticism was fair but that those directives — centered on findings that she had not immediately reported allegations of abuse and failed to conduct a background check for a volunteer — were the result of understaffing at her school. King couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

Porter, who was raised in Queens and attended New York City public schools, became the first Black woman to oversee the nation’s largest school system for 10 months in 2021 after her predecessor abruptly resigned. She spent more than two decades rising through the ranks as a teacher, principal, and a high-level administrator who eventually oversaw all schools in the Bronx. She is well-respected in New York City education circles, including by teachers, parents, and administrators.

She served as schools chancellor during the pandemic and as the district was beginning to reopen schools. During her short tenure, she oversaw policy pushes under former Mayor Bill de Blasio to eliminate separate gifted and talented classes and a $200 million universal curriculum for schools. Both initiatives were scrapped by de Blasio’s successor, Mayor Eric Adams. Porter was replaced as de Blasio left office.

After leaving the district, Porter became the president and CEO of the Bronx Community Foundation. The foundation, which was set up to help finance other local nonprofits, failed to distribute most of the money it raised from 2019 to 2023 and spent more on consultants and overhead than charitable giving, according to an investigation by the news organization New York Focus. In 2024, the organization’s board of directors fired Porter.

She most recently was a visiting senior fellow at the Center for Educational Innovation, an organization that works with school leaders and families, according to her LinkedIn. Porter did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday.

Narcisse led the East Baton Rouge Parish School System, Louisiana’s second largest, for three years, until January 2024, according to his LinkedIn profile. The school board voted not to renew his contract at that point, according to local news coverage, though he expressed interest in getting his job back later that year. He has since worked as managing partner of SJ Apple Consulting Group, a firm he founded that offers consulting services to school districts.

Narcisse focused on expanding preschool, college credit opportunities, and career pathways in East Baton Rouge. During his time there, the district drew headlines and a rebuke from the American Civil Liberties Union after high school students were bused to a “Day of Hope” event billed as a college and career fair. Students reported the event, held at a local church, carried strong religious overtones throughout, and transgender students said they were bullied.

He previously served in top school district administrative posts in Washington, D.C., and Nashville. Narcisse did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday.

Kia Banks, the president of the district’s principals union, had previously said many members wanted a new, fully elected board to pick a permanent CEO early next year, with King remaining at the helm as the district navigates the upcoming budget season. Banks said Friday she is still wary of disruption at a turbulent time for the district, which faces a massive budget deficit and pressure from the Trump administration.

“Stability is always important,” Banks said. “We’ve made a lot of progress under Dr. King. Making a shift with there being so many challenges right now can undo a lot of progress made.”

She said there is no representative from the principals union leadership on the community panel that will interview finalists, and she is unsure of the next steps in the search process.

In a statement, Chicago Teachers Union vice president Jackson Potter didn’t address the specific candidates but sought to remind the board of union priorities when choosing a CEO, including someone who would expand Sustainable Community Schools, push back against cuts from the Trump administration, and push Gov. JB Pritzker to increase taxes on the wealthy in order to boost education funding.

Hal Woods, policy director at education advocacy organization Kids First Chicago, said over the yearlong process, parents involved in his organization haven’t wavered in wanting the board to “prioritize someone who is most likely to lead with integrity, who is going to be partnering with families authentically, and who is going to work to improve outcomes from students across the city.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Board of Education picks finalists for next CPS CEO: sources

2026-03-06T22:07:29+00:00

The Chicago Board of Education has identified multiple finalists for the next CEO of Chicago Public Schools, according to three sources familiar with the situation.

The board picked finalists during its Wednesday meeting in its closed session, the sources said. One of the sources said the board is advancing three people; the other sources declined to specify a number. A second source said there’s a small chance that the board may decide to add applicants to the finalist list.

In a previous interview with Chalkbeat, appointed board member Norma Rios-Sierra said the board had a goal of identifying at least three finalists.

All sources, who requested anonymity to share private discussions, declined to reveal finalist names. One source described the finalists as “very strong,” and another said they have experience leading large urban districts.

The board passed a resolution last year saying the next CEO must have a superintendent’s license.

“What seems to be moving forward is keeping with the timeline and by this spring, being able to name someone and give them an offer,” said one of the sources, adding that an eventual pick likely wouldn’t start until the summer.

The next round of interviews and an eventual pick for CEO could happen as soon as within the next month, but an exact timeline isn’t yet clear, two of the sources said.

The district has been without a permanent leader since former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez left last June. Macquline King has been serving as interim since and applied for the CEO job but didn’t advance to a finalist round.

The process has so far been bumpy. The search appeared to be coming to a close last winter before multiple news outlets revealed finalist names kept under wraps — New York City schools chancellor Meisha Porter and current Denver superintendent Alex Marrero. After Marrero appeared to drop out, the board began interviewing more candidates. But last month, the board’s search firm Alma Advisory Group parted ways with the district.

In late February, a small group of elected members — including elected board member Jessica Biggs, who chairs the search committee — accused the mayor’s office and its allies of derailing the search, which the mayor’s office has denied. Those board members have advocated for keeping King in place until a new fully elected school board is sworn in next January.

Some of the candidates earned a majority of support to be advanced as finalists but did not get unanimous backing, which some board members also raised concerns about, one source said.

In a statement, the Chicago Board of Education office said “there are no updates to provide at this time.”

Sources said Harden and board office staff did not outline or present specific next steps on the search during the Wednesday meeting, but their understanding is that finalists will interview with board members and the mayor.

Originally, the board had created a community panel that would also interview finalists, but it wasn’t clear among the sources if such a panel will still conduct interviews.

The mayor’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

ASPIRA to close Business Finance and Early College high schools by next month

2026-03-05T22:36:43+00:00

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ASPIRA charter network will officially close two of its high school campuses and lay off all of its staff at those campuses next month, according to a layoff notice provided to staff Wednesday.

The announcement comes one week after Chicago Public Schools decided to begin transferring students out of ASPIRA Early College and Business and Finance high schools if they wanted to because it does not believe ASPIRA has enough money to keep the schools running for the rest of the academic year.

As a charter network, ASPIRA’s schools are privately managed but publicly funded and operate based on a contract with CPS.

In layoff notices to staff obtained by Chalkbeat, ASPIRA CEO Edgar Lopez said high schools will close by April 3, when all staff at the two campuses “are anticipated” to be laid off.

“At this time, we hope the closure will be temporary,” Lopez wrote.

Lopez did not respond to a request for comment. In a statement, CPS said it will soon share with ASPIRA staff a process to apply for open positions at district-run schools.

Students and staff have worried about a massive disruption to their education and jobs mid-year. Earlier this week, some students and network leaders pressed CPS to help keep the schools open. During a Chicago Board of Education meeting last week, other students and staff, as well as their representatives from the Chicago Teachers Union, sharply criticized the charter network for misleading them and worried about their futures.

Last week, district officials said they were planning a transition for students to other nearby high schools and would provide those students with certain individual supports, including providing letters to college admissions offices explaining the mid-year transfers. CPS will also ensure seniors who are on track to graduate from ASPIRA will still graduate on time, acting Chief Education Officer Alfonso Carmona said during a Chicago Board of Education meeting Wednesday.

But during the Wednesday meeting, interim CPS CEO Maquiline King said CPS could not make further moves, including fully carrying out a transition plan, until ASPIRA decides to self-close. CPS had planned to present a transition plan Thursday to ASPIRA families, officials said.

“We are walking a fine line, and just know that we are responding to the call to the greatest extent possible,” King said.

Until the layoff notices, ASPIRA officials had not said the campuses would close, but said they only had enough funding to make it to five weeks before the end of the school year, or late April. Lopez said last week he was working on securing more money, including through a GoFundMe campaign advertised on the network’s website and other fundraising efforts.

ASPIRA, which the district had placed on a financial remediation plan, had also requested more funding from CPS, which has provided millions of dollars in advances to the network this school year. CPS has said it cannot provide ASPIRA with more money because it has hit the state-imposed legal limit of funding the district can provide to charters.

District and charter leaders have linked growing financial problems in the charter sector to declining enrollment, tighter funding, and rising costs, such as for salaries at unionized schools. While charter leaders have decried a district move to withhold thousands of dollars per pupil for CPS’ pension and debt costs, charter critics say schools like ASPIRA have not responsibly managed their finances. Those critics also argue the district should have caught problems sooner. In November, CPS blasted ASPIRA for its financial management, months after the board had renewed ASPIRA’s contract with conditions to monitor its finances. Lopez has previously denied mismanaging money or misleading anyone.

In a press release earlier this week, ASPIRA officials said a closure would risk “students with English language learner/special education needs, graduation timelines, millions of dollars in scholarship eligibility, and student placement continuity.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

After possible building sale, Chicago Public Schools agrees to lease space for Acero Santiago

2026-03-05T17:52:04+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education has agreed to rent the building housing Acero Santiago charter school in the West Town neighborhood, avoiding a potential sale and loss of the school site.

The property at 2510 W. Cortez St. is owned by the Archdiocese of Chicago, which had put the building up for sale last July.

Last week, the board approved adding the building to its master lease agreement with the archdiocese, a move that also added the buildings of other Acero charter schools the school board took over last year to prevent Acero from shuttering those schools.

In total, Chicago Public Schools will transition five Acero schools — De las Casas, Cisneros, Fuentes, Tamayo, and Santiago — into district-run schools by the 2026-27 school year.

“I’m not gonna lie, this past year, especially the last six months, have been so scary because we knew that the CPS board members wanted to save us, but then we didn’t know if we’re going to have a building,” Reyna Rodriguez, a Santiago parent who pushed for CPS to keep the building, told reporters during a press conference Monday. “It feels like a dream.”

During that press conference, elected board member Carlos Rivas, who represents the area that includes Santiago, said the board’s vote means CPS will lease the building for at least the next decade.

The lease agreement represents the latest development in CPS’ gradual and unprecedented takeover of these charters, as other schools in Chicago’s charter sector face financial challenges, closures, and some accusations of mismanagement.

CPS did not respond to a request for comment. Archdiocese spokesperson Yasmin Quiroz said the sale was planned after the school faced closure last year but it changed course once CPS “expressed its desire to retain the school.”

“In recognition of the important service the school provides to the local neighborhood, the parish decided to retain the building and lease it to CPS rather than sell it,” Quiroz said in an email to Chalkbeat.

The cost of the master lease agreement with the archdiocese will increase by about $2 million with the addition of the Acero buildings, to a total of roughly $7 million for the next fiscal year.

Rivas said he began pushing to keep the building after being “caught off guard” by the archdiocese’s listing of the building, which at the time was reported to be $6.75 million.

On the first day of school at Santiago, parents and teachers held a press conference decrying the possible sale and pressing CPS to intervene.

Rivas and Ald. Gilbert Villegas, who also represents the area, told reporters that the “X-factor” in negotiations with archdiocese was twofold: The continued pressure from Acero parents to keep the school and an agreement with the archdiocese that it could still sell off a church building on the Santiago site that’s separate from the school.

Correction: A previous version of this story mistakenly said CPS had taken over Acero Octavio Paz; it did not, and that campus was closed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board adopts calendars for next two school years

2026-02-26T22:14:26+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education unanimously adopted calendars Thursday for the next two school years after initial pushback on having the first semester end after winter break.

The calendars for the 2026-27 and 2027-28 school years will include 176 days for student attendance, four Teacher Institute Days, four school improvement days, four professional development days, and two days for parent-teacher conferences.

The first day of next school year will be Aug. 24 for K-12 students and Aug. 25 for pre-K students, about a week later than this year. For the 2027-28 school year, the first day will be Aug. 23 and 24, respectively, for K-12 and pre-K students. Students would again get a week off for Thanksgiving break and a two-week winter break under both calendars.

But unlike this school year, the first semester would end after winter break, meaning final exams would occur after break — prompting concern from some board members when the calendars were first presented in January.

“The No. 1 concern I hear from students is about mental health, and having a break as an opportunity for resetting, recovering, and spending time with their families is really important,” appointed board member Anusha Thotakura said during a January meeting to review that month’s board meeting agenda. “If you have testing for second quarter after winter break, students won’t have that opportunity to reset, relax, and come into the new year energized.”

In order to have the first semester end before winter break, CPS would have to make certain shifts on the calendar, Nicole Milberg, chief of teaching and learning at CPS, has said. CPS considered getting rid of the full week of Thanksgiving break and moving more professional development days to the second semester, but that scenario would require starting school long before Labor Day in order to meet state requirements for school days.

Board members asked CPS to reconsider the calendars and survey families again on what they wanted. At a meeting earlier this month to review Thursday’s agenda, officials said 55% of the 22,000 people surveyed preferred ending the first semester after winter break. Another 37% of people wanted the option of ending the first semester before break, and 8% wanted to start school a few days earlier and also have a shorter Thanksgiving break. It was not clear how many of the respondents were high school students, parents, or staff.

Board members did not discuss the calendars further before their vote.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools to start moving students out of troubled charter ASPIRA

2026-02-26T21:32:23+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools will begin transitioning students from two ASPIRA charter high schools to other schools after months of financial turbulence at the network and deep uncertainty for its families and staff.

In a letter to the district this week, ASPIRA leaders insisted they will keep the campuses — ASPIRA Business and Finance and ASPIRA Early College high schools — open through the end of this school year. But district officials say the charter has not spelled out a clear plan to pull that off, even after the district steered millions of dollars in cash advances to it this winter.

CPS told the charter network in a letter dated Thursday that it will start the transition process this week and expected ASPIRA to assist with providing student records. During a Chicago Board of Education meeting Thursday, officials said students who wish to leave the ASPIRA campuses will have a guaranteed seat at a group of nearby district-run high schools and will have access to a “transition coordinator” for regular check-ins and other services.

CPS will host a town hall for families about the transition process sometime next week, officials said.

ASPIRA’s two high school campuses together serve about 700 students, who are predominantly low-income and Latino. The district said a third ASPIRA campus, an alternative high school on the Northwest Side operated in tandem with the charter network Youth Connections Charter School, is not facing closure.

In an interview with Chalkbeat after this story published, ASPIRA CEO and President Edgar Lopez attributed the network’s financial challenges to rising salaries and what he described as underfunding from the district.

Lopez said he’s upset CPS won’t give ASPIRA more runway to secure more funding. The network currently has enough money to operate the campuses in question up until about April, and he said they have “some leads” on ways to close the funding gap.

“If this is for the kids, what’s the rush?” Lopez said. “What’s another month?”

The Chicago Teachers Union, which represents staff at ASPIRA, held a rally with ASPIRA teachers, students, and parents outside the Chicago Board of Education headquarters Thursday ahead of the board meeting. They called for CPS to help families find new schools now that would “keep students and staff together.”

Lavelle Turner, a senior from ASPIRA Business and Finance High School, told reporters he’s “very concerned about my future” and that closing the school will impact many of his fellow seniors.

“Will my credits be transferred if I change schools? Will this affect my college applications? I would like CPS to answer these questions,” Turner said, adding that he’d like to attend a school with his peers so he can be around familiar faces.

The district is “reviewing and assessing” graduation requirements for juniors and seniors, Conrad Timbers-Ausar, the district’s acting chief portfolio officer, who oversees charters, told the board. He added that CPS plans to provide a letter that graduating seniors can provide to college admissions offices so they can “understand the recent events.”

Griselda Hermosillo, parent of a freshman at ASPIRA Early College High School, told reporters in Spanish that she is worried about what happens to student credits and their individualized education programs, or IEPs, which spell out legally required services for students with disabilities, if the school closes midyear. She said Lopez, the ASPIRA president, has left her in constant doubt about the school’s future.

“If this has been a false hope, we would hope CPS will give us the actual plan,” Hermosillo said.

CPS accuses ASPIRA of mismanaging finances

The move comes months after the district said ASPIRA had failed to responsibly manage its finances and was struggling to make payroll. CPS said it has already provided $2.5 million in advance payments to ASPIRA, which faces a $2.9 million deficit, and has reached a state-imposed legal limit for how much it can steer to a charter school.

CPS had asked ASPIRA to provide multiple documents by Wednesday, including proof that it could obtain funding from a third party and a plan showing how it would make it through the rest of the school year. ASPIRA provided neither, according to the district.

Instead, in its letter to the district, ASPIRA asked CPS to provide the network with the legal maximum amount of funding for the last four school years to reduce or eliminate its deficit. By state law, the district must provide charter schools with per pupil funding that’s equivalent to 97% to 103% of funding at district schools; ASPIRA is requesting 103%.

The network also said it was working on other funding fixes, including obtaining a bridge loan, raising money from alumni, and crowdfunding. But in its response, the district said it cannot provide funding for previous fiscal years retroactively, and it will start transitioning students out in light of “the emergency situation created by ASPIRA’s failure to demonstrate financial sustainability, which places the education of ASPIRA’s students at risk.”

Lopez denied that the financial issues are due to mismanagement. He said his network isn’t the only one facing financial problems, and he believes the district’s response is part of a broader plan to shutter charter schools. Asked how confident he feels that third party money will come in, Lopez said, “We’re working on it.”

ASPIRA is latest in string of charter troubles

The ASPIRA turmoil is playing out against the backdrop of larger turbulence and uncertainty in the city’s charter and contract sector — schools that are publicly funded and overseen by the district, but operated by private entities.

Last year, the Chicago Board of Education voted to absorb five campuses of the charter network Acero into the district to prevent their closure. It also moved to chip in so the South Sides’ EPIC Academy High School could finish out the year before closing and take over the Chicago High School for the Arts, or ChiArts, a West Side contract school. This week, the district held a meeting with ChiArts families concerned that the school would lose its conservatory model, in which professional artists work with students during an extended school day.

District officials and charter leaders have said the larger upheaval is due to declining enrollment across the city and tight finances, including a district move to withhold thousands of dollars per pupil from charters to chip in for its massive pension and debt costs.

But charter critics say schools such as ASPIRA have also made major fiscal missteps and should have been monitored more closely by CPS. The district has taken ASPIRA to task for budgeting based on wildly unrealistic enrollment projections and for withholding key financial information from CPS.

At the board meeting, appointed board member Debby Pope blasted ASPIRA for the possible closures. She said the situation should be a message to other charter operators to be financially responsible and turn in required documents on time to CPS.

“We cannot do this to our children,” Pope said. “It is just not OK.”

Appointed board member Karen Zaccor called for the district to find a way for ASPIRA students to spend planned activities together, such as already planned field trips and graduation.

In addition to the documents CPS requested, ASPIRA has not yet submitted a required financial audit or the monthly cash flow reports the district requires of charters such as ASPIRA that it has placed under financial remediation.

In a Wednesday interview with Chalkbeat, Timbers-Ausar said CPS will strive to work closely with families to find high-performing schools where students can transfer this spring.

“It has to be a process that is first and foremost student-centered and family-centered to provide as many options as possible,” he said. “We have to stay very engaged every step of the way with those families.”

The district expects it will have conversations with the Chicago Teachers Union about the possibility of finding other roles for them, Timbers-Ausar said.

This story has been updated with additional comment from school board members, ASPIRA CEO Edgar Lopez and Conrad Timbers-Ausar, the district’s acting chief portfolio officer.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago’s school board close to identifying finalists — again — for superintendent search

2026-02-25T20:02:56+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education is getting closer to choosing finalists — again — for Chicago Public Schools’ next CEO.

Multiple board members said the next step in the search process is to identify finalists from the group of candidates they’ve been considering. Norma Rios-Sierra, an appointed board member who is on a working group for the almost yearlong CEO search, told Chalkbeat the board will have a group of finalists “very soon” and “definitely before the end of the school year.”

But even as the search continues, six of the 21 board members and groups such as the district’s principals union are escalating calls to keep interim CEO Macquline King in her role into 2027, when a fully elected school board takes over. They argue that with a tough budget season already underway and the looming campaigns for all 21 school board seats, the district needs stability instead of a push to conclude the rocky search.

Last week, that group of elected board members revealed that the board was parting ways with its search firm, Alma Advisory Group, and accused Mayor Brandon Johnson’s office and its allies of intervening in the search process.

The mayor’s office has denied those claims and said the mayor has not meddled or interviewed candidates. The mayor wants to interview finalists identified by the board, Rios-Sierra said.

Other board members say the search remains on track and denied the accusations of sabotage. They said they plan to have a CEO in place before the start of next school year. Several board members who spoke with Chalkbeat declined to share names of front-runners or the number of people they are currently considering.

Appointed board member Anusha Thotakura said the board is continuing to interview “high quality candidates,” and as of at least earlier this month, one of the candidates is someone “whose name was leaked to the press several months ago.” But she declined to specify whether that candidate was Meisha Porter, former head of New York City public schools, or current Denver superintendent Alex Marrero, whose names were revealed by the Chicago Sun-times/WBEZ and Chalkbeat in November.

A spokesperson for Denver Public Schools said Tuesday Marrero is not a candidate; Porter did not respond to a request for comment.

In November, the search appeared to be in its final stretch when the leaks seemed to derail it. Marrero said he was committed to Denver the day his name appeared in the press.

“We’re taking this process very seriously and are trying to move with a sense of urgency that this level of a decision deserves,” Thotakura said.

As planned before, finalists will still be interviewed by a panel of community members, Rios-Sierra said. The board has not said who is on the panel but it was originally envisioned to include students, teachers, and other residents.

The district has now been without a permanent leader since former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez left last June; King has been serving since and applied for the CEO job but didn’t advance to a finalist round, the Sun-Times and WBEZ reported.

In November, after news broke that the board had two finalists, the Chicago Teachers Union blasted the board for keeping their names secret. Board members, who disclosed months earlier that they would not reveal finalist names, had signed nondisclosure agreements prohibiting them from discussing aspects of the search publicly. The union declined to say whether it will again call for finalist names to be revealed.

After Chalkbeat and the Chicago Sun-Times/WBEZ revealed the two finalist names, the board appeared to be left with just Porter.

Then the process appeared to come to a halt, but some board members later said they were rescheduling interviews and interviewing more applicants. Rios-Sierra said, at the time, many of her colleagues wanted to consider more than one finalist and that there were conversations about expanding the finalist pool.

Che “Rhymefest” Smith, one of the elected board members who released a statement last week decrying Alma’s departure and accusing the mayor’s office of interference, said he and other search committee members who signed it have been left in the dark about the status of the search. He said he believes a finalist or finalists have been selected and might meet with Johnson next.

The district can’t keep King “hanging on forever” and should work out an agreement for her to stay on, lest she leave for another job, Smith said.

Smith had opposed King’s appointment as interim last summer, but now says King, who came from a role in the mayor’s office, has led the district capably since. Smith and the chair of the board’s search team, elected board member Jessica Biggs, penned an op-ed in the Chicago Tribune last week that, in part, said they’re hearing calls to keep King in place until the new board is elected.

“This is the part where I have to listen to the community,” he said.

Unlike Martinez, King was not offered a contract when she was hired as interim CEO. Her offer letter — obtained by Chalkbeat through an open records request — does not indicate a specific end date for her job.

Kia Banks, the head of the Chicago Principals & Administrators Association, which represents school leaders, said her members have increasingly said they believe King should continue in her role. She said she worries that next year’s fully elected school board could second-guess or reverse any decision on a permanent top leader made this year.

Banks said King, a former district teacher and principal, has steered CPS through myriad challenges and is in the best position to craft budgets for schools and the district. The union, which reached its first preliminary contract with the district last August, is negotiating a more complete collective bargaining agreement.

“The search as it has been going on this year has become less about the needs of the students and more about which board members will prevail given their differences,” Banks said.

The West Side chapter of the NAACP has also called for keeping King in the top job until a new school board is elected and seated next January.

In a statement, Chicago Teachers Union vice president Jackson Potter said many national candidates may not be a good fit and the CEO search “requires being thoughtful and thorough to find a leader to repair, reconcile and rebuild CPS,” including with the current funding challenges facing the district. CPS is projecting a $520 million budget deficit next fiscal year.

The union did not say whether it supports keeping King in place until next year.

SEIU, which represents school support staff, did not respond to a request for comment.

Melanie Asmar contributed to this report.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Pritzker’s budget plan calls for education funding increases but fall short of requests

2026-02-19T22:41:50+00:00

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When Illinois’ main funding formula for K-12 schools was established a decade ago — meant to send more dollars to districts with higher needs — lawmakers at the time set a goal to fully fund it by 2027.

Gov. JB Pritzker’s budget proposal for next fiscal year wouldn’t do that.

Pritzker’s $56 billion budget proposal, which he released Wednesday, calls for a $305 million increase in the evidence-based funding formula, with a total investment of $9.2 billion. That’s $45 million less than what the Illinois State Board of Education, or ISBE, requested last month.

The proposal is the opening of budget negotiations. State lawmakers are expected to finalize a budget in May.

The governor’s plan angered the state’s biggest teachers unions, which are pushing lawmakers to fully fund the formula by next year, which would require an additional $3 billion. Another education advocacy organization described the budget proposal as responsible in the face of economic pressures and federal funding threats.

Pritzker’s proposed increase excludes property tax relief grants for school districts, which were paused last year, too. Lindsay Record, a spokesperson for ISBE, said a state panel is reviewing the effectiveness of those grants and is expected to release a report by March 1, which “will inform further conversations on the future of this grant program.”

The proposal also calls for a $51 million increase in funding that helps districts cover costs for special education, transportation, and some other expenses — about $100 million less than what ISBE requested.

In all, the governor is proposing about $10.7 billion for K-12 education. Pritzker proposed a social media fee that he estimates would raise about $200 million next fiscal year for education expenses. The fee would be imposed on companies that “collect consumer data and sell to third-party buyers,” according to the budget proposal.

Pritzker praised the state’s education investments, crediting them for eighth grade reading and math scores that surpassed national averages on the test known as the “nation’s report card.” Fourth grade reading and math scores were on par with the national average.

“We prioritize school funding, putting billions more into public education to improve the student teacher ratio and get better outcomes for our children,” Pritzker said during his State of the State speech Wednesday.

Pritzker’s plan — described as a maintenance budget in the face of federal funding threats — comes as some progressive Chicago-area lawmakers have introduced a new, union-backed bill that calls for the state to fully fund the formula by 2027 with more money for reimbursements to districts. If the bill passed as written, it would cost the state an additional $3.9 billion annually, Ralph Martire, the executive director of the think tank Center for Tax and Budget Accountability, previously told Chalkbeat. A 2024 report from the center found that at the current funding level, schools won’t be fully funded under the formula until at least 2034.

The bill’s backers have called for taxes on Illinois’ wealthiest residents and corporations to help cover the costs.

Since 2017, the state has increased funding through the new formula by about $2.5 billion. Today, roughly one-third of districts are considered at least 90% adequately funded.

Chicago Public Schools, the state’s largest district where about 70% of kids are from low-income families, has seen nearly $390 million in overall funding increases from the state over the past five years. Still, the district is $1.6 billion short of what the state considers adequate funding, an issue that district leaders often highlight as they plan their annual budget.

Pankaj Sharma, secretary and treasurer of the Illinois Federation of Teachers, blasted the governor’s proposal in part because it won’t fully fund the formula by next year as state lawmakers had originally promised.

“Each day that our Governor and members of the General Assembly fail to deliver valuable resources to students, educators, and their families, they are shortchanging our young people according to their own funding formula,” Sharma said in a statement. “It is another day where a student’s zip code — not state policy — determines whether they have what they need to succeed.”

But Advance Illinois, another education advocacy organization, described the proposal as responsible in a tough budget year. The group noted, however, that the state is still roughly $3 billion short of fully funding its formula.

“Governor Pritzker has consistently prioritized education, and past investments have served Illinois well,” Advance Illinois President Robin Steans said in a statement. “We hope the General Assembly can find ways to build on the Governor’s proposal to ensure that Illinois students do not lose ground.”

Separately, for the second year in a row, the governor called for banning cellphones from the classroom during his State of the State address Wednesday. Lawmakers failed to pass such legislation last year.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Some board members claim ‘sabotage’ as Chicago school board and search firm tasked with finding new CEO part ways

2026-02-13T00:39:35+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education is parting ways with Alma Advisory Group, the search firm tasked with helping the school board find a new CEO, according to a statement from six of the board’s 10 elected members.

The statement, obtained by Chalkbeat, does not specify when or why Alma wrapped up its work on the search. The board members who signed it — Carlos Rivas Jr., Ellen Rosenfeld, Jessica Biggs, Angel Gutierrez, Therese Boyle, and Che “Rhymefest” Smith — say they now want interim CPS CEO Macquline King to stay in the job until a new, fully elected school board is seated next January.

The end of Alma’s contract is another twist in the CEO search process, which began last spring and appeared to be coming to a close in the late fall, only to seemingly come to a halt. Former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez left the district in late June after he was fired without cause, and the district has not had a permanent CEO since.

Search firms generally remain involved until a pick for the role is announced and in some cases might help with negotiating a contract.

The statement, which praised Alma’s work with the board, claims mayoral appointees “sabotaged” the search process and the mayor and “his allies” have “started running political interference.”

After this story published, the Chicago Board of Education office said in a statement that Alma will work with the school board for the next 30 days to “ensure a seamless transition into finalist interviews,” then remain on retainer with the district for future executive-level searches. The statement described Alma offering “extensive support,” including screening more than 100 candidates, and said the board is “deeply grateful” for its work.

The statement, which said the application window for CEO candidates closed Feb. 6, did not provide an explanation for Alma’s exit.

But another elected school board who has repeatedly voted in agreement with that group of elected members said Thursday she still feels optimistic about the search. Jenni Custer said the board is on the cusp of selecting several finalists for the CEO role, though members haven’t decided how many and whether all of them will be named publicly.

“We have a lot of great candidates left in our pool,” she said. “We need to see this through before we say the process has been unsuccessful.”

Custer said that in her understanding, the board and Alma parted ways because of a mutual sense that the search firm’s work was done at this point: “Alma has taken us as far as they can, and now the ball is in our court.”

But Smith, one of the statement’s signatories, said he witnessed mayoral appointees “sideline” Alma when it recommended “best practices” for the search. Smith declined to offer more details about what exactly prompted Alma’s exit.

“Now that Alma has left, how can you trust this process? Who’s leading it?” Smith said.

The school board is currently 11 members appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson and the 10 elected members.

Chicago Public Schools referred Chalkbeat to the Chicago Board of Education office, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Board President Sean Harden and Monica Santana Rosen, the head of Alma did not respond to requests for comment.

After this story published, the mayor’s press office said in a statement that the allegation by these board members is “baseless and inaccurate.” The mayor’s office has not intervened in the CEO search or interviewed any candidates, the statement said.

The mayor’s office, in turn, accused board members of leaking names of candidates to the press — a matter that Harden hired a firm to investigate. It’s unclear where that investigation stands.

Each of the board members who signed Thursday’s statement had voted against hiring King as the interim CEO last year. And last fall, board members chose not to advance King as a finalist for the permanent CEO job before the process was halted when other finalist names were reported by Chalkbeat and the Chicago Sun-Times/WBEZ.

Later in November, school board members said they were “recalibrating” the search process. It’s unclear exactly where in the search the board is at or how close it is to choosing a candidate.

But during a board meeting Tuesday, Biggs and Smith publicly praised King’s leadership.

“I just wanted to take this time to just say thank you: Thank you for balancing the budget, thank you for visiting schools, thank you for inspiring confidence in our partners and thank you for being here and being a competent leader,” Smith said.

The board members’ calls to keep King are now in line with a broader call from the West Side NAACP and a coalition of Black-led groups, which want King to stay until at least a newly elected board is seated next year.

The question of the mayor’s role in selecting the district’s next leader has hung over the search, with some board members concerned that Johnson would exert control through his appointees. Smith said the board had at one point invited the mayor’s office to share what it wanted to see in the search process, but Johnson’s team said no.

The city’s mayors have traditionally hand-picked the district’s top leader, but there was an expectation that Johnson would play a more hands-off role amid the transition to a fully elected board.

Tensions on the board rose after the names of two finalists, New York City’s former top education official Meisha Ross Porter and current Denver Public Schools Superintendent Alex Marrero, were leaked to the media late last year, disrupting the search.

The Thursday statement from board members noted “names of finalists have been leaked, progress has stalled, and major decisions have been put on hold” — and it blamed interference from the mayor’s office for these disruptions.

“By making it impossible for a professional firm to see this through, Mayor Johnson and his appointed board members have shown that they are either unwilling, unable, or uninterested in finding a qualified CEO/Superintendent to lead CPS into the future,” the statement said.

Custer said she hasn’t yet seen clear evidence that Johnson’s office is meddling in the process.

This story has been updated with comment from board member Che Smith, the mayor’s office and the Chicago Board of Education office.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

After debate, CPS pitches keeping end of first semester after winter break for next two school years

2026-02-11T21:00:27+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools is recommending school calendars for the next two years that keep the end of second quarter after winter break, despite some recent concerns from school board members.

If approved by the school board at its Feb. 26 meeting, the calendars for the 2026-27 and 2027-28 school years would include 176 school days for students, four teacher institute days, four school improvement days, four professional development days, and two days for parent-teacher conferences.

For next school year, the first day would be Aug. 24 for K-12 students and Aug. 25 for pre-K; those days would be Aug. 23 and Aug. 24, respectively, for the 2027-28 school year, according to the draft calendars.

Winter break would start Dec. 21 next school year and Dec. 20 the year after that.

CPS proposed these calendars for approval at last month’s board meeting but pulled them from the agenda after some board members raised concerns they heard from parents of high schoolers. The parents argued that worrying about tests during break wasn’t good for students’ grades or their mental health.

CPS officials conducted a new survey and created three options for calendars, Nicole Milberg, chief of teaching and learning, told board members Wednesday. The district received more than 22,000 responses to the new survey, which was open from Jan. 21 through Jan. 27. Responses were divided about equally among students, staff, and parents, but she noted that they were not able to separate out how many of the responses were from high school families and staff.

A majority – 55% – of people surveyed preferred the option the district is recommending, in which the first semester would end after winter break; 37% of people preferred option 2, which would end the first semester before winter break; 8% wanted the option of starting school a few days earlier and have a shorter Thanksgiving break.

Milberg previously told board members CPS considered getting rid of the full week of Thanksgiving break and moving more professional development to the second semester in order to accommodate a pre-winter break end to the first semester. But it wouldn’t be possible to meet state requirements for school days in that scenario without starting school long before Labor Day.

“All three have merits and drawbacks,” Milberg said. “I’ll leave it to you to make the difficult decision.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Underfunding or mismanagement? Financial troubles at multiple Chicago charters spur a push for answers and solutions.

2026-02-11T17:21:23+00:00

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Jema Fabara knows what can happen when a charter school hits financial turbulence. She lost her teaching job when the Acero network’s Cruz campus closed last year.

Now Fabara, who is teaching at the ASPIRA charter network’s alternative high school, worries the same thing could happen again as that network struggles to make payroll and considers merging schools. This time, the turmoil could also affect her son, who is a senior at her school, and a nephew attending ASPIRA’s nearby Early College campus.

ASPIRA is one of a string of charters in the city that have floundered financially and in some cases moved to merge or close schools over the past year and a half. Two other charters asked Chicago Public Schools to front them money this winter just months after the district chipped in to help the South Side’s EPIC Academy High School finish out the school year before it closes this summer — and less than a year after the school board’s unprecedented decision to absorb five of seven Acero schools the network had slated for closure.

The district, which oversees most city charters, has flagged some of the struggling charters for financial issues for years and still renewed their contracts. CPS officials say they have taken numerous steps to tighten fiscal oversight in recent months, even as some charter critics say CPS should be doing more.

But in a confidential memo sent in October to interim CEO Macquline King and the school board and obtained by Chalkbeat, Alfonso Carmona, the district’s interim chief education officer, says charters face a widespread and systemic “crisis.”

Citywide enrollment losses have hit charter budgets hard, even as CPS has stepped in to heavily subsidize its own shrinking schools. Meanwhile, the district is withholding thousands of dollars per pupil from charters to chip in for CPS’ massive pension and debt service costs, forcing them to rely on increasingly uncertain funding sources, such as federal grants and fundraising, the October memo said. At the time, the district projected that six charter operators would end this fiscal year in the red.

In the memo, Carmona, who was overseeing the district’s charter schools, also voiced alarm about the school board’s decision to absorb the Acero campuses rather than letting them close — a precedent that created a “moral hazard,” he wrote.

“We are confronting a structural financial problem with the potential collapse of a significant portion of the charter sector, which now looks to the district as its financial backstop,” Carmona wrote.

About 50,000 students, or about a fifth of CPS’ enrollment, attend charters, which are publicly funded and privately managed — a student body that’s overwhelmingly Black or Latino and low-income. For Farbara’s family and others at charters, the financial issues have brought protracted uncertainty and even the specter of having to switch schools midyear.

Now, a new working group made up of school board members and charter and district leaders has started meeting to seek solutions, hard as they might be to come by for the budget deficit-plagued, shrinking district.

Does CPS fund charters equitably?

In recent months, charter leaders have blamed the sector’s budget struggles on chronic underfunding by CPS. The district is required by law to give charters at least 97% of the “per capita tuition charge,” a calculation the state sets that’s meant to ensure per student funding for charters is comparable to that for district-run schools. For the current school year, that 97% portion is about $19,740.

The district then charges a 3% fee to cover expenses related to overseeing the charters and withholds thousands of dollars for its long-term pension liabilities, short-term borrowing costs and — for charters in district-owned buildings — long-term debt related to facility spending. That brings the per-pupil amount down to $14,800 for charters in CPS-owned buildings and $17,600 for other schools, according to the district’s memo, which means the district is providing just 83% of the per capita tuition charge on average.

CPS officials say state and federal grants round out these funding amounts, and all schools — district-run and charter — should share in pension and debt costs the entire district is facing. The district is allowed to deduct these costs from charters under state law, notes Justin Marlowe, director of the Center for Municipal Finance at the University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy.

But charter leaders such as Serdar Kartal, the Illinois regional superintendent of Concept Schools, note that not all schools receive added grants at the same level; those tend to be increasingly uncertain and come with many strings attached.

Charter officials say it’s unfair to pass on massive pension and debt costs to charters, arguing that these costs exist because CPS leaders historically underfunded the district’s teacher pension fund and made bad borrowing calls without any input from charters.

“These are longstanding decisions that have created a structural deficit for CPS, and the gap should not be closed on the backs of charter students,” said Mike Madden, president of the Noble charter network.

For charters, other financial pressures also have ramped up recently. Even as the district shifted to a school funding model that guarantees core positions to all district-run schools regardless of size and takes into account their students’ needs, charters — where 87% of students live in poverty, compared with 69% in district-run schools — still get dollars largely based on enrollment.

For years, charter enrollment remained more stable than that at other district schools, but this fall, it dipped about 4.5% compared to 1.7% in CPS-run schools. Some charters felt budget pain — with none of the financial cushion CPS gives its own small schools.

The advocacy group Illinois Network of Charter Schools holds up the example of Noble’s Baker College Prep campus and the district-run Bowen, two high schools with fewer than 300 students that share a building on Chicago’s Far South Side. Baker got $15,800 per student this year; Bowen got $25,150, according to CPS data Chalkbeat reviewed.

Charter leaders say recent changes to the district’s GoCPS school choice site have made it harder to find charter options, and the district has held the line on enrollment caps in charter contracts even for thriving schools.

Carmona, who oversaw the district’s charter schools from 2022 to 2025, told Chalkbeat the end of COVID relief funds, a drop in philanthropic support for charters, the cost of maintaining aging buildings, and rising labor costs, particularly for charters that have unionized, have added to the pressures.

“What we’re seeing today is not even close to what we have seen in the past,” he said.

Should CPS watch charter finances more closely?

Some school board members and the Chicago Teachers Union have blamed at least some of the charter issues on poor financial management — and called on CPS to hold charter operators on a tighter fiscal leash.

The union points to EPIC, the South Side charter high school serving about 240 students, whose board of directors announced in September the school would close by the end of this school year. The union has said EPIC’s demise had a lot to do with an ill-conceived purchase and planned $22 million renovation of an old church building to house the school even as enrollment dropped for years.

EPIC has argued it needed the space to replace its crumbling building, and leaders hoped an attractive new campus would help arrest steep enrollment declines.

EPIC had gotten a clean bill of fiscal health on a financial scorecard CPS keeps and uses in deciding whether to renew charter contracts. But other charters that have reported money problems recently had shown signs of “living beyond their means” on that scorecard. In a letter to ASPIRA leadership late last year, CPS officials criticized the school for financial missteps and lack of transparency, including for budgeting based on unrealistic enrollment projections.

In recent years, CPS repeatedly determined that both Passages, a Far North Side elementary school serving about 380 students, and Urban Prep, which operates two small all-boys high schools, did not meet all standards for good financial health. The two schools were the latest to turn to CPS for help with cash flow issues this winter. The district, which itself resorts to short-term borrowing to make payroll and pay vendors, said that as of last month it has advanced $3.9 million to Urban Prep and ASPIRA. Carmona says he expects Passages and Urban Prep to “end the school year without any financial issues.”

Dennis Lacewell, Urban Prep’s chief academic officer, said the school has cut administrative positions, among other recent steps to strengthen its fiscal health. After a protracted legal battle, the school averted a CPS plan to shutter it and take over based on allegations of financial mismanagement and sexual misconduct the network vehemently denied. But Lacewell said its recent issues stemmed primarily from the federal government freezing a payment from a COVID-era Paycheck Protection Program the school was counting on.

ASPIRA board members and Passages did not respond to requests for comment.

Despite flagging their financial shortcomings, the district last May proposed renewing contracts for ASPIRA, Passages, and Urban Prep for two more school years, and the school board approved.

That was by design: Two-year renewals are a way to signal there are issues that must be fixed, and not doing that in time could mean closure, Carmona said.

As a condition of their latest contract renewals, CPS placed ASPIRA, Passages, and Urban Prep on financial remediation plans, which include submitting monthly cash flow statements to CPS.

Matthew Luskin, chief of staff at Chicago Teachers Union, said the district should consider asking for oversight of charter budgets in order to prevent midyear closures by catching “risky spending,” such as spending down their reserves.

CPS “can actually make the effort here to police this a little bit and get out ahead of these crises,” Luskin said.

At Chalkbeat’s request, Marlowe, the municipal finance expert, reviewed the district’s financial scorecards and characterized them as “the absolute bare minimum” and a “very retrospective” way of looking at a school’s finances.

While audits show how money was actually spent, they’re usually not available until nine to 18 months after the end of a fiscal year for public sector agencies, such as school districts or charters, Marlowe said. In order to get a more current picture, CPS could consider requiring monthly cash flow reports for all charter networks, not just those in financial remediation, or examining who they’re contracting with for certain services, Marlowe said.

Carmona said the district has tightened up financial oversight in several ways. That includes using actual enrollment figures from the previous school year rather than projections for the first quarter of payments for charters so they can budget better, requiring more reporting on charter debt obligations, and asking for more years of budget projections.

Meanwhile, some school board members and charter operators say they have been encouraged by the first two meetings of the new charter working group that school board President Sean Harden formed late last year.

Board member Ellen Rosenfeld said the group is focused on better cooperation between CPS and charters and on solutions, such as a request that the Illinois Network of Charter Schools start providing a “watch list” of schools that are struggling so the board isn’t caught off guard if some need help from CPS.

Fabara, the ASPIRA parent and teacher, says after months of fingerpointing, families are hungry for a proactive push for solutions that takes in their input and ideas.

Otherwise, she said, “You’ve already fallen off the boat, and you’re crying for help as you’re going down.”

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Several Illinois counties will vote on Trump tax-credit scholarship program in bid to sway Pritzker

2026-02-10T20:35:53+00:00

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A libertarian-leaning advocacy group has persuaded more than two dozen Illinois counties and townships to place a nonbinding question on next month’s primary ballot supporting a new federal tax-credit scholarship program championed by the Trump administration.

One of the campaign’s architects said in a public meeting that the overriding goal is to “send a signal” to Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker, who must opt the state into the program.

The draft ballot question circulated by the Illinois Policy Institute’s advocacy arm asks voters to support using privately-donated funds for tutoring, test preparation, and other academic needs – omitting that donors receive federal tax credits for donating to the program.

The ballot measures are an unusual tactic for swaying public opinion and decisionmakers in a strongly Democratic state, but it comes as advocates on the left and right lobby Pritzker on the scholarship program created as part of President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill.

The program would provide dollar-for-dollar tax credits to donors who give up to $1,700 scholarship-granting nonprofits, and those funds can go toward certain expenses for private, public or homeschooled kids whose families make up to 300% of the local median income.

In Chicago — where the advisory measure is not on the March 17 ballot — that would mean a family making roughly $233,000 or less.

As of Tuesday, the measure or a version of it will be on ballots in at least 24 counties and five townships across the state, according to the Illinois State Board of Elections website.

But voters — and the public at large — likely won’t have a full picture of how the program will actually work by the primary election because federal officials haven’t clarified many aspects of the program. It’s unclear, for example, whether the money could be used for tutoring provided by public schools or be restricted to outside tutoring groups.

Dick Simpson, professor emeritus of political science at University of Illinois Chicago and a former Chicago alderman, said the question “seems valid” to gauge whether the public supports the program. But he said it would more accurately capture public opinion if it included wording about the tax credit.

Still, whether lawmakers will pay attention to the results depends on where the question is being asked, he said. Most counties with the advisory question are suburban or rural areas that Trump won in last year’s presidential election.

“If they’re all suburban, rural Republican or MAGA-leaning counties, then Pritzker is not going to pay much attention,” Simpson said.

While the program would not directly cost the state of Illinois money, it would mean a decrease in federal tax revenue at a time when the Trump administration has already cut social service programs or withheld other funding for local governments.

Nearly half of U.S. states, most run by Republican governors, have opted in. Colorado Gov. Jared Polis is the only Democratic governor to officially do so, while North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein has indicated he plans to.

In remarks to the Grundy County board in November, Illinois Policy assistant editor Dylan Sharkey said that “asking voters to weigh in would send a signal to other counties, to state lawmakers, and, most importantly, Gov. Pritzker that Illinois families deserve these funds.”

In an emailed statement, Pritzker spokesperson Jillian Kaehler did not address whether the governor would be swayed by the results of the local ballot measures.

She said Pritzker will “evaluate the issue through a lens focused on affordability for working families and what best supports Illinois students, families, and public schools.” She did not provide a timeframe for when he would make the decision.

Libertarian-leaning group wants voters to weigh in

The measure was created by Illinois Policy, which describes itself as a nonpartisan advocacy arm for Illinois Policy Institute. The group frequently criticizes left-leaning policies, as well as Chicago Public Schools and the Chicago Teachers Union, which opposes the program.

In a statement, the group told Chalkbeat that it asked more than 100 counties and townships — the state has 102 counties — to include the advisory question. The group estimated that about 30 jurisdictions will have a question about the scholarship program on the ballot.

Most ballots will include the following question: “Should Illinois opt into a federal program that would provide public K-12, private school, and homeschool students with privately-donated funds for academic needs, such as tutoring and test preparation, educational therapies for students with disabilities, tuition, books, exam fees or for other specified academic needs?”

In its statement, the group said its suggested ballot language did not mention that donors will be incentivized by tax credits because those are federal and the question about opting into the program is up to states.

Ballots in at least two Illinois counties will have differently worded questions, including an inaccurate one in Grundy County. There, the question reads, “That the County of Grundy adopts the Federal Scholarship Tax Credit to allow the privately donated funds be given to Illinois students.” In fact, counties can’t choose to opt into the program; Pritzker must opt the state in.

Drew Muffler, chairman of the Grundy County board, referred Chalkbeat to the Grundy County State’s Attorney’s office on the wording of the question, saying that office drafted the question. The state’s attorney’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

Muffler said the board invited Illinois Policy to speak at a board meeting in November after the group called him about possibly adding the ballot question.

Sharkey, from Illinois Policy, told board members at the November meeting that the funds can be used for things like AP exam fees or ACT prep. The Treasury Department is still drafting rules for the program, however, so that’s unclear.

The law says that donated funds can be used on expenses allowed under Coverdell education savings accounts. That’s a type of trust that can be used to pay for things like tutoring, uniforms, transportation, tuition and services for someone with special needs.

“It makes sense if people are looking for alternative school programs,” Muffler, who is a nonvoting member of the board, said in an interview with Chalkbeat.

Muffler said his son attends a local public school, where his wife also works.

“I have no issues whatsoever with the public school system around here,” but not everyone feels that way about their districts, he said.

Cassie Creswell, president and executive director of Illinois For Public School Families, argues public schools could suffer because of this program at a time many districts are facing tight budgets. Chicago Public Schools, for example, is projecting a more than half-billion-dollar deficit next fiscal year.

The state’s main education funding formula provides more dollars to districts with more needs and is based, in part, on the number of students. Losing students doesn’t necessarily mean schools can easily adjust their budgets, she said, noting that districts have certain fixed costs they must pay for even if they lose students.

Creswell, whose organization has asked Pritzker not to opt in, is also skeptical of arguments that the program will benefit needy families. In states with universal education savings accounts or vouchers programs, a large share of participating students are from affluent families. Many already attended private school before the voucher program was launched.

Groups supporting school choice say this program would give families more agency over their kids’ education. Last week, during a visit to religious private school Chicago Hope Academy, U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said she’s “not quite sure why every governor wouldn’t jump in and opt in for this particular program because it will really benefit children.”

Illinois had a tax credit program from 2017 to 2023. The Invest in Kids scholarship program allowed individuals or corporations to donate to scholarship granting organizations, which would grant aid for tuition to low-income, private school students.

Donors would get a tax credit worth 75 cents for every dollar donated, up to $1 million. The state had capped donations at $100 million, but those limits were never reached, Chalkbeat previously found. State lawmakers allowed the program to sunset in 2023.

Ike Muzikowski, principal of the school McMahon visited, said nearly half of his students lost scholarships after Invest In Kids ended, and his school raised additional funds to help close that gap, he said.

He wants Pritzker to sign onto the new federal program

“Tax credit scholarships are what can sustain a school like Hope in perpetuity,” he said. “God is the only reason our school is still open.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Why this Chicago principal welcomed Education Secretary Linda McMahon despite community pushback

2026-02-06T00:43:03+00:00

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The reaction was decidedly mixed when Ike Muzikowski told students and staff last week that Education Secretary Linda McMahon might visit their Christian private school bordering Chicago’s West Side.

A religious private school like Chicago Hope Academy seems like an obvious choice for McMahon, whose administration has shown strong support of school choice and has criticized the city’s public schools.

But as word spread, Muzikowski received six emails from parents who were opposed to her visit. He also heard from parents who were “pumped” and wanted photos of their kids at the event.

Muzikowski, Hope’s principal, knew that a Connecticut public school had just canceled McMahon’s visit in response to outcry from parents.

After he received confirmation of her visit, he opened the floor to students at a town hall attended by more than a third of the school’s students. They talked about the visit for so long that dozens of them missed their next class. The days leading up to the visit were “filled with discussions, sometimes arguments” about how the Trump administration’s policies have been harmful to many in their school community, which is predominantly Black and Hispanic.

“While that challenge exists, can we host people from different political backgrounds, with different political interests, with different political agendas?” Muzikowski wondered.

He decided yes.

Ike Muzikowski, principal of Chicago Hope Academy, speaks during a visit by U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon at Chicago Hope Academy, a private school.

And so McMahon visited the school Thursday morning as part of her 50-state “History Rocks!” tour, timed for the nation’s upcoming 250th birthday. The Education Department is coordinating the tour with the America 250 Civics Education Coalition, which includes conservative groups like Turning Point USA and Moms for Liberty. About half of the school’s students participated in the optional event, Muzikowski said.

Two sophomores led McMahon on a tour of the school and to a U.S. History class. A large photo of Booker T. Washington, a prominent Black educator and leader from the late 1800s to early 1900s, hangs at the top of a stairwell. A religious poem, painted in both English and Spanish, adorns another wall. In a hallway, outside of Muzikowski’s office, hang bulletin boards including one that shows how the three branches of government coexist and another featuring prominent Black Americans. College banners line the wall above the bulletin boards.

The girls told McMahon about their future business ideas, summer travel plans, and why the school celebrates Black History Month, Muzikowski said.

A wall hanging at Chicago Hope Academy, a private school, on Thursday, February 5, 2026 in Chicago, Illinois.

Later, in the school’s chapel, McMahon spoke for a few minutes about her time as a presidential delegate for the U.S. Special Olympics, Muzikowski said. Then the group played general audience and team trivia games about U.S. and Illinois history.

McMahon told reporters after the event, which the press was not invited to out of concerns about students’ privacy, that it was “totally nonpartisan” and “absolutely about civics.”

“It’s kids having fun, competing,” she said. “It’s really making history fun, and you can see the enthusiasm that was in the audience.”

McMahon also spoke briefly about Illinois state history, highlighting the state’s importance in helping the Union win the Civil War, Muzikowski said. She didn’t wade into current politics or name prominent Illinois leaders, such as Abraham Lincoln or Barack Obama, who has also visited the school, he said.

McMahon complimented the family feel of the school, which was founded by Muzikowski’s parents in 1995.

“We understand, hey, that the approach to education from her office might be different than our execution of education in this building,” Muzikowski, dressed in a backwards baseball cap and tie with the word “HOPE,” told reporters after the visit.

It’s not a surprise the visit caused a stir, even at the type of school that is likely to draw praise from the Trump administration.

On top of the criticism McMahon has faced from Democratic lawmakers amid the Trump administration’s plans to eliminate the Education Department, Chicago is a fraught place for a Trump cabinet member to visit right now.

The federal government’s immigration raids last fall left many of Chicago’s Hispanic communities feeling scarred and fearful of federal officials. And the Trump administration has pulled $23 million in federal grants for the city’s magnet schools, claiming that Chicago Public Schools’ Black Student Success Plan, which is meant to improve academic outcomes and school climate for Black students, as well as its policies for transgender students, are violations of civil rights laws.

Muzikowski said he wished he had more time to make a decision about McMahon’s visit “as a community.” Still, he said he came away proud of his students.

While he didn’t get “100% co-sign on the event” from students, “I am very glad that we did it and that our students are able to learn from someone who may think differently.”

After the event, a student walked through the hallway holding a paper American flag from the trivia game.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board to reopen applications for Black Student Achievement Committee

2026-01-28T20:49:02+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education is reopening its application for joining the district’s Black Student Achievement Committee, the board office announced Wednesday.

The board had originally opened applications in late November with a deadline to apply by Dec. 15, 2025.

The application will be reopened Feb. 2 with a deadline of Feb. 9 “to ensure that all key stakeholder groups have a fair and accessible opportunity to apply following the holiday season,” said Shelia Pegues-Porter, board communications manager, in an email. Chicago residents, including students, parents, and CPS employees, can apply to serve a 1-year term on the committee.

The new application window comes as advocates have expressed concern about the delay in establishing the committee, which was officially launched last April and is required by state law.

The board office did not say how many applications it has received so far.

The Black Student Achievement Committee is supposed to help the district implement its Black Student Success Plan, which focuses on boosting the share of Black teachers, reducing Black student suspensions, and implementing more culturally relevant lessons in schools.

The plan, released last February, faced an immediate legal challenge and investigation from the Trump administration, which has opposed diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. Trump officials say CPS’ efforts to focus on Black students violates other students’ civil rights, which CPS has denied. The Trump administration has also said it will withhold millions of dollars in magnet school grants if the district forges ahead with the plan. CPS has defended its efforts and says it will not shelve the plan.

The committee will have 14 seats. As of last month, the board had sent about 500 applications to people interested in joining the committee, according to elected school board member Jitu Brown, who will chair the committee.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools closed Friday amid ‘dangerous cold’

2026-01-22T18:35:37+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools will be closed Friday as dangerously cold temperatures blanket the city.

All school buildings will be closed and all extracurricular activities, including athletic practices, games, and events, are canceled, CPS said in a statement. Canceled games will be rescheduled.

“With dangerously frigid temperatures expected tomorrow and a Warning from the National Weather Service that wind chills could reach -35 degrees, it will be unsafe for students and staff to travel to school,” CPS said in a news release.

Chicago joined many other Illinois and Northwest Indiana school districts that will also be closed Friday, though many will transition to remote learning. Chicago Public Schools will not offer remote learning, officials said.

A large winter storm is expected to sweep across the central and eastern parts of the U.S. this weekend.

The National Weather Service warned of “dangerous cold” starting late Thursday through the weekend in the Chicago area and surrounding suburbs. On Friday, the high temperature is forecast between minus 5 and 2 degrees, and lows are expected to range between minus 2 and minus 11 degrees. Wind chills are expected to drop between minus 20 and minus 40 degrees Friday morning, increasing the danger of frostbite, hypothermia, and frozen pipes, the weather service said.

The weather service advised people to stay indoors if possible. CPS expects classes to resume Monday.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

5 things to watch in 2026 in Chicago Public Schools and across Illinois

2026-01-16T12:00:01+00:00

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2026 is a big year for Chicago Public Schools.

The school board is looking for a new CEO as it stares down a possible half-billion-dollar budget deficit. And later this year, the city will hold school board elections — this time for every seat.

On the state level, there are questions about what education funding and child care will look like as the Trump administration threatens to withhold federal funding for Illinois child care services.

Here are five things we’re watching this year.

Who will be the next leader of Chicago Public Schools?

When Chalkbeat previewed 2025, we wondered who the next CEO would be. That question remains more than a year later.

The school board began searching last spring for CPS’ new CEO, who is charged with carrying out the board’s vision for the district’s schools and recommending policy changes for board approval.

The board was expected to choose one of two finalists by the end of 2025. But the process appeared to come to a halt in November after the Chicago Sun-Times, WBEZ, and Chalkbeat revealed finalist names. Later that month, one board member said they were “reconsidering the process,” while another said they were rescheduling finalist interviews. A November statement from the board said the process is “ongoing.”

Whoever is hired will face thorny issues like chronic absenteeism, budget problems, and declining enrollment. Notably, that person will be less than a year into the job before a new, fully elected school board takes over in January 2027.

Who will Chicago elect to be on the school board?

Chicago voters will elect a new school board on Nov. 3. But unlike the last election in 2024, voters will choose all 21 board members, including an at-large president.

Currently, the mayor appoints people to 11 of the seats, including board president.

Many board members have said they plan to run, but board President Sean Harden has said he won’t. Candidates who win seats currently held by mayoral appointees will have two-year terms; those who win seats held by elected members will have four-year terms.

It will also be key to watch who is donating to candidates’ campaigns. Last election, some of the biggest spenders were political action committees tied to the Chicago Teachers Union, Illinois Network of Charter Schools, and Urban Center.

Prospective candidates can begin Feb. 24 to collect petition signatures from registered Chicago voters – a requirement of getting on the ballot. The lists of signatures must be submitted to the Chicago Board of Elections between May 18-26.

By Aug. 27, the Board of Elections will have a final list of who will appear on the November ballot.

Are we in for another budget fight at CPS?

The short answer is, probably.

Chicago Public Schools and its school board navigated a bruising budget process last summer as it grappled with a $734 million deficit, or about 8% of the operating budget. Board members argued over whether to take out a short-term loan to cover expenses and whether to forgo a pension payment to the city. They ultimately avoided a loan and direct cuts to classrooms but slashed elsewhere, including vacant positions at central office, custodians, and hot meals.

For the next fiscal year, which begins July 1, CPS officials have so far projected a $520 million deficit, and it’s unclear if more federal cuts are coming. Board members may need to consider cuts right as many run for election. Some may try to find more revenue, such as lobbying the state for more money or changes to help alleviate the district’s structural deficit.

But the state is also facing a challenging financial picture.

What can we expect from the state budget?

The Illinois State Board of Education wants a $350 million increase to the main funding stream for school districts. The 4% increase, if ultimately approved by state lawmakers, is in line with past years, but some organizations say that increase is not enough, especially in the face of possible federal cuts. Roughly one-third of Illinois school districts are considered 90% or more adequately funded, according to state figures.

The state is facing a $2.2 billion deficit. Still, the legislature is unlikely to provide much less than the amount ISBE requested.

Illinois House Speaker Rep. Emanuel “Chris” Welch, one of the state’s most powerful Democrats, wants a new tax on millionaires. And some groups, including the Chicago Teachers Union, have been pushing since last year for state leaders to impose new taxes on Illinois’ wealthiest residents and corporations. If such proposals go through, it’s possible some of the additional revenue will flow to schools.

But the state has many other areas of government to focus on, including a possible loss of federal dollars for child care and social services assistance.

What will child care look like?

There are fresh concerns about child care after the Trump administration announced a plan to freeze about $1 billion in federal assistance for Illinois child care for low-income, working families and other social services programs.

Tens of thousands of Illinois children are in programs supported by those federal funds, including 152,000 kids who attend programs partially funded by the federal Child Care and Development Block Grant, according to Pritzker’s office. Thousands of other children go to licensed child care providers who receive federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF, dollars, the governor’s office said.

A federal judge has temporarily blocked the administration from withholding that money. But if the Trump administration is successful, the loss of these funds could mean a drastic drop in the state’s child care providers and could leave many families without help, advocates and policy experts have said.

Some unions and state lawmakers are calling for Illinois to expand funding to keep those programs afloat through new taxes on corporations and billionaires. It’s unclear if there is broad appetite on the state level to do so.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Illinois education officials ask for another $350 million increase in funding for school districts

2026-01-14T21:19:52+00:00

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The Illinois State Board of Education will ask state lawmakers to provide the same funding increase as past years for Illinois’ 800-plus school districts.

Board officials unanimously approved a budget recommendation Wednesday that, if ultimately approved by the Illinois state legislature, would boost the main stream of K-12 funding — known as the evidence-based funding formula — by $350 million, or a 4% increase.

Last year’s increase was $307 million, after state leaders paused property tax relief grants, which would return under this request.

The recommended increase to evidence-based funding reflects the minimum ask from members of the public, who submitted hundreds of budget requests to ISBE, state officials said in the fall.

The $350 million increase would be in line with most of the annual increases since 2017, when state lawmakers created the new funding formula that is supposed to send more dollars to schools with more needs. But a 2024 report found that at the current funding level, schools won’t be fully funded under the formula until at least 2034.

Still, in the face of financial pressures, “it’s a responsible budget,” said Robin Steans, president of advocacy organization Advance Illinois, which closely follows state education funding.

Overall, the board is asking the state for $10.9 billion to fund its main K-12 expenses — a roughly 2% drop compared to its current budget. Much of that cut is driven by the removal of early childhood education programming out of ISBE and into a standalone state department that is expected to launch by July 1.

ISBE is recommending other funding increases that fall outside of evidence-based funding, such as for student transportation, but is also recommending some cuts, including for organizations that provide after-school programming.

State education officials crafted their budget request, in part, based on the financial outlook for Illinois, which is expecting a $2.2 billion budget deficit for next fiscal year. ISBE’s request will go to Gov. JB Pritzker, who will reveal his full state budget proposal next month. The General Assembly will then work to approve a budget in late May, with the state’s fiscal year beginning July 1.

State lawmakers have increased evidence-based funding by $350 million annually in the decade since it was created with some exceptions, including no increase during the first year of the pandemic. However, to match the same value a $350 million increase had in 2017, state leaders would need to increase education funding by another roughly $100 million, according to the CPI inflation calculator.

In a statement, Stacy Davis Gates, president of the Chicago and Illinois teachers unions, said the possible funding increase was insufficient as students “in various parts of the state are going without meals, without their special education needs being met, without counselors, extra-curriculars, sports, and even without heat and hazard-free facilities.”

Since 2017, the state has increased funding through the new formula by about $2.5 billion, and now just over one-third of districts are considered at least 90% adequately funded.

Illinois’ largest district, Chicago Public Schools, is considered 73% adequately funded by the state. Still, CPS is projecting a more than half-billion dollar deficit next fiscal year. Many school board members have pushed for more state funding. Others, however, have not expected additional money as the state faces its own financial problems.

Future federal funding threats may also force Illinois’ hand to raise more revenue or find cuts. The Trump administration announced last week that it would freeze $1 billion in child care and social services funding for Illinois and several other Democrat-led states, but a federal judge has temporarily blocked that move.

Some progressive organizations, including the Chicago Teachers Union and the Illinois Revenue Alliance, are pushing the state to collect more revenue by imposing new taxes on corporations and Illinois’ wealthiest residents. Illinois House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch, a Democrat, is pushing for a new tax on millionaires, several news outlets reported.

More funding for transportation, cuts for after-school programming

ISBE is also asking the state to beef up funding for expenses it partially reimburses school districts for, including a nearly 15% increase for transportation for students with disabilities and an 11% increase in public and private school tuition for students with disabilities. ISBE officials have said the state’s reimbursements aren’t keeping up with rising costs for school districts, and they received many requests for more transportation funding.

But these increases would keep the state’s support at similar rates to last year, meaning districts may have to divert more evidence-based funding they could otherwise spend on classrooms, said Steans from Advance Illinois.

ISBE is calling for a 10% increase in grant funding to schools for career and technical education funding, another budget request from the public.

ISBE is also recommending cuts outside of direct school funding, including nearly $23 million in grants for a variety of programs, including after-school initiatives and money for individual organizations.

For example, Chicago-based Southwest Organizing Project, which distributes grants to organizations to train parent mentor volunteers, who provide additional support in low-income schools across the state, would get a $6 million cut, or a 30% reduction, to its current level of funding from the state. After School Matters, which provided paid enrichment opportunities to about 17,000 Chicago teenagers last fiscal year, would have a 50% cut to its ISBE funding. The organizations got funding boosts from the state for their current budgets; the recommended cuts would bring their funding levels back in line with past years.

It’s unclear how these cuts would impact these organizations. For example, ISBE funding made up roughly one-fifth of After School Matter’s government funding in fiscal year 2025, according to state records and the organization’s most recent annual report.

Southwest Organizing Project, which acts as the fiscal agent for the parent mentor program statewide, used the funding increase last year to bring parent mentors to 47 more schools, for a total of 292 schools, said Adriana Velazquez, who helps lead the organization’s parent mentor work. They also used the additional money to save programs at 32 existing schools that were losing expiring federal COVID stimulus dollars.

Velazquez said the organization will work with state lawmakers to preserve the funding. The organization focuses on schools with more than 80% low-income students, including many in Chicago neighborhoods that have been impacted by increased immigration enforcement.

“Just working in the most vulnerable communities, especially our communities that have been under attack, we are not going to take another cut,” Velazquez said.

Correction: This story previously misstated the number of schools that Southwest Organizing Project supported with additional state funds due to incorrect information. The organization added parent mentors to 47 new schools but also used the funds to sustain programs at 32 existing schools.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.t Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago schools will get about $200 million more from City Council TIF surplus

2025-12-23T20:56:54+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools will get $193 million more in tax revenue than was included in this year’s $10.2 billion budget after the City Council passed its own budget Saturday, declaring a $1 billion surplus Saturday from city tax increment financing districts.

But the additional dollars will not result in a windfall for classrooms as the school system continues to adjust spending, eliminate vacant positions, and account for increased interest payments on debt.

The TIF surplus amount is unchanged from what Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson proposed in October. By law, CPS gets a little over half of any TIF surplus declared by the city. City budget documents released in October said the school district would get $552.4 million, which is $193 million more than the $379 million the school board budgeted to get from those special taxing districts, known as TIF.

Johnson said Tuesday he would not sign the budget plan, but he would not veto it either. That means it will automatically go into effect at the start of 2026.

This is the second year in a row Johnson faced a significant budget battle with the City Council. This year, dozens of aldermen presented an alternative budget after voting down Johnson’s in late November. Facing an end-of- the- year deadline, the alternative budget plan passed Saturday by a vote of 30-18.

During a press conference at City Hall on Tuesday, Johnson expressed strong opposition to some elements of the alternative budget’s plan, particularly a move to sell off debt owed to the city. While he considers some elements of the budget “morally bankrupt,” he applauded other elements, including the TIF surplus.

“We added the largest TIF surplus in the history of the city to go to our schools, our parks, our libraries,” he said. “These investments create spaces for our young people to grow and thrive and keep our city safe.”

A coalition of school board members aligned with Johnson put out a statement after the City Council vote that thanked aldermen for not changing the TIF surplus but criticized them for not supporting the mayor’s proposed corporate head tax.

A significant chunk of the additional money — $175 million — is expected to go back to the city as a reimbursement payment to cover a portion of municipal pension costs for CPS non-teaching staff retirements.

That leaves roughly $18 million for the school district to use.

However, the district’s budget approved in August required officials to identify an additional $50 million in cuts. A CPS spokesperson said in recent weeks the district eliminated 69 vacant positions from 19 central and citywide departments, extended an ongoing hiring freeze at the central office , cut some professional development for teachers, and made additional cuts to central office expenses, saving about $34.4 million.

The district also said it found savings elsewhere, including through its Summer Bridge program which was offered at fewer schools this year, according to the spokesperson. The district estimated it saved $15.6 million through these and other measures.

No employee was laid off, and there are no planned cuts to “student-facing” programs for the second semester, another spokesperson said.

Other unexpected expenses have come up since the district passed its budget in August.

In September, the federal government cut millions in magnet school grants citing CPS’s diversity initiatives, which left an $8 million unexpected hole in this year’s budget.

And last week, WBEZ reported Chicago Public Schools is spending $23 million more than usual to cover interest payments on loans it routinely takes out to cover payroll and other expenses while waiting for Cook County to send tax revenue to government bodies.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Illinois investigating Instituto Health Sciences Career Academy for special education violations

2025-12-18T21:19:32+00:00

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The Illinois State Board of Education has escalated a yearslong investigation into violations of special education law at Instituto Health Sciences Career Academy, a charter school in the Little Village neighborhood, Chicago Public Schools officials announced Thursday.

Instituto, which has been open since 2010, has “repeated and unresolved failure to correct documented special education violations over multiple school years,” according to a letter from Josh Long, the district’s chief of the Office of Students With Disabilities, to the Chicago Board of Education describing the state’s investigation. Long read his letter aloud, as required by the state, to the board at its meeting.

Despite the ongoing state investigation, CPS renewed Instituto’s contract in May for another three years.

State officials estimate Instituto failed to provide more than 100 students with disabilities with services they were legally entitled to last school year, amounting to a loss of between 12,000 to 80,000 minutes of instruction.

The state is now requiring CPS to provide additional oversight to Instituto, including biweekly check-ins, monitoring how the school is providing paraprofessional services, and monthly visits from CPS to Instituto to ensure the school is completing its requirements to compensate kids with services they missed over the previous two school years, the letter said.

As a charter school, Instituto is a privately run, publicly funded school and operates under a contract with CPS. CPS considers various factors when deciding to renew a charter school’s contract, including how well a school serves its students with disabilities.

The charter school enrolled 479 students at the start of this school year, and about 16% of those students have disabilities, on par with schools citywide, according to district demographic data. Schools create plans — either Individualized Education Programs, or IEPs, or 504 plans — for many students with disabilities that outline which services students are entitled to and how often they should receive them.

As part of its recommendation to renew Instituto’s contract, CPS said the school must “demonstrate progress” toward implementing unspecified recommendations from the Office for Students with Disabilities.

CPS did not immediately respond to a question about why it recommended renewing Instituto’s contract despite the investigation. But in a separate statement, a spokesperson said it “takes seriously its responsibility to uphold students’ rights and to ensure compliance with all applicable special education requirements.”

The state says Instituto has not yet provided documentation to show that it has fixed five of the 10 violations alleged by the state, including failure to provide speech and language services to students who require them and maintain required class size limits for special education classes. There are still students who are owed services from the 2022-23 and 2023-24 school years, according to the state letter.

“This delay resulted in students graduating, transferring from the school and district, no longer being eligible or revoking consent for special education services, further impeding their access to required compensatory education minutes,” according to the letter.

Board members did not discuss the matter or ask questions after Long finished reading the letter.

Several educators from the school spoke to board members during the public comment portion of Thursday’s meeting, saying their issues worsened with the mass departure of special education staff shortly before the 2023-24 school year. They said the school has now hired more staff and improved its services for students under the school’s principal, Alberto Mendez, who took over during the 2024-25 school year, after the state investigation began in July 2023.

In a brief interview with reporters, Mendez said more staff has allowed the school to be able to offer compensatory services for students during and after school.

“When I first stepped in, it was almost like I inherited the systemic issues that pertain to the past and it’s been a priority to rebuild the special education department and program,” Mendez said. “We’re progressing in the right direction; unfortunately it takes time.”

Since the state first opened its investigation into Instituto, ISBE found Instituto had failed to follow special education laws. For example, in August 2023, the state said Instituto had not made up services to three students who required special education services, and for three other students, had provided only a fraction of what was required.

Instituto had at one point offered summer school to students, according to the letter. But the state said such an offer “did not dismiss Instituto’s obligation” to provide services to students who have not received them since the 2023-24 school year.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools finds buyers for three vacant schools

2025-12-03T22:50:42+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools has identified buyers for three former school properties on the South and West Sides, two of whom are planning to build new housing and a third who wants to open a community center.

The district is seeking the Chicago Board of Education’s approval at its next meeting on Dec. 18 to sell the old Bontemps Elementary in Englewood on the South Side for $75,000, the old Henson Elementary in North Lawndale on the West Side for $25,000, and the former Shedd Elementary, which last served as a satellite building for Bennett Elementary, in Roseland on the Far South Side for $25,000. All three buildings closed in 2013.

The proposed sales come after CPS put 20 properties on the market in May. Stephen Stults, the district’s director of real estate, said they got bids for 12 properties.

Chicago’s struggle to repurpose dozens of vacant school properties has taken more than a decade. The district has made multiple past attempts to sell them and many either had no buyers or pending deals fall through. CPS spends roughly $75,000 to $150,000 annually to maintain each vacant property, Stults said.

“We really want to put these buildings back to productive use,” Stults said. “The longer they sit there, the more they deteriorate, the harder it is to redevelop them, and the less value that we can get for them.”

School board member Michilla Blaise urged CPS officials to lean on the 21 board members elected and appointed to represent their communities to help get the old schools repurposed.

“We all have community contacts. We all have organizations that might be helpful to you. And we can also reach out to elected officials in the area,” Blaise said. “CPS is in the business of educating students, not necessarily being a landlord to derelict properties. So I understand the impetus to want to unload these properties … but we have to move thoughtfully.”

The potential buyer for the old Shedd Elementary building at 99th and Indiana Ave. is the Peace for Preston Foundation, led by Dionne Mhoon, the mother of slain Chicago Police Officer Aréanah Preston. Two years ago, Mhoon launched a GoFundMe to support the foundation and raise money for a community center in honor of her daughter. Mhoon’s bid for the old Shedd school is $25,000.

Elected school board member Carlos Rivas said Wednesday he was Preston’s college counselor in the 2015-16 school year when he worked at Noble’s UIC College Prep.

“She was such a determined young lady and graduated from Illinois State in three and a half years because of her determination,” Rivas said. “She had such a bright life ahead of her, and she did so much for her community.”

“I am so incredibly proud that we’re going to be honoring her and using this building in this way for the Peace for Preston Foundation,” Rivas added.

There was some interest in the old Shedd school in 2017 from a private Christian school and another buyer, but neither bid had the backing of the local alderperson, according to South Side Weekly.

The board resolution says Peace for Preston wants to offer youth recreational programming, educational programming, youth mentoring and counseling, mental health support, job readiness and vocational training, wellness programs, and access to health care support, as well as GED and financial literacy courses.

Both buyers for Henson and Bontemps want to demolish the old schools and construct new housing.

In the case of Henson, buyer Melvin Bailey of MKB Business Strategies told Chalkbeat that he plans to build about 27 single family or two-flat homes on the property.

At least one other shuttered CPS school property is now home to dozens of single family homes. A developer bought the old King Elementary in 2017 in Tri-Taylor and built 30 homes that came on the market in 2020.

MKB’s $25,000 bid was not the lowest received. There was another for $30,000 from Calling Water LLC. Stults said the community meeting was contentious and both proposals had supporters, but Bailey’s plan for redevelopment had the support of the local alderperson, Monique Scott.

In May 2018, the Board of Education approved a bid for Henson’s property from the Single Room Housing Assistance Corporation, which offered $55,000. The group put forward a plan to convert the school into 80 mini-studio apartments for low-income people, including veterans, single mothers, and people with disabilities. The sale never closed.

Devereaux Peters, a former WNBA player turned affordable housing developer, is offering $75,000 to purchase the Bontemps school in Englewood. According to the board resolution, the plan is to demolish the school and build two affordable housing buildings. One would have 72 units with various amenities, including a fitness center and coworking space. The second building would have 60 units for seniors “who wish to downsize while remaining in the community.”

Stults said the current Bontemps structure has no working plumbing, electric, or mechanical systems. He said there was a community meeting in October and the local alderman, Stephanie Coleman, supports the project.

In 2017, the school board approved a $50,000 bid for Bontemps from IFF, a nonprofit lender and developer based in Chicago. But like Henson, that sale never went through.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Board of Education members urge City Council to vote for proposed budget

2025-11-25T23:54:58+00:00

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Chicago school board members, educators, and community advocates rallied Tuesday outside Austin High School to advocate for Mayor Brandon Johnson’s $16.6 billion city budget, which would mean $552.4 million for Chicago Public Schools.

Their support comes after the mayor’s budget was rejected by a key committee last week, sending the City Council’s process back to square one. The mayor then launched an online portal to solicit more ideas for budget efficiencies from aldermen. Some aldermen are reportedly putting together an alternative proposal.

Jitu Brown, an elected school board member representing District 5A on the West Side, urged Chicago aldermen to vote in favor of Johnson’s proposed budget.

“The status quo is starving a school like Douglass, to where it goes from a school with 600 children, a thriving middle school to a school with only 35 children,” Brown said at the rally. “The status quo is getting rid of all the [career and technical education] programs that used to be in places like Austin and Dunbar and leaving those schools as shells of their former selves.”

Wallace Wilbourn Jr., a teacher at Oscar DePriest Elementary School on the West Side, said if the city’s budget is not approved, school staff could be cut and taxes could go up.

“A no vote on the mayor’s budget will support higher taxes and fees on us, the working people, and cuts to our schools and the services our families rely on,” Wilbourn Jr. said.

Several board members who spoke said there would be cuts at specific schools if Johnson’s proposed budget doesn’t pass. Their comments were based on calculations done by the Chicago Teachers Union.

But city budget officials have said the $552 million for CPS that would come from a surplus of special taxing dollars, known as TIF, are not allocated per school. They are provided to CPS by law as one amount that the school board would decide how to spend.

A spokesperson for the mayor said Tuesday the amount of the TIF surplus “is one of the least controversial parts of the budget.” If the mayor’s $1 billion surplus proposal is approved, the city would also get $223 million in revenue from those special taxing districts.

Depending on the final amount of TIF surplus approved, the district could likely maintain its current budget and avoid midyear cuts. The Chicago Board of Education approved a $10.2 billion budget for the 2025-26 school year in August with an assumption that it will get at least $379 million from the city. The City of Chicago’s budget is separate and operates on a calendar year from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 2026.

After Johnson put forward his budget proposal, the Board of Education approved an agreement that said it would use additional TIF surplus funds to reimburse the City of Chicago for certain pension costs the city covers that became the center of heated debate this year.

This story was updated to include comment from a mayoral spokesperson.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Samantha Smylie is the state education reporter for Chalkbeat Chicago covering school districts across the state, legislation, special education and the state board of education. Contact Samantha at ssmylie@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board’s CEO search is in a holding pattern

2025-11-25T22:52:19+00:00

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Earlier this month, after Chicago’s school board appeared to have two finalists for the next CEO of Chicago Public Schools, the board was poised to hire a new leader by the end of the year.

Now, it’s unclear which finalists remain and when the district will have a new CEO.

On Tuesday, appointed school board member Michilla Blaise said that the board is “reconsidering the process.” But elected board member Jessica Biggs, who is helping lead the board search committee, said they are rescheduling finalist interviews.

This comes a week after Mayor Brandon Johnson told reporters he was under the impression that “people can still apply if they want” to lead the nation’s fourth largest school system.

Chicago is looking to replace former CEO Pedro Martinez, who was fired without cause and left the district in June. Board members had promised a transparent search process that includes public feedback, but in recent weeks many have declined to comment on where the search stands.

Elected board member Jitu Brown, who represents the West Side, nodded in agreement with Blaise’s comment at the end of an unrelated press conference. Both said they couldn’t share more information because they signed nondisclosure agreements.

“We will have updates,” Brown told reporters.

Biggs declined to share a timeline for when rescheduled interviews could happen.

Two weeks ago, board members appeared to settle on two finalists: former New York City schools chancellor Meisha Porter and current Denver superintendent Alex Marrero, who later said in a statement that he was committed to Denver Public Schools. Sources said they would face final interviews with the mayor, the board, and a community panel during the week of Nov. 10. On Tuesday, Biggs said finalists were not interviewed at that time because of a need to reschedule; she declined to confirm who the finalists were or how many remain.

At one point, the board had scheduled three special meetings for that week. Two were canceled and one adjourned after about an hour.

Multiple board members have declined to comment on what happened or was discussed during the closed session that day, citing their NDAs.

“The board is working on recalibrating and deciding how to move forward together,” Biggs said.

Last week, the head of Alma Advisory Group, the search firm hired to help the board find a new leader, said she did not have a search status update. Alma did not respond to a request for comment Tuesday.

The board’s search process began in the spring with community meetings and surveys collecting feedback from the public about what it wanted to see in a new schools chief. The board also passed a resolution requiring the future CEO to have a superintendent’s license.

Board members began interviewing candidates this fall and planned to have a new leader in place by the end of this year, but also said finalist names would not be made public so as not to jeopardize their current jobs.

But when the Chicago Sun-Times and WBEZ reported earlier this month that the board had narrowed its choices to two unnamed finalists, some local organizations pushed back. The Chicago Teachers Union, a close ally of the mayor’s, criticized the board for not naming the finalists publicly and asserted in a letter to the board president that state law still gives the mayor the power to choose the CEO, an opinion shared by one of the state senators who created the elected school board law. But legal experts told Chalkbeat the law is not written clearly.

A group of West Side organizations, including the West Side branch of the NAACP, have pushed to keep interim CPS CEO Macquline King in the role and expressed disappointment when she was not reportedly one of the finalists.

A spokesperson for the mayor said Tuesday he was planning to meet with finalists in early November, but after finalist names leaked, the process was paused.

Last Monday, the mayor said he believed there was still a lot of interest in the job.

“I know there are a number of people who would love to be able to serve this city, particularly the time in which you know, again, my budget is putting forth the largest single investment in our public schools in the history of Chicago,” Johnson said. “So there’s a reason why a lot of folks want this position, because they’re going to have a mayor who believes in public education.”

He added that the next leader of CPS will need to transition the school system into “complete autonomy” after the school board becomes fully elected in 2027 and oversee “gradual weaning off of its dependency and its reliance upon the city of Chicago.”

This story has been updated to include comment from a mayoral spokesperson.

Becky Vevea and Mila Koumpilova contributed reporting.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago parents make custody plans amid stepped-up federal immigration enforcement

2025-11-21T18:33:07+00:00

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Last month, the day after a Chicago student’s father was detained by federal immigration agents, the girl’s aunt drove to her school with short-term guardianship papers in hand.

The girl’s father had worried about what would happen to his daughter if he was picked up by federal agents, according to the school’s principal, who requested anonymity because she was not authorized to speak with the press and did not want to make her school a target for federal law enforcement.

Like a growing number of immigrant parents in Chicago, he had the papers drawn up as a precaution.

Those documents gave the aunt temporary custody of the student and allowed the school to release her to the aunt during dismissal that day, the principal said.

The principal, whose school is located in a neighborhood with a high percentage of immigrant families, also said the guardianship papers allowed for a smoother process to transfer the child to a different school near the aunt’s home.

“The dad did what he was supposed to do,” she said.

As federal immigration enforcement in Chicago has intensified and resulted in more than 3,300 arrests over the past several months, parents in the city’s immigrant communities have grappled with the fear of what happens to their children if they are detained.

Chicago Public Schools has encouraged parents to set up caretaking plans for their children in their absence. Several community-based organizations and attorneys advise parents to set up short-term guardianships, which transfer temporary custody of their children to a trusted person after a specific event, such as federal detention.

In a statement, CPS spokesperson Sylvia Barragan said the sudden loss of parents is “highly unique and school and District leaders respond to each situation on a case-by-case basis in an effort to provide as much support as possible for impacted students and families.”

At minimum, families should identify someone they trust with their children in their absence, said Rebekah Rashidfarokhi, director of guardianship and immigration programs for children at Chicago Volunteer Legal Services, a legal aid group for low-income families.

“I always tell people, it’s more important and necessary that they talk to people about what their plan is,” she said.

CPS has long required families to submit emergency contact information in case, for example, parents don’t show up for pickup.

Since President Donald Trump took office for the second time and stepped up immigration enforcement, CPS began encouraging parents to create “family plans” that outline child care plans in their absence and give a trusted person access to important documents.

Typically, if no one comes to pick up a child from school, staff will call emergency contacts. Staff may also check enrollment paperwork or short-term guardianship papers to find others who may have the authority to “make decisions for the student,” a CPS spokesperson said.

If the school cannot get in touch with emergency contacts or people listed on other paperwork, principals are instructed to contact the CPS Student Safety Center, a 24/7 office that handles safety issues or emergencies, the district said.

Asked about situations where a child is in someone else’s care without an official plan in place, CPS referred Chalkbeat to Illinois State Board of Education guidance, which says districts “cannot require adult caretakers or relatives with whom a child lives to establish legal guardianship as a condition for gaining access to the district’s schools” but can require “reasonable reassurance” that the new caretaker will accept responsibility of the child. This can be done through a letter or affidavit, the guidance said.

The principal of the school where the child’s father was recently detained has experienced what happens when there’s no written record of who should be caring for a child. A few years ago, she said, an unaccompanied child from Central America arrived at the principal’s school with an aunt who lives nearby. At first, school staff wasn’t sure whether they could let the aunt make decisions for the student.

The staff eventually called the child’s mother, who was in the child’s home country and confirmed that she sent her child to live with the aunt, the principal said.

Staff wanted to be careful, but they also felt uncomfortable asking for additional legal custody paperwork, she noted. CPS policy and state guidance say schools shouldn’t ask for immigration status or related documents.

“What do you do? You gotta help this family,” the principal said.

Some parents worry that without a custody plan in place, child welfare officials will step in and place their children into foster care. That’s not necessarily true, according to the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services.

DCFS gets involved only “if there is no safe caregiver available or if there are credible concerns of abuse or neglect,” said Deborah Lopez, associate deputy director of communications for DCFS. As of last month, the agency had not placed any children in foster care whose guardians were detained by federal immigration agents, Lopez said.

Even informal child care plans “should be followed,” and DCFS “does not need to be notified about the arrangement,” the agency says. The agency considers it appropriate for the child to stay with a trusted relative, family friend, or neighbor so long as the child is safe, Lopez said.

If there’s no caregiver and no care plan in place, DCFS can be contacted through the Child Abuse and Neglect Hotline, at 1-800-252-2873, Lopez said.

Still, attorneys, organizations, and DCFS have encouraged families to establish short-term guardianships, which are free to create and give a trusted person temporary custody of their children after a “triggering event,” such as being arrested or having health issues.

Rashidfarokhi, the attorney from Chicago Volunteer Legal Services, said she would rarely receive a request for help with short-term guardianships, regardless of who was in the White House. But requests have skyrocketed this year.

“Demand for these has increased exponentially, dramatically, to the point where I’m getting many requests a day,” Rashidforakhi said.

The agreements can last for up to a year unless otherwise specified, she said.

The principal at the school where the girl’s father was detained said soon after the federal government announced its Chicago deportation campaign — known as Operation Midway Blitz — in September, at least 150 families called or emailed the school to share additional emergency contacts or share temporary custody plans.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Meet the Chicago moms helping their school communities amid immigration enforcement

2025-11-17T11:00:00+00:00

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In the last two years, Cristina, the mother of two middle schoolers on Chicago’s Southwest Side, moved to the city and joined the parent mentor team at her children’s school.

That role gives Cristina and other parent mentors a front-row seat to the needs of students and families. This year, it also put them face-to-face with an unexpected crisis: the impact of the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement push targeting Chicago.

Over the last two months, armed, masked agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Border Patrol, and other federal agencies have fanned out across neighborhoods, rousting people as they worked or slept — sometimes detaining U.S. citizens — and fueling dread among the city’s immigrants.

The anxiety has spilled into schools. Recently, Cristina said, she walked into a classroom that is usually filled but saw many empty seats.

“Because they just have not been coming in,” said Cristina, one of seven moms who work on parent mentor teams and talked to Chalkbeat on the condition that their full names not be used out of fear that federal agents might target them or people they support.

The moms, who joined the parent mentor program through a community organizing group, are part-time workers and volunteers; some work one-on-one with students during the week and others provide support to those volunteers. Since the stepped-up immigration enforcement campaign began, they’ve noticed fewer kids coming to school and parents worried about bringing them. They’ve heard from families afraid to leave home.

Even as these moms, many of whom are immigrants themselves, plugged away at their work in schools, they felt called to take on new responsibilities to help their neighbors feel safer.

One of the moms, Mary, helped spark the idea for a food drive at her school. Another has joined a grassroots rapid response team that is supposed to watch for federal immigration enforcement activity, including around schools. A third is giving kids rides to school. All have shared information with families about legal rights for people of varying immigration statuses across the community.

“I told my kids, ‘Look for the helpers,’ and normally you think that would be policemen, firemen — it’s not them. It’s us,” said Krystal, another parent mentor worker. “It’s the women on the street who are blowing the whistle. It’s the principal standing out front trying to make sure everyone gets picked up correctly and no one gets taken.”

How immigration enforcement is affecting Chicago schools

On the Southwest Side, signs of the immigration crackdown are everywhere. Federal agents took over a parking lot across from Back of the Yards High School, sprayed tear gas into crowds, and clashed with protesters, including an incident during which local elected officials said they detained students from Juarez High School.

In other parts of the city, agents have released tear gas near a Logan Square elementary school and during a Halloween parade and detained a day care teacher at a private child care facility. She was later released after a federal judge said her detention without bond was illegal.

The fear is palpable, the mothers who spoke to Chalkbeat said, and it feels like people are often targeted because of the color of their skin, regardless of immigration status or criminal background.

The specter of immigration enforcement activity in Chicago permeates social media and is present in conversations at school and work. The arrests of street vendors is particularly jarring in their culture, the mothers said, because it feels like agents are “attacking the weakest of us all.”

And it’s having a deep impact on children and schools, they said.

Several said they have reduced their daily routines, focusing only on getting to and from school or work. Some are afraid of dropping kids off to school. Teachers are helping give rides, and sometimes students wait for hours to get a ride home, some of the mothers said.

Attendance at CPS schools dropped after the immigration blitz was announced Sept. 8, a Chalkbeat analysis of student-level attendance data found.

Several of the mothers who talked to Chalkbeat described their own children who are CPS students growing more anxious about parents leaving home. Two said their children’s grades are dropping. A recent study of a school district in Florida linked a modest dip in spring test scores with Trump’s increased immigration enforcement policies.

When Mary tells her teenage daughter that she’s leaving home or attending a meeting, “she’s like, ‘Mom, no, don’t go, don’t go,’ or she’s sending messages [saying] ‘Where you are? What time you’re gonna come back?’”

At school, Mary said the presence of nearby trucks with blacked-out windows can spark panic among educators and families that federal agents are outside.

Another mother, who asked to be identified as Ms. Hernandez, said before this year, her son was interested in dance and theater and was known as a “politician” because he would talk to anyone. Since immigration enforcement has ratcheted up, he’s become more anxious, focused more on videos of federal agent activity on social media and keeping indoors.

The 14-year-old has started carrying a stuffed toy with him when he walks to “calm himself down,” she said.

Parent workers step up to help amid fears

The immigration crackdown has created a difficult balancing act for the moms in the parent mentor group, who are focused both on more stressful situations in their school roles and helping to protect neighbors.

That might mean helping guide other parent volunteers during the school day, then rushing out to the scene of a rumored ICE raid as part of a “rapid response team.”

Many Chicago communities, including those in wealthier, whiter communities, have set up daily watches for federal agents outside of schools, confronting agents when they pull people off landscaping jobs or in businesses or blowing orange whistles to alert neighborhoods about ICE activity. Involved parents are openly starting GoFundMe pages or gathering support for families whose relatives have been detained by federal law enforcement.

But on the Southwest Side, where so many people fear making themselves or their relatives targets, it can be difficult to get lots of people involved, the moms said.

At Cristina’s school, an organization passed out Know Your Rights cards and offered whistles during parent-teacher conferences. Many parents didn’t show up, and many of those who did did not want to grab whistles because they worried if they’d be “putting myself and my family in danger” by pushing back on federal agents, Cristina said.

Other times it’s hard to get families to open up and ask for help because they don’t want to draw attention to themselves or simply because they’re not used to relying on others, the mentors said.

“We got each other, but we’re also scared,” Krystal said. “We’re very, very scared.”

Still, the mentors have been checking in with the parents at their schools. They said they feel proud of what they and many others have done across the Southwest Side to help families feel safe: Preparing meals, giving people rides, sharing information.

Cristina created a binder full of information to share among families at different schools in the area, including on legal rights for people of various immigration statuses and family emergency plans if parents are detained. She’s encouraged the other moms to share whatever they feel is important for their school communities. Every mom said she distributed the information to parent volunteers and families in their schools.

Mary was getting grocery requests from mothers of young children. One of them said she didn’t want to leave home “because if they take me, what are they going to do with my kids?” Mary recalled.

She relayed those requests to a teacher at her school, who was also hearing from students that their families were in need of help with groceries. Together they came up with the idea of collecting donations for school families, she said.

Hernandez is part of a rapid response team. Last month, another mother’s daughter said she saw someone waiting for a bus detained by federal agents outside her home. That mother alerted Hernandez, who then informed her fellow team members. The team drove around the immediate area and nearby schools to see if any agents were nearby.

Sometimes, Hernandez is the one who checks for ICE agents when their team receives a report, she said. They recently received an alert of a local bread vendor getting picked up by agents; the woman was gone before the rapid response team arrived, Hernandez said. They couldn’t figure out her name, making it nearly impossible to figure out where she’s being held or how to help her.

When Hernandez meets with parent volunteers or goes home to her own family, “we have to put on our strong face,” she said.

But the work can take a toll. Sometimes when she gets back in her car after going to school, she’ll take a moment to cry. Then it’s time for the next task.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Former NYC schools chief a finalist for Chicago schools CEO

2025-11-07T21:26:42+00:00

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A former New York City schools chief is one of the two finalists for the job of Chicago Public Schools’ next CEO, according to three sources with direct knowledge of the situation.

Meisha Ross Porter, who led New York City Public Schools in 2021, will interview with Chicago Board of Education members, a community panel, and the mayor next week.

Chicago’s selection will mark the first time its new 21-member school board chooses a new leader for the nation’s fourth largest school district. Earlier this week, WBEZ/Chicago Sun-Times reported that the current interim CEO Macquline King was no longer in the running for the top job. Chalkbeat could not confirm the identity of the other finalist. Late Friday, the outlet also reported Denver Public Schools Superintendent Alex Marrero was a finalist. Marrero told Chalkbeat in a statement Friday that “my dedication remains firmly with Denver Public Schools where I am proud to continue serving as superintendent.”

Porter spent more than two decades working in New York City’s public schools, rising up the ranks as a teacher, principal, and high-level administrator. She ultimately became the first Black woman to lead the nation’s largest school system in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic after her predecessor abruptly stepped down.

She only spent 10 months at the helm of New York City’s public schools, appointed in March 2021 and replaced when Mayor Bill de Blasio left office at the end of the year.

In her short tenure, Porter oversaw two sweeping but late-breaking policy pushes under de Blasio that were subsequently scrapped by Mayor Eric Adams: a plan to eliminate separate gifted and talented classes and a $200 million proposed universal curriculum.

Porter is widely respected by many education leaders in New York and has also been floated as a possible schools chief for incoming Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Mamdani has said he is also considering current Chancellor Melissa Aviles-Ramos for the role.

Porter did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Neither Chicago Board of Education President Sean Harden nor the school board’s chief of staff returned requests for comment.

After leaving her post as New York City’s schools chief, Porter became the president and CEO of the Bronx Community Foundation. The foundation was set up to help finance other local nonprofits, but was in turmoil during her time there. It failed to distribute most of the money it raised from 2019 to 2023 and spent more on consultants and overhead than charitable giving, according to an investigation by the news organization New York Focus. In 2024, the organization’s board of directors fired Porter.

More recently, Porter has served as a visiting senior fellow at the Center for Educational Innovation, an organization that works with school leaders and families, according to her LinkedIn profile.

The Chicago Board of Education is scheduled to meet Monday for a special meeting during which they plan to interview the two finalists in person, WBEZ/Chicago Sun-Times reported this week. The board plans to reconvene later in the week to make a final pick and the full 21-member board could then vote on a final contract with the new leader at a meeting scheduled for Dec. 3.

Chicago began its process to find a new leader in March, hiring the search firm Alma Advisory Group, an executive search firm known for its work helping school boards hire superintendents.

The previous CPS CEO Pedro Martinez was fired without cause in late December 2024, but remained at the helm of the district until late June. Martinez, who made about $360,000 annually as head of CPS, clashed with Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former teachers union organizer, over how to handle the district’s finances. The tensions at one point led to Johnson’s entire seven-member appointed board resigning en masse.

For the past 30 years under mayoral control, CPS’s leader has been chosen by the city’s mayor.

Earlier this year, a key lawmaker who helped pave the way for an elected school board raised the possibility that the mayor should still get the final say on who runs CPS. Legal experts and local officials disagree on whether that is still the case and the language in state law is murky.

Nevertheless, Johnson is expected to interview both finalists next week, according to a source close to the search process. He also maintains significant influence over the school board given that 11 of 21 members are his appointees.

Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates criticized the secrecy surrounding the finalists and the “hand-picked panel” of community members being asked for input, calling it “a fundamental failure of the democratic values this new process was meant to uphold.”

“Black and Brown students and their families will bear the brunt of this decision,” Davis Gates said. “Their voices must be at the center of this process, not excluded from it.”

But in a letter sent to the school board president late Friday night, Davis Gates said “the authority to appoint the CPS CEO resides with the Mayor of the City of Chicago” and argued that the board’s “apparent belief that it is empowered” to pick the district’s next leader is against state law.

Dwayne Truss, a member of the West Side branch of the NAACP, said the group is upset that interim CEO King has been eliminated as a finalist.

Truss, a former member of the Board of Education, said the current board should be prioritizing a local candidate. He pointed to former “outsider” CEOs, including Barbara Byrd-Bennett, who was convicted of receiving bribes during her time at Chicago Public Schools, as failing to be successful.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Alex Zimmerman is a reporter for Chalkbeat New York, covering NYC public schools. Contact Alex at azimmerman@chalkbeat.org.

Michael Elsen-Rooney is a reporter for Chalkbeat New York, covering NYC public schools. Contact Michael at melsen-rooney@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board votes to keep ChiArts open, close EPIC Academy

2025-11-05T00:08:46+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education voted Tuesday to end agreements with independent operators of two high schools after those operators decided they could no longer run the campuses.

The school board decided to keep Chicago High School for the Arts, or ChiArts, an integrated arts high school serving 559 students who had to apply and audition, open as a district-run school and provide $1.5 million for the transition. The contract school is known for its arts conservatory, which has special departments for creative writing, dance, music, theater, and visual arts.

After a contentious debate at a special meeting, the board also voted to wind down EPIC Academy, a charter school in South Chicago with 244 mostly Black students enrolled and provide the school with $1.4 million to stay afloat through the end of the school year. EPIC’s operators previously said they faced closure in the middle of this school year if they couldn’t find additional funding.

For ChiArts, several students, teachers, and parents who spoke to board members Tuesday demanded the board maintain the school’s arts “conservatory” and keep its teachers and “teaching artists” intact.

“You hold the livelihoods of more than 60 arts teachers, you hold the sanctuary of over 600 art students run toward in a world that frequently tells us we aren’t necessary,” said Maya Davis, a senior at ChiArts who said the school has helped her flourish as a young actress. “Let it be the haven I’ve experienced it to be.”

The debate around EPIC’s future began last week at the board’s regular monthly meeting for October. That’s when elected board member Jitu Brown introduced an amendment attempting to keep EPIC’s students and staff together at a high-performing school next year. But a vote was delayed to Tuesday after district officials raised concerns about the tight timeline for producing a plan and other board members asked for the district’s general counsel to review it.

Ultimately, the board voted to require the district to offer enrollment to students at a district-run school, as well as job opportunities for “qualified” EPIC staff at receiving schools. An amendment to Brown’s amendment removed the term “high-performing.”

“I can support it if this would get us to a resolution,” Brown said. “But historically, 88% of the people that have been impacted by school closings have been Black students. The overwhelming majority of those students did not go to a better school.”

Past research from the University of Chicago found that not only did the city’s school closings disproportionately impact Black children, but most of those students did not go to better performing schools.

“How do we make sure a child doesn’t go from one school that’s closing its doors in the middle of the night, then they end up at a school that’s going to be in discussions for school closings the next year?” Brown said. “This has happened over and over and over and over again, and this is the concern. Now if that’s acceptable, then say that.”

Elected school board member Che “Rhymefest” Smith, whose district includes EPIC Academy, said he doesn’t want to limit parents’ options.

“Parents choose different schools for different reasons,” Smith said. “What one person may consider high-performing may be subjective to another person. I speak with parents who send their children to a school because it’s the safest school in the district for their kid to go to, even though another school may have better academics.”

Some board members echoed concerns raised by the principals union about hiring autonomy. Other board members said the language merely offers opportunities for teachers to apply and doesn’t require principals to hire them.

During the meeting, appointed board member Debby Pope added an amendment — later approved by the board — that commits CPS to preserving ChiArts’ conservatory “to the greatest extent practicable” and look for other ways to financially support the school’s model going forward, including through partnerships with other groups. It committed board members to reconvene on the issue of funding to support ChiArts transition to a district-run school by its January board meeting, after it engages with the school community.

The board spent about four hours in closed session where it planned to discuss interviews it had conducted with candidates for CPS’ next CEO and decide on a list of finalists, Jessica Biggs, an elected board member helping to lead the district’s CEO search committee, told Chalkbeat before the meeting.

Becky Vevea and Mila Koumpilova contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Attendance drops at Chicago schools in communities with increased immigration enforcement

2025-10-31T20:19:47+00:00

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At Mather High School in Chicago’s West Ridge neighborhood, music teacher Eriq Vazquez said as many as 10 of his students have told him they were staying home because of Operation Midway Blitz — the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in the city.

Some students said they’re afraid of being picked up by masked U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, agents, he said. Others are babysitting younger siblings who are being kept home or are working extra shifts because their parents, who are undocumented, fear going to work.

In the four weeks since the start of the high-profile immigration operation, attendance at the 1,662-student school dropped by 4 percentage points — nearly three times the attendance drop citywide, according to data obtained by Chalkbeat through an open records request.

Similar attendance declines are playing out in other immigrant and Latino enclaves around the city, data show. Many families are scared of going to school as they curtail activities like grocery shopping or going to restaurants to avoid being detained by federal agents, according to nearly 20 interviews with parents, educators, public officials, and community organizers.

“It’s generated a great level of fear within families,” said Jeff Bartow, executive director of the Southwest Organizing Project, a community-based organization that operates parent mentor programs in 19 CPS schools.

“Do I take my child to and from school, or do I find someone else they can walk with?” he said, describing the questions he’s heard from parents. “When do I come, when do I go? ”

The fear of immigration enforcement is especially intense during school dropoff or pickup, with multiple people comparing it to the anxiety of leaving home during the COVID-19 pandemic. School staff and district officials are trying to calm fears and make sure immigrant students don’t fall behind. But there are signs that many students — like those in Vasquez’s class at Mather — are staying home.

During the first month of school this year, student attendance across all CPS schools was about the same as it was last year, according to data Chalkbeat obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request and analyzed.

But in the second month, after the Sept. 8 announcement of the immigration sweeps, attendance rates dropped by 1.25 percentage point — more than double the drop in attendance between the first and second month of school the last two years, according to Chalkbeat’s analysis.

What’s more: 38 of Chicago’s 77 official communities saw attendance drop more sharply than the district; about 40% of those are home to large immigrant or Latino populations.

CPS officials said the attendance rate among English language learners, many of whom are immigrants, also dropped by 1.3 percentage points during the first nine weeks of this school year compared to the same period last year.

The immigration crackdown in Chicago has garnered headlines across the country for federal agents’ aggressive tactics and military-like scenes playing out in residential neighborhoods. U.S. Border Patrol Chief Greg Bovino has drawn scrutiny from a federal judge over tear-gas usage and told WBEZ some of the agency’s arrestees were targeted, in part, based on “how they look.”

Some students have protested against ICE. And a few immigration enforcement actions involved young people, including two high schoolers being detained and released by federal immigration agents last week, according to local elected officials.

Other U.S. school districts are reporting attendance drops coinciding with Trump’s second term and more aggressive immigration enforcement. A recent Brown University study found “significant” drops in average monthly attendance and increases in chronic absenteeism among Connecticut’s English learners since Trump’s inauguration in January. A Stanford University study found an average 22% increase in student absences after the inauguration in a California region with many Latin American immigrants.

Asked to respond to criticism of ICE agents and the idea that their presence could impact student attendance, an ICE spokesperson said, “The reality is simple: if you are not breaking the law, you have nothing to fear. If you are, the responsible choice is to self-deport rather than continue placing your children in harm’s way and disregarding their well-being.”

Several Chicago Board of Education members are advocating for a remote learning option in response to worries about student attendance, which CPS has so far declined to do.

Vazquez said he tells students that school is the safest place to be and has sometimes suggested they make a plan, such as walking to Mather with a friend.

“I haven’t come up with anything that can totally stomp out those fears,” said Vazquez, the music teacher. “I’m not a parent, but maybe if I was, I would be thinking twice about sending my kid to school, especially if they had my skin color.”

Several Latino communities saw school attendance drop more sharply after Operation Midway Blitz started

Of the 38 communities seeing bigger attendance drops than the rest of the district after Operation Midway Blitz was announced, include Belmont Cragin, Albany Park, Pilsen, Little Village, and Back of the Yards — all places where ICE activity has been reported.

Many of the immigrant and Latino communities that saw drops in attendance during the second month of school this year also saw attendance decrease during the same period last year. Just three saw attendance drop by as much as they did this year.

The absences raise fresh concerns about student learning and mental health, especially for English learners, who on average perform behind their peers academically.

Mary Ann Fergus, a spokesperson for CPS, said the district told school staff and principals in September that they can allow excused absences for “circumstances that cause reasonable concern for a student’s mental, emotional, or physical well-being.”

Under this policy, students can make up missed work, and “teachers are instructed not to penalize students for excused absences related to these concerns,” Fergus said.

Chicago schools encourage attendance for immigrant students but acknowledge fears

Alejandra, a mother of three kids in Pilsen who asked that her full name and immigration status be concealed out of fear of being targeted by federal agents, has lived in the U.S. for 18 years, most of that in Pilsen, one of the city’s Latino strongholds.

Pilsen is in a community area that saw attendance drop by slightly more than the drop citywide after Operation Midway Blitz began. Alejandra said she already pulled her kids out of outdoor sports in the fall fearing potential run-ins with ICE agents. She and other neighborhood parents she knows are hesitant to send their kids to school, she said through a Spanish translator.

Alejandra’s children are U.S. citizens, but she said she’s still worried given reports of citizens being detained. Her teenage daughter goes to school and an internship by herself.

“My fear is that one day my daughter doesn’t come home,” she said through tears.

About 10 miles northwest, in Chicago’s Belmont Cragin neighborhood, the attendance rate at Henry Lloyd Elementary School, which is usually stable this time of year, dropped by nearly two percentage points during the second month of school – after immigration enforcement ramped up – compared to the first, data show.

Residents and community groups have reported seeing ICE agents on the Northwest Side since Operation Midway Blitz began, including at a Home Depot in Belmont Cragin, an area that saw the attendance drops larger than schools citywide.

Laurel Salgado, Lloyd’s principal, said he had heard about ICE activity about one-and-a-half blocks away from the school. The possibility of encounters with ICE is scaring parents, he said.

One mother told Salgado that relatives or neighbors help her with tasks that require leaving her home, such as grocery shopping. Salgado explained that it’s important for her kids to attend school. She responded, “‘You don’t understand my situation … because you’re not undocumented,’” Salgado recalled.

Some parents and teachers push for virtual learning, but CPS is hesitant

Salgado, who just celebrated securing a Spanish dual language program at Lloyd, is exploring ways to encourage fearful parents to send their kids to school, such as sending staff to help pick up or drop off students.

“We don’t want kids to fall behind,” Salgado said.

Alejandra, the mom from Pilsen, said she planned to ask CPS for a remote learning option so that kids can receive instruction from home and not get marked absent if their parents are fearful of taking them. Other parents and some school board members have called for the same.

The Chicago Teachers Union, which has advocated against aggressive immigration enforcement, has asked the district to open more seats in its Virtual Academy.

In a statement to reporters, the district said the Virtual Academy serves about 500 students who have specific medical needs and provides nearly 3,000 others with part-time accelerated courses, such as algebra.

“While CPS can explore expanding this model in the future, it would not effectively meet the needs of English Learners or other populations most affected by federal immigration activity,” Fergus said.

CPS would otherwise need the governor to declare an emergency, similar to the pandemic, to allow a remote learning option for other students, Fergus said. She added that remote learning “brought real challenges for our students — from learning loss to increased feelings of isolation and stress” during the pandemic.

In Chicago’s historically Mexican-American neighborhood of Little Village, mom Ana Espitia asked her son recently if any of his classmates have been absent. The kids he named were mostly newcomer immigrants, she said.

Espitia hopes to create a “walking train” at her school, where parents who feel comfortable can escort kids of parents who are afraid of being stopped by ICE.

Other schools have created their own walking trains. Many also have staff and volunteers who stand outside during arrival and pickup with whistles to alert people about possible ICE presence.

One of those schools is Mather. Over the past two months, Vazquez, the Mather music teacher, said he and more than a dozen of his colleagues have distributed information to students and families about their rights with immigration agents and volunteered their time to monitor for ICE activity during arrival and dismissal.

About a month and a half ago, two Mather students heading to school were briefly stopped by federal immigration agents as they left the shelter they live in, Vazquez said. Staff wondered if telling the school community would cause panic. But they also wondered what they could do to prevent other students from being stopped by federal agents.

The answer, Vazquez said, is “not a lot, which makes it really, really hard.”

After the incident happened, he recalled, many teachers stopped their lessons and went over “Know Your Rights” slides with their students instead.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago student, a U.S. citizen, detained for hours by federal immigration agents, alderman says

2025-10-24T00:24:41+00:00

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A junior at Benito Juarez High School in Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood was detained by federal immigration agents for several hours Thursday while at the scene of a Little Village protest, according to local elected officials.

A second Juarez student was briefly detained at the same protest and went to the school afterwards, but then went home, said Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez, who held a press conference to denounce the arrests.

Both of the students are U.S. citizens and have been released, the alderman said. The two students’ names have not been released.

“This is not even about immigration,” Sigcho-Lopez said during the press conference, which he held outside the high school. “This is about crushing dissent.” He added that the immigration agents were “terrorists coming and attacking our neighbors because of how we look.”

The arrests came on the same day some Chicago school board members called on CPS to provide virtual learning due to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency’s aggressive presence in the city. But CPS says it cannot offer such an option unless the Gov. JB Pritzker declares a state of emergency.

Intensifying federal immigration arrests and activity in Chicago over the past month have affected school age children and their families. School staffers have reported ICE activity near schools, including the deployment of tear gas, prompting an outcry from the mayor and local leaders. Some families, staff, and elected officials say they’ve heard that attendance has dropped at some schools due to fears of ICE enforcement during pickup and dropoff.

Data obtained by Chalkbeat shows attendance from the first month of school was the same across the city as the same time period last year, at about 92%. But more neighborhoods are seeing attendance dip compared with last year, including neighborhoods that are heavily Hispanic and have many immigrants. The district has not yet provided data for the second month of school, when ICE activity grew more intense.

Community organizations as well as elected officials have also organized school patrols to track ICE activity and report it to families.

The arrests apparently happened at the scene of a protest against federal immigration enforcement in Little Village, a heavily Mexican and immigrant neighborhood, near 27th and Whipple streets, where immigration agents carried out arrests Wednesday, according to Sigcho-Lopez and his staffer.

U.S. Border Patrol agents were accused of deploying tear gas at the Thursday morning protest in violation of a federal judge’s order, the Tribune reported, which also reported that a 16-year-old Juarez student was arrested at the scene.

A video taken by a staffer for Sigcho-Lopez shows U.S. Border Patrol agents arresting a person whom the staffer identified as one of the two Juarez students detained by federal agents.

A spokesperson for U.S. Customs and Border Protection did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Tanya Roman, a spokesperson for ICE, which is a separate agency, said ICE agents were not involved.

CPS did not comment. But a district spokesperson forwarded a letter to reporters from Juarez’s principal, Juan Carlos Ocon, who said that “a member of our school community was impacted” by nearby federal enforcement activity, and that the incident did not happen on school grounds. Ocon’s statement did not mention a second student being detained.

It’s unclear what time Thursday morning the arrests happened, but the video shot by Sigcho-Lopez’s staff was taken at around 10 a.m., according to a time stamp. Sigcho-Lopez said the students were on their way to school, and his staffer said it’s possible the kids stopped to participate in the protest.

A separate Instagram video circulating online shows multiple federal agents firing objects toward a crowd of people in an unknown location, then pulling a young person to the ground and handcuffing him. The Instagram account identified the person as a Juarez student. The person taking the video repeatedly yelled at the agents and said, “He’s a kid!” Later, the person asked, “What are y’all arresting him for? What did he do?”

A total of four Juarez students were at the scene of the protest, and two who were not arrested went to school afterwards, Sigcho-Lopez said.

In his email, Ocon wrote the school has mental health resources available for students, and reminded families that schools do not allow federal agents to enter school without a criminal warrant signed by a federal judge.

“I know this situation has created many fears and concerns in our community, and I want to emphasize that we are taking this situation extremely seriously,” Ocon wrote.

Juarez teacher Mary Winfield said one of the arrested students is a junior who is committed to his school work. While he was not arrested on school grounds, the experience will traumatize the student and spread “through the school community,” she said.

“Students share photos, students share texts, they talk, they know what’s going on,” Winfield said. “It impacts their lives, filling them with stress and it makes my job harder … it makes learning nearly impossible.”

Multiple elected officials, including two school board members, denounced the arrests and broader immigration enforcement at Thursday’s press conference.

Emma Lozano, an appointed member of the Chicago Board of Education who represents the Pilsen neighborhood where Juarez is located, said she wants to see local and state authorities arrest federal immigration agents for what she described as unlawful enforcement activity.

“There is no due process,” Lozano said. “We have U.S. citizens being picked up, we have minors being picked up, so this is absolutely wrong.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

HSAT technical issues impact 1,000 Chicago students

2025-10-22T18:21:55+00:00

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At least 1,000 Chicago Public Schools students experienced technical problems while taking the High School Admissions Test earlier this month, with some unable to finish the exams or receive accommodations.

CPS said the affected students included those with disabilities and English learners who are entitled to testing accommodations such as more time. The computer-based HSAT platform primarily had a problem providing students at some schools with more time or the ability to pause the test, according to a district spokesperson.

All CPS eighth grade students take the HSAT during the school day. There are just under 23,000 eighth graders, though it’s unclear how many were present for the exam on Oct. 8. The exam is required for entry into the city’s selective enrollment high schools and to enroll at some schools outside of students’ neighborhood boundaries. CPS also offers the test in a handful of other languages, which was administered to students who chose that option on Oct. 15 “without incident.”

The issue affected groups of students who are already underrepresented at the city’s 11 selective enrollment high schools. While English learners make up about 24% of students at all Chicago public high schools, an average of 4% of students at selective enrollment high schools are English learners and 9.5% of students at selective enrollment schools have disabilities, while citywide, students with disabilities make up 16.7% of all CPS high schoolers, district enrollment data show.

In 2023, technical problems with the HSAT caused the district to pause and reschedule the exam. CPS contracts with Riverside Assessments, an Itasca-based company, to administer the HSAT and other exams. The Chicago Board of Education approved a new three-year contract in July with Riverside for $2.3 million.

“The District continues to work in close collaboration with the testing vendor, school leaders, and families to address these issues and prevent future disruptions,” said Sylvia Barragan, a spokesperson for CPS, in a statement.

Attempts to reach Riverside were unsuccessful.

Students were offered a chance to retake the test Wednesday or keep their results from the original test.

One of those students is Liz Gres’ eighth grade son, who has ADHD and was supposed to get extra time on the test when he took it on Oct. 8, but didn’t. She said students like him had to “rush through” and yet, she wasn’t aware of the extent of the problem until a letter was sent home with him a week later.

CPS said it notified families of a testing issue on the day of the test, then offered the option of retesting to students two days later. Officials shared additional details on the retesting option the following week, which is when Gres’ son came home with the letter from CPS offering the retake option.

While retaking the test might be a good option for some kids, it’s not for her son, Gres said. The test — and the high school admissions process — spark a lot of stress and anxiety for many families.

“Mine automatically was like, ‘I’m not doing this again. I had to go through enough to take this one,’” Gres said, whose son attends a Southwest Side school.

Gres’ son will keep his score from earlier this month. She said they don’t know his score yet, which makes it difficult to decide if it’s worth retaking.

Regardless, Gres said her son is interested in science and engineering and wants to find a good high school match for that. He hopes to attend Lane Tech, one of the city’s most sought-after selective enrollment high schools.

“I’ve tried to manage expectations around that,” Gres said. “Even with no challenges it’s difficult to get into the selective enrollment schools and there’s plenty of other schools and other options.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools opens handful of new language programs

2025-10-16T20:14:04+00:00

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In Room 222 at Calmeca Academy of Fine Arts in Chicago’s Brighton Park neighborhood, students in a world language class on Thursday morning were learning Mandarin.

Some raised their hands when their teacher asked in Mandarin if they were stressed as several Chicago Public Schools officials and journalists observed their lesson, drawing a laugh.

In other Calmeca classrooms, kids were learning different subjects in both Spanish and English as part of the school’s dual language program.

On Thursday, CPS officials visited Calmeca — where 97% of students are Hispanic — to show off what different language programs can look like as they announced three new dual language programs and three more world language programs at schools across the city. District leaders said the expansion is part of a long-term goal to provide more language options for students and is also part of CPS’ new contract with the Chicago Teachers Union.

In a press release, district officials said they will provide “ongoing support” to the newly minted schools, including professional development. Additionally, the district’s funding formula provides a dual language coordinator to schools with such programs.

“This work empowers the way students see themselves,” said interim CPS CEO Macquline King during the event Thursday announcing the expansion. “It builds their confidence and their ability to build their literacy and fluency skills in multiple languages.”

The new dual language programs will be at Henry D. Lloyd Elementary School in Belmont Cragin, Little Village Elementary School in Little Village, and Edward E. Sadlowski Elementary School in the East Side neighborhood. World language programs will open at Edgar Allen Poe Classical Elementary School in Pullman, Louis Nettelhorst Elementary School in Lakeview, and George B. Swift Elementary Specialty School in Edgewater.

CPS has 43 other dual language programs and about 240 world language programs, according to a press release from the district.

Through its world language programs, CPS schools teach students American Sign Language, Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Polish, and Spanish, according to its website.

In dual language classes, students learn in both English and one other language. Students learning English as a new language can choose to enroll in dual language programs and learn subjects in English in addition to their native language, such as Spanish, in order to meet their needs for special language instruction they are legally entitled to. But unlike other programs specifically for English learners, dual language courses can be offered to native English speakers, too.

Many experts view dual language programming as a gold standard of teaching English to those learning it as a new language. Last March, as the city saw an influx of migrant families, then-CPS CEO Pedro Martinez said the district had planned to “hit the gas pedal” on opening new dual language programs.

CPS has historically struggled to serve students learning English as a new language in accordance with state law, which requires bilingual programming at schools when 20 or more English learners who speak the same native language enroll. Part of that challenge has been finding bilingual certified teachers, a teacher shortage area in districts across the country. The challenge grew as migrant students enrolled and began settling down in communities with schools that historically served native English speakers.

CPS officials evaluated schools interested in launching new dual and world language programs by reviewing “detailed proposals” that outlined the school’s plans and what kind of resources they needed, according to the district press release.

Laurel Salgado, principal of Lloyd Elementary School, said his school had unsuccessfully applied twice, before the pandemic, to open a dual language program. He is not sure what changed after it applied this summer, but school officials were “so excited” to be selected, he said.

Salgado said the process involves CPS interviewing school staff and families and visiting the school to make sure “to see if we have the manpower [and] the ability to become dual language.”

He said most of the school’s teachers have the right credentials to teach Spanish dual language classes. This school year, Salgado said he and his staff are in an “incubation period” where they’ll plan out the program, which will officially be offered to pre-K and kindergarten students next year. They’re meeting regularly and setting up visits to more established dual language schools.

“We’re going to be looking at different models at different schools that are dual language – some schools that are similar to our demographics – and this is so we can learn from them,” Salgado said. CPS has provided a dual language coordinator to the school, Salgado said.

At Poe, Principal Eric Dockery said all students are already getting Spanish lessons two hours each week from a new Spanish teacher who also teaches the language before and after school.

Similar to Calmeca, many of Poe’s students are being exposed to languages they’re not familiar with. In addition to mastering another language, Dockery said he wants his students, 87% of whom are Black, to “appreciate different cultures even though we don’t have a large Spanish-speaking population in our school right now, but we’re hoping that can change.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Sendhil Revuluri running for Chicago Board of Education president

2025-10-15T20:43:31+00:00

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Sendhil Revuluri, a former vice president of the Chicago Board of Education under former Mayor Lori Lightfoot, announced Wednesday that he will run for board president in next year’s election.

Revuluri, who is also an education consultant, is the first person to announce he’s running for school board president in the 2026 election, when 21 school board seats will be up for election. In last year’s inaugural school board races, 10 seats were elected; the mayor appointed people to the remaining 11 seats, including the role of board president.

The board president presides over the board and after Jan. 15, 2027, will have voting powers just like any other board member, according to state law. Currently, the president only votes to break a tie. The current board president leads meetings, discussions with board members on various issues facing the board, and helps craft meeting agendas.

Rumors have floated for months about who is considering throwing their name into the race for school board president. Candidates are not able to circulate petitions to get their names on the ballot until Feb. 24, 2026. Those running for president must collect 2,500 valid signatures from Chicago residents registered to vote in the city by May 26, 2026. All other school board members must collect between at least 500, but no more than 1,500 from who live in and are registered to vote in their district.

Revuluri said he was hopeful about the new, hybrid board when it was sworn in and has been in touch with current board members. But he decided to run after feeling like the current board focuses only a “very small fraction” of time on district goals or academics.

“What I’ve seen this year since they were seated in January has convinced me that we need different leadership,” Revuluri said in an interview with Chalkbeat. “We need leadership that’s going to focus the board on student learning and on board work, rather than getting involved in political actions and district operations, and that’s really why I’ve decided to run.”

This year, the school board has navigated a gaping budget deficit, clashes with the mayor’s office, the looming closure of several charter schools, and the searching for a new CEO.

He detailed some of his ideas for effective governance in a piece he wrote for Chalkbeat Chicago before he stepped down at the end of 2022, shortly after Mayor Brandon Johnson was elected.

Revuluri said his vision for an effective school board involves having a CEO selection and evaluation process that the board is aligned on and adopting a budget “if and only if there’s clear and compelling evidence” that it will improve student learning.

In addition to improving student achievement, Revuluri said in a press release that he wants to “stand up to special interests,” who he defined as groups that focus primarily on adult-centered needs rather than student priorities.

Asked if he was referring to organizations such as the Chicago Teachers Union and the Illinois Network of Charter Schools, who were among the biggest campaign spenders in last year’s election, Revuluri said both are among groups that “have engaged in rhetoric and advocacy that’s really put adult interest and adult comfort first.”

Revuluri served on the school board during the 2019 CTU strike and the 2022 CTU walkout over COVID safety protocols.

Asked if he would decline campaign donations from special interest groups, Revuluri said he’ll “welcome support from anyone, any people, any groups who agree” with putting “student learning first.”

Lightfoot appointed Revuluri to the Board of Education in 2019, and he served on the board as CPS navigated the coronavirus pandemic and remote instruction. From 2018 to 2022, Revuluri was the managing director for strategic development at investment firm PEAK6 Capital Management, according to his LinkedIn page and biography online.

Before that, Revuluri worked at the University of Illinois at Chicago for roughly seven years, with most of that time helping to lead the Suburban Cook County Mathematics Initiative, which was meant to improve mathematics education across 40 public school districts.

Revuluri also worked for CPS’ Office of Mathematics for one year as an instructional specialist, according to his LinkedIn page. Before that, he was the math department chair at a New York City high school in the Bronx.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

When will Chicago schools have a noncitizen advisory board?

2025-10-09T19:07:07+00:00

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As federal immigration agents ratchet up enforcement in Chicago, some advocates and parents are calling on Mayor Brandon Johnson to abide by state law and create an advisory board focused on the needs of noncitizen students and families for Chicago’s school board.

Illinois state lawmakers required the creation of a Chicago Board of Education Non-Citizen Advisory Board when it established an elected school board for the city under legislation passed in 2021. Lawmakers sought to provide the school board with an advisory panel focused, in part, on improving the outcomes and experiences of noncitizen students and sharing the perspectives of noncitizen parents, who cannot vote in school board elections. The law does not prevent U.S. citizens from serving on the advisory board.

But nearly nine months after the new school board was sworn in, the mayor has not yet established the noncitizen advisory board. State law does not specify a deadline for creating the board or how many people the mayor should choose.

“The current situation we’re living through with the heightened ICE raids in the city have proven why we need to have this advisory board — to be able to advise the school board and the CPS district on how to handle things like this,” said Jessica Cañas, chief of community engagement for Kids First Chicago, a parent advocacy group that helped push for the creation of the advisory committee.

In a statement to Chalkbeat, mayoral spokesperson Griffin Kreuger said Johnson’s office has hosted four meetings with “partners” about the establishment of the committee. He said the office is working to finalize an application for the board, including translating it into multiple languages. The office is also taking additional steps to ensure people’s safety, but did not share more details.

“Due to increased tensions driven by federal immigration enforcement the City has taken added precautions to uphold the safety of our partners,” Kreuger said.

The law doesn’t specify who should be appointed to serve on the board.

Both the noncitizen advisory board and the Black Student Achievement Committee, mandated by Illinois lawmakers in 2024, could run afoul of the Trump administration, which said it will pull $20 million in magnet school funding over multiple years for CPS, in part, because of a district plan to improve outcomes and support for Black students. The administration claims that the plan violates the civil rights of students who aren’t Black; CPS says the administration has not provided evidence of civil rights violations.

The Trump administration has also slashed funding for a federal office that focused on serving English language learners and rolled back guidance about the rights of English learners, many of whom may be noncitizens or have parents who are noncitizens.

Yesenia Lopez, an elected school board member who has been tracking how immigration enforcement is affecting schools in her district, said “it’s crucial” to create this advisory board in order for the school board to hear directly from immigrant students and their parents. But she noted the district is in a precarious position: The city is required to launch this board per state law, but it “contradicts what the federal government wants from us.”

Parents fearful amid federal immigration activity

Stepped-up raids by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, agents have put Chicago’s immigrant communities on high alert. During a school board meeting Wednesday, two parents raised concerns about immigration enforcement and said there was a need for a virtual learning option due to fears of ICE enforcement during school pickup and dropoff.

Other parents who spoke to Chalkbeat in favor of establishing the advisory board also called for the option to attend school remotely, and the teachers union previously called on the district to have a virtual learning option ready for families who want it. Asked Thursday if CPS should consider offering remote learning, Johnson said “we may have to explore and look at other ways in which we can keep people connected until we fully defeat the tyrant that is in the White House.”

Five things to know about immigration policy and Illinois schools

Board member Jitu Brown said school is the safest place for kids and it’s important for communities to be informed of their rights. But, he said board members have raised the question of remote learning to interim CPS CEO Macquline King, and that CPS shouldn’t table that possibility if that’s what many families want.

Elected officials and community organizations have launched school patrols during dropoff and pickup in certain neighborhoods to help alert families if federal agents are spotted nearby. After ICE raided a South Shore apartment building last week — an incident cited by a federal judge in a ruling that found ICE was making “warrantless arrests” in Chicago — and federal agents reportedly lobbed tear gas near a school in another incident, local elected officials and the union called for more support for immigrant students and their families.

CPS officials have emphasized that school is the safest place to be, and federal agents are not permitted in school buildings unless they have a criminal judicial warrant signed by a federal judge. District leaders have so far not offered remote learning options. Chicago schools, like many across the country, saw significant academic declines and negative impacts on student mental health between 2020 and 2022 when the COVID pandemic moved most learning online.

Advisory board should have been established sooner, some parents say

Valentina, a former CPS parent and longtime Chicago resident who is interested in joining the noncitizen advisory board, said immigrant family concerns could have been shared earlier and in a more formal way had the board been established.

“All children should have the opportunity that their parents raise their voice for equity,” Valentina, who is on the Kids First Parent Advisory Board, said through a Spanish translator. Chalkbeat is using a pseudonym for Valentina, who is not a U.S. citizen, because she is fearful of identifying herself publicly.

She added, “It doesn’t matter if the children come from a family that is a mixed family, like parents who have asylum, parents who have no status, parents who are not refugees — all children have a right to education.”

In a separate statement, Chicago Board of Education President Sean Harden said there will be updates on the application process for people interested in serving on the noncitizen advisory board in the “coming weeks.” He said the school board is committed to launching the advisory board, as well as the Black Student Success Committee and a committee focused on special education.

“The Board is making every effort to protect partners and stakeholders, and it supports the Mayor’s Office in doing so as well as they advance the work for the Non-Citizen Advisory Board,” Harden said.

Brenda Rivera, who also sits on the Kids First Parent Advisory Board, said one way to navigate those concerns is appointing both citizens and noncitizens to the board, and those who are comfortable can speak on behalf of people who are fearful of speaking publicly.

Norma Rios-Sierra, an appointed school board member who is also tracking immigration-related concerns, said she and some of her colleagues are interested in creating an “ad hoc committee” where board members can receive more information on how CPS is responding to immigration concerns and discuss other issues related to “crisis planning,” including the possibility of virtual learning.

Lopez, the elected school board member, said establishing the noncitizen advisory board right now should be done carefully in order to protect parents who are interested in it. She also wondered how the state might support Chicago if the Trump administration tries to penalize the city for establishing the committee.

“How can the state step in to provide financial support if we get more funding cut?” Lopez said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

16 quotes about being a Chicago Board of Education member

2025-10-08T10:00:00+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools is undergoing a major shift in governance. This year is the first time the Board of Education has 21 members — 10 elected and 11 appointed by the mayor.

Chalkbeat spoke to 15 current and one former board member about what it’s been like to navigate major issues, including passing a budget, hiring an interim leader, and figuring out how to be responsive to their constituents.

Over roughly 16 hours of interviews, board members shared insight into the challenges of navigating political divides, the obstacles in communicating with so many colleagues, the time commitment for this unpaid role, especially while balancing jobs and family, and other topics.

Many of those comments were included in a Sept. 17 story looking back at the new board’s first months on the job. But with the election of all 21 school board members looming in 2026, Chalkbeat wanted to share some of the insights that didn’t make it into that article. Here is more of what the board members interviewed had to say. We included audio clips from some of the interviews.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Amid ICE activity, CTU and elected officials call for community to protect students, families

2025-10-02T23:24:02+00:00

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In the wake of aggressive immigration enforcement in Chicago, some elected officials and union leaders are calling on the community to help protect immigrant students and their families.

Chicago Public Schools is also reminding families that it doesn’t collect immigration information and that parents should provide emergency contact information to schools.

The messages from CPS, the Chicago Teachers Union, and state and local elected representatives came after a mother and her children, ages 8 and 3, were detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at Millennium Park over the weekend. Their comments also come after federal agents rappelled onto an apartment building in South Shore on Tuesday, where ICE arrested more than 30 people. Many migrant families have settled in the South Side neighborhood in recent years.

Chicago Public Schools did not say whether South Shore-area schools had planned or offered additional support for their students this week after the raid.

During a press conference Thursday outside of Roosevelt High School in the immigrant-rich neighborhood of Albany Park, teachers and elected officials reported ICE activity and arrests in the neighborhood Wednesday, including near schools. A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security did not confirm whether ICE detained anyone near the school or elsewhere in the neighborhood.

“I am standing here with educators, teachers, school clerks, teachers assistants, social workers and nurses to say that again … They are not welcome to pick up parents and detain them after they drop their children off at our schools. They are not welcome in our neighborhoods to terrorize, to ask for papers,” Stacy Davis Gates, president of the CTU, told reporters.

In a Wednesday letter to CPS families, interim CPS CEO Macquline King said teachers do not ask students or families for immigration status, and CPS does not share student records with ICE or other federal representatives without a court order or consent from the student’s guardian. Her letter also reminded families that schools do not allow federal agents inside without a criminal judicial warrant signed by a federal judge.

Five things to know about immigration policy and your rights

Evelyn Gonzalez, a teacher and CTU delegate at Roosevelt, said teachers volunteered to stay late at the building Wednesday for kids who felt safer staying back.

“There were businesses offering refuge in case we needed it, and there were neighbors from our community stepping up to make sure our students were safe walking home,” Gonzalez said. “I hope that we can stand together and that we can care for each other.”

Ald. Rossana Rodriguez, whose ward includes Albany Park, said she closed her office early Wednesday so that she and staff could help monitor school dismissal. Her office and community organizers were able to gather 50 people in about two hours who would help “notify the community” in case ICE agents showed up, she said.

State Sen. Graciela Guzman told reporters that the children and mother arrested at Millennium Park have been released, and the 8-year-old girl went to school Thursday, crediting advocacy from the community. A federal judge ordered that both are protected from deportation for now, the Chicago Tribune reported.

“She went to school today and she played in her playground today,” Guzman said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Tens of thousands of students transfer within Chicago Public Schools. Are you one of them?

2025-09-26T16:10:41+00:00

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Every year, tens of thousands of Chicago Public Schools students transfer schools.

The district tracks more than a dozen reasons for why students change schools, including leaving the city, graduating, or going to a private school.

But the most common type of transfer among CPS students is going to another school in the district.

During the 2024-25 school year, more than 24,000 kids — or more than 7% of the student body — transferred within the district, according to data obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request. That number excludes 8th graders who move on to high school.

Chicago families may choose to switch schools for a range of reasons. Children may move to a different neighborhood. Parents might feel their child’s school is not a good fit. Or, in more extreme cases, students may feel unsafe in their buildings due to harassment or abuse.

No matter the reason, school transfers can mean significant change for a student, the school they’re leaving, and the new school they’re going to.

Are you or your child one of the tens of thousands of students who have transferred schools? We want to hear from you about your experience. Tell us here or in the short survey below. (We will not use your answers or your name in our reporting without your permission.)

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Editor’s Note: This article has been updated with additional information about the data provided by CPS after publication to clarify the number of transfers in a given year.

A previous version used numbers that included 8th graders who are labeled as transfers when they move on to high school. We’ve revised the numbers to exclude this cohort since there is not an option for them to remain at their existing school.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Board of Education members call for a solution to closure of EPIC Academy charter school

2025-09-25T22:20:47+00:00

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Several Chicago Board of Education members called Thursday for a solution to support students at EPIC Academy, a South Side charter high school that’s planning to close.

During a Chicago Board of Education meeting, some board members also asked for a deeper look into the district’s process for renewing contracts with charter schools, which are publicly funded but privately run institutions that operate based on legal agreements with CPS.

EPIC’s independent board voted last week to close the charter school, citing enrollment declines and financial challenges. While EPIC leaders said they planned to close the school by the end of the 2025-26 school year, they have not ruled out closure before the end of the year. The Chicago Tribune reported that school officials are in talks with CPS for financial help, but the district’s finances are tight.

In May, the school board voted to approve a two-year renewal for EPIC on the district’s recommendation.

But by July, EPIC put up for sale a building it had purchased a few years ago to do a multimillion-dollar expansion that it hoped would improve facilities for students and draw more kids to the school.

EPIC’s impending closure comes months after the board decided to save and absorb five of seven Acero charter schools that were also slated for closure.

“It is beyond disappointing to see a community once again be disrupted by an abrupt closure,” said elected board member Yesenia Lopez, who sponsored a resolution this spring to tighten oversight on charter schools. “It is clear the process needs to be revisited.”

EPIC enrolls just over 250 students, about half the number it enrolled before the pandemic. Chicago’s charter sector has seen sliding enrollment for years, as have district-run schools.

Several EPIC students expressed frustration during Thursday’s meeting with EPIC leadership’s decision to close.

Ayomide Olatunji, a 17-year-old senior at EPIC, told board members that he and his classmates have “worked tirelessly” toward graduation and are in the middle of working with EPIC staff to apply for college. A midyear closure, he said, would “take away our sense of stability and strip this very moment we’ve been building toward for four years.”

The Chicago Teachers Union, which represents teachers at EPIC, called on the board to help prevent the school from closing midyear. Moving forward, union leaders want the district to turn EPIC into a district-run school or transfer all the charter’s remaining students to nearby South Shore High School so they can stay together.

“We should not have schools opening in the fall that have budget deficits that mean doors can close midyear,” said Jen Conant, the union’s charter division chair.

Some board members raised concerns about whether the district provided enough oversight before EPIC closed. Appointed board member Karen Zaccor said she wants a “more precise scrutiny of finances” for charters.

Elected board member Che “Rhymefest” Smith, whose district includes EPIC, said he supports the school and wants to look “deeper” into the issues contributing to the closure. Appointed board member Michilia Blaise, who represents the West Side, said she’s “ready to roll” with Smith on finding a solution to EPIC’s closure. She cited how difficult transfers can be for students.

“That’s heavy for a kid to show up at another school, and now they’re graduating with a bunch of kids who are graduating together, and they don’t know who they are,” Blaise said of a midyear closure.

CPS officials previously said their assessments of charters include slightly older financial data — which it considered as satisfactory for EPIC ahead of its renewal — and that the district doesn’t assess a charter’s future financial outlook. LeeAndra Khan, EPIC’s executive director, previously told Chalkbeat that the school informed CPS in January of its projected budget shortfall; CPS still recommended renewal for the school in May.

In a letter to EPIC families earlier this month, CPS officials said they would host a “joint initial parent town hall, host town hall meetings on an ongoing basis, and provide individual student support.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema atramin@chalkbeat.org.

After two years of increases, Chicago Public Schools enrollment drops 2.8%

2025-09-25T18:11:38+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools’ official enrollment this school year is 316,224 — a 2.8% drop compared to last school year, interim CPS CEO Macquline King announced Thursday.

“Enrollment decreased across a majority of grades and most student groups,” King said during a Chicago Board of Education meeting.

The official figure, which is solidified annually on the 20th day of school, represents the first time in the past two school years that enrollment has dipped at CPS, as preliminary data analyzed by Chalkbeat indicated earlier this month.

But the drop picks up a trend that began almost 15 years ago: Student enrollment at CPS has now dropped by nearly 22% since the 2011-12 school year, when more than 404,000 students attended the city’s public schools.

Until 2022, Chicago was the third largest school district in the country, but it is now the fourth.

Chicago is not alone. Enrollment has dropped at public school districts across the nation because of a number of factors, including declining birth rates.

King said there is a continued dip in the number of Black students, Hispanic students, those who are learning English as a new language, and those who are living in temporary housing. At the same time, the district saw increased enrollment in the number of white, Asian American, and multiracial students, and those with disabilities, King said.

As of publication, the district had not yet posted the data file that includes a school-by-school breakdown of enrollment for the 2025-26 school year.

Enrollment increased slightly at CPS over the previous two years as thousands of migrant students and their families arrived in Chicago, fleeing political and economic turmoil in Central and South American countries.

But as the Trump administration rolls out aggressive immigration enforcement, including in recent weeks in Chicago, immigration advocates say some families are scared to send their children to school. Families, they say, may have left the city or even the U.S. altogether.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago’s search for new schools chief narrows, source says interim CEO plans to apply

2025-09-24T17:18:16+00:00

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The search for Chicago Public Schools’ next top leader is ramping up.

Chicago school board members are preparing to begin interviews with CEO candidates, staying on track to meet a goal of choosing a new schools chief by the end of 2025.

District leaders and the head of the consulting firm helping with the search say the opening at the helm of the country’s fourth largest district has drawn a strong pool of contenders, even as some were scared off by recent leadership turmoil and the complex politics of the job. More than 85 people have applied for the job, and the district’s search firm expects at least a few more might yet get in the running.

One of those soon-to-be applicants is the district’s interim CEO, Macquline King, according to a CPS official with knowledge of her plans who requested anonymity to discuss them openly. When asked earlier about her interest in the permanent job, the former CPS teacher and principal said she had not decided but was focused on her interim responsibilities. She declined to comment for this story.

In the coming weeks, the school board will start interviewing about 20 top candidates prescreened by the Chicago-based firm, Alma Advisory Group. Over several rounds of interviews, they will zero in on a smaller group of semi-finalists, and eventually three to four finalists with the credentials and mettle to steer a district with a $10 billion budget and 45,000 employees. Only one frontrunner will be publicly announced before the board takes a vote to hire that applicant, likely in December.

The district launched the search earlier this year following the firing without cause of former CEO Pedro Martinez, who had clashed with Mayor Brandon Johnson and his allies at the Chicago Teachers Union over dealing with CPS’s fiscal challenges.

The next district leader would have to navigate the district’s transition to a fully elected 21-member school board, looming budget deficits, declining enrollment, and clashes with the Trump administration over diversity, equity, and inclusion, among other challenges. But that leader also gets to build on recent academic momentum that has brought improvements in the district’s graduation rate and a post-pandemic recovery that gained some national notice.

“It’s fair to say this position is not for the faint of heart,” said Monica Santana Rosen, the CEO of Alma. “There are leaders out there who would be strong contenders who’ve said, ‘No, thank you.’”

But, said Rosen, the challenging, high-profile position is also a major draw: “We’re feeling really good about the quality of the applicant pool.”

Jessica Biggs, who chairs the board’s search committee, said applicants include people who have worked for CPS or served as superintendents or in senior education leadership roles elsewhere.

“It’s really a unicorn, the person who is the right fit for this job,” Biggs said. “There are really a handful of people across the country who are well suited to do the job.”

Board members were trained recently on interview protocols and will conduct second round interviews in the coming weeks, followed by a semifinalist and finalist round.

Neither the school board nor Alma will release candidate names before the finalist is announced.

“The tension here is wanting to make sure we attract the best talent, and sometimes the best talent can’t let the spaces where they are currently know they are looking to leave,” Biggs said.

The board is weighing a community panel that could include students, teachers, and other residents and would interview the finalist confidentially before a public announcement, Rosen said.

In any case, Rosen noted the district solicited extensive community input before kicking off the search. It hosted community roundtables in the spring to collect feedback about what the public wants in the next schools chief, hosted focus groups, conducted a survey, and shaped its job description based in part on that input.

“We feel confident that community voice will be a part of the process,” Rosen said.

Earlier this year, State Sen. Robert Martwick, an architect of Chicago’s transition to an elected school board, wrote the board president, Sean Harden, to argue that state law gives the mayor the final say in picking the next top district leader through 2027 when a fully elected board is in place. But following guidance from the district’s legal team, the current hybrid school board is planning to vote on the CEO.

“We embrace the fact that the mayor is an important leader who appoints 11 of the board members and his voice and perspective really matter in this process,” Rosen said, adding that the search committee is keeping Johnson in the loop, and he’ll get to interact with the frontrunners.

In March, the school board passed a resolution requiring its next leader to hold a superintendent’s license, saying the district needs someone with extensive background in education to steer it. CPS is one of relatively few large districts that have a CEO rather than a superintendent at the helm.

Rosen said that finding the district’s next top leader is a priority for school board members, who see it as an important part of their legacy.

“We really want to get this right,” she said.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

No more networks? Chicago Public Schools considers reorganizing middle management

2025-09-23T21:46:08+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools leadership may restructure middle management and is considering aligning it to school board electoral districts, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the plan.

District leaders say the change could be a way to make the administration more responsive to school needs and to save money, but some principals are concerned about an organizational overhaul in the middle of the school year.

During a routine call with principals on Friday, CPS leadership said it planned to reorganize the current network system of middle management into districts, but didn’t offer additional details, according to two principals who spoke to Chalkbeat on condition of anonymity in order to avoid reprisal.

The networks organize schools based on geographic location and each has a network chief who principals answer to. Among their responsibilities, network chiefs evaluate principals, provide instructional expertise if needed, and may step in when principals need help during the year, such as for additional staff or issues with their building.

According to two school board members who spoke directly to interim CPS CEO Macquline King, the potential restructure would involve reorganizing the district’s 13 existing networks for elementary and middle schools into 10 that would align with the Chicago Board of Education’s electoral districts. The four high school networks would be kept the same. The plan would also require current network chiefs and their deputies to reapply for their jobs.

On Monday, district spokesperson Sylvia Barragan said CPS has been considering changes at central office to “strengthen teaching and learning for all students,” and that no final decisions have been made about the district’s network offices. She did not outline specific plans that CPS is considering.

“All plans remain subject to change as CPS leadership continues to thoughtfully review options and considerations moving forward,” Barragan said.

The number of students under each network varies. For example, Network 14, which covers part of the North Side, oversees two dozen schools with a total 27,000 students. But Network 5 on the West Side has 28 schools with just under 8,000 students.

Switching to the 10 districts mirroring school board electoral districts could also mean uneven distribution. For example, District 5 on the West Side has more than 100 schools, many of them charters. But just over 30 schools exist in District 4 on the North Side.

A senior CPS official told Chalkbeat that the goal of the reorganization is to make the district’s administration more nimble and responsive to school needs. It would also reduce spending on administrative positions, delivering a portion of $50 million in savings the district’s 2025-26 budget assumes it will make this year and allowing it to steer more dollars directly to schools in the longer run. The official said it is too soon to say how much the district would save thanks to the overhaul or how many administrative positions might be affected.

However, the two school board members who spoke with King said the cost savings were estimated to be roughly $2 million.

The district recently passed a $10.2 billion budget that included a slew of cuts to close a $734 million deficit, but district leaders said the plan avoided midyear cuts to classrooms. Still, CPS faces potential funding threats, including a recent threat from the Trump administration to withhold federal funding.

It’s not uncommon for new leadership to restructure the district’s central office. Under Mayor Rahm Emanuel, his handpicked CEO Forrest Claypool laid off hundreds of central office staffers and did an organizational restructure. Before that, former CPS CEO Jean-Claude Brizard also oversaw a revamp of district’s management structure that was meant to provide oversight and additional support for schools.

In addition to the 17 networks that exist for most CPS schools, there are also separate networks for options — or alternative — schools, charter schools, and schools run by principals who have been granted more autonomy than their peers.

One elementary school principal said a midyear change feels “very unfair” to school leaders. Her network chief has already evaluated her once this year, and she’s concerned about losing a supervisor with whom she’s built a positive relationship and knows her school well.

But another longtime district principal said less middle management would free up more dollars to spend directly on schools.

“Reorganizing is always an opportunity to build a better structure,” the principal said.

One of the principals who spoke to Chalkbeat said it could make sense to reorganize schools in a way that corresponds with school board electoral districts given the new structure of the board.

But two school board members who spoke to King said they’re concerned such a change could send the message that school board members have a managerial role with schools when they shouldn’t.

“I don’t want me to go visit a school, and the principal thinks this is going to affect their evaluation or they have to put a show on for me,” said board member Carlos Rivas.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Pressure and time: Chicago navigates its elected school board era

2025-09-17T10:00:00+00:00

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In the eight months since Chicago’s partially elected, partially appointed school board was seated, many of its members have had to exercise a muscle their predecessors weren’t required to flex: Figuring out what the public wants.

The 21-member Chicago Board of Education has already navigated most of the core functions of a school board, including picking an interim leader, approving the Chicago Teachers Union contract, balancing a budget with a $734 million deficit and grappling with the hotly protested proposed closure of seven charter schools. The board members have worked through these issues while wrestling with time constraints, internal politics, and external pressure that hasn’t existed before, according to interviews with 15 current and one former board member.

Take, for instance, Ebony DeBerry’s journey from community activist to elected school board member. After easily winning the race to represent a diverse, progressive pocket of the North Side with the backing of the Chicago Teachers Union, DeBerry faced a pivotal vote on Chicago Public Schools’ $10.2 billion budget proposal.

The budget plan had drawn opposition from the CTU and Mayor Brandon Johnson because it didn’t include a pension reimbursement to the city and a loan. DeBerry ultimately split with her allies and cast a vote in favor of the proposal, despite her own “strong distaste” for some of the district’s calculations, she said.

She did so because she wanted to listen to the people she represents, DeBerry said.

“It just keeps coming back to the constituents,” DeBerry told Chalkbeat the week before the vote. “That’s what I would love to do as an elected official: Do as I’m asked.”

Elected board member Ebony DeBerry said she is planning to run for reelection next year.

Previous Chicago school board members appointed by the mayor mostly did as the mayor asked. But now, school board members must consider what the broader public wants to see in schools, especially those who want to keep their seats through the next election in November 2026, when all 21 members will be chosen by voters.

The way board members navigate these major decisions and the political divide on the body provides a window into how this experiment in Chicago democracy is going so far — and how it could impact policymaking for the nation’s fourth largest school district for years to come.

Chicago school board members are unpaid

The 21 people leading Chicago’s transition to an elected school board are doing so on a volunteer basis. They’re working without pay and clocking at least an average of 25 hours a week, according to school board members interviewed by Chalkbeat.

Some are juggling the role with full-time jobs, and others have quit their day jobs. They go on school visits, host office hours, attend meetings, take phone calls, and read materials that are supposed to inform their votes, which multiple board members described as detailed and lengthy.

Chicago Board of Education President Sean Harden, a mayoral appointee who also runs a consulting firm, said he spends an unlimited amount of time on board business. His responsibilities also include communicating with board members and keeping in touch with the mayor’s office.

“It really never turns off,” he said. “It’s a Monday through Sunday scenario.”

Elected board member Jennifer Custer, a mom of three, including one under the age of 1, said she has a supportive husband and community of relatives and friends who can help with child care in a pinch. But her responsibilities at home mean she can’t make every obligation and often must get creative.

“Sometimes I take my kids with me to school visits, and schools are very welcoming and very warming to that when I have no other option,” Custer said. “I take my daughter to the board office all the time. You do what you have to do to do the work.”

Elected board member Yesenia Lopez and appointed board member Norma Rios-Sierra both said they quit their full-time jobs in order to have more flexible schedules to serve on the board. Rios-Sierra, a single mom, is earning some money through freelance artwork; Lopez said she will probably need to find another, more flexible job soon.

Angel Gutierrez, an elected member who works full-time, said he wishes he could hold town halls like other legislators, but “I have bills that I pay at home, I have a family to support.”

Former appointed board member Frank Niles Thomas said despite enjoying his time on the school board, he won't run in next year's elections.

Frank Niles Thomas was retired when he was appointed to the board last fall after the mass resignation of the mayor’s first appointed board. Thomas converted his dining room table at his South Side home into his office, and his days filled up with phone calls, answering emails, reading documents, and attending meetings.

Thomas loved serving on the board, he said, but he needed to earn money to support a relative in need.

”You got to have income to deal with it — and I didn’t,” Thomas said, who resigned in June.

Illinois law prohibits paying school board members beyond reasonable reimbursements related to their role. A push to provide pay for Chicago’s new board has so far been unsuccessful in Springfield.

“When we first fought for the elected school board, we definitely were talking about compensation, because we view it as an obstacle to parents if they couldn’t have this be their job,” said appointed board member Karen Zaccor, a retired teacher who was part of the decades-long effort to create an elected board. “That really is asking a lot.”

Factions and alliances emerge in key Chicago school board votes

In addition to the time demands, trying to bridge the board’s political divide can cause a level of “emotional pressure” that elected board member Jessica Biggs said she did not anticipate.

“The stakes are really high,” Biggs said. “Where I thought that there would be some more consensus around things that I see as sort of obviously in the best interests of kids, schools, and the system, everybody else doesn’t see it that way all the time or there are competing interests at play.”

Elected board member Jessica Biggs said she tries to create boundaries, such as an hour of "Do Not Disturb" time on her phone, in order to balance personal and board responsibilities.

Divisions on school boards are nothing new, but public debate and disagreement is unfamiliar when it comes to school governance in Chicago.

From 1995 through 2024, Chicago’s mayors picked people to serve on the city’s school board. By design, board members were aligned with City Hall and were often criticized for being rubber stamps for the mayor, who earned the credit or backlash for the state of the public school system.

That’s partly why observers of the school system were stunned when Johnson’s entire first appointed school board stepped down over disagreements with his office in October 2024, just three months before the new 21-member board was seated.

Several of the newly appointed members stayed on when the new board was sworn in this past January and tensions carried over. Five appointees who remained had voted in late December to fire former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez, who had sued those board members and would stay in his job for another six months. But many newly elected board members opposed Martinez’s firing.

Together, they faced an onslaught of problems that are at the heart of a school board’s responsibilities: the decision on who would replace Martinez, souring negotiations over the Chicago Teachers Union contract, and the planned closure of seven charter schools run by Acero, which the CTU, staff, and families protested for months.

In interviews for this story, several board members cited their decision in February to save five of the Acero schools and absorb them into CPS as a major accomplishment that maintained stability for families and students.

That vote was also one of the board’s early splits. Some board members wanted language that would allow CPS to check in one year if it was financially viable to absorb the schools. Without that language, three members who are often aligned voted against saving the schools — drawing backlash from organizations like the CTU and some Acero families.

But divisions and new political alliances continued to emerge.

In March, CPS needed to amend its budget in order to pay for upcoming labor contracts, including the new CTU deal. The mayor’s office wanted CPS to consider taking on a loan so the district could also reimburse the city for a $175 million municipal pension payment that had been debated for months.

Following the advice of CPS leadership at the time, seven elected board members signed a letter opposing paying the pension reimbursement amid CPS’s financial challenges. Because budget amendments require 14 votes — or two-thirds approval — the pension payment never happened.

Choosing an interim replacement for Martinez also proved divisive. Roughly half of the board wanted someone other than interim CEO Macquline King, a mayoral advisor who had been investigated multiple times by CPS without facing formal discipline during her time as a principal. Eleven board members — elected member Jitu Brown and 10 appointees — voted for King, while eight other elected officials voted no. DeBerry abstained and told Chalkbeat recently that if her vote had been decisive, she would’ve voted no in line with what she heard from her constituents.

Mayor Brandon Johnson and CPS CEO Dr. Macquline King smile for a photo during the first day back to school for CPS students at Mary E. Courtenay Language Arts Center, 4420 N. Beacon St., in Uptown on Aug. 18, 2025.

Despite the divisions that have played out in public, several board members pointed to a handful of issues they’ve agreed on, including ensuring the next schools CEO has a superintendent’s license — and sticking to that goal even after Harden reportedly wanted Johnson’s chief of staff to be considered for the job. They also supported establishing a Black Student Success Plan committee and unanimously passed the new CTU contract.

Multiple board members expressed frustration that they haven’t been able to dig more into education policy, and said many members agree on wanting to center the needs of children. Their disagreements are rooted in how to pay for things.

“It’s been about the money since we came on,” elected board member Therese Boyle said in an interview weeks before the budget vote. “The money is why the original board stepped down; the money is why Pedro [Martinez] had to go; it’s about the money now.”

Most board members interviewed said it’s difficult to have robust discussions with more of their colleagues because of the size of the board. They said it’s difficult to coordinate schedules, and additionally, board members can’t meet or talk in groups of six or more without providing notice of an official meeting, in order to comply with the Illinois Open Meetings Act.

That law is meant to ensure public bodies don’t conduct business in secret. But in practice, some board members argued, it means that by the time they get to a public meeting where the entire board can debate an issue, they’re sometimes already facing a vote. By then, they say, many board members have made up their minds.

Multiple board members also said they’ve tried to work with people they don’t typically align with. Boyle and appointed member Debby Pope, who have voted differently on some hot issues, both said they work well together on special education issues.

During the pension dispute this spring, appointed member Ed Bannon reached out to elected member Che “Rhymefest” Smith, who had signed the letter opposing it, to better understand his view, Bannon said. The two had a “great” discussion about the issues they could collaborate on, such as getting more parents involved in CPS, Bannon said. Smith confirmed the account.

“I do try to reach out to people I disagree with,” Bannon said. “I’m not saying I’m a saint about it and I do it all the time or that I’m expressing myself all the time to all these people, but I hope people think I’m making an effort.”

Who do Chicago school board members answer to?

Many board members said major interest groups and unions, as well as parents, push them on many issues, such as special education services, charter schools, and labor matters.

When asked if they felt pressure from any one group or person, including the mayor’s office, to vote a certain way, no one said yes.

In politics, money often translates into influence. Now, in Chicago, money can be spent on directly backing board members. More than $13 million was spent on Chicago school board races last fall. The top spenders, apart from candidates’ direct spending, were the Chicago Teachers Union’s political action committees, followed by two school choice PACs, the Illinois Network of Charter Schools and Urban Center.

“It’s politics now. There’s factions,” said appointed board member Michilia Blaise, a longtime political consultant who served on the city’s last fully appointed board but also ran against Jitu Brown in the last election before dropping out. “There’s people who have to, like, take care of people who gave them money for their campaigns. It’s people positioning themselves for whatever they’re gonna do later.”

On hot button issues, board members have often voted in line with those who supported their campaigns or appointed them. Of the seven board members who opposed CPS’s budget, six, including Blaise, were mayoral appointees.

On a resolution aiming to increase oversight of charter schools, five elected members abstained. Of those, two — Carlos Rivas and Gutierrez — were endorsed and got campaign donations from the Illinois Network of Charter Schools, which opposed the resolution. The other three abstentions were Ellen Rosenfeld, Smith, and Boyle.

But board members have also broken ranks with their supporters or voted in surprising ways.

Custer was endorsed by the CTU during the election but has not voted in line with the union on some major issues, such as the Acero closures or in favor of a short-term loan.

Blaise proposed extending the renewal term for West Side charter school North Lawndale College Prep, which is in her district, for one year longer than what CPS proposed. Blaise was appointed by the mayor, who has been critical of charters in the past.

Charters make up about a quarter of the 105 schools in District 5, which Blaise and Brown represent.

Brown, who is also an ally of the mayor, is known for his decades of advocacy opposing the expansion of charter schools and the closure of neighborhood schools. He voted in favor of the resolution to tighten oversight on charters. But he also supported the renewals of a slew of charter schools in the spring, including Blaise’s proposal to lengthen the renewal term for North Lawndale College Prep.

Elected board member Jitu Brown ran unopposed in his election last year. He's unsure if he's going to run again next year.

“I have to get over my disdain for the charter industry,” Brown said. “I went to a few charter schools that were clearly schools that were doing the right thing, and I will support those schools, because at the end of the day [I ask], are you doing right by children?”

Appointed members said they don’t feel undue pressure from the mayor’s office to vote a certain way.

Still, elected member Rosenfeld, who represents wealthier North Side neighborhoods of Lake View and Lincoln Park, said the hybrid structure of the board “is a bit of a problem.” She said she knows her votes won’t make everyone happy, but her decisions are based on public feedback. When she considers how appointed members vote, “It’s like, is that how you really feel, or is that how somebody who appointed you told you to feel?”

More Chicago school board elections coming in 2026

Boyle represents part of District 9, including South Side neighborhoods with high voter turnout. The retired school psychologist said she can no longer go on her weekly trip to her neighborhood grocery store without someone recognizing her, which she credits, in part, to two old billboard ads with her face on them.

People have stopped her to talk about special education, the budget, and the former CEO, she said.

“Now I put on a little makeup before I go,” Boyle said, laughing.

Other board members, however, are working to introduce themselves to more people.

Zaccor, who ran unsuccessfully for the board last fall and was instead appointed by the mayor, said she knocked on neighbors’ doors this summer to ensure people know she’s their representative. Zaccor said she’s “probably” running again.

Rios-Sierra, who spent years working for a community organization, said she feels like a political “nobody” and wants to gain recognition.

“I think for me, it’s been a little bit of invisibility still,” she said. “I feel like I should take a little bit more time to get out there and connect with people and do my rounds and really have people see me and understand that I listen and that I can be of service.”

Nine of the 15 current board members Chalkbeat spoke with said they plan to run in next year’s school board elections: elected members Biggs, Boyle, Custer, DeBerry, Gutierrez, Lopez, and Rosenfeld, as well as appointed members Blaise and Bannon.

Another five — elected member Brown and appointed members Zaccor, Rios-Sierra, Pope, and Cydney Wallace — said they’re considering it. School board President Harden and former board member Thomas both said they will not run in 2026.

Wallace, a working mother of four, said she wants to see what kind of “grassroots help” she can get for a potential campaign.

“If I were to run, and my neighbors decided they didn’t want me on the board anymore, obviously I’d be bummed that I lost, but it would be like, ‘Oh no, not all of this free time and not doing all of this work for no money! Whatever will I do?’” Wallace said, laughing.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago charter school EPIC Academy could close at the end of the school year

2025-09-15T23:27:55+00:00

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EPIC Academy, a charter high school on the South Side, may close by the end of this school year due to low enrollment — just months after the Chicago Board of Education extended its contract.

EPIC’s board of directors is scheduled to meet Wednesday to discuss shuttering the school, located at 8255 S. Houston Ave., because of enrollment declines and financial challenges, according to LeeAndra Khan, EPIC Academy’s executive director, and a letter sent to families Friday by Alfonso Carmona, the director of Chicago Public Schools’ Office of Innovation and Incubation.

EPIC enrolled 254 students as of Friday, according to preliminary enrollment data analyzed by Chalkbeat Monday.

“Despite our best efforts at trying to boost enrollment and trying to elevate our profile and kind of let the public know about some of our unique signature experiences and programming, we just have not been able to get enrollment back up to 500,” Khan said in an interview.

EPIC’s board notified CPS of the closure on Aug. 21, according to the board’s letter to CPS. The charter school held meetings for families on Friday and also sent them letters about the impending closure after CPS sent out its own letter, Khan said. André Golston, the head of security at EPIC and a Chicago Teachers Union member, said staff was notified a couple of weeks into the school year of the possible closure.

“Our ultimate goal is to provide school options that will meet the needs of all students for the 2026-27 school year,” Carmona said in the letter to families. “With that in mind, CPS will work with EPIC leadership to schedule a joint initial parent town hall, host town hall meetings on an ongoing basis, and provide individual student support.”

CPS’s letter also suggested that the school could close before the end of the school year, which Khan did not dispute but said is “not our hope.” Jennifer Conant, the charter division chair of the Chicago Teachers Union, said in an interview that a midyear closure would be “incredibly destabilizing and harmful” to the school community — a concern it has expressed to CPS.

The union and staff also plan to attend Wednesday’s EPIC board meeting to “demand answers,” including why leaders didn’t share sooner that a closure was possible, Conant and Golston said.

If EPIC Academy closes, it would be at least the 15th Chicago charter school to do so over the past six years and represents a continued trend of enrollment declines and financial problems in Chicago’s charter sector — issues the district also faces with its own schools.

The possible closure also raises questions about how, if at all, Chicago’s new school board might intervene as they did in another charter closure scenario earlier this year.

EPIC leaders hope for help from CPS

In February, about a month after the city’s new half-elected, half-appointed board was sworn in, the school board made the unprecedented decision to absorb and save five Acero charter schools planned for closure, following heavy protest from Chicago Teachers Union and Acero families. The district budgeted $20 million this fiscal year to absorb the Acero schools.

During EPIC’s July meeting, the board discussed CPS absorbing the school as one potential option instead of closure, as well as merging it with another charter, according to meeting minutes posted online.

“The only reason that idea was floated was because of the Acero thing,” Khan, EPIC’s executive director, told Chalkbeat in an interview.

Khan said she doesn’t know if CPS is willing to absorb the school, but “we’d love that” or other options “just so that our school community can stay together.”

Conant said the union would also support moving the EPIC students and staff together to another school as “a precedent of how you move a school into another school community to keep it whole, to keep the students and staff together.”

As a charter school, EPIC Academy receives public funding, but is privately managed. It operates under an agreement with the school district but is allowed to close so long as it provides notice to CPS. It wasn’t immediately clear how much time EPIC was required to give under its contract, but CPS said the charter operator followed legal parameters even with a new Chicago Board of Education resolution that aims to tighten oversight of charters.

Khan said the school’s leadership has been discussing dipping enrollment at board meetings and with its staff over the past several years. EPIC leadership informed CPS of its projected budget gap about nine months ago. She said the school used “every ounce of reserve” cash that it had left after investing in a new campus site that it’s now selling. During the July EPIC board meeting, board members discussed the charter network’s $1.4 million budget gap and the school’s six-year enrollment decline.

In May, the Chicago Board of Education approved a two-year contract renewal for EPIC, representing the shortest renewal term the board offered this year for charters. As conditions of EPIC’s renewal, CPS required the school to submit an annual report on disciplinary practices, show progress on properly serving students with disabilities, follow state and local laws on serving kids learning English as a new language, and ensure its teachers are properly licensed. CPS did not, however, flag concerns with the network’s finances or enrollment.

CPS reviewed EPIC’s financial performance for fiscal years 2023 and 2024 for this year’s contract renewal process, and rated EPIC’s financial performance as “meeting standards” on several indicators, which include the network’s net assets and how much cash on hand it has, a CPS spokesperson said. The network’s finances have received even higher ratings over the past eight years. CPS’s review looks at a “point-in-time” snapshot, the spokesperson said.

Conant said both EPIC and CPS failed to provide “oversight,” and neither “did that job well enough.”

“It’s really students and staff who will suffer if the school closes midyear or even at the end of the year,” Conant said. “It’s not fair to students, and so CPS really needs to come up with a plan to protect the school community.”

Like CPS, EPIC sees years of declining enrollment

EPIC Academy first opened in 2010 for a maximum student enrollment of 480, which was expanded to a maximum of 600 by 2015. But enrollment began to drop by 2019, when the school enrolled 521 students at the start of that school year. Enrollment at the school is about half of what it was before the pandemic.

Funding for the charter, which is more directly tied to the number of students, has dropped as the number of students has dropped, Khan said. Expenses have increased, including the cost of salaries, health insurance, and services for students with disabilities, she said.

Khan said the school tried spreading the word about EPIC Academy through radio and billboard advertisements, as well as home visits to potential students.

CPS enrollment has largely dipped over the past decade as birth rates have also fallen, but a wave of newcomers from Central and South American countries helped boost enrollment slightly over the past couple of years. That appears to have been temporary and preliminary data show the district’s enrollment is poised to drop again this school year.

In 2023, as EPIC’s enrollment dipped, Chicago City Council approved a $22 million renovation and addition for EPIC at the former St. Michael the Archangel Catholic School, which closed in 2018 due to low enrollment and is about a quarter of a mile from the school’s current site. Charter officials had hoped the new building would help grow the school’s enrollment to more than 600 kids in the short term, according to its website. The current school, located in a former CPS school, doesn’t have a gym, library, kitchen, “adequate” bathrooms, or computer labs, according to CPS.

But during its July meeting, EPIC officials discussed the sale of the St. Michael’s site, which is listed online for $3 million. An agent overseeing the listing told Chalkbeat that the site was listed for sale on July 5 and has attracted multiple offers.

Khan said a potential sale of the site could help save EPIC Academy for the next two years, but a structural deficit would still exist after that if student enrollment didn’t shoot up. She added that the South Chicago neighborhood where EPIC is located has three other high schools nearby, including Bowen, a neighborhood school. All are competing for the same students.

“So this is complicated: I don’t want Bowen to close, I don’t want EPIC to close, but we might have too many schools,” Khan said.

Conant, from the union, said that EPIC “used up important resources” when it tried to create a new facility, that should have been used on the current school site.

Golston, the school’s head of security, said most students are saddened by the possible closure and staff feel caught off guard.

“This news has devastated [staff], it has knocked the wind out of them, and so that’s why we’re going to push hard to try to keep our doors open and do what we have to do to continue to keep this building and these doors open,” Golston said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools wants to tighten up employees’ use of paid time off

2025-09-10T22:10:17+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education is considering tightening up paid time off policies for CPS employees, including requiring more notice for taking off for religious holidays and adding explicit language that says CPS can fire employees who misuse sick days.

The district also proposed changes to bring its sick leave policies for non-union employees into alignment with new City of Chicago policies.

CPS is proposing the changes for approval at its board meeting on Sept. 25.

Under the proposed changes, employees would have to provide 14 days notice — a week more than currently required — before taking one of their three allotted religious days off. The proposal also includes additional language on what does not count as religious beliefs, including “social, political, or economic philosophies, or personal ideological preferences.”

The proposed policy changes for religious holidays come two years after the district stopped docking pay for teachers who took off on religious holidays. The old policy cut pay for teachers because, they argued, the school needed to be able to pay for a substitute. At the time, union leaders who had pushed for the tweaks applauded that policy change, saying it penalized teachers who observe religious holidays that aren’t accounted for in the school calendar, such as Yom Kippur.

Administrators can deny religious holiday time off for employees if there is an “operational need” for that person to stay at work. Those supervisors would have to provide their denial in writing at least seven days before the requested holiday off, the proposed changes said.

These changes would give “managers, mostly principals, more time for planning and coverage when an employee is out,” Ben Felton, the district’s chief talent officer, told the board during a meeting Wednesday to review the board’s agenda for the Sept. 25 meeting. Felton said clarifying definitions for religious beliefs and denial procedures “are in case religious holidays are not being used properly.”

The district is proposing that employees who abuse paid sick leave “may be subject to discipline up to and including termination,” which Felton said is possible under current board policy but isn’t explicit.

According to current board policy, unionized employees not represented by CTU who are found to be using sick leave “in an unauthorized manner” can be suspended from work without pay for up to 15 days. The current policy also says that employees who fraudulently use leaves of absence or have “excessively poor attendance” can be fired.

“It is not our intent to create more severe discipline for these infractions,” Felton said in a brief interview with Chalkbeat. “It’s just to align our policies and make sure that it’s clear that in some instances, using sick days in this way could result in termination.”

Employees who are out on sick leave for more than three days must present documentation that they were treated by a doctor or another practitioner for their illness.

CPS got little feedback on the proposed changes when it opened the policies up for public comment last month, Felton told the board. He did not specify the nature of that feedback. Neither the Chicago Teachers Union nor SEIU Local 73 responded to a request for comment.

Separately, CPS is proposing that hourly and part-time employees would begin accruing sick leave immediately upon being hired and can begin using that time 30 days after they’re hired. The district has already started implementing those changes but is updating its policies to come into compliance with a new city ordinance, Felton told board members.

Full-time, non-union employees would also be able to carry over some unused sick days into the new fiscal year; previously, these employees had to use their sick days or forfeit them by June 30, or the end of the fiscal year.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Days before budget vote, CPS tells school board it can borrow in the future in a ‘true emergency’

2025-08-27T15:43:31+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools’ chief financial officer refuted several concerns raised by school board members in recent weeks about the district’s $10.2 billion budget proposal — and sought to reassure the board that it could borrow money in the future if there was a “true emergency.”

In a memo obtained by Chalkbeat, Chief Financial Officer Miroslava Mejia Krug said the district’s legal counsel advised that the school board can authorize emergency borrowing after the budget is passed through a simple majority vote, even though budget amendments typically require a two-thirds vote.

“This would ensure that any additional borrowing would be used to prevent cuts to schools and core district operations — in line with the request from many board members regarding a contingency plan in the case of a revenue shortfall,” Krug wrote in the memo sent Tuesday to board members.

Krug reiterated the district’s arguments that including a $200 million loan and a much-debated $175 million pension reimbursement to the city in CPS’s budget would result in cuts to schools. Currently, the budget proposal does not include either and only states that CPS would make the pension payment to the city if additional revenue comes through midyear.

She also repeated the district’s stance over the past year: That taking out a short-term loan without an immediate need would likely mean a downgrade in the district’s bond rating — which is similar to a credit rating — and result in high interest payments, potentially future cuts to schools, and impact the district’s ability to borrow in the future.

Krug said the district is concerned that a “market for additional debt may not exist” given that the district is already issuing $2.4 billion in new long-term debt. CPS has estimated that repaying additional loans could cost up to $194 million in interest, putting more pressure on future budgets already projected to have funding shortfalls.

The district’s debt-per-student ratio is among the highest in the nation among big school districts, Chalkbeat reported Monday.

Krug’s memo was sent to board members two days before the board is set to vote on the district’s budget proposal, which avoids beginning or midyear cuts to school funding but doesn’t include the pension payment to the city.

A majority of board members, made up of largely mayoral appointees and at least one elected official, have signaled their opposition to the district’s budget proposal because it excludes the pension reimbursement and has no plans for a short-term loan in addition to other borrowing the district does. Mayor Brandon Johnson, who advocated for CPS not to make the pension payment before he was elected, has said he expects CPS to make that payment as the city tries to balance its own budget for the new fiscal year.

Opposing board members have argued that not reimbursing the city is detrimental to its partnership with the city, and it’s the district’s obligation to fulfill that payment, which covers non-teaching staff, as it becomes its own elected body. The district began reimbursing the city under former Mayor Lori Lightfoot, but stopped last year because of budget challenges. The board members have also asked for the option of a loan in case cuts are necessary during the school year.

But several elected board members support the budget proposal because they’re worried that taking out a short-term, high-interest loan would negatively impact the district’s financial future and take away from classroom spending. They also say reimbursing the city for pension costs right now is not the school district’s legal responsibility and is untenable as they work to close a $734 million deficit.

Krug’s memo outlines the possibility to borrow later in the fiscal year through a simple majority vote if the district faced a funding gap midyear.

CPS must pass a budget for the fiscal year that started July 1 by Friday or it risks not being able to legally spend money and could be labeled as a district in “financial difficulty,” according to state law and the Illinois State Board of Education. The Chicago Board of Education needs a simple majority to approve the spending plan.

However, Illinois state law requires a two-thirds approval vote from Chicago’s school board when it wants to amend its budget midyear. That issue became a flashpoint in the spring, when seven board members refused to approve an amendment that would have, in part, reimbursed the city with the $175 million pension payment — meaning the board did not have the two-thirds majority it needed. Krug says amending the budget for additional expenses like the pension payment would still require a two-thirds approval.

However, CPS’s legal counsel has determined that the two-thirds vote requirement only applies to new expenses or liabilities, the memo said. But taking out an emergency loan to maintain spending outlined in the current budget would only require a simple majority vote, Krug wrote.

Krug also sought to refute claims from some board members — largely mayoral appointees — that the district has overestimated how much money it will receive from the city in Tax Increment Financing, or TIF, surplus dollars, a pool of taxpayer dollars meant to spur economic development. The city can declare a surplus of those funds annually and in the past decade, has done so every year. CPS gets 52% of whatever is declared as surplus and roughly one quarter goes to the city’s coffers.

Krug wrote that several aldermen testified during the district’s budget hearings that they expect TIF dollars to be surplused because the city will also need those dollars to help close its own budget deficit.

The district has assumed this year that it will receive $379 million in TIF surplus, or $79 million more than last year, when Johnson surplused a record amount of these city dollars. The exact amount of how much will be surplused won’t be made public until Johnson presents his budget plan later this fall.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago’s mayor fills vacant school board seat ahead of key budget vote

2025-08-27T15:15:32+00:00

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Ahead of a pivotal vote on Chicago Public Schools’ budget, Mayor Brandon Johnson has filled a seat on the Chicago Board of Education that has been vacant for the past two months.

Johnson is appointing Ángel Vélez, a diversity, equity, and inclusion consultant who lives in West Englewood, city hall confirmed.

Vélez will fill the South Side district seat left vacant by Frank Niles Thomas, who served from last November until June 11. He will represent neighborhoods from Canaryville to Auburn Gresham, which make up subdistrict 9a.

The choice of Vélez was first reported late Tuesday by WBEZ, who reported that he went to Clemente High School in Humboldt Park and his children now attend a Chicago public school. Vélez holds a doctorate in education policy, organization and leadership, from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, according to the public radio station.

The 21-seat school board has 10 elected positions and 11 others that are appointed by the mayor. The board will be fully elected by 2027. The new appointment would again ensure mayoral appointees make up the majority on the board. Thomas stepped down after a key vote in June: appointing city hall advisor and former CPS principal Macquline King as interim CPS CEO.

The mayor’s pick comes one day ahead of a vote on the district’s proposed $10.2 billion budget which board members are divided over. Shortly after the budget presentation earlier this month, 11 board members — nine mayoral appointees and two elected members generally aligned with the mayor — penned a letter signaling their opposition to the plan and asked for the inclusion of a $175 million pension reimbursement to the city and a loan “as an option” to avoid cuts.

King’s proposed plan does not include the city pension reimbursement, which the mayor said he’s expecting CPS to pay as the city also seeks ways to balance its own budget.

CPS has said that reimbursing the city for that pension cost, which is not legally required, would result in midyear cuts to schools, but the district would make the pension payment if it received more state dollars or additional city funds from a pool of taxpayer dollars meant to spur economic development.

But board members who support borrowing and reimbursing the city for a portion of the municipal pension payment have argued that CPS must rely on the city less to help pay its bills as it transitions into a fully elected body, and having the option for a loan would help avoid cuts in the middle of the school year.

While the proposed budget excludes a short-term, high-interest loan, it does include other borrowing. In a memo obtained by Chalkbeat, CPS officials continued to caution board members against additional borrowing because it could trigger a credit downgrade.

“Importantly, we anticipate that including additional borrowing authority in the budget — even if not used — would still result in a downgrade,” the memo said.

Chicago schools’ debt burden is the third-highest among large districts and amounts to roughly $28,000 per student.

Board member Ebony DeBerry, one of the elected members who signed the letter opposing the budget proposal, told Chalkbeat this week that she plans to vote with her constituents. So far, she says, they have said they don’t want the district to take out another loan or to reimburse the city for the pension payment, which contributes toward the retirement of non-teaching staffers.

While it’s unclear how the vote will shake out, an additional mayoral appointee could help solidify enough votes to oppose the district’s proposed budget and pass a plan that includes the pension payment, as well as a loan.

The mayor and his strongest ally, the Chicago Teachers Union, once advocated for CPS not to pay the pension payment; Johnson’s mayoral transition team report recommended the city stop asking CPS to kick in. The district began reimbursing the city for the payment under former Mayor Lori Lightfoot, but declined to pay it last year under former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez, as it faced budget challenges. That decision helped lead, in part, to Martinez’s firing.

Johnson and CTU have since changed their stance, with the CTU also advocating for the district to reimburse the city.

Becky Vevea contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

New Illinois law aims to protect access to public education for immigrant students

2025-08-19T21:39:48+00:00

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Illinois state legislators and immigrant advocates gathered outside a Chicago elementary school on Tuesday to celebrate a new state law meant to enshrine a child’s right to public schools regardless of their immigration status, a step they said is necessary in the face of the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement.

The law, known as the Safe Schools For All Act, also pushes school districts to adopt policies outlining how schools should respond if federal immigration agents come to a campus. The law, passed at the end of May and signed by Gov. JB Pritzker last week, goes into effect Jan. 1, 2026.

Roughly 100 people flanked elected officials and supporters of the law during a press conference held outside Lloyd Elementary School in the Belmont Cragin neighborhood, which is home to many working class immigrant families. Some held signs that said “Education Not Deportation” and “ICE out of Chi,” referring to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Young students occasionally passed by a second-floor window at the school and looked down at the press conference.

“Parents have always counted on the supports from our principals and our teachers here at Lloyd; they protected our kids and made them feel safe,” Maria, a parent of a third grader at Lloyd who did not share her last name, told reporters in Spanish. “But now all of our communities are able to see that their schools and their families are protected, as they should be, from ICE.”

The new law says all children have the right to a free, public education regardless of their immigration status, effectively codifying the protections established in a 1982 Supreme Court case, known as Plyler V. Doe. Other states have taken the opposite approach, such as in Tennessee, where lawmakers attempted to allow school districts to ban undocumented children from attending public schools.

Advocates said it’s a “first-of-its-kind” state law because it also prevents schools from adopting policies that have a “chilling effect” that could discourage kids from attending school.

In addition to the education provisions, the new law prohibits schools from adopting policies that could exclude or discourage students from attendance, such as requesting immigration status or a Social Security number. It also requires schools to adopt policies for how to handle immigration agents who show up to schools, including provisions around reviewing warrants or other documentation the agents might have.

Chicago Public Schools requires staff to contact district law department staff if immigration agents show up to a school, and staff is told not to let such agents enter without having a judicial warrant. The previous Chicago Teachers Union contract also codifies those policies, including prohibiting staff from asking for a student’s immigration status. A copy of the new contract is not on the union’s website, but union leaders have said that the new contract keeps those provisions.

The Illinois State Board of Education provided districts with guidance on what to do as the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and other federal agencies increase arrests or other actions near schools. This was announced in a weekly message by State Superintendent Tony Sanders earlier this year.

The law signed last week drew some opposition while it was being debated in the legislature, including from sheriff’s departments, as well as the Illinois Association of School Boards. The IASB took issue with a provision of the law that allows people to sue school districts if they feel their rights were violated.

“The potential increased risk of litigation and new financial liabilities for school districts was the basis for IASB’s opposition,” the association wrote in its end-of-session report.

Lawmakers felt it was important to require all districts to draft policies that comply with the new law, said State Rep. Lilian Jimenez, one of the main sponsors of the bill.

“People thought, ‘Oh immigration is too confusing. If somebody comes to our school, what do we do?’” Jimenez said. “Well you create a policy, and you all train on the policy and everybody knows what to do.”

Jimenez and State Sen. Karina Villa, another bill sponsor, said during the press conference that they introduced the measure after President Donald Trump’s calls for mass deportations.

Just a few days after Trump’s second inauguration, the administration rescinded the federal “sensitive location” policy, clearing the way for Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, known as ICE, to make arrests at places like schools, child care centers, hospitals, and churches. Federal immigration agents then arrested about 100 people in the city and suburbs in January.

In February, ICE arrested a father who was dropping his children off to school in Gage Park on the Southwest Side.

In the winter, some parents decided to keep their children out of schools, and attendance dipped even as school administrators tried to support families and train staff on immigration protections. Local advocacy groups stepped up to provide support and ‘Know Your Rights” training to students.

State lawmakers drafted this legislation with the help of immigrant and bilingual education advocacy organizations, including the Latino Policy Forum, Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, or MALDEF, and the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, or ICIRR.

Even if the U.S. Supreme Court were to overturn Plyler V. Doe, states like Illinois “would still be within their rights to enact their own policies” — and that’s what the new law does, said Fred Tsao, senior policy counsel for ICIRR.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools students head back to class amid budget uncertainty

2025-08-18T18:48:54+00:00

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Armed with a school bell and flanked by CPS and union leaders, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and interim Chicago Public Schools CEO Macquline King opened the first day of the 2025-26 academic year with a pair of visits to schools on the North and West sides.

Johnson and King visited Courtenay Language Arts Center, where King served as principal from 2013 to 2022. They later made an appearance at Austin College and Career Academy, a high school on the West Side that has newly joined the Sustainable Community Schools program, a CPS and Chicago Teachers Union initiative that provides wraparound services to students and families, which the mayor has promised to expand.

At Courtenay, the mayor and King rang a large bell as kids and families cheered. At Austin, a teacher served as the morning DJ off to the side of the building, playing hits like Dua Lipa’s “Levitating” and Robin S.’s “Show Me Love” as students greeted each other and staff.

Students started school on a schedule similar to years before last year’s Democratic National Convention, when the start date was shifted to accommodate for the large-scale event. Monday was the first day for K-12 students, while pre-K students return to class Tuesday.

King was picked in June to take over the helm of the nation’s fourth largest school district six months after the school board voted to fire Pedro Martinez, who clashed with Johnson over how to balance the district’s budget.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and interim CPS CEO Dr. Macquline King smile for a photo during the first day back to school for CPS students at Mary E. Courtenay Language Arts Center in Uptown, where King served as principal from 2013 to 2022 when she left to work in the mayor’s office.

King and Johnson posed for pictures together, striking a more congenial tone than the mayor and King’s predecessor did during their appearance together last year on the first day of school. The two worked together in City Hall, where King was senior director of educational policy in the mayor’s office before becoming interim CEO.

King made brief remarks at Courtenay before introducing Johnson as “the mayor of education who has made so much possible,” and Johnson complimented King on her work as interim CEO before making his own remarks. Neither King nor Johnson took questions from reporters at either stop.

The two may also be at odds, however, over how to close the district’s $734 million deficit. Last week, King put forward a budget plan that does not include a reimbursement to the city to pay a portion of a pension payment that partially covers school district employees. The proposal says CPS would only contribute if it finds additional revenue. The 21-member school board is also divided over the proposal, with Johnson’s allies urging King to include the city pension reimbursement. Johnson said last week that he expects CPS to make that payment.

Johnson, who said he dropped his own kids off to school Monday morning, did not address the district’s budget situation, but rather highlighted fears that the federal government could cut funding for public education.

A former CTU organizer and an ally of the union, Johnson also highlighted several elements of the new CTU contract finalized this spring, including more staffers, smaller class sizes, and commitments to teaching Black history.

“Our workers, whether you are a [Special Education Classroom Assistant] or a social worker, they’re all here to support our families, particularly at a time at which there’s a great deal of consternation at the federal level, where dollars are being starved away from our city,” Johnson said outside Courtenay. “But we are going to work tirelessly to ensure that every single child has a high quality education.”

CPS starts year with budget uncertainty but fewer staff vacancies

CPS is starting the school year for the first time in recent memory without a budget. In 2016, facing a similarly difficult financial outlook, Chicago’s school board approved a budget in late August, but that year, the school year started after Labor Day.

The school board must legally adopt a spending plan by Aug. 29 and is expected to vote on a plan Aug. 28.

Kids walk to school during the first day of classes for Chicago Public Schools students at Mary E. Courtenay Language Arts Center in Uptown on Aug. 18, 2025.

Students and families may notice some changes in classrooms this year related to both budget cuts and the new Chicago Teachers Union contract. These include smaller class sizes in the early grades, additional teaching assistants, fewer hot meals, fewer custodians, and adjusted bell times at about two dozen campuses.

Custodians represented by Service Employees International Union held a rally outside of Jones College Prep on Monday to protest CPS cutting 480 full-time custodial positions.

District officials, however, also said CPS started the year with some of the lowest staffing vacancies “in recent history.” As of Sunday night, CPS had just under a 2.5% vacancy rate for teaching staff compared to 4.4% at the start of last school year, and a 3% vacancy rate for support staff, compared to nearly 7% this time last year, officials said.

For the first time in at least three years, the district has largely the same number of teaching positions as the year before — 22,671. And it has 13,267 support staff positions, down by 567 positions at the start of last school year, according to CPS data as of Friday. Ben Felton, the district’s chief talent officer, said not adding more positions helped the district shrink vacancies, but he heavily credited the district’s Teach Chicago effort, which has multiple programs meant to recruit and keep people in CPS, including at hard-to-staff schools.

“We know in CPS, as is true in any big school district in America, that when you have teacher vacancies they disproportionately impact students that are furthest from opportunity, whether that’s kids in some of the highest need communities or kids who require teachers in higher need subject areas, like bilingual education and special education,” Felton said.

Students and teachers share hopes and concerns about the next year

About an hour after their visit to Courtenay, Johnson and King moved on to Austin College and Career Academy High school on the West Side.

The mayor made brief remarks before joining King and other officials, who stood near the entrance and welcomed students as they walked into the building.

School staff and Chicago education leadership welcome students as they walk into Austin College and Career Academy for the first day of school on Monday, August 18, 2025.

Debra Woods, a special education teacher at Austin high school and a CTU delegate, watched as district, union, and city officials greeted students. Woods said she hopes that joining the Sustainable Community Schools program means the high school will be able to provide extra programming for kids. She also hopes the initiative will result in more parent and community involvement at Austin High.

“We haven’t had a lot of success with that so hopefully this will help,” Woods said.

But Woods’ optimism is paired with nervousness about her school’s future, given the district’s financial troubles. Woods said she was a teacher in 2013 when her former school, May Elementary, was closed with 49 others that year and merged with Leland Elementary. She left education for one year following the mass closures before a colleague persuaded her to come back to the field.

Austin College and Career Academy on Mon., Aug. 18, 2025 on the first day of school in Chicago, Illinois.

Austin high school, she noted, has the capacity for hundreds of students but enrolls fewer than 200 kids. The school has seen dwindling enrollment for the past two decades and enrolled just 140 students last year.

The district’s proposed budget includes no plans for closures and no beginning or midyear cuts to schools. But officials have projected deficits for future school years.

“There is this fear of what’s going to happen to our school? Will it be closed? Will it be combined with other schools?” she wondered out loud.

Nevertheless, Woods said “We are the ones who create productive citizens in our communities. The fact that we struggle so much to have the resources that we need and there is still a deficit, it’s so hard to figure out where that funding will come from, it’s disappointing.”

Stanley Scales, 15, felt nervous as he waited to enter the school for the first time. The sophomore used to attend Providence St. Mel, a private school in Garfield Park. But his mother, Tanya Saracco, who was with Stanley, said she isn’t working as she undergoes treatment for breast cancer and can no longer afford tuition at the private school, so they decided to enroll at Austin, which is his neighborhood high school.

As a fan of flag football, Stanley said he hopes to try out for school sports. He also has a simple goal this year: “To pass.”

Sarocco described Stanley as a “good kid” who’s smart, so she doesn’t have many concerns, besides bullying.

Staff at Austin College and Career Academy welcome a student for the first day of school in Chicago, IL on Monday, August 18, 2025.

Asked if she has any concerns about the lack of a budget, Saracco said, “As long as [Stanley does] what he has to do, and gets good grades, and doesn’t get in trouble, I’m not worried about it too much,” she said. “They’ll figure it out — they always do.”

Kaniyah Harris, 14, is starting her freshman year at Austin high school after graduating from nearby McNair Elementary School. She felt anxious about the first day but as she waited outside of the building with her parents, she grew calmer, she said.

“I’m gonna stay focused this year,” Kaniyah said. “I’m not trying to pressure myself, but I’m gonna stay focused, get good grades, and stay successful.”

She had advice for her peers who are also nervous: Don’t put too much pressure on yourself, stay positive, be respectful, and “pick your friends — don’t choose everybody.”

First-day jitters were also on display at Chalmers Elementary in North Lawndale. In the gym, some students clung to the parents dropping them off, and a staffer reassured a boy gripping his mother’s hand, “It will all be OK.” Overall, it was a more laidback vibe compared with last summer, when the West Side campus hosted Johnson and then-CEO Martinez, whose relationship had recently soured, for the first day of school.

The school — along with nearby Collins High School and Johnson Elementary — underwent extensive renovations over the summer as part of a community-led initiative to reinvent them as Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math schools. All three have grappled with declining enrollment over the past decade, and supporters hope the STEAM project will give them a boost in a neighborhood with few specialized programs.

Chalmers got a spacious new maker space, computer lab, and arts studio on the second floor — a makeover that workers scrambled to wrap up Sunday.

Many parents dropping off students Monday had not heard much about the initiative. They said the close-knit, supportive environment is what brings them to Chalmers.

One third grader, Aaliyah, and her grandmother, Angelica Smith, arrived more than a half hour before the 8:45 a.m. first bell. The girl, in the school’s elementary grades uniform of dark green polo and khakis, was ready to kick off the year, Smith said: “She wanted to get in and eat breakfast and see if she remembers any of her friends.”

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Colin Boyle is the photo editor at Block Club Chicago.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

It’s the first day of school at Chicago Public Schools. Here are 5 things we’re watching.

2025-08-18T10:00:00+00:00

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As Chicago Public Schools students return to class this week, families may feel the effects of the district’s belt-tightening over the summer as it worked to close a $734 million deficit.

Even as the first day starts — Monday for K-12 students and Tuesday for those in pre-K — the district and Chicago Board of Education have not yet adopted a budget that covers this school year. The board, which is already divided on the district’s proposal, must legally adopt a budget by Aug. 29, and is expected to vote on a plan Aug. 28.

Families and kids may also feel the impact of changes related to the new Chicago Teachers Union contract, including smaller classes and more staff.

Across the district, Chalkbeat will be watching an array of items, including potential changes to federal policy, the district’s enrollment changes, and the state’s focus on school quality — and how those impact student learning and the public’s perceptions of schools.

Here are five things we’re watching this school year.

Will enrollment drop this year?

After more than a decade of dipping enrollment, Chicago began seeing a slight uptick in the number of kids attending CPS schools — likely due to the influx of thousands of migrant families from Central and South American countries.

Public schools have seen drops in enrollment across the nation for several reasons, including decreasing birth rates. Last year, a total of 325,305 students attended Chicago Public Schools by the 20th day of school, or the day the district officially counts how many students it’s serving.

But it’s unclear if enrollment will increase again this year, especially as immigration to the U.S. slows as President Donald Trump ramps up immigration enforcement.

Chicago Public Schools staff are instructed by the district not to allow immigration enforcement into their buildings unless they have a judicial warrant.

But advocates worry that Trump’s aggressive deportation goals will have a chilling effect. The president’s policies, they worry, could discourage newcomer kids not to attend school or even leave the city.

How well are Illinois students learning?

The state of Illinois is set to implement changes in measuring when students are proficient in core subjects and is reconsidering how it labels schools — potentially impacting the public’s understanding of how well students are doing.

The Illinois State Board of Education recently approved changes to cut scores that determine when a student is proficient in a subject and expects to see an increase in how many students are considered to be learning core subjects well. The changes came after state leaders said the previous cut scores did not reflect the reality of what students were learning or their ability to enter college without remediation courses.

The state also worked with dozens of teachers on collecting feedback for potentially changing its own learning standards and benchmarks for how well schools are doing. Chicago Public Schools also rolled out new school accountability dashboards this year, which are supposed to include more traditional metrics like test scores and information about students’ well-being.

With budget cuts and new teachers contract, how will school day change?

After nearly a year of contentious negotiations, the Chicago Teachers Union reached a deal with Chicago Public Schools in the spring over a four-year deal that, in part, implements a series of changes that students may notice in the classroom.

At the same time, CPS is planning tens of millions of dollars in cuts that could impact things like meals and how clean schools will be.

Under the new teachers contract, class sizes will be lowered to 25 students in kindergarten, and the contract requires a teaching assistant for classes with more than 23 students. In grades 4-8, the class size will decrease to 30 students.

The contract also adds hundreds of new positions over the next three years, including more teacher assistants, case managers for students with disabilities, and nurses. Unrelated to the contract, the district is also restructuring its special education department and implementing staffing changes related to students with disabilities.

And, kids could be getting more recess or time in enrichment classes. The contract increased preparation time for elementary school teachers by 10 minutes. Schools will meet this requirement by getting an additional 10 minutes of recess where schools are not currently following a state requirement for a half-hour recess, district officials have said. But schools may also add specialty classes to give homeroom teachers more prep time.

As it worked to close its $734 million deficit, the district announced more than $165 million in cuts. That included layoffs to central office and crossing guards, cutting 480 full-time custodial positions, and hot meals for students.

How could Trump’s agenda impact schools?

In some ways, the Trump administration has competing interests that could have sweeping impacts on Chicago’s schools.

Trump wants to invest fewer federal dollars in the nation’s schools — which almost resulted in a loss of about $60 million for CPS — and any funding restrictions could impact CPS’ already tight budget plan.

At the same time, his administration wants a hand in what schools teach. The federal government has opened a civil rights investigation into CPS’ Black Student Success Plan, claiming that the plan is a form of race-based discrimination that seeks more resources for “favored” students. CPS has declined to comment on the matter.

If the federal government decides the district has violated federal law, it could decide to punish the district by pulling funding or reaching a settlement that impacts the district’s approach to serving students with the most needs.

What’s next in CPS’ leadership saga?

Chicago Public Schools has experienced profound leadership turnover over the past year. Since October, the entire mayor-appointed Board of Education resigned, the former CEO was fired, and a new 21-member, partially appointed, partially elected school board was seated for the first time in Chicago’s history. That board then hired interim CEO Macquline King and is searching for a permanent CEO.

And King now finds herself in the crosshairs of the city and mostly appointed members of the board after proposing a budget that doesn’t include a pension reimbursement to the city or a loan.

The board hoped to find a new CEO as early as September, but it’s unclear how quickly it will narrow down candidates for interviews. Some have raised questions in recent months about who legally has the authority to hire the CEO.

Whomever the board chooses will be charged with overseeing the district as it faces financial pressures. And, if that person stays in the job through 2027, they will be the first CPS CEO to oversee the district with the city’s first fully elected board.

Becky Vevea contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago’s Acero Santiago charter school faces another year of uncertainty with potential sale

2025-08-14T23:06:24+00:00

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Outside the Acero Santiago charter school campus in Chicago’s West Town neighborhood, Principal Melissa Sweazy greeted students and parents as if they were celebrities.

Under a sunny sky and one of the mildest mornings the city has seen all summer, Sweazy cheered and waved glittery maroon and gold pompoms as the kids, dressed in white shirts and navy blue pants or skirts, walked down a paper red carpet into the big brick building.

“Vivir Mi Vida” by Marc Anthony blasted out of a portable speaker perched in a planter near the entrance. “I missed you,” Sweazy said to one young student who hopped toward the front door. “Buenos dias, mi amor,” she called to another.

A mother asked Sweazy what was going on at the other end of the school.

“We’re just trying to make sure CPS buys our building,” the principal replied.

On the east side of the building, in sharp contrast to the first-day hugs and hellos, the scene was somber. Two elected officials hosted a press conference, surrounded by dozens of teachers, students and parents who held signs that said, “Save our school,” and “Not For SALE.”

Ald. Gilbert Villegas and school board member Carlos Rivas hold a press conference calling for Chicago Public Schools to purchase the building where Acero Santiago, a charter school, is located. The Archdiocese, which owns the school's property, has put the building up for sale.

Santiago and four other Acero campuses narrowly avoided closure this year, when the Chicago Board of Education took an unprecedented vote to save the campuses in February and turn them into district schools by the 2026-27 school year. Now, the school is facing a new obstacle: The Archdiocese of Chicago, which owns the school building, put it up for sale last month for $6.75 million, according to elected officials and a Zillow listing.

“The Santiago community is once again – once again – facing another threat of closure,” Ald. Gilbert Villegas, flanked by school board member Carlos Rivas, told reporters. “It caught many folks off guard.”

The split-screen action reflected a small, tight-knit school celebrating another year of existence, while grappling with a potential sale that the community worries could end with their building being razed by a developer.

In a statement, Yasmin Quiroz, communications and public relations manager for the Archdiocese, said the property where the school is located is part of the unified Our Lady of Unity parish, which has “multiple worship sites,” and the church campus where the school is located is “no longer needed.” Quiroz said there is no additional information about potential buyers or how the property might be used in the future.

It’s unclear what would happen if a developer or another private buyer purchases the campus. The school has a lease for the building through the 2025-26 school year, Quiroz said.

The Zillow listing says the neighborhood is in high demand, and the plot has the zoning to build 48 units.

Villegas and Rivas held the press conference to urge Chicago Public Schools to purchase the building. CPS has already proposed to budget $20 million this fiscal year for “incubation” costs as it works to transition the five Acero campuses into district-run schools, according to a district budget presentation this week. The district is facing its most severe budget crisis since at least the pandemic. However, Rivas argued that it’s possible to negotiate an affordable deal for the building. Part of the expenses CPS has already accounted for, according to Rivas, is fixing Santiago’s roof.

“If CPS is saying that they’ve earmarked millions of dollars to replace this roof on a building that isn’t ours, I’d much rather work on finding a deal with the Archdiocese to be able to take over this building,” Rivas said.

Acero, which will oversee the school until next year, did not respond to a request for comment. CPS did not say whether it is considering purchasing the property.

“Regardless of the building’s future ownership, the District’s primary focus is on ensuring a smooth and successful transition for all students and staff,” Sylvia Barragan, a CPS spokesperson, said in a statement.

Acero abruptly announced last fall that it would close seven of its 15 campuses, including Santiago. After pressure from staff and families, the Chicago Teachers Union, and the mayor’s office, the Board of Education voted in February to save five of the campuses and turn them into district-run schools. Some board members opposed the move because they wanted the opportunity to consider whether absorbing the schools would be a viable decision amid district financial pressures.

As district enrollment has largely dipped over the past decade, the same has happened in Chicago’s charter sector, prompting several networks to call for consolidations and closures.

Rivas said co-locating Santiago with a nearby district school is not an ideal option because doing so would require complicated coordination between two different sets of staffers and school leaders.

“I’d much rather that we try to get this done as fast as possible to ensure that our families know they’re here for years to come,” Rivas said. “We’ve already made that commitment as a board.”

Erick Alonzo, father of a fifth grader and eighth grader, said his girls felt relief when the board blocked the closure. Last year was “very hard” on his daughters, who have attended Santiago since kindergarten and faced the prospect of leaving their friends.

Alonzo’s older daughter will move on to high school elsewhere after this school year, but his younger child once again faces the possibility of leaving Santiago sooner than she anticipated.

“If they sell the building, then you know, she’s gonna have to start making new friends and going to a different school,” Alonzo said, before hugging his girls goodbye for the day.

The school’s close-knit culture was apparent Thursday morning as children and parents pulled up to the school.

Acero Santiago Principal Melissa Sweazy embraces a student on the first day of school. After months of fearing the campus would close, Acero Santiago staff and families are worried the building will be sold to developers.

Alexandra Pabon, joined by her 17-year-old daughter Isabelle, dropped off Pabon’s 10-year-old son. The family used to live around the corner and later moved about a half-hour out of the neighborhood but has continued coming back to Santiago. They like that the school, which enrolled just under 230 students last year, has small class sizes and everyone knows each other.

Isabelle, who attended Santiago from kindergarten through eighth grade, embraced an old teacher, who talked to her for several minutes.

“A smaller school like this, it seems like you’re getting less experience, but it’s actually more impactful for your life because you form kind of like a family bond, not just with your teachers but with your friends,” said Isabelle, a senior at an Intrinsic charter high school downtown. “The teachers still see me, and it’s like I never graduated.”

Just before the first day of school started Thursday, a little girl wept outside the front doors. As her mother knelt down to reassure her, a Santiago staffer approached and said, “C’mon, we’ll go find our friends.”

The staffer invited the mother as well, and the three walked in together.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Majority of Chicago Board of Education signals opposition to interim CEO’s budget proposal

2025-08-14T21:58:44+00:00

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Shortly after the Chicago Board of Education heard a budget proposal by Chicago schools interim CEO Macquline King that did not include a loan or pension reimbursement to the city, a majority of members sent her a letter with a demand: Include the loan and pension payment.

Eleven of the 20 current board members signed the letter sent to King Wednesday during a board meeting where Chief Budget Officer Mike Sitkowski presented the district’s proposed $10.2 billion budget, said Norma Rios-Sierra, an appointed member of the school board who signed the letter obtained by Chalkbeat. The letter was sent after Sitkowski’s presentation, she said.

The proposal, which covers the 2025-26 school year, avoids beginning and midyear cuts to schools, but includes other cuts, including to custodians, hot meals, and central office. It does not commit to reimbursing the city with a $175 million pension payment for non-teaching CPS staff unless the district receives more money than expected from a city pool of taxpayer dollars meant to spur economic development — known as TIF — or from the state. The proposal also excludes any plans for a short-term, high-interest loan to cover costs.

District officials, who were charged with closing a $734 million deficit, said including the pension reimbursement would result in cuts to schools. They have argued that short-term borrowing could lead to a downgrade in the district’s already junk bond-rating status and lead to debt with high interest rates.

Board members were split on the proposal during the Wednesday board meeting, with some elected members expressing support while largely mayoral-appointed members said the city is foregoing its responsibilities by passing up the payment, which would help the city close its budget as it faces its own financial challenges. Earlier this week, Mayor Brandon Johnson said he was expecting CPS to fulfill the pension reimbursement.

In addition to Rios-Sierra, the letter was signed by appointed board members Olga Bautista — the board vice president — Michilla Blaise, Karen Zaccor, Debby Pope, Emma Lozano, Edward Bannon, Anusha Thotakura, and Cydney Sylvan Wallace. Elected board members Jitu Brown and Ebony DeBerry also signed. Johnson appointed 11 members, but former member Frank Thomas stepped down and has not been replaced.

The letter, first reported by the Chicago Sun-Times and WBEZ, insisted on changes to the budget proposal before it had to be published online by Wednesday in order for the board to vote on the budget Aug. 28, one of the last days the board can legally adopt a budget for this fiscal year. The members’ requested changes don’t appear to be in the proposal posted online, but the letter signals that King’s proposal has for now lost a majority of support needed on the board to pass.

CPS spokesperson Mary Ann Fergus confirmed King received the letter Wednesday evening but did not provide further comment on the board members’ request.

“There are other components we believe could potentially work as presented, but this loan provision, along with the [Municipal Employees’, Officers’ and Officials’ Annuity and Benefit Fund] disentanglement, is critical to keep in place today to preserve our ability to act on them,” the letter said. “It would be difficult for us to support a budget without these two changes.”

The letter does not specify a loan amount or interest rate to be included. The Chicago Tribune reported Tuesday that City Hall had pitched to CPS to take out a $200 million loan. Last year, City Hall asked CPS to take out a $300 million loan to cover the pension payment and labor contract costs. The letter says the loan “should be included as an option to be utilized only in the event it is necessary to avoid further cuts to the classroom.”

“Leaving it out at this stage would unnecessarily limit our flexibility as we continue discussions and refine the proposal,” the letter said.

Board members also wrote that they support the district “continuing the disentanglement” of a pension payment to the city for non-teaching CPS staff — a reference to reimbursing the city with the $175 million payment.

CPS is not legally required to reimburse the city for that payment, which contributes to a $1.3 billion municipal pension fund. The district has previously paid it, starting under former Mayor Lori Lightfoot. Former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez’s refusal to reimburse the city with that payment as CPS faced budget challenges last year helped lead to his firing.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Who picks the person to lead Chicago schools? Elected officials and legal experts disagree.

2025-08-13T10:00:00+00:00

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Months after the Chicago Board of Education hired a search firm to help look for the next CEO of Chicago Public Schools, board President Sean Harden received an email from one of the chief architects of Chicago’s elected school board legislation.

At the time, State Sen. Rob Martwick, who represents parts of Chicago’s Northwest Side and some suburbs, said newly-elected and appointed board members had been asking him who has the power to choose the next CEO.

Martwick, who is also an attorney, decided to email Harden on May 28 with the answer: It’s the mayor — and it would be “outside of the law” for the board to choose, he wrote.

In the email obtained by Chalkbeat through a Freedom of Information Act request, Martwick cited a section of Illinois’ school code that was first written when Chicago’s schools were put under mayoral control in 1995. It states: “The Mayor shall appoint a full-time, compensated chief executive officer, and his or her compensation as such chief executive officer shall be determined by the Mayor.”

But school board members point to a different section of the school code that puts the power of picking a superintendent in the hands of the Chicago Board of Education.

Some legal experts, however, disagree that there’s a straight answer — including on whether the law gives the school board hiring power once it’s fully elected in 2027.

“It is completely unclear,” said Teri McMurtry-Chubb, a professor of law at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

The competing opinions raise questions about whether the law is clear enough on who hires the CEO and whether current or future Chicago mayors could try to argue that it’s their choice, not the board’s.

The mayor appoints 11 members to the 21-member school board until 2027.

Martwick’s interpretation — or his May 28 email — hasn’t had any apparent impact on the board as it looks for the next leader of CPS by as early as next month. Jessica Biggs, who is the chair of the board’s transition team, said the question arose earlier this year.

“I think that there was a wondering early on in the process about whose authority this actually was, but it’s my understanding that that question was resolved pretty quickly, and it was determined that that authority rests with the board,” Biggs said.

Martwick, an ally of Mayor Brandon Johnson’s, sent the email one month after the school board committed to hosting community feedback meetings about the CEO search and two months after it passed a resolution requiring the next leader to have a superintendent’s license. His note also came about a week after the board had narrowed its choice for an interim CEO to a handful of candidates, which at that point excluded the mayor’s chief of staff.

Martwick said he has not discussed the issue with the mayor or City Hall, and that his interpretation is also based on what he and fellow lawmakers settled on as they negotiated the legislation.

“I didn’t want this, but the concession that I made was that the mayor would appoint the school board president and the mayor would appoint the CEO during the transitionary period,” Martwick said. “After [it’s] fully elected, [the board is] a separate, standalone government, and they retain the power to do everything.”

Martwick and other lawmakers pushed for years to establish the city’s first elected board after more than a decade of advocacy for an elected school board from community groups and the Chicago Teachers Union.

In February 2024, the mayor sent a letter to state Senate President Don Harmon, asking for 10 people to be elected to the school board this year and to allow the mayor to appoint the 11 others until 2027. Harmon — who had originally supported the idea of full and immediate elections — filed legislation carrying the mayor’s preferred plan, which was ultimately passed.

Asked what he thinks of the school board moving ahead with its search process despite his interpretation of the law, Martwick said the board could open itself up to legal action from the mayor.

“There’s no legislation police, right? We don’t come around and say, ‘Oh, you’re not following the law,’ but you leave yourself open to some sort of legal challenge,” Martwick said.

“But I suppose if they say, ‘You guys decide — that’s OK with me,’ you know, then that’s the way it goes.”

Legal experts interpret Illinois law differently

In Illinois state law governing public schools — also known as the school code — the Chicago mayor’s authority for choosing the district’s CEO is outlined in a section related to CPS’s former Board of Trustees, which existed between 1995 and 1999, at which point it was replaced with a mayoral appointed board that oversaw Chicago schools until this year.

That section of the law was not removed when the elected school board bill became law and there is no explicit date for when the mayor loses the power to appoint a CEO, even as other sections of the law outlining Chicago’s transition to an elected school board set specific start and expiration dates.

However, a different section of the school code states that after June 30, 1999, “the board may, by a vote of a majority of its full membership, appoint a general superintendent of schools” and that the board can conduct a national search for a superintendent.

In practice, between July 1999 and January of this year when the hybrid school board was sworn in, Chicago’s mayor has chosen a CEO, who was later approved by a vote of the school board, whose members were all appointed by the mayor.

David Bloomfield, a former general counsel of New York City public schools before that district became a mayoral-run system, said from his reading of the Illinois school code, Chicago’s school board chooses the CEO. He said the mayor’s authority is outlined in a section that talks about an emergency declaration that was “overhauled by more recent reforms.”

“I don’t think it’s ambiguous, and if my interpretation is correct, no legislative action is needed,” Bloomfield wrote in an email to Chalkbeat. “It’s just obsolete, not really requiring repeal.”

But Nadav Shoked, a law professor at Northwestern University who has studied local government law, said the school code doesn’t set an explicit expiration date for the mayor’s powers and uses more passive language for the board — that it “may” hire a CEO — making the law unclear and potentially inviting legal challenges.

He drew out a hypothetical situation: If a board-picked CEO approves the firing of a principal, that principal could choose to sue the CEO and argue that person has no power because they weren’t hired properly. Shoked said he’d bet on the board winning such a case, since the law does allow the board to hire a CEO, and the broader intent of recent reforms have been to make the school board its own governing body. Still, the ambiguity could lead to legal challenges and legal bills for CPS, he said.

McMurtry-Chubb, the law professor from UIC, said the law as written could allow both the board and the mayor to hire co-CEOs, which “would also be another drain on resources that we just don’t have.”

If the mayor or the board hired someone the other wasn’t supportive of, the CEO could “endure a potentially contentious work environment,” McMurtry-Chubb said.

State lawmakers should clarify the law to say who has the authority to hire the CEO, McMurtry and Shoked said. And the board can make some moves in the meantime to avoid a legal move from City Hall, Shoked said.

“To the extent that they’re not currently at war with the mayor, they can solve the problem by just making sure that once they come up with their candidate, just get the mayor to also agree,” Shoked said.

Neither Harden’s office nor the mayor’s responded to requests for comment.

Biggs feels the law is “pretty clear” that after 1999, it’s the school board — whether elected or appointed — to hire the CEO. She said Harden worked with board members to decide when they should invite the mayor to “offer his recommendation.” The mayor’s office has also not raised concerns about the search with her, she said.

“As a sister agency of the city, we’re interested in working in partnership with the mayor’s office,” Biggs said, including deciding when to introduce candidates to the mayor’s office. “I do not have a concern about a legal challenge.”

The current law does not have explicit language that says who can choose the CEO after 2027, when the 21-member board will be fully elected. Martwick said the General Assembly would need to clarify the law’s language if it’s ambiguous, but it’s his understanding from the negotiations around the elected school board legislation that the power to choose the district’s leader belongs to the board after it becomes fully elected.

“I will testify to that in open court,” Martwick said. “That is the intent of the legislation.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

CPS budget proposal won’t include city pension reimbursement to avoid more school cuts, sources say

2025-08-12T15:35:41+00:00

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Interim Chicago Public Schools CEO Macquline King is planning to propose a $10.2 billion budget to the school board Wednesday that doesn’t include midyear cuts to schools or a reimbursement to the city of Chicago for a highly-debated pension payment covering the retirements of city workers and CPS staff, multiple sources told Chalkbeat.

Not including the pension reimbursement — a move that most elected school board members have said they support — would help close the district’s budget deficit, which was estimated at $734 million in June. According to a source with direct knowledge of the budget plan, King’s budget proposal also does not include a plan to take out a short-term, high-interest loan — a strategy to address the budget deficit previously pitched by the mayor’s office, where she worked before she became CEO.

But if the board adopts a budget without the pension reimbursement, it could lead to more tensions with City Hall as the district breaks away from 30 years of mayoral control. It could also prompt another midyear dispute over the matter.

A second source with direct knowledge of the budget plan said the proposal assumes CPS will receive $404 million from a city pool of taxpayer dollars meant to spur economic development, known as surplus Tax Increment Financing, or TIF, dollars. That is $100 million more than the record amount CPS received last year in TIF surplus dollars, which are controlled by the mayor’s office.

However, district leaders are willing to reimburse the city with the pension payment if the city provides additional TIF dollars beyond the $404 million included in the proposed budget, or if the state provides a “windfall” of additional revenue, to help cover the cost, the second source said.

Cassio Mendoza, a spokesperson for the mayor’s office, said Monday afternoon it is “not correct” that CPS’s budget proposal does not include the pension reimbursement. He said negotiations are ongoing between City Hall and CPS.

Earlier this summer, the district announced hundreds of layoffs and cuts, including to hot meals. King’s budget proposal does not include additional cuts that would impact classrooms or direct student services and avoids the need for cuts to schools in the middle of the year, according to a source with direct knowledge of the budget plan. It also does not include furloughs and fulfills commitments to unions, the source said.

There was “no way to avoid the potential for midyear cuts” or future cuts without declining to reimburse the city for the municipal pension payment, according to the source.

The district closed its remaining deficit through “additional savings and cuts away from the classroom,” other one-time funding sources and revenue and through refunding of existing debt, the source said, adding that there may be additional layoffs at the central office but that’s not yet certain.

In March, a coalition of Chicago’s newly-minted elected school board members blocked a budget amendment that would have transferred $175 million from CPS to the city to put toward a $1.13 billion payment to the Municipal Employees Annuity and Benefit Fund.

But not pitching in for that pension payment will likely draw ire from the mayor’s office and members of City Council as the city faces its own financial challenges. Aldermen and the mayor must pass a budget before the end of the calendar year and typically begin their budgeting process in October. CPS began reimbursing the city for a portion of that pension payment in 2020, under then-Mayor Lori Lightfoot. Former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez was fired, in part, for refusing to reimburse the city for the pension payment, which is for non-teaching CPS employees.

King is expected to present the budget Wednesday at a Chicago Board of Education meeting to review its agenda for its meeting later this month, when it is expected to vote on the budget — one of the last days the board can do so, per state law. The district’s new fiscal year began July 1.

“It looks like our superintendent is not a rubber stamp superintendent,” said elected school board member Che “Rhymefest” Smith, who voted against hiring King and opposed the pension payment in March and was aware of King’s upcoming budget proposal. “She heard the community loud and clear.”

Smith said many residents told district officials that they did not believe the cash-strapped district should take on the pension payment at a series of forums CPS hosted to get community input on the budget.

He said he and a majority of fellow elected board members remain staunchly opposed to borrowing, which he said would place the district on shaky legal ground and only defer the problem to next year while adding borrowing costs: “We’d be stuck repaying the loan and still needing the money.”

Norma Rios-Sierra, an appointed member of the board, said she is not yet certain what the budget proposal will include, but thinks that not paying the pension payment “is a mistake.”

She said she supports a budget plan that would avoid cuts to schools and said many of her constituents don’t want the district to pay the pension payment. However, she compared foregoing the pension reimbursement to not paying a bill and wants to have more conversations “with all stakeholders.”

“We need to find a permanent solution,” she said.

School board President Sean Harden did not respond to a request for comment.

Meanwhile, the Chicago Teachers Union announced that representatives from the union, school district, mayor’s office, and labor groups representing district principals and support staff will hold a series of briefings for aldermen and state lawmakers Tuesday to argue for more funding for CPS from the state. Illinois lawmakers have sent an additional $1.1 billion to the district over the past seven years, but by the state’s own calculation for what would constitute “adequate” funding, Chicago’s allocation remains $1.6 billion short.

Becky Vevea contributed.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

There are many ideas for solving CPS’ budget issues. Here’s how 9 of them could play out.

2025-08-05T21:51:32+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools has a $734 million problem.

That’s the size of the district’s budget deficit, which must be closed in the coming weeks in order for CPS to comply with state law requiring it to pass a balanced spending plan for the upcoming school year. District officials must release their budget proposal to the public by Aug. 13 for the board to pass by its Aug. 28 meeting.

Officials have not yet decided on how they’ll close the gap, but there are generally two approaches: Find more money, or make cuts. Last month, Chief Budget Officer Mike Sitkowski said CPS had so far reduced the deficit by $165 million through a series of layoffs and other cost-saving measures, leaving $569 million left to resolve. That number is now $519 million due to an unexpected $50 million increase in state money.

Even after the Board of Education passes a balanced budget this year, Chicago’s financial issues are not projected to go away. As it faces rising costs, CPS projects a $1.3 billion deficit by 2030.

So, where could CPS get more money? Are there expenses that can be cut?

Below is a list of various solutions that different groups, including CPS, civic organizations, and unions, have floated to close the gap.

This list does not include every idea but is meant to provide a small buffet of options. Some of these ideas are short-term fixes, meaning they solve the budget deficit this year but do not help increase revenue or reduce expenses down the road. Other ideas would provide long-term help, but may not help now. And many of the solutions would not be under the Board of Education’s control and would require another government entity to act.

All of the figures are estimates based on research done by advocacy organizations and budget experts who spoke to Chalkbeat. The numbers could fluctuate for different reasons. For example, it remains unclear how much CPS could actually issue in bonds. And the revenue potential from an additional tax on corporations would depend on how much corporations actually earn in the year that would go into effect.

Many of the timelines, including those that could take effect in fiscal year 2026, assume the soonest a government entity could take action on these proposals, but not necessarily if they would. For example, state lawmakers have not yet shown interest in calling a special session to address the district’s funding challenges.

Some officials, such as school board President Sean Harden, have made a case for a mixture of these solutions, such as borrowing money right now (a short-term fix) and pushing for more state revenue (a long-term fix).

What are the obstacles to solving CPS’ budget crisis?

What’s not reflected in the options above are the political challenges facing some of these ideas. For example, some organizations argue a progressive income tax is needed to generate more state revenue for schools and other public goods. But voters rejected the idea in 2020 in a 55% to 45% referendum vote on a proposed constitutional amendment. Some political and budget observers see less appetite at the state level to raise taxes and describe such proposals as an uphill battle.

We included the ideas on taxing corporations, which are different from income tax proposals, and assumed a scenario where lawmakers would funnel all of that new revenue into the state’s evidence-based formula, or EBF, which sends money to school districts based on their needs.

The idea about increases to EBF center around advocates’ call for a $550 million annual increase to the formula. That formula calls for an additional $1.6 billion for CPS to be adequately funded, and lawmakers set a goal to fulfill the formula by 2027 — but they’re projected to blow that deadline.

Another proposed solution is consolidating pension systems to free up more dollars available to go directly to classrooms. But it would require approval from state lawmakers and may be a hard sell to legislators who don’t represent Chicago, as well as the Chicago Teachers Union.

Similarly, borrowing money could come with logistical challenges. When CPS asks investors publicly to loan the district money — known as issuing bonds — there are legal limits to how the district can use that money and, in turn, how much it can ask for. The district also has a junk bond rating, similar to a bad credit score, meaning it would likely face high interest rates. Considering those factors and using estimates from the city and a municipal finance expert, we assumed the district would be able to borrow roughly $200 million without going a more private route, like to a bank.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools cuts 480 janitor positions as it ends all private custodial contracts

2025-08-04T21:37:39+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools will cut 480 custodian jobs, end all private custodial contracts, and directly oversee the work of keeping schools clean.

The move, which comes as the district is working to close a $734 million deficit, sparked an immediate rebuke and demand for reconsideration from the two unions representing school custodians.

Starting Sept. 30, CPS will oversee 2,100 full-time custodians and end seven contracts with private custodial companies. The change will mean cutting about 1,250 private custodians and ending a longstanding practice of contracting with private companies to help clean schools.

CPS officials said the move is not only about cutting costs, but also part of the district’s goal to bring 25% of privatized positions back under direct district oversight, as outlined in the five-year strategic plan. Last year, CPS ended its agreement with Aramark, the Philadelphia-based company that oversaw management of all privately-employed and CPS custodians.

When Aramark took over management of custodians in 2014, the district also laid off 480 janitors and many schools complained of dirty conditions for many years. The cost of outsourcing went millions over budget. A decade later, unions and school principals cheered the end of the Aramark deal.

Now, some are also raising concerns about school cleanliness with these staffing reductions two weeks before the school year is set to begin on Aug. 18.

“You can’t eliminate 1,200 custodians just two weeks before school starts without any real plan for how these buildings will be cleaned and ready,” said Genie Kastrup, president of Service Employees International Union Local 1, the union representing privately-employed custodians. “Our kids deserve a safe and healthy learning environment on day one.”

Charles Mayfield, the district’s chief operating officer said Monday he believes more CPS oversight will help ensure cleanliness at schools, even with fewer custodians. That includes improved staff training, better monitoring of cleaning supplies, and a mobile app that allows custodians to upload information about rooms they’ve cleaned, giving the district “visibility” on the work at schools, he said.

Custodians with the private companies have received a text message and email about the change and instructions on how to apply for 750 full-time custodial roles inside CPS. They’re being asked to fill out an interest form by Aug. 22 and apply.

In a letter sent to elected officials Friday, Mayfield wrote that the district’s budget challenges made it “necessary to consolidate custodial services to ensure greater efficiency and long-term sustainability.”

CPS said the custodial changes will save about $40 million, which is part of the $165 million in savings that district officials already announced earlier this summer through layoffs and cutting down on some school-based services, such as hot meals and health services.

The seven private custodial contracts now set to end were expected to cost a total $222 million over the next two school years, according to a summary of the contracts that the Board of Education approved last February. CPS has the right to terminate those contracts with at least 30 days notice, according to district records.

Mayfield also wrote that the district is “mindful” that many of the private custodians losing their jobs have served CPS “loyally for years.”

“While CPS is proactively inviting all privately-employed custodians working within CPS schools to seek employment directly with CPS, unfortunately, due to budget constraints, not all positions will be retained,” he wrote.

The district says the changes will also “streamline” custodial operations and improve oversight and quality.

One South Side principal said she supports the shift to having CPS directly oversee custodians, but she’s concerned about the transition. However, she said it may be difficult for schools to manage with fewer positions and worries about schedule changes.

SEIU sharply denounced the change, raising concerns about job losses and the district’s ability to keep schools clean. The union demanded the district rethink the number of positions it is cutting, provide custodians with the most years of seniority the right of first refusal for new in-house jobs, and ensure that any worker who takes an in-house custodian role represented by SEIU’s Local 73 — which represents CPS-managed custodial workers — can keep the current rate of pay and minimum benefits.

CPS officials did not directly comment on those demands.

In SEIU’s press release, Maria Avila, Local 1 vice president, said she’s worked in CPS schools for more than 15 years, but the change feels like CPS is “throwing us away like we don’t matter.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Illinois lawmakers offer no quick solutions for CPS during district finances hearing

2025-07-31T22:44:33+00:00

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Illinois state lawmakers did not express willingness Thursday to help Chicago Public Schools close its $734 million budget gap in the coming weeks.

Although some lawmakers agree they want to boost education spending, they did not commit to doing so during a public hearing held in downtown Chicago just a few weeks before the start of the school year on Aug. 18. Chicago’s school board has until the end of August to pass a balanced budget for this fiscal year, which began on July 1. The board is expected to vote on a spending plan at its Aug. 28 meeting.

“I’m hopeful that we can move past the rhetoric, the talking points and unrealistic demands, and get down to business about how we can do better by CPS and its students,” said Illinois Democrat Rep. Ann Williams, who represents neighborhoods on the North Side of Chicago and chairs the House Executive Committee.

Illinois has increased funding for K-12 schools across the state by more than $2 billion under a funding formula created eight years ago, of which $1.1 billion has gone to CPS. The state set a goal to “adequately” fund all school districts by 2027, but they’re projected to miss that deadline. According to the state’s formula last year, Chicago schools need almost $1.2 billion to be considered adequately funded.

The hearing was called at the urging of Democrat State Rep. Curtis Tarver, who filed a bill during the spring legislative session to reinstate the Chicago School Finance Authority, which oversaw CPS’s finances from 1980 until 2010. It made financial decisions for the district and had the authority to borrow money, issue bonds, levy taxes, and approve school budgets instead of the Chicago Board of Education, according to the Civic Federation, an independent, nonpartisan research organization.

During the hearing, Tarver sharply criticized the mayor’s popularity and his legislative team. School Board member Michilla Blaise, who was appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson, defended the mayor by highlighting his background as a teacher, to which Tarver said, “Part of the reason we are where we are is because of the ineffectiveness and sometimes ineptitude of the fifth floor,” a reference to Johnson’s City Hall office.

Chicago’s budget deficit is driven by multiple things, including rising costs and the district’s use of onetime federal COVID relief dollars to hire thousands more staff.

For weeks, the Chicago Teachers Union and some school board members have pushed the state to call a special session to address school funding issues and other impacts of federal cuts to social safety net programs.

State lawmakers and the governor have not said whether they’ll hold a special session before the regular fall veto session. Thursday’s hearing didn’t reveal an appetite to do so. After the hearing, Williams told Chalkbeat that she is interested in progressive tax ideas for raising revenue, but that calls for a special session are “gimmicky” and designed for “media attention.”

“Demanding special sessions when [the city and CPS] really weren’t there in May, when we were actually working on the budget, seems disingenuous to me,” Williams said.

The district, board members, unions, and civic groups have all floated various solutions for closing CPS’s projected $734 million budget gap. Those include borrowing money, more state funding, using more surplus dollars from a city pool of tax dollars meant to spur economic development, and forgoing a $175 million pension reimbursement to the city.

During her testimony to state lawmakers, interim CPS CEO Macquline King outlined current impacts of the shortfall, including cuts to crossing guards and hot meals.

“We cannot completely cut our way out of this situation,” King told lawmakers. “To do so would have a devastating consequence on the day-to-day operations of our schools and therefore the quality of our students’ education.”

Asked why lawmakers didn’t ask CPS officials more questions about the budget issues, Tarver said state lawmakers were “really just trying to better understand, as opposed to drill them with questions.”

Appointed Chicago school board members Blaise and Debby Pope, along with elected members Jennifer Custer and Ellen Rosenfeld, also testified about why funding cuts would negatively impact students and classrooms. But their joint testimony revealed differing opinions among the 21-person board on how CPS should solve its financial problems.

Blaise and Pope pressed state lawmakers to help CPS. Rosenfeld and Custer echoed calls for collaboration, but Rosenfeld said she’s not calling for a special session and doesn’t want the school board to take out a loan or reimburse the city $175 million for a municipal pension payment that covers some school staff. Custer said she’s not expecting the state to give CPS “a handout,” but wants lawmakers to work with the board on a solution.

Joe Ferguson, president of The Civic Federation, said a School Finance Authority might be an acceptable solution, but it wouldn’t need to operate as it did in the past. For example, it could have partial decision making power over budgets or veto power over contracts, but otherwise leave those powers in the hands of the school board, according to a report from the Civic Federation.

Tarver said he thinks the state “should have some say” over how the district spends its money. The state provides flexible education funding to all districts in Illinois and Chicago is the largest.

“I don’t know that [a School Finance Authority] needs to be in the same iteration that it was before,” Tarver said. “That was obviously 40 years ago. Things have changed.”

Multiple organizations, including the Chicago Teachers Union, called for more state money for public services in Illinois.

Half of the room was packed with members of the Chicago Teachers Union, which held a rally before the hearing along with other progressive organizations to pressure state lawmakers and Gov. J.B. Pritzker to raise revenue through new taxes, including on the state’s highest earners and corporations.

“Illinois has a Democratic super majority,” said Diane Castro, the CTU’s financial secretary, during the rally. “We are a blue state. We need that to mean something.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

To accommodate bus routes, 22 Chicago school bell times will change this fall

2025-07-24T23:42:37+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools will tweak arrival and dismissal times at 22 schools this fall in order to address ongoing challenges with providing students with busing.

Arrival and dismissal times will be pushed back by 15-30 minutes at nearly all of the schools and families and staff at each school were notified of the changes last week, said CPS spokesperson Evan Moore.

District officials did not provide exact bell schedules for each school.

The time changes are due to a bus driver shortage, according to district officials. They’ve cited a driver shortage in recent years as a factor in why CPS hasn’t been able to provide transportation to general education students. Interim CPS CEO Macquline King said the changes are helping the district “address both our transportation crisis” and its financial challenges. The district is facing a $734 million deficit.

“Regardless of the systemwide benefits, I know this is disruptive” for parents, King said during a Board of Education meeting on Thursday.

The district had suspended transportation for general education students in 2023. That change also came after the state placed CPS on a corrective action plan for exceedingly long bus rides for thousands of students with disabilities. The district has since been taken off that plan.

As it has been in recent years, transportation will be prioritized for students with disabilities, who are legally entitled to transportation if it is included in their Individualized Education Program, and those who are homeless and approved for yellow bus service. CPS officials say about 17,000 students, or 5% of all CPS students, are legally eligible for bus transportation.

King said the district will also again have hub stops this school year, where a group of selective enrollment and magnet schools serve as central pickup and drop off points for general education students. CPS provided busing to 700 general education students using hub stops last school year, and provided bus transportation to 15,790 students by the end of last school year, or 92% of kids who were eligible for transportation.

The district did not say how many students will be eligible to use the hub stops this upcoming school year or exactly when the program will start, except that it will be “later this year.” Families whose students participated last year have been notified that the program is continuing and will be contacted again when the district restarts it.

The hub stops will be for the same schools as last school year.

The district’s Office of Student Transportation had a roughly $140 million budget last school year, slightly lower than the previous year, according to budget records.

Correction: In the list of schools with changing bell times, we have corrected the name of Mosaic School of Fine Arts. CPS initially provided an incorrect name for the school.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board moves to make more students eligible for accelerated coursework

2025-07-24T21:52:20+00:00

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The Chicago Board of Education unanimously approved a policy Thursday that district officials say will expand who can become eligible to skip a grade or access accelerated coursework.

The policy will go into effect this upcoming school year and will help determine accelerated learning assignments for kids in the 2026-27 school year. Chicago Public Schools officials said the change is meant to expand accelerated coursework or opportunities to more students, noting that most who currently become eligible live on the city’s North Side.

Under the new policy, students in grades 4-6 can be eligible to skip a grade or take accelerated math and reading if their scores on state tests fall among the top 10% of their grade at their schools. Previously, students had to score “exceeding” on state tests to qualify, a score that roughly 4% of fourth and sixth graders and 2% of fifth graders attained last year, according to state data.

While board members didn’t discuss the change at Thursday’s meeting, elected board member Jennifer Custer and appointed board member Debby Pope both praised the changes at a meeting earlier this month to review Thursday’s agenda.

The changes will also eliminate external testing fees. Students who become eligible still need to meet a slew of other requirements, including attaining a certain GPA, scoring high on district exams, and passing additional assessments, in order to be approved to skip a grade or take accelerated math or reading.

District officials estimate that the changes will expand eligibility to 1,500 more students. CPS did not immediately say how many kids were eligible to skip a grade or take an accelerated subject last school year; according to WBEZ, roughly 80 students did so in 2022 and 2023.

The policy changes would also limit “double acceleration,” when parents apply for early entrance to kindergarten and a seat at a selective enrollment school, which already provides accelerated coursework. Now parents would have to choose either one of those options.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago school board president says borrowing could solve CPS’s budget woes — but not in ‘isolation’

2025-07-23T22:51:10+00:00

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Chicago school board President Sean Harden laid out a case Wednesday for borrowing as “a viable option” for closing the district’s $734 million budget deficit. But he said it must be paired with long-term solutions to solve CPS’s larger financial crisis.

“The centerpiece is children and education, and if the tool that we have to protect that is borrowing, then that’s the tool that we’ll use,” Harden said in an unrelated interview with Chalkbeat. “But we’re also saying: ‘Give us different tools, and then we will use that.’”

The district must pass a balanced budget within 60 days of July 1, when the new fiscal year started. CPS hosted a series of public budget meetings last week, and is expected to present a budget update to the board this week. District leaders have said they plan to present a budget proposal to CPS next month, with a board vote expected at its Aug. 28 meeting.

Harden is one of 11 people — the majority of the school board — appointed by the mayor. Harden can only vote to break ties.

Former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez resisted short-term borrowing last year when City Hall floated it as a way to reimburse the city for pension costs and cover new labor contracts. That resistance led, in part, to Martinez’s firing and the mass resignation of Mayor Brandon Johnson’s first appointed school board.

But Harden said borrowing could be the only pathway to avoid “draconian cuts” to schools and said he doesn’t feel the public is connecting the dots between budget cuts and how they could impact students in schools. He made similar comments to WBEZ on Wednesday.

“We’re talking about significantly impacting educational experience,” Harden said, arguing that cuts could hurt the progress made by CPS students in the wake of significant academic declines during the COVID-19 shutdowns.

But borrowing shouldn’t happen in “isolation,” Harden said. That means looking for money down the road that could bring in additional sustainable revenue for the district to solve its long-term financial problems. That could include more “efficiencies” in CPS’s budget, examining declining enrollment and underutilization of buildings, pushing the state for more revenue, providing additional tax levying authority for CPS, and looking at pension obligations.

Harden also pointed to future revenue expected from expiring Tax Increment Financing, or TIF, districts, which represent a pool of city tax dollars meant to spur economic development.

Roughly half of the property tax revenue tied up in those districts would go to CPS once they expire — a point City Hall officials have previously pointed out when making the case for CPS to borrow money. By the end of 2025, CPS is expected to receive $54 million in additional property tax revenue from expiring TIF districts and another $117 million by the end of 2026 with amounts growing beyond that, according to data published by Cook County.

“The goal is to have this be a short-term strategy connected to structural change,” Harden said.

Still, attracting lenders could be difficult for CPS. The district has a junk bond rating status, which is similar to having a bad credit score. Additionally, its financial difficulties and challenges to find more revenue are well-publicized.

Any short-term borrowing the district does now is more likely to have high interest rates, which could mean costly debt payments in the coming years — potentially impacting classrooms in the future as revenue is diverted to pay off debt. Asked if it’s worth the risk of incurring high interest rates and failing to secure long-term revenue solutions, such as more state money, Harden said, “Yes” — but that failure shouldn’t be an option.

“I could make a just rationale for incurring [a high interest rate] in lieu of what would happen in terms of job loss, the atrophy that would occur in schools,” Harden said. “That domino effect is so significant that I would argue it pales in comparison to what we would incur in interest.”

The Chicago Teachers Union, a strong ally of the mayor’s, has advocated for a similar solution: borrowing now and finding sustainable revenue in the future, such as pushing the state to hold a special legislative session and impose greater taxes on the state’s highest earners.

Several board members and other organizations, however, have also advocated for not reimbursing the city for a pension obligation of $175 million, which CPS is not legally obligated to do but began paying back under former Mayor Lori Lightfoot, as well as having the city provide more TIF-related dollars to avoid borrowing.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago Public Schools lays off more than 1,450 staff

2025-07-11T22:30:14+00:00

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Chicago Public Schools laid off more than 1,450 school-based staffers, including teachers, on Friday as it works to narrow a $734 million budget deficit.

The layoffs include 432 teachers, 311 paraprofessionals, such as teacher assistants, 677 special education classroom assistants, or SECAs, 33 security officers, and five parent workers.

Across district-run schools that are not alternative or specialty schools, 57% saw a reduction in positions, according to a Chalkbeat analysis of school budgets that were released publicly Friday. The remaining 43% saw no change or an increase in the number of positions available compared to last school year.

However, 123 special education teachers and up to 300 SECAs will be eligible for retention pools, meaning they would be paid centrally over the next school year and can be deployed to schools with vacant jobs, according to Ben Felton, CPS chief talent officer. Staffers with unsatisfactory ratings are not eligible for the retention pools, Felton said.

The district typically adjusts staffing and announces layoffs in the summer before school starts. In the past, about 80% of those laid off got jobs at other schools, said CPS, adding in a news release that it is “working diligently to maintain or improve that rate again this year.”

School-based layoffs are happening later than usual this year amid delays in the district’s budgeting process. The new fiscal year began July 1, but CPS doesn’t expect to present a budget to its board for approval until next month.

Interim CPS CEO Macquline King also emailed teachers and principals on Friday promising that they would get retroactive raises for last school year in their checks by mid-August, according to copies of emails obtained by Chalkbeat.

Last school year, CPS laid off 1,410 staffers. CPS did not immediately say how many of these staffers were rehired.

Layoffs announced today may not be the end of staffing cuts and changes at schools.

CPS publicly pegged its budget deficit at about $229 million this spring under former CPS CEO Pedro Martinez, hoping for about $300 million additional money from the city and state and not taking into account certain potential expenses. When King took office earlier this month, she said the gap is about $500 million larger, removing the assumption that additional money will come in and factoring in additional costs, including a much-debated $175 million pension reimbursement to the city.

The larger deficit means additional cuts could still be on the horizon. Officials could also choose to borrow money — an option that has for months divided the school board and education advocates in Chicago. CPS officials are holding a series of public meetings next week across the city to collect public feedback on how the district should close its budget deficit.

Budget Director Mike Sitkowski said CPS is in a “tough situation” and the district has been open about its funding challenges. He said officials are “open-minded” about how to solve its deficit going forward “in a way that’s student-centered and that protects our schools.”

According to Chalkbeat’s analysis of the data released Friday, there will be 477 fewer positions across all district-run schools next year. CPS officials said they could not immediately verify that number. Sitkowski said position cuts at the individual school level are because of less need for those jobs at those specific schools.

At the same time, Sitkowski said, the district plans to give schools more positions after the academic year starts, based on need and “where students show up.”

“Anything that’s looking like a net reduction is going to be made up for in what we add back,” Sitkowski said.

District officials told Chalkbeat earlier this month that they’re changing how they staff schools with special education teachers and SECAs in order to address staffing imbalances at schools across the city. And they emphasized that those staffing changes have nothing to do with budget belt-tightening. Still, families and teachers expressed concern that the shifts could reduce the amount of support provided to students with disabilities.

The layoffs sparked frustration from the Chicago Teachers Union, which represents teachers and support staff. Earlier this week, CTU called for Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker to launch a special legislative session in order to find additional funding for education.

More than 740 people laid off are CTU members, and just over 700 belong to SEIU, CPS said.

In a letter to members on its website, CTU’s leadership team called the layoffs a “harmful and distressing annual ritual at CPS” but highlighted the retention pools they bargained for.

In a statement, SEIU said it hopes the city and the school board can work with state leaders “to mitigate these cuts so the workers do not bear the brunt.”

SEIU’s statement also said that CPS informed the union the SECA layoffs are because of a “philosophical position that too much support from SECAs will impact the independence of students post-graduation.” The union said district officials did not discuss this matter with the union or advocacy organizations before making this decision, which will “negatively impact students.”

The district’s funding formula has shifted in recent years, now providing schools with positions instead of dollars. Schools with higher needs — determined by a formula called the Opportunity Index — are generally provided more resources.

One principal on Chicago’s South Side said her budget, which is based on the smaller deficit figure, was down just one position compared to last year, and she’s trying to save it through “some savvy budgeting and maneuvering.”

She’s warned her staff that more cuts could be coming, and that the budget they’ve been working on since May is like using “monopoly money.” She’s advocating with her alderperson to provide CPS with more surplus money from a city pool of tax dollars to spur economic development, known as Tax Increment Financing, or TIF.

“I am concerned that the budget I worked with and put together is not a fully funded budget,” said the principal, who requested anonymity because she was not authorized to speak to the press. “It’s fictitious in some ways at this point.”

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.