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A former Chicago Public School principal, a teacher-turned-policy advocate, an Englewood mother who runs a nonprofit on the South Side, and a finance manager are all vying for a seat on Chicago’s elected school board in District 6.
The four candidates in this district will have to get their message out to families from different socioeconomic backgrounds and race and ethnic groups and schools with varying levels of need.
District 6 candidates have collectively raised more than $60,000, according to campaign filings with the Illinois State Board of Elections.
With a population of over 275,000, District 6 includes wealthier and majority white neighborhoods such as Streeterville and River North and working-class neighborhoods such as Bronzeville, Hyde Park, Woodlawn, Englewood, and Greater Grand Crossing. While the district’s population is majority white, the majority of the 21,000 Chicago Public Schools students attending schools in the district are Black.
About 70% of students in the district’s 52 schools come from low-income families and 15% of students have Individualized Education Programs.
Most students are enrolled in neighborhood schools, a smaller number of students attend charter, magnet, and selective enrollment schools. Three schools – Walter Payton High School, Skinner North, and Franklin Elementary Schools – are ranked “Exemplary” and in the top 10% of schools for academic performance, according to the Illinois State Board of Education. Payton and Skinner North are both selective and require an admissions test, while Franklin is a magnet that admits students via lottery. Six schools spread across the district are designated as needing “Intensive Support” by the state board, meaning that these schools are in the bottom 5% of the state for academic performance.
Who is Jessica Biggs?
Biggs is new to politics, but she isn’t a novice when it comes to education. Biggs’ parents were educators, her brother is a special education teacher, and she was a classroom teacher and principal.
Biggs was a principal at Burke Elementary School, a school on the city’s South side in Washington Park, for six years before being fired. Biggs was fired for directing staff members to mark students tardy when they would have been marked as absent for half a day and to transport students from their homes to school without any paperwork, according to a report by WBEZ Chicago in 2018,
Biggs believes she was fired in retaliation for speaking out against the lack of cleanliness at schools after Aramark — a company that Chicago Public Schools contracted for janitorial services until this year — failed an inspection that found almost 100 schools, including Burke, were not clean in 2018, as reported by the Chicago Sun-Times.
Biggs said the end of her time as a school leader does not speak to all the work that she and her school’s community did to improve academic outcomes for students at Burke.
If elected, Biggs said her priorities as school board member would be to work with state lawmakers and the governor’s office to fully fund the evidence-based funding formula for Chicago Public Schools students, retain staff and filling vacant positions in schools, ensure that families have access to high-quality neighborhood schools, and create a clear process for families who choose magnet and selective enrollment schools.
Biggs has received endorsements from local lawmakers, including 20th Ward Ald. Jeanette Taylor, a key player in the Dyett High School hunger strike that kept the school open and garnered national news attention, and Cook County Board of Commissioners President Toni Preckwinkle.
Biggs has raised over $10,000 in donations as of mid September, according to campaign filings with the Illinois State Board of Elections.
Read Biggs’ full questionnaire responses.
Who is Andre Smith?
Before running for school board, Smith ran for 20th Ward alderman several times, the Illinois House of Representatives in the 5th District, and Cook County Board of Commissioners in the 2nd district.
Now, in his bid to represent District 6 on Chicago’s school board, Smith says he will bring expertise from his time as a finance manager that will help close the budget gaps Chicago Public Schools is currently facing.
Smith said his other areas of expertise include working on issues related to public safety. He founded Chicago Against Violence, an anti-violence organization, because he is passionate about ensuring safety around schools and in communities. Smith said he was part of the push to get a trauma center at the University of Chicago. The Trauma Care Coalition, a group of several community organizations, campaigned for a trauma center in response to the death of Damian Turner in 2010 who was shot near the hospital but was taken to Northwestern Memorial’s trauma center on the city’s north side and later died.
Smith said his top three priorities on the board would be increased transparency so communities can understand the district’s budget, school funding, and public safety, which includes transportation to get students to and from school safely. Before Smith makes plans for the district’s budget and funding local schools, he said he would like to have an audit to see where funding is going.
The city’s Board of Elections approved Smith’s spot on the ballot in late August after he faced several challenges. So far in the race, he has raised about $5,000 as of July 1, according to campaign finance records from the Illinois State Board of Elections.
Read Smith’s full questionnaire responses.
Who is Anusha Thotakura?
Thotakura, who grew up going to schools in Chicago’s northwest suburbs, said she was lucky to have a good public school education. Now she wants every Chicago student to have the same opportunity.
As a middle school math teacher at a bilingual public school in San Jose, California through Teach for America, Thotakura saw firsthand how the lack of resources impacted her students inside the classroom and in their communities. In her two years at the school, she saw large class sizes, a lack of social workers and nurses, outdated facilities, and the lack of special education services. At the same time, her students struggled with homelessness, food insecurity, trauma at home, and violence in their community.
Thotakura is currently the director at Citizen Action/Illinois, a progressive policy organization that advocates for local, state, and federal policy, and volunteers as a debate coach with Chicago Debates at Columbia Explorers Academy in Brighton Park.
As a board member, she said her top three priorities would be to invest in early childhood education to help prevent opportunity gaps, provide funding for after-school programs to keep students engaged in school and decrease chronic absenteeism, and school safety and wellness, which would include supporting students with trauma they experience outside of school and updating school facilities.
Thotakura has been endorsed by state lawmakers and local organizations, including state Sen. Robert Martwick, who sponsored the elected school board bill that passed in 2021, and the Chicago Teachers Union Local 1.
Thotakura has raised more than $45,000 since launching her campaign. Of that, roughly $20,000 has come from the CTU’s political action committee, mostly to pay for campaign staff, according to campaign finance reports filed with the state’s Board of Elections.
Read Thotakura’s full questionnaire responses.
Who is Danielle J. Wallace?
Wallace is the only candidate in District 6 running as a write-in candidate. She was knocked off the ballot early in the election season after signatures on her petitions were challenged.
Wallace has experience in Chicago Public Schools as a student, staff member, and parent. As a student, she didn’t have a straightforward path in school. When she was attending Simeon Career Academy on the city’s south side, she dropped out of high school before graduating because she was pregnant. At the time, there wasn’t a lot of support for pregnant students who wanted to continue their education. She opted to get a GED certificate.
She went on to work in the district as a clerk, school security officer, and third grade teacher at a charter school. Wallace doesn’t work as a teacher any more, but she is the founder and executive director of Kingdom Avenue Inc., a nonprofit organization that puts on events and programs for young people in Englewood.
If she is elected, Wallace said she would want to focus on community partnerships, improving student outcomes, and using restorative practices in schools instead of punitive discipline such as suspensions and expulsions.
A quarterly finance report from Wallace’s campaign filed with the state Board of Elections shows that Wallace raised $375 between April 1 and June 30 and had about $18 cash on hand as of July 1.
Read Wallace’s full questionnaire responses.
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.
This story was published in partnership with Block Club Chicago.
