Chicago Principals Favor Powerful, Politically-Connected Kids
If there's one word to know in Chicago politics, it's this: clout. The ability to get things done because of who you know and how much money you have.
It looks like clout hasn't just permeated the walls of City Hall. It's spread to Chicago's public schools, specifically its fanciest and hardest-to-get-in-to selective enrollment high schools.
These top nine high schools in the city of Chicago use a strict score system to admit students based on their grades, attendance, state standardized test scores and school admissions tests. The system is brutal - parents regularly complain about the circus-style hoops their kids have to jump through just to get into a good school. But the system has a back door - principal discretion picks. It's supposed to be used for kids who can argue why they didn't get a higher score - maybe they're not so good on standardized tests - but deserve to go to their