Rally against school closings Thursday
From the CTU:
We urge you to attend a public meeting on Thursday, February 16, 2012. This rally will unite representatives of the 16 school communities whose schools face being closed, phased-out and turned-around by the Chicago Board of Education on February 22, 2012.
Please stand with the affected school communities by ATTENDING this important rally at at Pleasant Gift Baptist Church in the Bronzeville community,
4526 S. Greenwood,
6-8 pm. on Thurs. 2/16.
Among the invited guests will be legislators and allies who support the neighborhood schools’ efforts to improve the schools in a community- and teacher-led process, in direct opposition to the proposed take-over by politically connected private school operators. This meeting will call for passage in the Illinois Legislature of two bills which would institute a moratorium on closings, phase-outs and turnarounds.
The state legislative task force created to address community concerns over Chicago’s efforts to shut down or turnaround underperforming schools is calling for a moratorium on school closings, phase-outs and turnarounds. State Rep. Cynthia Soto, (D-Chicago), has introduced a bill in the General Assembly calling for a ban on these
Now we’ve got Mayor Rahm upset
The secret sauce has made a touchdown, according to Mayor Rahm.
He’s really mad about our protest yesterday against Noble’s discipline policy. I’d guess he’s even madder that the news made every Chicago news outlet plus CNN, MSNBC, and Huffington Post, so far, and it definitely has legs.
He’s mad because we forgot to mention that Noble has better-than-mediocre test scores (though the network is federal academic watch) and a better-than-citywide graduation rate (though it’s hard to compare given that the discipline system in question allows Noble to pressure almost any lagging student to leave).
He may even be mad that we made fun of his comment that Noble has “the secret sauce.”
By the way, Rahm claims that Noble’s near-90% graduation rate is “almost double the system-wide [rate]” which