Secret [redacted] clout list for Chicago Public Schools
Secret log kept by Arne Duncan’s administration during 2008. It shows who made requests to get kids into the city’s top schools, and where they sought admission.
April 25, 2013
AP/File
File: Education Secretary Arne Duncan at a news conference in Chicago, Nov. 13, 2008. Duncan was Chicago Public Schools chief then. WBEZ gained access to a 'secret log' of school requests kept by Duncan’s CPS administration via FOIA.
This is the “secret log” that Arne Duncan’s administration kept to manage requests by public officials and other connected Chicagoans seeking to get their children into the city’s elite grammar and high schools, many of which admit students only by test score or lottery. Recent figures showthat at some of the schools there are 20, 30, or even 50 times more applications than available seats.
In 2010 the Chicago Tribune first reported that Arne Duncan’s office had kept a list of VIPs seeking favors to get kids into coveted schools, and that it included “25 aldermen, Mayor Richard Daley's office, House Speaker Michael Madigan, his daughter Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, former White House social secretary Desiree