Latest News and Comment from Education

Thursday, October 3, 2013

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rahm's 'Fog Machine'

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rahm's 'Fog Machine':

Rahm's 'Fog Machine'

“Their decision to modify their promise of a five-year moratorium on school closings is a smack in the face to the parents, teachers and students who are working so hard to secure vital resources for their neighborhood schools.” --CTU's Stephanie Gadlin

If her lips are moving, Byrd-Bennettis lying.  Becky Carroll is lying even when her lips aren't moving. Crain'sGreg Hinz calls it Emanuel's "fog machine."

There is no transparency at CPS or anywhere around City Hall. Everything said in Rahmville -- and make no mistake, CPS is square in the middle of Rahmville --has to be interpreted through the haze. 

Usually, it's CPS Liar-In-Chief Carrollframing the message. But this time around, it was Rahm's toadie BBB who was made to go in front of the cameras and assure an outraged community and teachers' union that there would be a 5-year moratorium on Chicago school closings once she was allowed to close 50. This despite the fact that 20,000 parents and community members came out to series of citywide hearings, demanding a stop to the closings. Or that even BBB's own hand-picked panel of VIPs advised against the closings.

Now as fractured and demoralized neighborhoods try and pick themselves up from the rubble, and some 30,000 children cautiously navigate their way through so-called Safe