Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rahm's mea culpas don't extend to school closings and wild charter expansion

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rahm's mea culpas don't extend to school closings and wild charter expansion:

Rahm's mea culpas don't extend to school closings and wild charter expansion

Given all Rahm's recent mea culpas, the one he hasn't made is about his wholesale school closings, mostly in the black community and his replacement of them with privately-run charter schools. CPS's publication of a new list of supposedly "underutilized" schools, indicates another round of closings and charter openings is coming.

His appointment of Jaime Guzman, a shill for the charter operators, to the CPS board, shows that Rahm's game plan remains intact. Guzman takes Jesse Ruiz' spot as the lone Latino on the seven-member board.

The amazing thing about that appointment is that Guzman previously sat on the State Charter School Commission, the group that has the authority to create charters even when they've been rejected by local school boards, including Chicago's.

That's the same group, acting under pressure from House Speaker Mike Madigan, that actually reversed CPS's rejection of Concept (Gulen) charter schools' application at a time when the FBI was investigating Concept's operations.

Last year, the senate voted to abolish the commission on grounds that it had become "too politicized" and a purveyor, rather than an objective evaluator and Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rahm's mea culpas don't extend to school closings and wild charter expansion: