Chicago to close 54 schools to address $1B deficit

ABC6 ^ | 3/21/13 | SARA BURNETT and JASON KEYSER Associated Press

[mdittmar]

CHICAGO (AP) - Chicago Public Schools officials said Thursday they plan to close 54 schools in an effort to address a $1 billion budget shortfall and improve a struggling educational system - a plan that drew the ire of parents and teachers.

District CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel say the closures are necessary because too many CPS buildings are half-empty. The nation's third-largest district, CPS has about 403,000 students but has seats for more than 500,000, officials say. But opponents say the closures will disproportionately affect minority children and endanger students who may have to cross gang boundaries to attend school.

The plan will affect about 30,000 students, CPS officials said. They say money being spent to keep underutilized schools open could be better used to educate students elsewhere.

"Every child in every neighborhood in Chicago deserves access to a high quality education that prepares them to succeed in life, but for too long children in certain parts of Chicago have been cheated out of the resources they need to succeed because they are in underutilized, under-resourced schools," Byrd-Bennett said. "As a former teacher and a principal, I've lived through school closings and I know that this will not be easy, but I also know that in the end this will benefit our children."

Critics say the closings are unnecessary and will devastate communities, particularly poor, minority neighborhoods.

[1010RD]

Totally. I had a friend with a no work admin job at CPS on 39th Street. She hated it so much she quit.

[Gabrial]

The looters always use the same language to take the resources of those that earned it.

It goes like this....

“Every (fill in the blank) deserves (fill in the blank).”

The fact is no one deserves the fruit of the labor of others. It really is that simple.

[ogen hal]

Closing schools is good. It results in less child abuse by so-called “educators”.

[MrB]

Funny...

Next you’re going to say that the kids’ dads should take more repsonsibility for their kids’ education.

[Monorprise]

So the people of Chicago and Illinois are paying to respect Gang bounties?

Maybe if they went so focused on giving them gangs a huge arms advantage over the rest of the population they might have time get rid of a few of them as effective terrorizing forces.

[Cen-Tejas]

Use of the word “school” in the context of the CPS is fraud upon the students and the students single parent.

My kid attended the Marine Military Academy in grades 10-12. Walking down the hall you could hear a pin drop. Peek in a class and all kids were sitting straight up and listening to a teacher that was not an NEA card carrier and in about one third of the cases he/she had a PHD and enjoyed working at his/her job.

Now, THAT’S A SCHOOL!