Our newest commenter, Televised Revolution said.....> {Craig} "is for the privatization of our public schools (i.e. his support of charter schools - which use non-unionized teachers and take away money from the public schools just to open up experimental schools - many of which fail).
Whoa, did I say that? While the candidates have put a moratorium on the workers/volunteers and themselves (OK, not Chris Adams lately), one commenter has decided to open up and defend his leader.
He's calls himself Televised Revolution. Although, he sounds a lot like Alderman Moore's sometime staff, 'all the time' campaign worker, *Wayne Frazier*.
*(If anyone doesn't know Wayne, he's is on the cusp of violating the Shackman decree. But Alderman Moore never wants to talk about that.)*
Anyhow, Televised Revolution (we'll call TR), opened a can of worms by putting words in my mouth about private/public schools. The comment had nothing to do with the blog-post topic, so I gave it a blog of it's own.
Here's a lead-in and the questions. I pay property taxes for the public schools, and I believe (it's not in front of me right now), but school funding is one of the biggest line item, waste drains.
It's seems every year some public school board is maxing out a increase in school funding. This comes out of my pocket right? But the crazy thing is, I got no kids. Why would I be in support or or be against private or public education? I just pay the line item tax and move on.
Besides that, I don't believe I've ever talked about which is better - public or private schools, here on my blog? TR brought it up.
Wayne Frazier (oops, I mean TR), he's always talking about this issue when defending Alderman Moore. I've heard it a thousand times myself. It's a broken record when you talk to Wayne Frazier about issues. It all comes back to one subject. Privatize this, privatize that. If you're not for Alderman Moore, you're for privatization. That's Wayne Frazier's cure all 'battle cry' for Alderman Moore when politicking for his fearless leader.
Still, we had another commenter chime in....
Gaby said....> How come it's okay for Joe to oppose charter schools but also okay for him to send his own kids to private schools in Evanston? DO YOU THINK JOE WANTS YOU THINKING ABOUT THIS?"
Well, I don't know about where Alderman Moore takes his kids to school? But if this is true - it is quite strange a public official (who is suppose to show confidence in his city he earns a paycheck from), decides to have his kids educated outside of the system.
This is like a vote of no-confidence in a system he created according to Birchwood Bill. Bill's right, the Alderman voted on. He rests his laurels in campaign material touting new schools in his ward. He even put it on one of his campaign materials, right under me. But he won't send his own kids to a Chicago public school? Really now, what's up with that?
TR decides to respond back.
Televised Revolution responded....>"Opposing charter schools and sending your kids to schools in evanston actually makes 100% sense and doesn't contradict. That position and action both send the same message - OUR PUBLIC SCHOOL'S ARE BROKEN AND THEY AREN'T BEING SOLVED. (because Charter school's certainly don't solve the issue)."
So TR says it's OK for Alderman Moore to send his kids to school in Evanston because the Chicago Public Schools are broken. Why are our public schools not working Alderman Moore? Is it because of the private schools?
When's the last time you heard a word from Alderman Moore on this issue? Maybe a new 'where-as' is in the works? Maybe Alderman Moore want's to call out Arnie Duncan too? First Alderman Moore takes Frank from the CTA to the public wood-shed - now Arnie?
Why doesn't Alderman Moore do these little 'dog and pony' shows during the annual budget hearing every year? That's when the various department heads submit their budgets to city council. That's the time to really make a real impact. Talk about 'gross incompetence'!
Blognotes: Public or private - Pro's & con's. OK, here's the essay for the candidates. What do the candidates think on the subject of schools? The burden of funding and the parental, taxpayer and public servant's responsibilities?
How are you, as our leader going to handle the taxpayer crisis we are in - regarding our failing public school system?
How do we get the kids to go to school and do their homework? So they can graduate, maybe go to college, get a job and stay off the street corner slinging dice and selling crack and trying to put bullet holes in each other.
Are our tax dollars not making it to the right destination?
Like I said, they keep taking my money and I don't have a chid in the system. So that should be able to cover the cost for someone's child who's not paying taxes and who's in the system. Shouldn't people who don't have kids get a school-tax rebate? Rebates the one's DevCorp North gives away to get businesses to come to the neighborhood and the shoppers to spend money in the neighborhood?
Any school research guru's out there? I'd like to find out which has a better graduation rate - Sullivan High School or the Math and Science Charter School on Lunt?
How much does it cost us taxpayers to send a student to Sullivan High School for a year? And how much does it cost for us taxpayers to send a student to MASCS for a year? How about the percent of students that goes on to college from each school?
Which school has the most calls for police service? You know what I'm talking about, those 911 calls. This is a taxpayer drain, wasting the police time on unruly students. In fact, this is the single largest cause of lack of education. Safety of the students. If they don't feel safe, they're too busy looking back over their shoulders to learn anything but self defense. Not to mention the teaching pool is limited once the word gets around how dangerous the environment is.
Which school has the highest number of suspensions? Which has the higher rate of drop-outs? Let's see if we can myth-bust some of these theories TR is creating. Or maybe TR is right when he says the Chicago Public School system is broken and they're not being solved?
14 comments:
And while TC has me on my little school debate. I don't believe CAPS beat 2431 ever set up a citizen patrol to keep the Math and Science Charter School students from beating up the Sullivan High School students on their way home from school. But just to make sure, I'll check my CAPS notes.
Bonus Question:
Why are the TIF dollars being diverted from our local public schools and into the bank accounts of connected developers with inside ties to the Alderman's office and well-off private universities that use Alderman Moore's political action committee, DevCorp North - to push the TIF agenda (aka: a letter of support/lobbyism) through as the a 'perception' of the communities wishes?
When, in reality, they're not.
a. There are plenty of public school teachers who send their children to private schools. Why? They know the system.
b. TIFs are draining money from schools, police, fire department funding. Perhaps instead of banning foie gras JM should have been lobbying against TIFS.
c. Parents (and children) should have a right to choose a school if they are not satisfied with their neighborhood school. PERIOD.
d. Like Stroger/Cook County et al, the board of ed suffers from some of the same maladies.
School Report Card
You should be able to find the answers in this link.
The differences between M&S and Sullivan will not be known for several years as M&S has only existed for a couple of years and has not graduated any students yet. In general, however, there have been many studies that have shown that, nationally, the average charter school does worse [as far as scores on standard tests] than the average public school.
In addition, many people are under the impression that Catolic and private schools do better than public schools because of some mysterious ability that those schools have [better teachers, more rigorous curriculum, etc]. In actuality the difference is mainly the students that are admitted and the parental influence that comes with them. If you are interested enough in your child's education and you either write the check or arrange for the funding for the $7,000 to $20,000/year for your child to attend a private or Catholic school, you will also pay attention to the work your child does in that school. If their homework is not done, your foot will be applied to that butt until it IS done. You probably also spent the money or time teaching your child to read/write, etc. before they entered school. Also, many studies have shown that the greatest influence/predictor of a childs' academic performance is their peer group. Take all the students from Orr and New Trier and switch them...no change. Take ONE student from Orr and send them to New Trier and that student will tend to improve their performance because of the atmosphere and peer groups' interest in academic performance at New Trier.
How many parents of students at Field, New Field, etc. DO NOT attend parent teacher nights...DO NOT have valid phone numbers on file with the school for contact...DO NOT ensure their child completes their homework each night...DO NOT sit and read with their child...etc. Now let's ask the same questions at a school like Edison, Decatur or Oriole Park.
If I had a student of school age, I would first try to get them into a school like Decatur and then Northside or Payton. If I could not..I too would send them to a private or Catholic school. Not because of a lack of confidence in the SCHOOLS, rather because I would want my child to go to a school surrounded by children whose parents have the same value for education that I have and who have invested the time/effort/money to instill that value in their children.
"you will also pay attention to the work your child does in that school. If their homework is not done, your foot will be applied to that butt until it IS done. You probably also spent the money or time teaching your child to read/write, etc. before they entered school. Also, many studies have shown that the greatest influence/predictor of a childs' academic performance is their peer group."
Are you aware that many schools don't 'reach out' to involve all parents? My daughter was read to, could do many things prior to entering first grade. However, even with a LISTED phone number, PTA meeting notices were not posted, or sent home. In high school, it was even worse for a 'magnet school'. There wasn't an attendance office on an open campus. Attendance was taken at 10am to ensure all the kids finally made it in and more bodies in the chairs would be reported for money. Granted, parental involvement is crucial, and there should be no form of cliques between certain teachers and certain parent groups.
Toni...Just as there are poor lawyers, doctors, mechanics, and janitors...so to are there poor teachers and principals. It sounds like a situation in which the parents should be applying pressure to the local school council to remove the principal and administration and to replace them with a team that WILL maintain parental contact and other such student supports.
Of course, with charter schools there are no local parental controls. Those schools are run as the administrations see fit and answer directly to no one. Also, with mayoral control of the Board of Ed, any principal with good political connections could possibly survive such pressures to removal.
Either way...it is the responsibility of concerned parents to have the LSC move to remove poor school administrations.
Craigsfriend...every school SHOULD have a local school council [LSC]. I believe that it is the responsibility of the school to arrange for elections for parent and community members. Are you saying that the local schools have NO LSC?
"Also, with mayoral control of the Board of Ed, any principal with good political connections could possibly survive such pressures to removal.
Either way...it is the responsibility of concerned parents to have the LSC move to remove poor school administrations."
About like removing slumlords and/or following-up on court cases! If politically connected, a slap on the hand. FYI some LSC's are the clique's I refer to. They just transitioned the milk and cookies crowd from the PTA into the LSC and have daytime meetings while parents are at WORK. More Exclusion.
Hahahaha - that's so funny - who the hell is Wayne Frazier?
Well, I'm not Wayne Frazier but I'm glad my comments (written in poor grammar) have solicited so much attention.
I'm also glad to see that Craig is calling upon the candidates to answer some questions on school reform. Now to business...
No, Craig has never said ANYTHING about Charter schools - that was just me writting down some crap (aka going with the general flow of this blog). Adams, however, has come out in support of charter schools. Charter school's are Mayor Daley's baby. Because they are technically not run by CPS they're general scores and stats are not grouped in with the CPS. So essentially this is what happens - they move a bunch of kids out of CPS, put them in schools with underqualified and inept teachers - these kids get a horrible education - and CPS doesn't get blamed. Actually, CPS scores might even go up.
There are some good Charter schools - CMSA is one of them. But there are others - like ACT Charter school - that only have 6% of their student body passing the PSAE math portion.
I would actually like to see Joe Moore stand up to Mayor Daley and tell him that Renaissance 2010 and Charter schools are not the answer. Jim G (Geinderske or however you spell it) has taken a stance against Charter schools - but he's not the man to stand up to Daley.
If he's elected he'll be new in the council and inexperienced. He'll lack the track record to stand up to Daley, and we'll be losing Moore - the champion of the people against our beloved Fuhrer Daley.
Love,
Wayneeee (seriously I don't even know who that man is)
LSC are publically elected (at least the parent & community members). The only thing is that you need to keep an eye for the election dates and filing info. However, I've never seen the 4:00pm LSC meeting.
I'd be interested in hearing from the candidates their thoughts on the idea of changing the LSC to be more publically controlled and inclusive.
Welcome aboard Dr. O. Thank you for your thoughtful comments, I hope we can hear more from you? - Oh, and thank you for reading too.
Before you make inapt comparisons between the M &S Charter School and Sullivan, rememember that the Charter School is much more selective of its students, as the parochial and private schools are.
Sullivan, on the other hand, must take everyone who lives in the area.
It's easy to look good when your students are selected from the 90th percentile in skills, or better. These students are far more likely to have come from solid middle class homes where they were properly socialized.
Moreover, the charter school, as well as the parochial or private school, can give a student the boot if his grades fall below par, or if he has behavior problems, while the public schools can't evict a student unless he commits a crime on school property. It might not be possible to do it even then.
A parent is entitled to send his child to school where he pleases, with just this one provision- he will still pay for the public schools, because single, childless people like me pay for them even though we don't use them at all.
My criticism of Moore is due to the fact that he has supported the diversion of hundreds of millions of dollars of tax money from our schools, as well as our other essential services, and has done nothing to help make our schools the kind of places we would want to send our kids.
You know we have a pauper school system when teachers have to dig into their own pockets (which aren't so full)for school supplies for their pupils.
I love how Joe Moore's people are against "privatization" for schools but they're for "DevCorp North", which is the same thing for street "cleaners"
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