Karen Zaccor (District 4)
Section 1 - Basic Information & General Questions
Candidate's Name Karen Zaccor
District 4
Campaign link https://neighborsforkarenzaccor.org/
Are you a current or recent CPS parent, grandparent, or guardian/caregiver? CPS Parent (not recent)
Are you a CPS graduate? No
Have you ever served on a Local School Council (LSC)? Yes
Have you ever served on a Parent Advisory Committee (PAC)? No
Have you ever served on a Bilingual Advisory Committee (BAC)? No
Have you ever served on a Community Action Council (CAC)? No
Have you ever worked in a CPS school? Yes
How long have you lived in the district you are running to represent? 46 years
Describe your CPS experience.
My daughter attended CPS schools growing up. At her elementary school, Stockton Elementary, I was part of the Local School Improvement Council, a precursor to LSCs, and then was the first LSC chair (1989-1991). As LSC chair I led successful efforts to institute full-day kindergarten and more equitable resourcing of bilingual classes. I also spearheaded the drive to get lead removed from Stockton. I served on the Arai Middle School LSC as a parent 1993-1995. I was an active member of the Parent Equalizers of Chicago in the 1980s, working to remove the racist and substandard Chicago Mastery Learning reading curriculum that was forced on neighborhood schools but not magnet schools. I became a CPS teacher in 1995 and taught until just this past June. I taught at Stockton and then Arai Middle School. When the board voted to close Arai as part of Renaissance 2010, two colleagues and I wrote a proposal for Uplift Community High School so as not to lose our neighborhood school to a charter. I taught at Uplift from when it opened in 2005 till I retired. Besides co-creating the proposal for Uplift, I wrote the proposal for Uplift to become a Sustainable Community School. It is one of the first cohort of 20 SCS schools and I have been active on the Leadership Team as well as on the Anti-Racist Educators Committee of SCS, which focuses on developing challenging, engaging and culturally relevant curriculum.
Why are you running for the Board of Education?
In our fight for the elected representative school board, we envisioned a board that would be about the humanity of our students–students as whole people, not just vessels to receive instruction–and would prioritize the needs and interests of our Black and Brown communities that have been disinvested in for decades. We envisioned a board that would not favor corporate interests and privatization, but would be about developing schools throughout the city to be hubs in their communities focused on serving the whole community and developing the whole child. We envisioned a board that would be made up of parents and educators and education activists dedicated to being accessible to the community and truly listening to their needs and interests. I am running to realize that vision.
What is the most pressing challenge our district is facing?
Money to adequately and equitably fund the schools is the most pressing challenge. We know CPS is about $500 million short even without the contract resolution, and there are certainly items in the contract that are critical for adequate and equitable resources but come with a cost. Continuing to use property tax increases to make up budget shortfalls is not sustainable, nor is it acceptable to just not fill positions if they are necessary for proper school functioning. We need progressive revenue sources. One source is for the state to pay the legacy pension costs for CPS the same way they pay them for the rest of the state. That amounts to $600 million. The state’s own equitable funding formula says it owes Chicago $1.1 billion and many other districts are owed as well. The state plans to dribble it out over basically an entire generation of students. We need to unite as the board, the mayor, CPS, CTU, the business community, the unions, the elected officials, the parents, and the other districts to demand the schools be funded. Budgets are moral documents and it is immoral to not adequately educate the children of Illinois. Nothing is more important than our children’s future and we need the political will to act on that belief. In the long run, we need a progressive income tax so that corporations and the wealthy pay their fair share. More money is the means, but equity is the goal. For decades, resources in CPS have been distributed in a way that favors wealthier whiter neighborhoods. We need to ensure that every school in every neighborhood in Chicago is a school parents are proud to send their children to.
Section 2 - Board Responsibilities & Commitments
How will you interact with CPS students and families in your district to ensure that the voices of the most impacted are heard and understood?
I intend to spend significant time on a weekly basis “bringing the board to the people.” By that I mean going to schools, community groups, religious institutions, etc. to hear from students, parents, staff and community members about their ideas, needs, and concerns and to share with them the Board’s work. As a member of Northside Action for Justice, I have been doing outreach to families for decades, including door to door work and organizing forums on education topics, so I have a lot of experience in this area. During the fight for the elected school board, we heard from parents that they want a board that is transparent and accessible, and the way to accomplish that is to meet people where they are. Frequently, I have experienced CPS using surveys to gather information, and that is just not sufficient. Most people do not fill out surveys and that is not a way to get a broad range of perspectives. We also have to acknowledge the need to hear from families that do not speak English and make sure we are doing outreach in a variety of languages so that everyone feels truly heard.
What specific actions will you take to address and repair the historical harms within Chicago Public Schools, and how will you ensure that students, parents, and educators are actively engaged in the healing and trust-building process?
The historical harms have gone on for so long that not only do we need to fully resource schools that have long been underserved, but we need to provide extra services to undo those harms. This will of necessity take many forms.
We need to ensure that schools are adequately staffed to provide a quality education for students with special needs and English language learners.
We need to have staff that provide resources for student health and well-being, such as nurses, counselors, and social workers
We need librarians who can encourage a love of reading and teach our students research skills including how to evaluate internet sources
We need restorative justice practitioners who can provide training and support for building a restorative culture and sense of community and safety in schools
We need art, music, sports, and other outlets for our students to explore their talents and creativity
We need a process for students and parents to have genuine input into all aspects of school life
We need to fix and update infrastructure so that our students can have a comfortable learning environment where they feel valued.
The list is longer, but this is a good start. A model that can accomplish many of these things and also ensures that all stakeholders are part of decision-making is Sustainable Community Schools. So we should be continuing to develop and expand that model.
What is your understanding of the Board’s relationship with Local School Councils? How will you collaborate with LSCs in your district?
I have served on multiple LSCs and to be honest, not found much genuine support from CPS or the Board. Based on my experience, I think one priority for the Board is to see that supports are provided to LSCs that will ensure they are prepared to do the work they are charged with. Right now that is not the case for too many LSCs. The training currently provided by CPS does not adequately prepare LSC members to work knowledgeably on school issues.This enables principals to in effect make decisions that should be done cooperatively with LSCs and undermines the LSC’s oversight role. So our first task needs to be to improve the training and require a better monitoring system for completion of training. An additional aspect of how the Board can facilitate the work of LSCs is to promote transparency and timeliness, particularly with regard to budgeting. It is a frequent concern of LSCs that they receive the budget without enough time to study it before it has to be voted on. Beyond taking steps to help LSCs with their role, I would expect to make a schedule so that I attend LSC meetings periodically and to have a monthly call to brief LSCs and check in with them. Board members are supposed to reflect the values of the community, and as the elected representatives of their constituent groups, LSC members are well qualified to share the values of their own school community. I also think the Board can help advocate for all schools to have a fully empowered LSC.
List the Board committees you intend to join and describe any new Board committees you will propose.
The only committees I am aware of are the Special Education Committee and the soon to be implemented Black Student Achievement Committee and Non-Citizen Advisory Board. I believe membership in those committees should include Board members and non Board members who have the most experience with those issues. I would propose a Whole School Safety Committee to ensure the Whole School Safety Plan is adequately supported. Embracing restorative culture requires a tremendous change in mindset and that requires appropriate resources and ongoing support in the form of training and coaching. I would also propose something like an Equity Sustainable Community Schools Committee to ensure that we are taking visible steps to more equitable resourcing of schools and building on our existing model for expanding equity. Sustainable Community Schools support schools in being hubs in their community, offering challenging, engaging and culturally relevant curriculum with professional development to support it, extensive wrap around services in the form of after school programs, health and legal services, ESL classes etc. for families and the community, robust restorative culture, and parent and community involvement in decision about priorities and programming. Finally, I would propose a Clean Green Schools/Sustainability Committee. Right now CPS has an Office of Energy and Sustainability with no one in charge and no one to help schools that want to reduce their carbon footprint and involve their students in sustainability practices, so that is one thing that needs to change. There is a lot of demand for CTE programs and we should promote development of a green technology program to give our students access to jobs of the future. I’m not sure how many committees it will be possible for members to join, but I am interested in the ones I am proposing.
How will you prioritize your time to ensure you give your role on the Board of Education the attention it deserves?
I believe it will take at least 20 hours a week on average to do this role justice–maybe more. Board members will need time for study, attending committee meetings along with the time to prep beforehand and complete tasks afterward, attending the agenda and board meetings, and outreach to the community as well as seeking input from people with expertise in certain areas. I am retired, so I am able to put in whatever time it ends up to take to do the job that is needed.
Section 3 - Budget & Facilities
What are your thoughts on the current proposed district budget for SY24-25? As a board member, where would you look to increase funding and where would you make budget cuts?
The current budget is obviously incomplete since it does not account for contract negotiations with either the teacher’s union or the new principal’s union. It doesn’t account for steps that need to be taken to push the district to equity and make up for decades of harm, many of which are included in the 5 year plan that was just approved. Rather than begin our tenure in the board already looking to see what necessities we can skimp on or cut out, we need to be organizers and advocates for the funds the state itself agrees it owes to Chicago. We have to view educating our children as a partnership that requires all segments of the city as well as the state. As I explained in a question above, that includes not only the Board, CPS, CTU, and the mayor, but also the business community, unions, elected officials, and parents. Prioritizing equitable education is a must.
Funding for CPS is in a particularly precarious situation due to state shortages to Evidence-Based Funding (EBF), the end of pandemic funding, and more. What would you prioritize when facing these overwhelming budget realities?
I would prioritize fighting for more funding. As stated in above questions, there are two sources for those funds: having the state pay legacy pension costs like it does for every other district in the state and the state paying for what is owed according to the Evidence-Based Formula. I would always prioritize using funds to ensure that all schools have the staffing and resources they need to offer high quality learning, beginning with the schools that have historically been the most disinvested. There should be an audit of current spending so we can make sure funds are in fact being used efficiently and according to our priorities.
What experience do you have with complicated budgets?
The areas I have the most expertise in are teaching and learning, equity and school culture, and parent and student voice. But I do have some experience with budgets within CPS. As an LSC member in multiple schools, both elementary and high school, I have been involved in analyzing budgets and making decisions about how to spend discretionary monies. I am a co-founder of Uplift Community High School and in our proposal we included a budgetary overview for the school. While I have not worked with a $9.9 billion budget, I am familiar with the budget practices and terminology in CPS.
What will you do to ensure equitable and transparent funding for neighborhood schools?
First, we need a thorough audit. We need to really know how funds are being distributed and reasons for differences. We need to know how “hold harmless” policies are being implemented. There’s a lot of belief in that concept, but it needs to be applied equitably. At the same time, we don’t want to take steps that jeopardize thriving schools. The goal is not to redistribute funds and make all schools inadequate, but to improve those schools that have been disinvested or neglected. Some measures for how we make up for that history of disinvestment and neglect need to be established, which is over and above how we allocate funds more equitably moving forward. The transparency needs to be ongoing, beginning with the audit.
Many parents have expressed an urgent need for capital improvements in their schools. What steps will you take to ensure that schools have functioning facilities, particularly bathrooms and water fountains?
Certainly functioning and sanitary bathrooms and lead-free sources of drinking water are important. We have too many schools that have additional serious problems: lead paint, asbestos, mold, HVAC that doesn’t work, collapsing infrastructure, lack of safe outdoor recess space, no gym–the list goes on. The estimate for capital improvements that I have seen is $14 billion with $3 billion of it urgent. We need to look into funding sources for these particular needs. Perhaps there are federal dollars available for certain types of capital improvements–we know that is the case for green infrastructure. Perhaps schools can capture TIF funds for capital improvements. Some of these conditions are serious health threats and need to be moved on with all deliberate speed.
Bussing challenges have a long and fraught history in CPS. The last few years have been particularly difficult for special education students, as well as those who attend magnet and selective enrollment schools. Given CPS’s recently announced plans for the coming school year, How do you plan to address the ongoing school bussing challenges and ensure that all students have reliable, safe, and equitable transportation to and from school?
I agree that the first priority needs to be to ensure that students with IEPs who are entitled to bus service receive adequate service and are not forced to ride for more than an hour to get to or from school. We should be using some common sense approaches to improving busing. CPS Parents for Buses offered a number of different ideas, working from a premise that solving the problem for some students was better than not solving it for any and that problem solving should start with the lowest-income students. Their solutions included allowing a mix of students with and without IEPs to ride the same bus where space allowed and increasing the number of drivers by offering a competitive wage and removing irrelevant qualifications from the licensing requirements. This year, CPS changed a number of start times and is picking up students at hubs, but they do not expect this to completely solve the problem. When groups, especially parent groups, have worked on solutions to a problem and want to collaborate, that deserves a response. If we are to restore trust in CPS we have to be a Board that is willing to listen to and work with the public.
Section 4 - Educational Programs & Academic Success
How do you define a quality education?
A quality education is one that prepares a young person for a fulfilling future. It is holistic, so beyond ensuring academic success in the form of skills and knowledge needed in order to have options of college and/or careers, it needs to provide for a young person’s health and well-being in other ways. These include social and emotional learning, opportunities to explore and expand one’s creativity and imagination, talents and interests, and motivation toward lifelong learning. A young person needs what are sometimes called “21st century skills” in communication, collaboration, problem solving, appreciation of diversity, etc. They need to be able to analyze information, understand whose interest it serves and what biases are present, and be able to evaluate the validity of sources whether that is a teacher or the internet. They need to learn skills in the context of working on meaningful real world problems and have opportunities to engage in projects that allow them to make impactful change in their communities.
What is the role of the Board of Education in ensuring quality educational programs for all students regardless of their background, zip code, or school type?
That is an essential role for the Board. Eliminating the pervasive inequity that exists throughout CPS and ensuring all schools are well-rounded, well-resourced and high quality should be the main focus. This is what parents told us they wanted as we fought for the elected school board. We need to move in the direction of better resourcing schools starting with the most disinvested and plan for all schools to offer rich curriculum in areas such as arts, STEM, languages and technology in addition to the core areas. In the high schools we need to ensure access to a variety of CTE programs, an area that is garnering increasing interest from students and families.
What are your views on the roles of neighborhood, selective enrollment, magnet, and charter schools within CPS? Please address each type of school in your answer.
I support public education as a public good, and I oppose the practice we have seen in Chicago of giving public dollars to charters instead of adequately supporting neighborhood schools so that parents feel they can rely on them. We should not expand charters beyond the ones that currently exist. I support the current Board’s commitment to prioritize neighborhood schools so that they are all well-resourced and provide a quality education. If our school system was equitable, I believe that most families would choose neighborhood schools, which by their proximity would facilitate family involvement and the feeling that the school is in fact a family, which most parents I talk to want for their child. There will still be a role for selective enrollment schools with accelerated classes and higher level course offerings for students who are ready for and want that extra challenge. However, we need to address the disparity in who enrolls in them. A WBEZ study found that only 1% of 8th graders from low-income and majority Black elementary schools are offered seats in the top selective enrollment schools. Magnet schools were established to comply with a desegregation order and that order was lifted years ago. Families flocked to them because they were better resourced, but if that resource disparity disappeared we would have to see what parental preferences were. Most people I talk to would like their children to be at a school that is well-rounded rather than focused on a specialty area. Sustainable Community Schools are the best answer. These schools are community hubs with challenging and culturally relevant curriculum supported with teacher professional development, extensive after school and into the evening programming in arts, sports, etc. for students, their families, and the community, a commitment to building restorative culture, and a clear leadership role for parents and students.
How should the Board approach charter oversight and accountability?
The moratorium on charter school expansion should be extended. We should not be adding more schools of any kind. Charter school employees should have the opportunity to join a union and be able to bargain for their working conditions. Charter schools should be required to have a fully elected, fully empowered Local School Council so that there is some accountability to families and the community. They need to be accountable to standards of inclusion and equity in terms of both admission and retention of students, including students with special learning needs.
The initial recommendations of the Black Student Success Working Group were shared earlier this summer. Which of those recommendations will be most important to incorporate into the district’s strategic plan and why?
I strongly advocate for including all of the recommendations into the district’s strategic plan. Our school system cannot adequately serve our communities until we have corrected the legacy of deliberate disinvestment and neglect. That said, the most urgent recommendations are those focused on students’ daily experiences. Without an engaged, supported, and thriving student body, we don’t have a functioning school. Schools that engage our students and teach them a meaningful, relevant curriculum while holistically supporting them as a full being are not only necessary, but it’s what our students deserve. With that strong foundation in place and centered, we can also focus on the other, vitally important areas of focus on the working group’s recommendations.
How will you work to ensure special education assessments and placements are more timely and equitable?
One thing we need to do is ensure that every school has a full-time case manager. Case management has many requirements to do it well and emergent needs have to be addressed promptly. When case managers have to also teach or manage another program, they cannot provide the attention case management demands. My most recent teaching experience was in high school, a time of many transitions for all students, but certainly for students with IEPs. As students move from elementary school to high school, IEPs need to be written to ensure that not only are students who need it getting assistance with math and English, but also science, social studies and electives if their learning needs require it. Similarly, as students get ready to leave high school, depending on what they are doing next we need to make sure they know the supports they are entitled to and we work with them to ensure those supports are in place. For students in cluster programs, schools need to work with the families as well as potential programs to find the best fit of meaningful activities for those students.
What should the Board board do to guarantee students are receiving all of their required IEP minutes?
The first step is to ensure that IEPs are written with the full number of minutes needed for students to be successful. As a classroom teacher, I have had students whose IEPs clearly fell short on that. Often it seemed to revolve around the differences between elementary and high school, so better communication and timeliness of revisions would be helpful. Allocations of special education certified staff are done centrally and are based on minutes, emphasizing the need for those minutes to be accurate. Having a full-time case manager, whose duties include ensuring that all students with IEPs are in the appropriate placement for the support they require, will help guarantee that students receive their minutes. There are some strict rules in place preventing co-teachers from being pulled for other duties and case managers should certainly be advocates to make sure these rules are followed. Having a pool of substitutes with special education certification for when special education teachers are absent would help ensure that minutes are met.
In 2021, even before the recent influx of asylum seekers, the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) put CPS on a corrective action plan because the district was out of compliance with bilingual education requirements. To date, CPS still fails to staff bilingual programs and certified bilingual teachers at all schools that need them. What steps would you advocate for the district to take to solve this problem?
CPS needs to provide incentives for staff to become ESL and bilingual certified. These can include providing certification pathways free of charge and encouraging area colleges and universities to make ESL certification an automatic part of their teacher certification programs, as I believe Loyola does. CPS can work with area universities on ways to make pursuing becoming a bilingual educator a more sought after pathway. Thinking ahead, incorporating ways to highlight bilingual education as a career in dual language academies and high schools with education CTE programs could help generate more future bilingual educators. Last year, in a number of cases, schools that do not normally have a significant population of students who don’t speak English all of a sudden received an influx of newcomer students for which they were not prepared nor did they receive any assistance. Some thought needs to go into how students are placed to increase the likelihood that the services they need will be available. In the absence of adequate teaching staff, CPS could reach out to parents and the community for people who would be willing to provide classroom tutoring and translation support in another language. CPS could also provide some professional development for teachers who speak only English who are teaching classes that are half English speakers and half Spanish speakers.
How would you advocate for the reinstatement of comprehensive art, music, and library programs to our schools?
Art and music are fundamental parts of education–they should not be viewed as optional extras. Library programs are a way to encourage a love of reading as well as teaching how to do research including how to evaluate sources. Our students desperately need that as cell phones have become ubiquitous and misinformation floods the Internet. CPS has a new formula for allocating resources for school staffing that could be altered to build in requirements for such programming. Of course, this is a question of money. The more we look at specific needs such as these, the more apparent is the necessity of receiving the full state funding now, not 17 years from now.
Section 5 - School Culture
What do you believe is the role of the Board in fostering a culture of belonging for every CPS student?
As I visit schools and talk to parents around my district, I hear an overwhelming desire for schools to feel like family. We all understand that schools are much more than dispensers of learning and that in fact, to be effective they need to nurture children in many different ways, like families do. For older students clubs, sports, and the arts are often ways for students to find a niche for themselves and those programs need to be supported. For students at all levels, building classroom community through activities like class meetings and team building activities is important to foster that family feel. Sponsoring activities for families like Family Reading Night or community gardening are ways to bring people together and make them feel like valued members of the school community. The Board also has a role to play in examining the practices at school regarding the integration of students in cluster programs and with other special needs into the full life of the school. Promoting a culture of belonging for students also means finding ways to encourage inclusion of parents into the life of the school. The Whole School Safety Plan is the best vehicle for promoting this culture.
What are specific steps you will propose to increase in-school mental health support for our children?
Increased mental health support requires trained staff to provide that support, which means sufficient counselors, social workers, and nurses in every school. Schools have Behavioral Health Teams that analyze needs for specific students and determine what types of supports to offer. These might include grief support groups or supports for students dealing with chronic illness, for example. Again, schools need to have sufficient staff to provide these interventions. My high school students had a great deal of interest in mental health and had ideas themselves, including incorporating mental health breaks into class and offering seminars on mental issues for students and parents. In some schools, students are trained as peer counselors and offer support to each other. Teachers need to incorporate social and emotional learning activities into their daily routines as an integral part of class. We can’t think of this as an add-on or luxury: if students are distracted by problems that are weighing on them they cannot give their full attention to learning.
What policies do you propose to help stop bullying in CPS schools?
Bullying is a pervasive problem in CPS and it negatively impacts both attendance and academic performance. Addressing student mental health needs in comprehensive ways (see preceding answer), ensuring that we have Tier 1 interventions which apply to all students, such as classroom presentations and activities that address issues like bullying, up to Tier 3 interventions like individual counseling are important to this. Again, schools need to have personnel like sufficient counselors and social workers to provide these interventions. Teachers need professional development and support to ensure they are able to incorporate social and emotional learning standards in their instruction. We need to make sure we are involving students in any anti-bullying initiatives and helping them to develop leadership and problem solving skills to work with their peers on ways to promote a positive, safe, and nurturing school climate.
What specific steps will you take to address and reduce racial bias in our schools, both in terms of pedagogy, curriculum, and disciplinary practices?
One step is to increase the number of teachers who are Black, Brown and Indigenous and support their success as they enter the teaching profession. Expanding the Grow Your Own pathway for parents, SECAs, and other community members to enter the teaching profession and encouraging participation in We Care, a CTU initiative that offers mentoring and support to newer teachers are potential ways to do that. CPS also needs to institute professional development in cultural competence so that at minimum teachers become more aware of their identity with respect to their students and how that influences their teaching and how their students receive it. A second step is to define curriculum expectations and require CPS to use an anti-racist lens when developing/approving curriculum. Pillar 1 of Sustainable Community Schools is to provide challenging, engaging, and culturally relevant curriculum. Methods to develop curriculum such as Curriculum Circles are being piloted in SCS schools, which can help inform this process. In terms of discipline, data clearly shows that Black and Brown students are far more likely to experience discipline and harsher disciplinary consequences than white students. Moving forward with the Whole School Safety Plan and honing that plan to be as comprehensive as possible is a step to help address bias in disciplinary practice.
Students who report sexual assault and violence in CPS schools often feel that their voices are not heard. What is your approach to ensuring meaningful accountability and what will you do to ensure that this type of violence stops?
As we know, those who perpetrate violence are often victims of violence themselves. So first we need to provide the kinds of mental health supports documented in some of the above questions. Teachers do receive training on how to recognize trauma and how to respond and the resources to support students experiencing trauma need to be in place. Social and emotional learning curriculum and activities that support self-esteem can help to limit violence including sexual violence and to sensitize students and teachers on what to look for and how to help. Programs like BAM and WOW (Becoming a Man and Working on Womanhood) originated by Youth Guidance are found in many schools and provide outlets for young people to practice positive values that enhance creating a community of respect. The trained personnel who run the programs are also role models young people can talk to if they feel unsafe in addition to full time school personnel. Seminars on topics like toxic masculinity, which harms males as well as others, can provide a space to build understanding of proper behavior in relationships. When this type of violence occurs we need to first and foremost ensure that the physical and mental health needs of the victim are met and that moving forward a safety plan for them is in place. This requires accountability on the part of the school, that they don’t minimize or explain away what happened and that they take steps to reinforce learning on consent culture and setting and respecting boundaries. They also need to establish norms around social media and educate students about the ways in which content they post on social media now can come back to haunt them in years or even decades to come.
How do you plan to ensure that LGBT+ students are protected and supported in CPS, both in anti-discrimination policy and inclusive curricula?
CPS has some clearly laid out policies in place. Staff complete required online PD each year on protecting and supporting LGBTQ+ students, schools are expected to have GSA committees, and the state passed an Inclusive Curriculum Law that requires teaching about LGBTQ+ contributions. Regarding curriculum, it is not necessarily the case that every school is incorporating this teaching despite the law. Curriculum outlines and resources need to be available, teachers need time to plan for seamless ways to incorporate it so that it doesn’t just seem like an add-on, and administrators need to monitor that it is being taught in ways that promote tolerance of others who are not like oneself. Additionally, the policies have not prevented widespread use of homophobic slurs and bullying behavior by students. This is an aspect of Whole School Safety (see next question) and beginning in younger grades, time has to be spent on building community within classrooms and the school as a whole, valuing and respecting differences, teaching tolerance, and promoting the practice of being upstanders not bystanders.
Is there anything you would change about the recently adopted Whole School Safety plan? What can the Board do to ensure its implementation?
I have read through the Whole School Safety Plan, but not as yet studied it in sufficient detail to have a thorough analysis of what I would change. In general, I would like to see greater emphasis on building school-wide restorative culture in a manner that involves students as leaders and provides ongoing training and coaching for all members of the school community by a restorative justice coordinator or individual with those skills. Schools already have Behavioral Health Teams and Culture and Climate Teams and that does not guarantee a restorative mindset. Nor are the number of suspensions and arrests an adequate metric of school safety and belonging. Building genuine restorative culture requires a commitment to a lifelong practice that looks very different from what most of us have experienced for most of our lives. Because it is so different, it needs to be supported and monitored and adjustments made where we see it is falling short. I think establishing a committee (see earlier question) that can provide direction and standards for monitoring and evaluation is a necessary step. Building restorative culture is also a fundamental pillar of Sustainable Community Schools, and we should look for guidance to what has worked in the 20 schools that are currently SCS schools.