RYH Statements + Press | CPS BOE 3.24.21

Mar 24

Our prepared CPS BOE statements are below; press coverage of the meeting is far below.

The meeting starts at 10:30AM and will be live streamed on the CPS YouTube channel here. RYH will be live tweeting parts of the meeting. Here is the Chicago Documenters webpage of the meeting (scroll down for links to live tweets & notes as well as BOE documents like the presentations and actions taken.)

You can submit written comments to the CPS BOE through Thursday, March 25, 5PM. Go to www.cpsboe.org and scroll down to “Board meeting Mar 24 Form”, click, and this will take you to a Google form.

Jianan Shi, RYH Executive Director

CPS has excluded parents, students and educators from meaningful decision making in almost every part of the reopening process. Last month, parents and youth designed their #TrustLearningCare demands and asked for a meeting with CPS leadership. It was only after we announced that we were going to march to City Hall and CPS during February’s board meeting did we get a response the afternoon before. In it were 11 pages that seemed like past press releases copied and pasted. No where was there a response to the first demand which was to meet.

Out of the 20 demands, 15 responses did not address the demand itself.

When the demand was to create hardship passes for students, the response simply stated we are doing regular grading. I wonder how this fits into the healing centered framework?
When the demand was to double down on eliminating the digital divide, the response was that Chicago Connected was a national model. When we FOIA’d this data, we saw that on average each school had connected 15% of eligible families. This isn’t even talking about the connection speed issues and the equity gaps in broadband across this city.
What about the remote learners who have lost specials? What about the special education students who are deeply struggling? Those families will never forgive CPS if this continues.

The language was often written in the past tense, as in nothing more was going to be done and cited evidence of growth before the pandemic as if CPS should be given credit for that. Our parents and students want to know what are you doing for them during the pandemic? It is clear that y’all have decided what is best for us and are moving forward regardless.

CPS is receiving 1.8 billion dollars from the American Rescue Plan - if the rescue money is meant for them, shouldn’t families and educators decide how to spend it? CPS needs to adopt the TLC framework and be bold in its district initiatives and give local school communities a portion to allocate for their needs. Isn’t local authority what CPS says it believes in? Or is it only when it's convenient to them?

Final note, as a kid who has experiences with DCFS, this is not the way. The administration at Inter American needs to be held accountable for their actions.This policy needs to be examined. Thank you.

CPS Response to Trust Learning Care (TLC) Demands | Feb 23, 2021

Jennie Biggs, CPS Parent & RYH Communications & Outreach Director

As the Whole School Safety process enters phase 2, we urge the district to think more boldly about how it addresses safety.

The intention of this process is to create a climate where youth feel emotionally, mentally and physically safe. The Whole School Safety process should be holistic and transformational. Keeping police in schools does not live up to the spirit of this process. It is not if we will see another violent SRO incident but when.
- If youth who have experienced harm by our policing system do not want police in their schools, we must listen. This is not a crazy idea. RYH had 8 workshops this month around safety. Youth spoke and were centered in every one of them. We saw parents truly listen and hear that we can and must create something better.
- On Monday, CPS announced the healing centered framework to address trauma from the pandemic. What about the trauma caused by police and policing culture in schools before the pandemic? Policing has become this society’s solution to everything and the time is now to abandon that.
We must fully fund alternatives to police. Students see right through adult BS. Before this process CPS spent $33 million on police in schools, the squad car cops, their lieutenants, their pensions and benefits. But now CPS says the majority of that money has been allocated and cannot commit to funding this process fully.
- How can the CPS community trust this process if we are still just hearing words and not a true commitment to alternatives?
- We cannot say out of one corner of our mouth how essential healing and safety are but then not actually give alternatives the support to thrive. Adults love to use words to cover up the truth.
Decades of data & research support removal of police from schools.

The responsibility lies at the district level as well. Central office must look at how it polices our families. It is not a coincidence that DCFS was called on a Black mom when there is evidence the policy has not been equally applied. CPS must examine the impact of its policies.

Thank you.

RYH’s CPS-CPD SRO Toolkit for Parents-Caregivers-Community

Press Coverage of the BOE meeting

Chalkbeat Chicago: Chicago asks its high schools to come up with alternatives to campus police

Block Club Chicago: Chicago Asks Its High Schools To Come Up With Alternatives To Campus Police

Sun-Times: CPS pushes alternatives to police in schools, but won’t yank them yet

WTTW: CPS Considers Alternatives to School Resource Officers | Chicago News | WTTW

Sun-Times: Less than half of CPS students — including 1 in 3 high schoolers — choose 4th quarter in-person learning

La Voz Chicago: Solo 1 de cada 3 estudiantes de secundaria quieren regresar a las clases en persona para el último semestre

WBEZ: The Number Of CPS Students Due Back To Classrooms Doubles

Chalkbeat Chicago: Chicago says most of its teachers and staff should return to campus for 4th quarter

Chicago Tribune: More CPS students sign up for in-person learning but still no high school return date set; district sets pre-Labor Day opening for next fall