Catalyst Chicago Notebook

School closing, turnaround lawsuit dismissed

Rebecca Harris — Fri, 25 May 2012 17:29:55 -0500

In a victory for CPS, a judge has dismissed for the second time a lawsuit filed by parents who sought to stop school closings and turnarounds.

The suit claimed that CPS did not provide adequate support to schools slated for closure and turnaround while they were on probation, resulting in a disproportionate impact on African-American students.

“This ruling is a win for students and families across the district. For too long, CPS has accepted a status quo that has failed its students year after year,” the district said in a statement. “With almost one out of two students not graduating high school, and only 7.9 percent of our 11th-graders testing college ready, it would be an injustice to wait another day to give our students access to the quality education they deserve.”

Michael Persoon, an attorney who represented parents in the case, said it’s too soon to say whether the case might be re-filed or the ruling appealed.

Judge Michael Hyman wrote in an opinion issued this afternoon that “this court understands the frustration of the students, their parents, the Local School Councils, the neighborhoods, and the teachers at the manifest failure of the 10 public schools in this lawsuit.”

But, he wrote, “this court has neither the discretion to second-guess nor the authority to prevent the Board of Education from moving ahead with its previously approved plans for the 10 schools … The power to make decisions on dysfunctional schools is placed squarely on the Board, with minimum interference permitted after these immensely consequential decisions are made.”

In the News: Why one teacher marched

Cassandra West — Fri, 25 May 2012 07:13:35 -0500

In a letter to the editor, a Chicago teacher explains why he participated in the big CTU rally on Wednesday: "…the privatized educational system that is being proposed by the current administration will cause irreparable harm to our students, schools, communities and our careers."

A Sun-Times editorial seems to almost come to the defense of the CTU, saying "Chicago teachers have had it." But the newspaper criticized the union for "doing little real bargaining" in its contract negotiations with CPS.

CPS communications on Thursday sent links to its online information pages that it says are intended to “clear up misleading claims” about the district’s contract proposals and to provide information on the collective bargaining process.

CPS teachers say more than dollars and cents at stake in next contract. (Medill Reports)

Columbia College Chicago is considering altering its admissions policies to be more selective as part of a Blueprint for Action 2016 strategic plan that could hurt some students if approved. (Sun-Times)

IN THE NATION
The teachers union in Detroit is planning to file what is being called a monumental lawsuit against the Detroit Public Schools that could test the limits of the state tenure law. The Detroit Federation of Teachers, which represents more than 5,000 teachers, counselors, school psychologists, school social workers, and other employees of Detroit Public Schools, will hold a press conference today. (Detroit Free Press)

High school students work harder and are more focused on school than they were a generation ago, suggests a special analysis in “The Condition of Education 2012,” and the economic downturn may highlight an opportunity to put more of them on the path to college. (Education Week)

Above all other major life goals like marriage or fulfilling careers, today's college students and recent graduates are looking for financial security, a new survey finds. (NYT)

Child-care cuts smaller, advocates still fight

Rebecca Harris — Thu, 24 May 2012 17:17:25 -0500

A budget passed by the Illinois Senate would cut child care subsidies by $1.6 million compared to last fiscal year – smaller than the $6 million cut that was previously proposed – but advocates are still fighting for more funding.

On Thursday, parents, children, and members of the group Pilsen Neighbors held a press conference at Pilsen’s Plaza Tenochtitlan to demand a neighborhood meeting with Illinois Governor Pat Quinn about the cuts.

“I can go study and work knowing that my children are in a safe place,” said Odette Ojeda, a parent at Chicago Commons Guadalupano Family Center who graduated from Curie High School in 1998. “Once I got divorced, the program gave me support to take care of my kids.”

Because of available child care, Ojeda says she is on track to finish her associate’s degree at the end of the summer. After that, she hopes to study bilingual education – maybe at National-Louis University – and become a CPS teacher.

Even more cuts are on the table in the House budget bill, introduced today, which would cut the Early Childhood Block Grant by $25 million.

The Senate budget, on the other hand, would:

*Fund the Early Childhood Block Grant at the same level as this fiscal year (Quinn had originally proposed a $20 million funding increase.)

*Maintain funding for home visiting programs.

*Reduce Early Intervention funding by $1.4 million.

In the News: CTU rally gets city's attention

Cassandra West — Thu, 24 May 2012 08:30:25 -0500

In an impressive show of force and fighting spirit, the Chicago Teachers Union staged what it called a "historic" rally Wednesday at the Auditorium Theatre that was followed by a 6,500-strong march to CPS headquarters.

Here are media reports on the rally:

To read Catalyst's tweets from the CTU rally on Storify, click here.

CTU has a striking photo from the rally on its Facebook page. Taken from the stage, it shows CTU President Karen Lewis looking out onto a sea of red-shirted union members.

Thousands of Chicago Public Schools teachers jammed the streets of downtown Chicago Wednesday afternoon, where their union held a rousing rally. The show of force comes as the Chicago Teachers Union and school district are locked in contract negotiations, and as a vote authorizing a strike seems increasingly likely. (WBEZ)

Thousands of Chicago Teachers Union members held a boisterous rally at the Auditorium Theatre on Wednesday afternoon, with many teachers showing support for a possible strike in the fall. (Catalyst)

Mayor Rahm Emanuel bore the brunt of criticism from angry teachers who filled the Auditorium Theatre on Wednesday to make clear their unhappiness with the administration's efforts to overhaul public education in Chicago. (Tribune)

Board of Education members granted the wishes of two organized community groups in making polar opposite decisions about newly-built schools. South Shore International College Prep will have no neighborhood boundaries, starting in September. Meanwhile, a new elementary school at 48th and Rockwell will be reserved for attendance-area students. (Catalyst)

Barbara Byrd-Bennett, former Cleveland public schools CEO, was hired Wednesday to act as “chief education advisor” to Chicago Schools CEO Jean-Claude Brizard and to temporarily fill the gap left by the resignation of Chief Education Officer Noemi Donoso. (Sun-Times)

DePaul and Loyola universities to partner with two Chicago high schools to provide high-caliber choices designed to stop middle-class families from fleeing to the suburbs. DePaul will join forces with Microsoft to help Lake View High School make the conversion to one of five so-called STEM high schools specializing in science, technology, engineering and math. Loyola University will help Senn High School make the leap to one of five neighborhood high schools devoted exclusively to the rigorous International Baccalaureate diploma program tailor-made to prepare students for college. (Sun-Times)

IN THE STATE
Oak Park School District 97 appointed Sam LeDeaux as the new principal of Horace Mann Elementary, where the current principal is stepping down following allegations of improper ISAT testing procedures. (Trib Local)

The number of minority teachers in Rockford Public Schools is below the national average while District 205 has a large minority student population. (WIFR.com)

IN THE NATION
Mitt Romney said Tuesday that under a K-12 education plan that he's proposing, federal education funds will follow every low-income or disabled American child so that he or she can attend any school in the state, including private ones. (ABS News)

The economic downturn seems to have worsened an already vast gap between the numbers of men and women teachers, particularly in the early grades. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' 2011 Current Population Survey, men make up only 18.3 percent of elementary and middle school teachers and 2.3 percent of preschool and kindergarten instructors—a dip from the 2007 prerecession proportions of 19.1 percent in grades 1 to 8 and 2.7 percent in preschool and kindergarten. (Education Week)

Academic outcomes improve for quiet students when there's less pressure to speak up, according to experts. (Education Week)

CTU shows strength at rally

Rebecca Harris and Sarah Karp — Wed, 23 May 2012 20:54:54 -0500

To read tweets from this event on Storify, click here. For Catalyst Chicago’s interactive timeline of the negotiations and possible next steps, click here.

Thousands of Chicago Teachers Union members held a boisterous rally at the Auditorium Theatre on Wednesday afternoon, with many teachers showing support for a possible strike in the fall.

Union officials announced on Tuesday that a strike vote would likely be taken before the end of the year and that 95 percent of the members who voted in a union survey would reject the current CPS proposal. CPS argues, however, that the union is inaccurately portraying the district’s offer to teachers.

“We respect our teachers and the work they do on behalf of our kids every day. They deserve a raise for that work, but our children can’t afford a strike. That’s why we are working with an independent negotiator to find a compromise proposal that fairly compensates our teachers and starts the school year on time,” schools CEO Jean-Claude Brizard said in a statement.

Randi Weingarten, head of the American Federation of Teachers, was among those who spoke at the rally.

“The next time I come back… I want to see a fair contract,” she said. “I come to you for, and with the support of, 1.5 million people. If all those with silver spoons in their mouths can get help, what about the children of this city and the people who educate them?”

Weingarten said that she had just come from a conference on labor-management collaboration an hour away where 100 districts were represented. “But here in the second city of America, we have to rally to even be heard,” she said. “I will come back every time you need me.”

Earlier at the board of education meeting, the advocacy group Stand for Children held a press conference featuring parents who don’t want to see a strike occur.

Michael Butz, who has a son at Disney, said that if the teachers strike, parents will be left scrambling to figure out what they should do with their children. Like many, both Butz and his wife work.

“I am frustrated and disappointed with the rhetoric,” he said. “It does not help the children…. My son wants to be in school succeeding and learning.”

Harold Trujillo, a parent of two, added: “The talk of a strike brings stress to families and to people. In the name of the parents come together in a humble way.”

Stand for Children, which is a national organization with a local chapter, pushed for the passage of Senate Bill 7. The bill establishes a process for calling a strike and requires 75 percent of the teacher union membership authorize a strike. Currently, CPS and CTU are in the fact-finding stage of the process in which an independent arbitrator considers both proposals and issues a report. That report is due by July 15.

Stand for Children Chicago Director Juan Jose Gonzalez said that the organization thinks it is disingenuous for teachers to call a strike authorization vote before the fact-finding report is released.

“It is not true to the process,” he said.

CTU officials have said the high threshold for approval of a strike authorization vote forces them to schedule it before the end of the school year. Waiting until the summer would make it difficult, if not impossible, to get all members to vote. The way the law works a non-vote is essentially a “no” vote.

Gonzalez would not speak to whether the Senate Bill 7 inadvertently created the need for an imminent strike authorization vote. Instead, he insisted the bill’s purpose was to make the process more transparent.

Teachers at the rally were given stickers and hand-held red paper fans that doubled as signs, with check marks in boxes on them -- likely an allusion to a coming strike vote – next to the phrases “YES to small class sizes” and “YES to well-funded neighborhood schools.” Popcorn and union T-shirts were on sale in the lobby.

When CTU President Karen Lewis took the stage, the entire auditorium shook with stomping feet. “Why are we here?” she asked the crowd, part way through her speech. “Strike!” someone yelled, and it became a chant – “Strike! Strike! Strike!”

Lewis then mocked CPS officials and Mayor Emanuel. “I think it’s very interesting that the spokesmodel for CPS says we are being too aggressive,” she says. She recounted old anecdotes that accused Emanuel of swearing at her, and made fun of Emanuel saying, over and over, “I want the school day long.”

“They took $600 million out of the capital budget,” Lewis complained. “They don’t intend to fix anything.”

The rally was followed by a 6,500-strong march to CPS headquarters that joined with a protest of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.

Amy Dollarhite, a 9^th-grade math teacher at TEAM Englewood Academy, said she came to the rally because “our union rep at school told us about this, that it was important for us to come and stand up for our rights.”

She added: “We’d like to be treated with the same respect as any other professionals. I don’t know any lawyer or doctor [office] that stays open more hours without being paid for it.”

Sheila Finley, a teacher at Jamieson Elementary, echoed a concern of many older teachers that “I’ve spent a lot of time and money to be educated and be a better teacher… [but] everything I worked for to earn, like my [stored-up sick] days, I’m going to lose all that.”

As members filed into the theater, a video showed CTU members reminiscing about past strikes, and members stood up and started clapping to an old-style version of “Solidarity Forever.” When “We Shall Not Be Moved” played, the video switched to a slideshow of the union’s leadership. Next, the video segued into pop hits like “R-E-S-P-E-C-T” and slideshows of CTU pickets.

CTU Recording Secretary Kristine Mayle argued that Chicago Board of Education members “want to turn teaching into a low-wage, high-turnover profession.”

“I am willing to do whatever is necessary to ensure our members get a fair contract – are you?” she asked the audience.

“Yes,” the theater bellowed.

One video that played had messages of support from leaders of Chicago’s SEIU and UNITE-HERE locals. Another showed parents and other Chicagoans talking about the positive impact of teachers on their lives.

Speakers from 19^th Ward Parents and Raise Your Hand also appeared at the rally. Raise Your Hand’s Matt Farmer, in a fiery speech, noted that the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools have seven fine arts teachers. He also quoted the schools’ director criticizing standardized testing and praising teacher unions.

Later, Illinois Federation of Teachers President Dan Montgomery spoke in support of the CTU. “When the current fight is over you will be prouder than you ever have before; you will have more power than you ever had before,” he said, his voice drowned out by cheering.

Community groups get their wish for South Shore, Brighton Park schools

Sarah Karp — Wed, 23 May 2012 16:56:38 -0500

Board of Education members granted the wishes of two organized community groups in making polar opposite decisions about newly-built schools.

South Shore International College Prep will have no neighborhood boundaries, starting in September. Meanwhile, a new elementary school at 48^th and Rockwell will be reserved for attendance-area students.

These decisions are the culmination of battles that began long before the current administration and board. They also show how different communities and parents look at schools in the current environment regarding choice.

Last winter, the debate over who would get to attend the building at the corner of 75^th Street and Jeffrey Boulevard was raging. On one side were parents and current students at the old South Shore buildings, where four small high schools were housed. They desperately wanted to attend the shiny new school.

On the other side were community members who wanted a selective enrollment school, considering it the only way to have a fresh start.

At the time, the CPS administration went with a compromise. The school would have two small specialty programs that would start with a new freshman class, but the majority of the students--61 percent--would come from the neighborhood.

Community activists told board members that the arrangement is not working out. They applauded the decision to keep the International Baccalaureate and career and technical education programs, but to reserve the other half of the seats for students chosen through the selective enrollment process. Though students must apply for IB and CTE programs, the threshold for acceptance is lower.

Students who currently live in the South Shore High School attendance boundary will now be sent to Chicago Vocational Career Academy, a school that has been struggling for a long time but is slated to become a turnaround this year. No parents or community members opposed to this plan spoke at the board meeting.

LaShawn Brown told the board members that there are enough high-achieving neighborhood students to support a selective enrollment high school. The current problem is that they are all leaving, she said. Though she lives only a block and a half away from the new school, Brown drives her child to a selective enrollment high school in another community.

“It is a very great burden on parents,” she said.

She and others told the board that in order to make it work, South Shore International College Prep would need resources and a strategy to create a new brand image for the school. The change will take effect starting in September 2012. CPS will now send letters to students who applied for selective enrollment seats, but didn’t get one, to see if they are interested in attending South Shore International College Prep, said Chief Portfolio Officer Oliver Sicat.

While the community members in South Shore wanted a selective school, those in Brighton Park insisted that there be no barriers to neighborhood students attending their new school.

As far back as the administration of Paul Vallas, community members were pleading for a new school. Shields, at 4250 S. Rockwell, has long been one of the city’s biggest and most overcrowded schools. Currently, Shields has 1,800 students spread across three buildings, one of them an old Catholic school four blocks away.

As it often does, it took more than a decade to secure plans and funds and to get a school onb the drawing board.

Then, this year, just as the building was being completed, parents heard rumors that UNO's charter school network was collecting signatures in an effort to open up a campus in the building. Patrick Brosnan, executive director of the Brighton Park Neighborhood Association, says Ald. Edward Burke told parents and community members it was a done deal.

“The political threat was real,” says Brosnan. Brighton Park Neighborhood Association runs a community school inside Shields.

Parents and community members decidedly didn’t want a charter school. They wanted this new state-of-the-art school to be available to all the students in the community, not just ones chosen in the lottery. And they wanted to make sure that Shields reaped the benefits in that the crowding was relieved.

Lead by Brighton Park Neighborhood Association, parents waged a campaign against the prospect of UNO moving in. They let CPS officials know that they would have a battle on their hands.

“This would have been a very, very big deal,” Brosnan said.

Two weeks ago, in front of a meeting attended by 450 parents, CPS officials announced that they were recommending the school be a neighborhood middle school.

“This way all the neighborhood children get to go to this school,” he says.

In other business, the board voted to close achievement academies, programs for over-aged 8th graders who are not ready for high school. Achievement academies were created as a result of stringent promotion policies announced by then-Mayor Richard Daley in 1996. The policies resulted in thousands of students not graduating from 8th grade, though they were 15 years old or older.

Housed in traditional high schools, the programs were supposed to help students complete elementary school and get them ready to transition into regular high school as juniors. However, the drop-out rate for achievement academy students is high, and on other measures they continue to lag behind.

Starting this summer, over-aged 8th graders will go to an intensive four-week program and then into their freshman year of high school.

Over the years, CPS’ promotion policy has been weakened. College and Career Pathways Officer Akeisha Craven said that CPS has learned that, while retention has some short-term benefits, it doesn’t help in the long run.

In the News: CTU to flex its muscle at big rally

Cassandra West — Wed, 23 May 2012 07:22:11 -0500

It's a big day for the Chicago Teachers Union, as it expects thousands of its members to attend a rally at the Auditorium Theatre that's staged to fire up teachers and serve as a display of muscle in the midst of protracted contract talks with CPS.

CTU Vice President Jesse Sharkey says while thousands of teachers will rally at the Auditorium Theatre today, the event will not include a strike vote. (CBS Chicago)

Nearly 80 percent of Chicago Teachers Union members voted to reject the latest teacher contract proposal in recent straw polls — more than what would be needed to authorize a real strike under a new law, CTU leaders said Tuesday.

Schools in Chicago's Austin area are slated to receive a little more than $12 million as part of Chicago Public Schools’ $110 million and five-year capital improvement plan announced earlier this month that will address immediate health and safety concerns for its public schools. (Austin Talks)

IN THE NATION
Teacher union leaders and school administrators this week at the Labor Management Conference in Cincinnati will focus on ways to transform the teaching profession with such targets as better recruiting, preparation and career development, and evaluations based on effectiveness. (CBS News)

The Education Department is issuing draft criteria for the $400 million in new Race to the Top competitive grants earmarked for districts. (Education Week)

With the need for charter administrators growing, the sector is developing its own leadership-training programs, many of which are as diverse as the in dependently operated public schools themselves. But questions remain about whether those entrepreneurial programs are growing quickly enough to meet the demand for charter school leaders and whether the programs are turning out leaders of high quality. (Education Week)

The New York Times obtained information showing how scholarship programs have been twisted to benefit private schools at the expense of the neediest children. Spreading at a time of deep cutbacks in public schools, the programs are operating in eight states and represent one of the fastest-growing components of the school choice movement. This school year alone, the programs redirected nearly $350 million that would have gone into public budgets to pay for private school scholarships for 129,000 students, according to the Alliance for School Choice, an advocacy organization. Legislators in at least nine other states are considering the programs.

Strike authorization vote likely before end of school year

Sarah Karp — Tue, 22 May 2012 14:27:54 -0500

Wednesday afternoon the Chicago Teachers Union is planning a massive rally to protest the current CPS contract proposal, which they call “unreasonable.” No strike authorization vote will be taken at the downtown event, but such a vote will likely happen before the end of this school year.

CTU Vice President Jesse Sharkey says the vote is a “bargaining tool,” and emphasized that a strike date would not be set until after a final proposal is on the table, which won’t happen until the middle of the summer.

CPS spokeswoman Becky Carroll says a strike authorization vote is premature. CPS and CTU are engaged in a process called “fact-finding,” which means an arbitrator is considering CPS and CTU proposals. Both sides had to agree on the arbitrator. The arbitrator will issue a final report on July 15 and then the union and CPS have 15 days to respond to the report. Then, they have to wait 30 days for a cooling-off period.

Only then could the union call a strike.

“The independent fact-finding process can serve as a compromise,” Carroll says. “Why rush? They should let their members review the independent fact-finder’s report first. They have plenty of time for a vote.”

Carroll also notes that 1400 teachers are retiring and will end up voting for a strike authorization of a contract that they won’t be working under.

But Sharkey says there’s good reason to take a vote over the next few weeks. Union leaders do not want to hold a strike authorization vote during the summer, when teachers are dispersed. They also don’t want to wait until the beginning of the next school year, hoping to have a contract in place by the fall when school starts.

Once the next school year starts, things like the longer school day will be in place, making it harder for the union to negotiate over pay for the longer day, Sharkey says.

But taking a strike authorization vote is risky because a new law requires that CTU get 75 percent of its members to vote yes. That means a non-vote is essentially a “no” vote. If it fails, the union’s power will be greatly diminished.

However, union leadership has been emboldened by a poll showing the public supports teachers by a 2 to 1 margin. Also, a survey the union conducted on May 10 showed that 95 percent wanted to reject the current CPS proposal, according to the CTU.

Sharkey says that 21,000-plus of 25,000 members participated in the survey. The union has done a detailed analysis of where the non-surveyed members are, Sharkey says. In the units where the survey took place, participation was “very high,” Sharkey says. Some small units did not conduct the survey, mostly because the delegate wasn’t around.

The indication that a strike authorization vote is imminent comes as the two sides continue to spar about the details of the contract proposals.

On Tuesday, CTU officials again claimed the proposal presented by CPS only guarantees a one-year raise of 2 percent and removes numerous provisions, including those establishing class sizes; the allocation of art, music and gym teachers; and the number of classes teachers are expected to teach. Sharkey says CPS management also wants to eliminate the measures that set out rules for laying off or displacing teachers.

“They want the contract to go from more than 200 pages to about 40,” Sharkey says.

But Carroll says CPS labor negotiators have tried to streamline the contract, by taking out language referring to antiquated practices. Officials have no plans of changing class sizes or teacher allocation and they intend for those provisions to be in the contract. She says that there are “place holders” for these provisions.

“CTU officials know that,” she says.

Yet the absence of these provisions worries union leadership. CPS officials are projecting a deficit of $600 million. At the same time, they have decided to extend the school day and year and have laid out plans to open 100 more new schools in the next five years.

Sharkey says the fear is of massive teacher layoffs and ballooning class sizes, and that neither teachers nor students would be protected.

“Getting rid of those things would be the wrong thing to do,” he says.

Jay Rehak, a Whitney Young High School teacher and union delegate, says that CPS officials have already told staff at his school that they could have seminars with 50 students to accommodate the longer day.

In the News: Selective seats planned for new S. Side HS

Cassandra West — Tue, 22 May 2012 08:54:42 -0500

Chicago Public Schools plans to add 100 selective enrollment seats this fall at the new South Shore International College Prep, the district said.

The new $94 million South Shore high school, at 1955 E. 75th St., opened last fall as a largely neighborhood school with an International Baccalaureate program and a trade program. This fall, half of South Shore's admissions will be through selective enrollment. The rest of the school will continue to offer International Baccalaureate courses and trade programs. The CPS board will vote on the plan Wednesday. (Tribune)

CPS on Monday said it intends to renew contracts for the district's two largest food vendors, Chartwells-Thompson Hospitality and Preferred Meal Systems, less than two months after the resignation of an official accused of accepting improper gifts from the district's two largest food vendors.

Illinois students are one step closer to a mandatory recess break if one of state Sen. Kimberly Lightford’s (4th) bills, which passed the Senate May 10, becomes law. SB 636 would require schools to offer children in kindergarten through fifth grade an outside recess – weather permitting – of at least 20 minutes. (Austin Talks)

Chicago's public schools remain one of the most overlooked aspects of the city's architectural heritage. It's good to take a closer look now and then, which architecture critic Lee Bey does in this photo essay, posted on his WBEZ blog, "Beyond the Boat Tour."

IN THE NATION
The number of teachers in Wisconsin public schools fell 2.4 percent in 2012, continuing a sharp three-year decline that began in 2010. (Post Crescent)

A year after a tornado devastated the Missouri town of Joplin and killed 161 people, President Obama on Monday night addressed the graduating seniors of Joplin High School, telling them that their resilience in the face of disaster was an inspiration to people everywhere. Story also includes the full text of Obama's speech.

A record number of California school districts are facing bankruptcy, the state's superintendent of public instruction announced Monday. (Los Angeles Times)

School closing lawsuit goes to court this week

Rebecca Harris — Mon, 21 May 2012 13:43:24 -0500

UPDATE:A judge has put off until Friday his decision about whether a lawsuit against school closings and turnarounds will be able to proceed.

If it does, the case will be heard on May 30 and 31 rather than on Wednesday, as had previously been planned.

The lawsuit claims that school actions disproportionately affect the district's African-American students. It was dismissed in mid-March when a judge ruled council members did not have standing to file it, but was re-filed it with changes.

Last week, CPS lawyers asked a judge to dismiss the lawsuit. CPS filed a rebuttal to council members stating that the suit "essentially asks this Court to ignore the unfortunate and undisputed facts that the schools they purport to represent have been failing for many years, and that something has to be done about it."

The district is arguing that the powers to impose school actions were given by the state Legislature, "and their exercise should not be derailed by a handful of individuals who fear change."

The district says that only 84 students will have to change schools due to this year's closings and turnarounds, and in the court papers filed Thursday, slammed school action opponents for "Chicken Little allegations of violence and crossing gang boundaries."

Price Elementary parent Krista Alston, a plaintiff in the suit, says that she is glad the judge "is taking his time and digeting everything that was presented to him."

The lawsuit had previously been dismissed, but was re-filed. It claims that CPS cannot close and turn around schools because it did not take adequate steps to help them get off probation, and that school actions have a negative impact on students who a disproportionately minority. CPS, in its response, pointed out the district's demographics.

"They are trying to say there is no disparate impact because all of our worst-performing schools are disproportionately minority," says Michael Persoon, an attorney for the parents who are suing to stop school closures and turnarounds. "That's an unfortunate argument to make."