Mayor Emanuel announces free fare card pilot program for select 5 CPS schools

[mopinko]

"CTA is proud to continue to partner with community leaders and the Chicago Public Schools to help children access the full education they need to excel," said CTA President Forrest Claypool. "For many families and students the school day starts not when the bell rings, but when our bus and train doors open. This pilot program will make it even easier for students to get to and from school so they can spend more time in the classroom.”

This pilot program grew out of an idea presented to the Mayor by the Mikva Challenge Mayoral Youth Commission, a group of 25 Chicago high school and college students who meet with the Mayor on a regular basis to present new ideas and provide the Mayor with a youth-oriented perspective of the challenges facing the city.

The entire cost of the pilot program is being funded by Chicago-area philanthropist Wendy Abrams. This pilot program represents an investment of $50,000,




http://www.examiner.com/article/mayor-emanuel-announces-free-fare-card-pilot-program-for-select-5-cps-schools

one of many interesting innovations from rahm. and one more example of him listening to people.
i know y'all hate him, but he is working very hard to be a good mayor.

[grasswire]

1. Portland has bus passes for students.

Almost lost that this year with budget cuts, but the liberal mayor threatened the transit agency and they backed off.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

2. beat me to it. it's a great program

I can name 3 kids right now that would be dropouts if it weren't for the bus passes.

[HiPointDem]

6. the only reason portland students need bus passes is because they go to charters.

[grasswire]

8. charters?

no.

where did you get that idea?

[HiPointDem]

9. because portland public schools have their own buses.

http://www.pps.k12.or.us/depts-c/bus/

and portland has charter schools.

[grasswire]

17. do you live in Portland?

If not, you don't know what you are talking about. Thousands and thousands of students take city buses to public school. At certain times of the day a person can't even get a seat on a bus because it's filled with high schoolers from the PUBLIC schools.

[HiPointDem]

18. my family has lived near portland for generations. portland students have not always taken city

buses to school. the reason they do so now is education deform.

portland used to have neighborhood schools. their charter school law passed in 1999.

furthermore, living somewhere doesn't mean you actually know much about the place, nor does not living somewhere mean you don't know anything about it.

[grasswire]

19. *near* Portland is not *in* Portland

Near Portland, schools and their problems are very different from Portland Public Schools.

And as far as your maxim is concerned -- it's a crock.

[HiPointDem]

20. near enough to have relatives in portland, got it? even relatives working in the schools.

near enough to have seen 4 generations of local history, understand?

portland students used to have neighborhood schools and didn't need to take city buses to get to school.

the reason they do so now is education deform which has broken up the old neighborhood public school system.

and your maxim -- that one can only know anything about a place by living there -- is clearly absolute bullshit. i wonder why you want to push that bullshit. why don't you counter with some proof that portland students have *always* used city buses to go to school?

maybe because you arrived in portland after 1999, who knows.

[grasswire]

22. I was born in Portland.

I went to school in Portland from K-15. Yes, I lived elsewhere part of my adult life after college, but I have been back for 19 years. Members of my family are sixth generation Portlanders -- and one is going to kindergarten at his neighborhood school next week.

Portland still has neighborhood schools. Portland also has some magnet schools. And Portland has a policy allowing students to enter certain magnet school programs by lottery -- meaning they attend a school out of their neighborhood. Cleveland High School is an example, having an IB program that provides an accelerated academic program. Kids from all over town take the bus to Cleveland. Some schools have a language immersion program. One school is an arts school. People CHOOSE to go to those schools.

I don't know where you get the idea that there are no neighborhood schools. That's just bunk.

[HiPointDem]

23. i didn't say there were *no* neighborhood schools. i said it used to be *all* neighborhood

schools & consequently, portland students didn't need to ride city buses.

and if you say they did, that's just bunk too.

magnet schools came to portland the same time they did in the rest of the country -- on the heels of desegregation, in the 70s, as a way around forced busing. and did not take off until later.

to be more precise, my first oregon-born ancestor arrived in 1883. parents from prussia by way of louisiana and wisconsin.

Portland, Ore., may return to neighborhood schools model

Reporting from Portland, Ore. — For years, urban schools have struggled with segregation. When busing failed, many lured students out of racially isolated neighborhoods with irresistible programs in theater, technology and advanced academics at schools across town.

Here in Portland, as in many other cities, the plan backfired: White, middle-class parents adept at school bureaucracy got their children into the best schools. Poor families got left behind in ever-shrinking, underfunded and poorly performing neighborhood schools.

http://articles.latimes.com/2010/may/11/nation/la-na-portland-schools-20100512

[grasswire]

25. my mother's family has lived in New England since 1620.

Doesn't mean that *I* know anything about public schools there. I've never lived there.

[HiPointDem]

26. Except, as I said before: 1) Members of my family have lived in Portland & do, at this moment,

live in Portland. And some work in the school system or have children in the system. Family members, not to mention friends, also *have* lived in Portland. Even I *have* lived in Portland, as a young person, as did my ex, who taught at Lewis & Clark. The same in the generations after mine & before mine.

2) You don't have to live in a place to know things about it, and living in it doesn't mean you know all about it; and

3) The people who are making education policy are largely people who've never lived in the places they are making policy for -- and in fact many have never attended public schools.

You are simply wrong when you claim that Portland students have 'always' used public transport to get to school. You're simply wrong, regardless of your long residence in Portland.

I don't like this orwellian neoliberal revisionism, that pretends what is is what has always been. Things have changed significantly, and if we forget the past we can't imagine different futures.

Portland was an early target of the education deformers; home of Stand for Children, 1999 charter law, early adopter of online schooling, & vicki phillips, gates mole, as superintendent 2004-07, now with the gates foundation.


ps: i knew you had new england roots. seriously. and i know things about new england in 1620, too. it's amazing, the power of literacy.

if you hadn't made the utterly ridiculous claim that one can only know things about a place by residing there, we wouldn't be talking about our families.

[mopinko]

29. do members of your family live in chicago, too?

keep trying to make every everything squeeze into that red diaper baby world view of your hb. it's always entertaining.

[HiPointDem]

30. never claimed they did. but unlike you folks, i don't claim that one has to live in a place to

know something about it.

if y'all feel that way, i wonder why you're letting folks like bill gates design your school policy?

[mopinko]

31. we are letting the university of chicago's school of education design our schools,

for the most part. they are the guys who do the turnarounds, and hold and manage some charters.
it really doesn't get any better, expert-wise, than the guys who run the u of c lab school. quite possibly the best elementary school on the planet, started by john dewey.
get it? the best there is.

[HiPointDem]

32. did the u of chicago "design" KIPP?

http://www.kippchicago.org/

cause you seem to have three in chicago. they have schools in 19 other states too.


or ASPIRA?

Cause they, like KIPP, seem to have schools not only in chicago, but also in florida, puerto rico, etc. They apparently run several schools in chicago.

The controversial president of ASPIRA charter schools was fired late Monday evening during a stormy board meeting that included a chorus of community protests about ASPIRA’s management.

Rodriguez is no stranger to controversy. In 1997, as president of the Clemente Local School Council, he was accused of steering the spending of poverty funds in the early 1990s to pro-Puerto Rican terrorists speakers and activities. More recently, under Rodriguez’s leadership, ASPIRA schools were investigated in 2008 for strip-searching high school girls and altering grades.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/11567662-418/aspira-charter-school-ceo-fired.html

http://www.aspira.org/en/about-us/about-us


I don't think U of C designed this one, because it's run by catholics:

Can a world famous private school — which claims to promote Christian values, discipline, and hard work — lock an entire community out of public space after it gets the power to run a Chicago public charter school...? Two years after the Chicago Board of Education ignored community pleas (and evidence) and first closed the Ralph Bunche Elementary School for “academic failure,” the “Providence Englewood Charter School, rooted in the Catholic Church, has locked its grounds to all but its own students....

http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=506


I doubt U of C designed this one (& 2 others in the same network) & its 'african-centered curriculum," either...

http://www.bsics.org/


Or this one, because it's a GULEN school (linked to a Turkish imam, now resident in the US, reported to have US intelligence connections. GULEN schools = the biggest charter network in the US.

http://www.cmsaonline.net/


I'm sure there are a few more. Those are just some obvious ones.

Did U of C 'design' Noble's system of fines?

They've got about 12 schools in chicago (one named for the wealthy pritzker family, one named after obama's buddy bruce rauner, "venture capitalist" and private equity bigshot).

Maybe Rauner, good capitalist that he is, designed the fine system?

Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Tuesday offered a spirited defense of one of his pet charter school franchises amid allegations that it is maintaining student discipline by sticking it to parents — to the tune of nearly $387,000 in fines for “minor infractions” over a three-year period.

Earlier this week, parents, students and Parents United for Responsible Education (PURE) charged that Noble Street has pocketed nearly $387,000 in fees over a three-year period by issuing demerits to students for “minor infractions” that included not sitting up straight and openly carrying “flaming hot” chips.

PURE’s Julie Woestehoff charged that Noble’s Street’s list of forbidden conduct is “as long as my arm” and amounts to a “dehumanizing” disciplinary system fit more for a “reform school than a college prep.”

http://www.suntimes.com/news/education/10642434-418/rahm-emanuel-noble-charter-schools-results-speak-for-themselves.html

[mopinko]

34. noble is a reform school.

it is a drop out recovery school for kids with behavior problems. everything they do is signed off on by parents. everybody cries about parents are not involved. seems like one way to get them involved to me.

[HiPointDem]

37. "Noble is comprised of a growing network of high quality public high schools located in Chicago’s

communities of greatest need. We currently operate 12 high schools serving 7,900 students from more than 70 Chicago communities. Among our 12 campuses are the two new high schools in the Auburn Gresham and North Lawndale neighborhoods that opened this fall."

http://www.noblenetwork.org/campuses

did these low-income parents sign off to be robbed of 1/4 million in 'fines'? i doubt it.

Following a media firestorm prompted by outcry from parents and students at schools in Chicago's Noble Street Charter Network, Illinois legislators are now considering a bill that would prohibit schools from levying fees for student misbehavior.

The schools made headlines in February after allegedly collecting nearly $390,000 in disciplinary fines over three years from low-income students for minor infractions like chewing gum or failing to make eye contact with teachers. A report by the Voices of Youth in Chicago Education (VOYCE) and Parents United for Responsible Education (PURE) found the fines discriminate against students and "surreptitiously raises the cost of public education."

Noble's disciplinary code charges students $5 for minor infractions and up to $280 for misbehavior in the classroom, according to the report by VOYCE and PURE.

"Noble is forcing low-income parents to choose between paying the rent and keeping their child in school," Donna Moore, parent of a student at a Noble school, said in a statement released by the advocacy groups that accompanied the report. "This is a hidden tax on Chicago's Black and Latino families, and it's wrong."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=post&forum=1124&pid=3316


Noble (sic) is a "reform school"? really? A reform school is a court-mandated punishment/jail for crime committed by youth. Can you give me some evidence that the 8000 students at the 12 Noble charter schools have been convicted of crimes and sentenced to do time at Noble?

Since his inauguration as Mayor of Chicago, Rahm Emanuel has repeatedly claimed that Noble Street is the "best non-selective high school" in Chicago and proposed that it replace the city's general high schools, which he claims are "failing."

But a closer look at Noble Street shows that the charter school has a ruthless disciplinary policy which results in a huge "push out" rate. And the result of the Noble Street push outs is that Noble Street makes its statistics look good, while nearby neighborhood high schools, which have to take the kids Noble rejects, get blamed for the results if the students undermined by Noble Street later drop out or provide test scores that are lower than those of the kids left at Noble Street.

http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=3055


I guess low-income schools look like 'reform schools' to some people.

[Wait Wut]

3. I don't hate him.

Far from it. I agree he's doing what he can with what he has and what he has been left with. He, like so many others, was left a mess to deal with.

Great news, thanks for sharing!

[kickysnana]

4. I feel the same visceral hate for this guy I did for the BFEE. n/t

[mopinko]

5. as a person, i am told he is just a miserable excuse for a human being.

but so far i think he is working very hard, thinking outside the box, and not getting pushed around.

[HiPointDem]

7. the only reason chicago students need bus passes is because they go to charter schools.

which is the only reason 'philanthropist' wendy abrams is funding the passes -- to make it easier for students to opt for charters.

that money will dry up once it achieves its real goal. which is to help the rich to public monies.

as they're doing now, by using public transportation to bus kids to their privatized schools.

[mopinko]

10. absolutely, completely wrong.

in case you hadn't heard, chicago is a big city. enrollment in chicago schools is fairly open. there are lots of magnet programs, as well as attendance districts that are several miles across. thousands of students now use discounted student cta passes and thousands ride the cta to school each day. and always have.

and wendy abrams has nothing to do with any charter schools, afaik. she is an environmental activist.

nice kneejerk responses, hb, but not even close.

[HiPointDem]

11. the system has 'open enrollment' because of 'education reform'. students have not 'always'

used public buses, because students used to go to neighborhood schools.

[mopinko]

12. which have large attendance areas, especially back in the day. but

there have also been magnets going back 50 years. so have far back is always? as long as there has been public transportation and public schools in chicago kids have taken trains and buses to get to school.

[HiPointDem]

13. and had schoolbuses. "always" is "always".

The first magnet school in chicago was established in 1975. They didn't take off in a systemic way until later.

[mopinko]

14. not for every kid.

[HiPointDem]

15. your history of chicago schools seems to begin in the 80s. chicago used to have neighborhood

schools.

[HiPointDem]

16. First magnet school in chicago (whitney young, michelle obama's alma mater) est. 37 years ago.

not 50.

and they didn't take off in a systemic way until later -- 80s and 90s.

Whitney M. Young Magnet High School (commonly known as Whitney Young) is a highly selective Chicago Public School that opened its doors to students on September 3, 1975, as the city's first public magnet high school.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitney_M._Young_Magnet_High_School

the first charter school in chicago opened 1997. charters and magnets are both part of the education deform agenda that was formalized in renaissance 2010 in 2004.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaissance_2010

wendy mills abrams' husband james (CEO of her family's business) belongs to Chicago's Commercial Club (a prime instigator of Ren2010).

http://216.78.200.159/Documents/RandD/Duncan,%20Arne/Renaissance%202010%20neoliberalism.pdf

[mopinko]

21. lane tech opened in 1908

washburne trade school opened in 1919. yeah, i see you can use the wiki. big deal.

[HiPointDem]

24. technical and trade schools aren't 'magnet' schools, they're trade schools. maybe you don't

know the difference, or know what the age of compulsory education was in 1908 and 1919.

[mopinko]

28. no, they started calling them magnets when they became a tool for desegregation.

which has nothing to do with kids needing to ride the bus/going to school outside their neighborhood, which was the point.

[HiPointDem]

33. since you're such a native & all, tell me what the age of compulsory education was in chicago

in 1909.

i know -- do you?

[mopinko]

35. i can ask the google just like you do.

big deal. i don't claim to know everything about chicago. but i have lived here all my adult life and have sent 5 kids through cps schools. that is a little different than reading a few wiki pages.
i'm getting pretty bored with this.

and i will remind you that the point of this discussion was whether or not the bus passes were to get kids to charter schools. 5 schools have been named to participate in the pilot program-
Clemente (1147 N. Western Avenue, in West Town)
Richards (5009 S. Laflin Street, in New City)
Sullivan (6631 N. Bosworth Avenue, in Rogers Park)
TEAM Englewood (6201 S. Stewart Avenue, in Englewood)
Wells (936 N. Ashland Avenue, in West Town)

all public schools. so, you lose this one hb.

[HiPointDem]

36. Yes, I use the google. I also read books, magazines, & newspapers.

and I continue to state that the move by cities to put students on mass transit is part & parcel of the move away from neighborhood schools with dedicated student transportion to a neoliberal school choice model with selective enrollments, charter schools, etc., & the ongoing closing/deservicing of traditional schools.


CPS students already ride CTA buses and trains at reduced fares on school days from 5:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m., 30 minutes later than normal to accommodate Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s longer school days.

Now, 100 students at each of five CPS high schools — Clemente, Richards, Sullivan, TEAM Englewood and Wells — will be able to ride for free. Principals will help identify which students get the free rides...

Sun-Times Media, through a partnership with the mass transit agency, is paying the way for the first day this year and the two years that follow, said CTA President Forrest Claypool at a Monday morning news conference. Sun-Times Media is contributing more than $150,000 to the program.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/cityhall/14759039-418/500-high-school-students-to-get-free-cta-rides.html


I'll also continue to state that when lane was established in 1909, it was not as a "magnet school," since compulsory education ended at 8th grade. I'll also state that the 'magnet school" began in chicago, as elsewhere, in the wake of desegregation, as a way to continue segregation.

[mopinko]

38. you have no grasp of the scale of the thing you are talking about.

but i repeat- this is nothing new. these kids already take the bus. they are just getting a free card to make sure that money is not in the way of their getting to school. and every one of the schools is a public, neighborhood school. kids come in from outside, but kids also need a ride from the far edges of the attendance area.
this has nothing, nada, zip to do with charter schools or even magnet schools, both of which are growing at a pace demanded by families.

besides- what's wrong with choice in high schools? by then kids are starting to know what they want and what they can do and they and their parents want a good fit. there are tons of options in chicago, and that is a fabulous thing.

[HiPointDem]

39. I have more grasp than you. The scale is global. Tell me more about the Noble 'reform school'

you native, you.

That little bit of 'insider' info from you is so telling.

[LWolf]

40. I don't hate him.

I do my best, although I'm not always successful, not to hate anyone or anything. Hate is a destructive force.

As far as the rest, I don't like him, and I don't respect his career or his politics.

Should students have bus passes? Yes. They do in other cities; it's not something he thought up himself. It's calculated. He has to have something to point to that isn't harmful, to distract from his other more despicable policies.