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CPS served nearly 5 percent less of the city’s school-age children in 2023 than it did in 2018. At the same time, the percentages of Chicago students enrolled in private school and those classified in census data as “not enrolled” have both inched up.
Summary and audio linked here.
Chicago’s political leadership is floating a pension buyout program as evidence it is seriously addressing the city’s thirty-six-billion-dollar unfunded pension liability, but Mark Glennon, founder of the Illinois policy research organization Wirepoints, said that the proposal moves debt from one column to another rather than reducing it, and that the broader fiscal picture facing the city continues to deteriorate across every measurable dimension. Audio here.
Expect no retraction or apology. This what they do.
The state’s existing buyout program for its own pensions is the precedent for Chicago, which should be a warning: Look out for similar exaggerated claims and shoddy analysis.
Full interview and summary linked here.
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What is wrong with CPS parents? Don’t they realize that reading and writing are grossly overrated? Social Justice and Equity are the economic engines of the city’s future!
You know what that means: time for the CTU to strike for higher wages and even better benefits!
CTU apologist Emmanuel Camarillo tries to play the declining birth rates card, Hal Woods straightened the record: “population decline continues to be the biggest driving factor of falling enrollment.” The sad fact is, people are abandoning Mayor Cliff Notes’ Chicago and JB the Hutt’s Illinois, seeking a more sensible place to live. Trust fund brat JB the Hutt has never known ‘unaffordability’, so his policies continue to drive up prices for Illinois businesses that pass along these costs to consumers. Other states not run by leftist ideologues remain a far more attractive and, yes, affordable place to live and work.… Read more »
Maybe CPS needs to close underutilized schools and lay off the staff associated with those schools. Then take those funds to develop programs to improve student education and raise test scores. CPS needs to focus on teaching language arts, math, science, world and US history. Eliminate the progressive and identity political teaching. CPS needs to develop a backbone and stand up to CTU. CPS needs to discipline teachers for calling off and teacher pay based on student test scores. Teaching students to respect others and implementing discipline would be helpful as well.
Those are all good ideas, but I would say these things do not take more money, or even the same money. They should close schools and make your reforms, but they should not “take those funds to develop programs,” as those programs already exist elsewhere. This should not be expense-neutral, it should result in actual reductions in spending. Shockingly to think of, and the CTU will call it “gutting education” or whatever; but it would be better education for cheaper.
Good thing taxes for schools decreased as well! Oh, wait…
Fewer students . More money 💰 more teachers , administrators , lower test scores. CTU only concern is getting MORE UNION JOBS AND TAXPAYERS MONEY 💰.
The CPS is doing a very poor job. The CTU is doing a great job at extracting taxpayer money.
Ye have little faith. Student achievement should soar with CPS’s growing budget and CTS’s rich new contract to “educate” fewer students. Right?