By Steve Rhodes
“If 61 percent of the city’s youth are graduating from high school, but among African-American adolescent males, it’s 44 percent, but you do nothing, what does that say?” Emanuel said. “Is that enlightened? Is that progressive?”
Is Rahm for real? So many questions.
Who is advocating doing nothing?
Teachers and parents have cried for even just a share of the resources that the University of Chicago Lab schools use to educate Rahm’s kids.
Is Rahm suggesting that Richard M. Daley did nothing all these years?
Rahm has been a close political ally of Daley for years. Did he ever say anything?
Did Paul Vallas, Ron Huberman, Terry Mazany and Jean Claude-Brizard do nothing all these years?
And what of Arne Duncan, who did such a great job he was promoted by Barack Obama to U.S. Secretary of Education. Rahm, you were the president’s chief of staff at the time, did you ever ask Duncan why he never did anything?
Is it possible that the schools aren’t to blame for the impovershed conditions so many African-Americans males grow up in?
Perhaps the city has disinvested in the poorest neighborhoods and closing schools there will only make it worse. Wouldn’t it make more sense to build neighborhoods instead of destroying them?
The Great Financial Scandal wiped out the economy and left much of the South and West Sides in foreclosure. Do your Wall Street pals share any of the blame and responsibility for deteriorating conditions in our city?
Perhaps, then, it would be fair to shore up the budget through a relatively miniscule financial transactions tax.
Is closing 54 schools enlightened and progressive? Only on Planet Orwell.
Decidedly not. See The Rahmney Plan For Schools.
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“Emanuel acknowledged the closing of scores of neighborhood schools will be ‘tough’ on parents and students. But he said kids will ultimately end up attending better schools, even if they have to travel farther to get to them.”
Yeah, the research doesn’t really back that up: “81% Of Displaced Students Moved To Schools Just As Bad, Worse.”
But then, this administration creates its own reality.
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See also the item Rahm’s Wrong Again. Hint: Facts aren’t his friend.
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The Real Problem With Rahm’s School Reforms. Hint: Claims counter to the facts.
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Two Visions For Chicago’s Schools. Hint: Teachers’ vs. Rahm’s.
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Meanwhile, Barbara Byrd-Bennett repeated to Chicago Tonight last night that her actions couldn’t possibly be racist because, well, look at her! She’s black!
Is that why the school closings were announced when Rahm was in Utah? To put a black woman out front to blunt just such charges? So the video the national news networks had didn’t show Rahm making the announcement?
Duh.
Of course no one thinks you got up in the morning, as you imagined to marginalize your critics, and thought to target people of color. But if you don’t know better than to think that’s what you’re being accused of, you aren’t qualified to hold your job.
Racism is an effect of institutional policies that does not require bigotry as a motive.
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“Performance has nothing to do with our utilization plan.”
– Barbara Byrd-Bennett, Nov. 27, 2012
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See also:
Save Lafayette: Poor Humboldt Park elementary school’s orchestra is something to build on, not destroy.
Global Views Of The School Closings Protest: The whole world wasn’t watching, but some of it was.
Chicago Youth: Abandoned: School? For what? These children have already been left behind.
Golden: A Poem About Chicago Violence: Drastically snatched from my reality, my golden ray of sunshine died. Father told me this was just the way the world worked.
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More commentary following Wednesday’s performance as well as some media criticism can be had on our Twitter feed.
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And from the Beachwood toy department today: Fantasy Fix: The Top 20 Starters & Relievers.
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The Beachwood Tip Line: Addition, not subtraction.
Posted on March 28, 2013