On just about every residential block throughout the city, yard signs are visible to remind the more than 400,000 Chicago Public Schools students and their parents that summer is coming to a close: “School Starts Tuesday, September 8.”
On just about every residential block throughout the city, yard signs are visible to remind the more than 400,000 Chicago Public Schools students and their parents that summer is coming to a close: “School Starts Tuesday, September 8.”
As CPS, local elected officials and community groups prepare for the upcoming school year, the importance of attending school on the first day is stressed.
An aggressive door-to-door campaign was launched last month in the Englewood community on the South Side.
School officials, aldermen and education activists knocked on doors taking verbal pledges from students that they would be in class on the first day of school. Bookbags with school supplies inside were also given out. School officials reported first-day attendance for the 2008-2009 school year at 93.7 percent, an all-time high for the school district, despite a boycott by the state Sen. Rev. James Meeks, D-15th.
Disturbed by the gap in state funding between white and Black students attending public schools, the senator organized a boycott on the first day of school last year. Meeks bussed students to north suburban New Trier High School in Northfield to register for classes. Approximately 1,000 students, along with their parents, participated in the two-day event.
But Ron Huberman, the new head of CPS–replacing Arne Duncan who is now the U.S. education secretary–is looking forward to a different, fresh start this school year.
He was on the stump over the weekend making the rounds to community back-to-school festivals pushing for the school district’s students to be in class from day one.
While historically the push to attend the first day has been attached to a message that doing so adds up to a gain or loss of dollars for the school district, Huberman said that is more lore than actual fact.
______
To read the rest of this article, subscribe to our digital or paper edition. For previous editions, contact us for details.
Copyright 2009 Chicago Defender. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
About Post Author
