Coalition to Launch City-wide Drive for Elected School Board

Coalition to Launch City-wide Drive for Elected School Board Referendum

MEDIA ADVISORY

A coalition of parents, teachers and community organizations fed up with Rahm Emanuel’s rubberstamp school board, will launch a campaign for a city-wide referendum on February’s ballot asking voters to endorse the call for an Elected Representative School Board.

The coalition will launch the campaign at a press conference and rally on Monday and then canvassers will fan out in the surrounding neighborhood  to get signatures  on petitions to put the referendum on the ballot in February.

	WHAT:  News conference and campaign launch for city-wide elected school board referendum drive

	WHEN: Monday, Oct. 13, 10 a.m.

	WHERE: McNair School, 4820 W. Walton, Chicago

	WHY: The mayor’s hand-picked, unelected school board is not accountable to the people the schools serve.
	The voices of students, parents and teachers are shut out of decision making that impacts their daily lives,
	while the board pursues a political agenda focused on privatizing public education.

The coalition will launch its referendum drive in front of McNair elementary, which CPS recently “turned around,” firing all teachers and staff, over the strenuous objections of the school community. The school was turned over to a private operator with ties to CPS Board President David Vitale.

The campaign is working to place a separate referendum on the ballot in each of the city’s 50 wards.  This week, progressive aldermen attempted to get an elected school board referendum on the city-wide ballot but they were thwarted by the mayor’s council allies.

Chicago is one of a handful of cities in the state where voters don’t elect the school board and the vast majority of school boards nationally are elected. While a change in state law is needed to create Chicago’s elected board, the referendum drive will give momentum to push for a new law in the General Assembly next spring.

The referendum drive is being sponsored by a coalition of community, parent and labor groups, including the Grassroots Education Movement (GEM), Communities Organized for Democracy in Education (CODE), Grassroots Illinois Action (GIA) and United Working Families (UFW).


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