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Thinking and Linking

Safe at school — but nowhere else

Joanne Jacobs

Mar 12, 2018
3 min

Safe at school — but nowhere else

School is a safe haven from the streets, students at Baltimore’s Excel Academy tell Kevin Rector, a Baltimore Sun reporter. Seven students at the alternative school have been shot to death in the neighborhood in the last two years. Many students have lost family members to street violence. Deaundra Fisher said her older brother was killed about five years ago. She later witnessed the shooting of her young nephew. . . . Dajona Bass, an 18-year-old senior, said her father was k

Closing the gap in Chicago

Joanne Jacobs

Feb 27, 2018
1 min

Closing the gap in Chicago

Two Chicago charter schools are closing the achievement gap for low-income, black children, according to a new book, The Ambitious Elementary School. “They greatly expanded the school day, week, and year,” writes Daniel Hamlin. “Weekdays begin with before-school tutoring at 7:00 a.m. and end with after-school enrichment classes at 6:00 p.m. There are also academic and enrichment courses for several hours on Saturdays.” In the “shared, systematic” model, teachers receive “inte

Low-scoring school is better — but not good

Joanne Jacobs

Feb 27, 2018
2 min

Low-scoring school is better — but not good

Locke High has improved in its 10 years as a Green Dot charter school. But it remains a very low-performing school, report Kyle Stokes and Carla Javier for KPCC. In 2007, a majority of teachers voted to “kick out the L.A. Unified School District’s leadership and turn the school over to a charter network called Green Dot Public Schools,” they write. Math teacher Eric Strong leads the “See A Man, Be A Man” mentorship program for African-American males. Photo: Kyle Stokes/KPCC A

New Mexico: Apply to college or else

Joanne Jacobs

Feb 7, 2018
1 min

New Mexico: Apply to college or else

New Mexico will make applying to college a high school graduation requirement, under a bill moving through the Legislature. “Exceptions would be made for students who can prove they have committed to military service, a vocational program, or work upon graduation in an apprenticeship or internship,” reports AP. (Getting a job that isn’t part of a program apparently doesn’t count.) The goal is to increase college enrollment and develop a better-educated workforce. New Mexico i

Most improved cities: Chicago? Or New Orleans, D.C.

Joanne Jacobs

Jan 15, 2018
2 min

Most improved cities: Chicago? Or New Orleans, D.C.

New Orleans and Washington, D.C. — not Chicago — are the fastest-improving urban districts, argue Emily Langhorne and David Osborne of the Progressive Policy Institute on The 74. Chicago’s third to eighth graders made six years of reading and math gains in five years (2009 to 2014), the best record of any major city, according to a new Stanford study. “The district has received heat for inflated graduation rates and three years of flat scores on PARCC (Partnership for Assessm

How effective is your school?

Joanne Jacobs

Dec 5, 2017
2 min

How effective is your school?

Three-quarters of Chicago Public School students come from low-income families. As third graders, they test below the second-grade level in reading and math, on average. But they nearly catch up to the national average by eighth grade, gaining six grade levels in five years, according to a nationwide study by Stanford researchers. That makes the much-maligned district one of the most effective in the country, reports the New York Times, which has some great interactive graphi

Not a gang school any more

Joanne Jacobs

Dec 5, 2017
1 min

Not a gang school any more

Enrollment is soaring at Benito Juarez Community Academy. Photo: Amadou Diallo/Hechinger Report Choice has emptied many low-performing Chicago schools, but enrollment is climbing at Benito Juarez Community Academy, reports Hechinger’s Amadou Diallo. A skills-mastery model adopted in 2013 got the school off academic probation. Juarez now ranks 49th out of 658 Illinois public high schools based on test scores and college readiness. When Principal Juan Ocon started in 2008, Juar

Strivers succed in Chicago charters

Joanne Jacobs

Dec 5, 2017
1 min

Strivers succed in Chicago charters

Chicago’s charter high schools are helping underdog kids get to college, according to a study by the University of Chicago Consortium on School Research, writes Maureen Kelleher on Education Post. As a whole, Chicago’s charter high schools take in eighth-graders who score lower on tests but have higher attendance than average for Chicago Public Schools (CPS) students. . . . Charters make them work harder to pass to the next grade. They provide more challenging instruction, st

9th-grade GPA predicts college success (or failure)

Joanne Jacobs

Oct 2, 2017
2 min

9th-grade GPA predicts college success (or failure)

Grades, attendance, test scores and graduation rates are up in Chicago Public Schools. Helping ninth graders raise their grades is paying off for Chicago Public Schools, according to a new report by the Consortium on Chicago School Research. Ninth-grade GPAs predict high school graduation and college success, reports Maureen Kelleher in Education Post. “In 2006, 30 percent of ninth-graders in Chicago’s traditional public high schools had GPAs at 3.0 or higher. By 2013, that

Internships motivate — but scores are low

Joanne Jacobs

Aug 28, 2017
2 min

Internships motivate — but scores are low

Student internships “saved” a low-performing Chicago school that serves low-income students, writes Hechinger’s Chris Berdik in The Atlantic. Aurice Blanton, a senior at Chicago Technology Academy, interned for a month at CNA Insurance last May. Photo: Chris Berdik/Hechinger Report Founded as a charter-like contract school in 2009 by Chicago Public Schools, Chicago Technology Academy offered “classes in coding, entrepreneurship, and software such as Excel and Photoshop, field

Welcome to Refugee High

Joanne Jacobs

Jun 14, 2017
1 min

Welcome to Refugee High

Chicago’s Sullivan High has raised its enrollment and test scores by welcoming immigrants and refugees, reports Elly Fishman for Chicago Magazine. Forty-five percent of the school’s 641 students are immigrants: 89 refugees — many of them Syrian — arrived in 2016-17. Of 35 languages spoken by Sullivan students, the third most common, after English and Spanish, is Swahili. Sarah Quintenz teaches English to students who are learning the language. Quintenz’s class looks like a j

Chicago mayor: No diploma without a plan

Joanne Jacobs

Apr 6, 2017
1 min

Chicago mayor: No diploma without a plan

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel wants to add a new graduation requirement for public school students, reports the Chicago Tribune. By 2020, students would need a letter of acceptance from a two- or four-year college, the military or an apprenticeship program to collect a diploma. “You want to make 14th grade, not high school … universal,” the mayor said. Later, an aide added new categories: Students could produce letters showing a job offer, a spot in a job-training program or in

How high schools hide dropouts

Joanne Jacobs

Feb 26, 2017
2 min

How high schools hide dropouts

High schools are inflating graduation rates and test scores by steering low achievers to alternative schools, reports ProPublica and USA Today. When they drop out, nobody’s accountable. Heather Vogell and Hannah Fresques focus on Orlando, Florida, where district schools, such as “A”-rated Olympia High, send their future dropouts to for-profit charters such as Sunshine High. Sunshine’s 455 students — more than 85 percent of whom are black or Hispanic — sit for four hours a day

Work, study, dream — and stay poor

Joanne Jacobs

Jan 23, 2017
1 min

Work, study, dream — and stay poor

Chicago’s North Lawndale neighborhood. Photo: Linda Lutton/WBEZ “School is what makes the American Dream possible,” writes WBEZ reporter Linda Lutton in The View From Room 205. That’s what desperately poor kids are told. But is it true? On the first day of school, September 2014, Barbara Byrd-Bennett, then head of Chicago Public Schools, told Penn Elementary students they could achieve anything. “No matter where you’re from, what neighborhood you call home, and no matter what

Chicago’s empty high schools

Joanne Jacobs

Dec 19, 2016
1 min

Chicago’s empty high schools

Although Chicago Public Schools (CPS) is “essentially bankrupt,” the district is operating dozens of half-empty schools, reports Chicago City Wire. Team Englewood is in a building that once housed more than 5,100 students. Only 161 are enrolled now. On an average day 122 students show up for class. Harper, which once had 4,400 students, now has 172. Fenger is down from 5,300 to 223. Hirsch enrolls 147 students; the building has space for 3,280. In 1966, CPS enrollment was 607

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