Last week, a lawsuit was filed against 145 school districts including Chicago Public Schools, Governor Pritzker and ISBE by groups of parents at these districts to lift the mask mandate and other covid safety measures in the schools. Each group of parents gave Attorney Tom Devore $5000 totalling $725K donated to make our schools and communities unsafe.

Important news from the IL State Board of Education last night, no federally-mandated testing for 2021 will take place in Illinois until at least March 15.

This is a big deal. Despite the fact that states have begun to request waivers for 2021 tests, the outgoing Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos has said none will be granted. The incoming Biden administration has not yet said where they stand on a moratorium on standardized testing

The General Assembly is back in session tomorrow in Springfield. This is likely to be a whirlwind three-day session covering a very barebones legislative agenda compared to a normal spring. (Politico shared this list of bills/topics on Tuesday.)

And, unfortunately, other than the state budget for Fiscal Year 2021, it's likely that not that much directly relevant for K-12 schools will be tackled.

Public schools are playing a vital role in helping families through the current crisis and in the recovery period to come. The pandemic and school closures have made it clearer than ever that public schools are the center of our communities and our children’s education.

Now is the time to tell your alderman to oppose the creation of two new megaTIFs—Cortland Chicago River and Roosevelt/Clark! This isn’t just an issue for Lincoln Park or the South Loop—taxes are raised on all of us from Rogers Park to Roseland to subsidize wealthy developers with dollars from our schools. Use the form below to email, call and tweet your alderman. 

Can't make it to our lobby day in Springfield on May 9? Here are three quick actions you can take from anywhere to support better public ed policy in Illinois! 

ACTION ALERT: 2 Witness Slips Needed!

April 3, 2018

There’s a hearing in the IL Senate Education Committee tomorrow afternoon (Tues. March 13th) at 1:30pm covering several bills important for public ed advocates like you to weigh in on!

Chicago Classical Academy Charter was rejected by CPS in December but is appealing to the unelected IL state charter commission for approval. The "targeted communities" for Chicago Classical are Bridgeport, Bronzeville, Chinatown, McKinley Park, Pilsen, and South Loop.

There was a hearing conducted by the commission on this appeal Tuesday night in Chinatown. We were live tweeting. The thread of tweets starts here.

The IL General Assembly is back in session this week, and there's an important bill on the agenda in the Senate Education Committee this Tuesday, Jan. 30th for supporters of public schools and the common good.