A struggle for education justice in Chicago
THE COMING battle between the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel will have a national impact, and it will be fought over the issues of race, class and social justice--or as Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. put it, "educational apartheid."
Jackson used that phrase at the Chicago Board of Education's February 22 meeting, where the unelected body voted unanimously to close or "turn around" 17 schools--all in African American and Latino neighborhoods.
During nearly two hours of heartfelt testimony by parents, students and teachers, board members like former Northwestern University President Henry Beinen and billionaire Penny Pritzker checked their smartphones and barely bothered to conceal their disdain. But earlier, when Jackson spoke, they looked up, eyes a bit wider than usual.
The situation of African Americans in Chicago schools, Jackson said, recalled that of Little Rock, Ark., in 1957--a reference to the segregated system that the state's racist governor refused to do anything about, in defiance of a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, until he was forced to do so by federal troops. "It's a type of segregation when, within the same school system, you have an upper tier and a lower tier," Jackson said.
more . . . http://socialistworker.org/2012/03/13/education-justice-in-chicago
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