After decades of being run by the mayor, the new Chicago Board of Education was sworn in Wednesday morning. This is a big change in who is in charge of the country’s fourth-largest school system.
The hybrid board, which is made up of 10 people who won their seats in the city’s first school board elections and 10 people who were appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson, will have a big say in how Chicago Public Schools develop in the future, even though the district is currently facing serious financial problems and negotiations for a new four-year contract with the Chicago Teachers Union have turned into a long-lasting power struggle.
Johnson hasn’t chosen his final board member yet, which will bring the total number of members to 21.
At his news conference after City Council on Wednesday, the mayor asked people to be patient with his new board member. When asked about the delay for his 11th member, Johnson said, “I’m a very thoughtful person.” “Our team is asking real, important questions to make sure that the people who are raising their hands really do have what it takes.”
Even though there was a lot of excitement at the meeting, the board, which is still mostly made up of Johnson supporters, showed its divisions Wednesday during a vote for vice president.
In a 12–7 vote, Olga Bautista, a CPS parent and former member of the John Marsh Local School Council who Johnson put on the board, won the job. She also pushed for green new schools on the Southeast Side and was on Johnson’s transition team for the Environmental Justice Subcommittee.
“Like I always have, I will continue to serve my city, not for the praise, but for the fairness and happiness that all CPS students deserve,” she said before the vote.
The rest of the votes went to Jessica Biggs, a former director and CPS parent who mostly got votes from people who were against Johnson and the teachers union. Biggs easily won her spot in November, beating a candidate backed by the CTU even though she said she was running as an independent.
The vice president is in charge of running board meetings when the president isn’t there, and if the president can’t do something, they usually take over the president’s duties.
Sean Harden, a business expert, will keep his job as board president. His LinkedIn profile says that Harden was the deputy CEO of community relations for CPS about 15 years ago. Last month, the mayor chose him to take over for the Rev. Mitchell “Ikenna” Johnson, who was accused of being anti-Semitic for posting things that were negative about Israel.
At Wednesday’s meeting, he said, “I am very optimistic about the future of the district. I look forward to making new friends, reaching a consensus with my fellow board members, and keeping students and their families at the center of our work.” “As we continue to improve the district, we have a wonderful chance to make a learning environment that can’t be found anywhere else in the US.”
The district leaders, the mayor, and his supporters in the teachers union, which financed his 2023 campaign, have been fighting for months over who has the most power. The new board is in the middle of it. Last month, six members of the board that Johnson had chosen before voted to fire district CEO Pedro Martinez for no reason.
The mayor has put pressure on Martinez to accept a $300 million loan with high interest rates to help pay for some of the demands in a CTU contract. Martinez refused to do so, saying that it would be irresponsible to put the district’s already tight budget into debt. A Cook County judge granted Martinez’s request for a temporary restraining order just days after he was fired. This order said that board members could not go to contract talks without his permission or stop him from “doing his job duties.”
Since Mayor Richard M. Daley persuaded the state to give him power in 1995, the mayor has chosen the board members for almost 30 years. In 2021, lawmakers in Springfield and Gov. JB Pritzker backed a bill that took some of that power back from City Hall. It made it possible for the partially-elected board to be created and gave locals more say over how the district is run. All 21 slots will be filled by 2027.
Johnson, whose campaign for mayor was based on changing the way schools work, and the CTU, which has had problems with mayors in the past, pushed for the change. There were also groups that supported private schools and school choice.
Wednesday, CTU President Stacy Davis Gates walked up to the board and was clearly emotional. Seeing an elected school board is “absolutely confirming and affirming,” she said. It’s also a win for people who “imagine, fight hard for, and sacrifice for justice and equity.”
She also told the board that they need to help get a deal for teachers “across the finish line.” The deal has been being talked about between CPS and the teachers union since April. Davis Gates said that CTU members want to work with the board to improve CPS by pointing to contract ideas like more libraries and more time for teachers to prepare.
“Together, we can keep our school district going and make sure that all of our children get the help, justice, and fairness they need,” she said.
But money is a big reason why the two sides can’t come to an understanding. The CTU wants teachers to be paid more and for disadvantaged schools to get more teachers. CPS says that the union’s original plans come with too high of a price tag. Since then, they have been getting closer to an agreement while holding back-to-back last-minute news conferences a few times a week to tell the public about their differences.
Johnson’s plans for education failed in the end in the November elections, when most of the candidates backed by the teachers union lost their races. Aside from the three newbies, Johnson chose appointments from a group of current board members and candidates who lost their elections.
Aaron “Jitu” Brown, a CTU-backed candidate who won, thanks everyone who “believed in this moment” after a long fight to get his name on the school board. He said, “First they laugh at you, then they fight you, and then you win.”
Che “Rhymefest” Smith, an award-winning rapper who ran as an independent, said that being voted to the board was the “high point of the beauty in my life.” He said that he wants to start a new era in city schools.
He said, “Dr. (Martin Luther King Jr.) says that education should teach people how to sort through evidence and tell the difference between what is true and what is false, what is real and what is not real, and what is fact and what is fiction.” This is the world we’ll be living in in 2025. It’s important that we know how to tell the difference between fact and fiction and that we teach our children the same thing.”
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