Chicago School Closings: A Qualitative Inquiry of Parent Engagement in an Urban Education Policy Context

• In Event: Roundtable Session 15
  In Roundtable Session: A Tale of Three Cities: Parent Activism and School Reform in Chicago, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia

Abstract

Since 2001, Chicago Public Schools (CPS) – the third largest urban school district in the nation – has proposed a series of school actions that has resulted in over 100 schools being closed or reconstituted through turn-around policies (Lipman & Person, 2007; de la Torre & Gwynne, 2009). In 2013, the mayor-controlled district recommended that 54 elementary schools be closed beginning in fall 2013. This historic school board decision represented the largest school closure for one year among school districts in the nation. The rationale advanced by the school district is that budget concerns force the hands of the school board and they must produce cost savings by consolidating underutilized and underperforming public schools.
The announcement of school closures caused an emotional outcry from teachers, parents, and community members who viewed the proposal as another form of public disinvestment in predominantly black and Latino neighborhoods.
This study explores the role of parent voice in the development of a resistance movement to the district’s policy on school closings. It examines closely the neighborhood differences that exist and the diversity of opinions on school closures within the African American community. It uses a predominantly African American neighborhood as a case study to examine differences across social class. By exploring the differences and similarities across residents, the study sheds light on the saliency of the notion of linked fate advanced by Dawson (1998). At the same it explores the role of more bridging forms of social capital that appear to be developing in the resistance movement of school closures.
It specifically attempts to answer the following research questions:
1) What are the main ingredients for a broad resistance movement that opposes school closures and advances an educational equity and social justice agenda in the City of Chicago?
2) Using the case of a predominantly African American Chicago neighborhood, what has been the response to existing school closures among parents and residents?
3) What potential does a resistance movement initiated by parents have in shaping the education and social policy landscape in a city such as Chicago?
Data and Methods
This study relies on participant observations at general community hearings and neighborhood forums on school closures as well as interviews with approximately 10 African American parent leaders in one Chicago neighborhood impacted by the closure of two elementary schools.
Scholarly Significance
This work aims to provide new empirical understandings about the way African American parents interact with school districts through organized resistance in their schools and communities. This work also provides a critical analysis of the motivations and meaning-making of African American parents and may aid in altering the deficit-based discourse about parents of color that pervades neoliberal education policy.

Author

• Rhoda Freelon, Spencer Foundation