Chicago Charters: Make the Fight National

CHICAGO, IL—January 21, 2014, the Chicago temperature sank below zero while dozens of spirited protesters gathered outside the Board of Education office.  They endured sub-zero wind-chills in an overnight vigil before the Board meeting the next day, when the School Board was to review the applications of 17 charter schools.
At the meeting, the Board again ignored vociferous community testimony. As expected, the Board approved the applications of seven or the 17. Some of those denied indicated they would appeal to the State to overrule the Chicago decision.
The Board claimed new charters could relieve the pressure in overcrowded schools. However some of the schools approved will open in the same areas devastated by 49 school closings for “underutilization” last year.  Andrew Broy, president of the Illinois Network of Charter Schools, explained another rationale: “I think CPS is trying to add high-quality public schools of choice. . .”
“Choice” is a smokescreen:  Charter expansion is intended to turn public education over to private corporations.
“Concept Schools,” run under the auspices of the Gulen movement, won approval for 2 schools.  Gulen is the largest charter school corporation in the US with 150 schools (and more in other countries).  Gulen runs the Chicago Math and Science Academy in Chicago’s Rogers Park. This year CMSA cooked the figures to show that it performs better than it actually does. Concept Schools approved this year also get additional public funds.
Gulen has done well by courting friends in high places.  The Gulen movement leader, Fethullah Gulen, lives in Pennsylvania, but his movement is based in Turkey.  Gulen organizations funded four trips to Turkey for Illinois Speaker of the House Madigan,  who has supported the expansion of Gulen schools.  Rogers Park alderman Joe Moore got two junkets to Turkey.  Moore defended CMSA and even went to another ward to support another Gulen school (opened over the objections of the Chicago Board of Education).  Bill Clinton and Barack Obama have both praised Gulen schools.
Noble Schools, approved for opening 2 charter schools, boasts that they will have 10,000 Chicago students.  Supported by both Democrat Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Republican Bruce Rauner, Noble plans to open up directly across from a traditional high school.
Charter expansion is a hedge fund and real estate business plan, that treats education like a commodity to be bought and sold.  Charter schools are private schools using public monies to make more money. Gulen and Noble schools show how government and corporate interests merge.  The school by school battles we have been fighting, these scattered, local, defensive skirmishes can’t answer our needs.
As we come together to hold our political leaders accountable, we need to figure out  what accountable means. We are confronted by nationally connected charter chains like Gulen and Noble schools.  The government is already enforcing a national education plan that robs us of the promise of good education for all.  We’ll only see the end of phony charter choice when we hold all levels of government accountable to nationalize public education in the interests of all the people, abolish charters and privatization, while providing equal funding and quality education for all students and schools.