Featured Press

2025

Parents Push Good Governance

A new report from parent advocacy group Kids First Chicago advises the Chicago Board of Education on best governance practices and collaboration with parents, students, and the broader community. The report lays out a well-developed vision for governance, community engagement, board training and support, transparency, and relationship building--both among board members and with the community.

January 22, 2025 Board Rule | READ

Some parents fed up with CPS and CTU battles: ‘I feel like politics is taking over our children having the best education’

Despite having put five of her kids in Chicago Public Schools, Blaire Flowers said once her eldest daughter graduates high school, she may have to make the difficult decision of moving her children to a school district in the suburbs. “It’s not worth the fight,” Flowers said. “My son is missing out on too much. You want me to sit here and wait while (teachers) scream and holler about wanting more money, and I’m still not getting the basic services my son should be getting from CPS.” Flowers and some other parents said they are left wondering how long their children’s needs will fall by the wayside while the district and union continue their battles.

January 22, 2025 Chicago Tribune | READ

While the state faces a tighter budget, Illinois’ schools chief ask for a boost in education funding

The Illinois State Board of Education is proposing an additional $497.2 million for the state’s education budget — a smaller increase than last year as federal COVID relief money dries up and the state grapples with a projected deficit. Claiborne Wade, chair of Kids First Chicago’s Equitable Funding Task Force, a CPS parent, and staff member at DePriest Elementary, is not surprised that the board decided to propose $350 million. However, he hopes the state will boost funding to K-12 schools by $550 million due to the uptick in inflation and the end of COVID-19 relief funds for schools.

January 15, 2025 Chalkbeat Chicago | READ

2024

Money, missteps behind the monthslong CPS saga

Mayor Brandon Johnson’s Board of Education is set to take action on Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez on Friday — why is this drawn out drama coming to a head now? The situation has left some parents bewildered and upset. Katrina Adams, whose three daughters attend Burnside Elementary on the South Side, said she doesn’t want to see cuts, nor does she want the school district to take out a high-interest loan that will “mess up the future.” “It’s so political, and the only people that suffer are the parents and the students.”

December 20, 2024 Chicago Sun-Times | READ

Mayor appoints new members to fill CPS school board

Mayor Brandon Johnson named 10 members Monday and said an 11th is still being vetted. The appointees join 10 members who were chosen by voters in Chicago’s first-ever school board elections in November. Ahead of the announcement, some 140 parents organized by the advocacy group Kids First Chicago sent a letter to the mayor asking that he make sure the racial makeup of the board — the appointees together with the elected members — reflects the students in the district, who are nearly 90% Black and Latino. In the end, seven of the 21 are white, six are Black, seven are Latino and one is Asian American.

December 16, 2024 Chicago Sun-Times | READ

We're CPS parents. Some CTU contract demands would hurt children's education.

As parents and grandparents of Chicago Public Schools students, we’re watching with dismay as negotiations between the Chicago Teachers Union and CPS drift away from our children’s pressing needs. We love our teachers and want them well-compensated and respected — but we also deserve respect. It’s unfair for CTU or CPS to propose terms that ignore parents and our children’s rights, diminishing our say in their education and potentially driving schools into financial ruin. Most of all, we deserve to know if our children are learning and meeting essential milestones.

December 8, 2024 Chicago Sun-Times | READ

An uncertain future for Chicago’s Latino students: What’s been their experience amid CPS turmoil?

The school board has long been appointed by the mayor, and this year it will go from 7 to 21 members, with 10 elected by Chicagoans. Though November’s local election ostensibly presents an opportunity for more community voices in decision-making about Chicago schools, advocates say it leaves out non-citizen parents who cannot vote. “Is it possible for a Latino candidate to be elected in a predominantly white district? It’s probably uncommon,” said Jessica Cañas, chief of community engagement for the group Kids First Chicago. “People tend to vote for the person or the candidates that look like them — that share their identities.”

November 1, 2024 Chicago Tribune | READ

Do we really need to vote for school board candidates? The answer is yes, and the reasons are many.

“From what I’m hearing, nobody’s interested in trying to vote,” said Blaire Flowers, a mother of five in Austin and a parent leader with the advocacy group Kids First Chicago. Her district has only one candidate listed on the ballot, which could be even more discouraging. Flowers also pointed out perhaps the biggest challenge of all: “People who don’t have anything to do with media, they don’t know they get a say in the Board of Education.”

October 30, 2024 Chicago Reader | READ

While the mayor seeks to center neighborhood schools, parents weigh options they see as best for their kids.

Behind the recent drama at Chicago Public Schools — the resignation of the school board, Mayor Brandon Johnson’s quest to oust the CEO, and his demand that the district borrow to fund operations — is a longer-term but fundamental question: Should neighborhood schools take priority over choice? “It would be great if every single student could wake up and go to their neighborhood school that is an excellent school,” says Hal Woods, chief of policy at the nonprofit Kids First Chicago and a former CPS director. “But that is just not where we are as a city.”

October 21, 2024 Crain’s Forum | READ

Vote, Chicagoans, in the city's first school board election

Voters should support candidates with experience in education, finance or management, who won’t be afraid to speak up as part of a board dominated by mayoral appointees. “The biggest thing is, a lot of parents don’t know about the elections,” as Blaire Flowers, chair of the Elected School Board Task Force for the education advocacy group KidsFirst Chicago, told us. Parents “want to be heard. They don’t care about politics, about the mayor and Martinez,” Flowers says. “They care about the buses being taken away, the high schools that don’t have extracurricular activities, the quality of teachers, about [school] buildings falling apart around them.”

October 21, 2024 Chicago Sun-Times Editorial Board | READ

Chicago Fire: Chaos Reigns as School Board Quits & Elections Loom

Amid a growing deficit and a mayor with sagging approval ratings, America’s fourth-biggest district turns to voters for the first time. Families have an immediate opportunity to make their feelings known in November, when Chicago will hold its first-ever school board elections. Daniel Anello is the CEO of Kids First Chicago… [Anello] argued that the developments of the last few weeks more closely resembled Emanuel’s “top-down” management style than the participatory democracy that voters hoped for in 2021.

October 17, 2024 The 74 | READ

School board fell short on real community engagement for CPS strategic plan

We write on behalf of the Coalition for Authentic Community Engagement and are cautiously optimistic about the district’s recent release of its Success 2029: Together We Rise strategic plan. However, our optimism is tempered by the process leading up to it, which has significantly contradicted the values the board professes within the document.

September 22, 2024 Chicago Sun-Times | READ

Policy researchers: How to confront Chicago Public Schools’ financial freefall

Chicago Public Schools is teetering on the brink of the financial abyss, one that threatens to unravel the recent progress families and educators have fought so hard to achieve. The system is grappling with a structural budget deficit projected to be more than $700 million this year, the largest it has faced in nearly a decade. In our new report, “Revenue Options to Address Chicago Public Schools’ Deficit,” Kids First Chicago presents six revenue proposals. Our goal is to ignite public discourse around how to secure the future of public education in Chicago.

July 30, 2024 Chicago Tribune | READ

Chicago Board of Education passes $9.9 billion budget for upcoming school year

The Chicago Board of Education passed a budget Thursday for the coming school year, following weeks of tension and opposition that reached as high up as the mayor’s office. Kids First Chicago, a parent advocacy group, has suggested different ways to raise revenue and save money, including by advocating for more state funding, raising property taxes, and gradually consolidating the Chicago teacher pension system, which is funded by CPS, with the state’s pension fund for teachers, which is funded through the state budget, not local districts.

July 25, 2024 Chalkbeat Chicago, cross-published in Crain’s and Block Club Chicago | READ

Board of Education approves $9.9 billion Chicago Public Schools budget

The Chicago Board of Education on Thursday approved a $9.9 billion spending plan for the Chicago Public Schools for the 2024-25 school year, over the protests of the Chicago Teachers Union, which warned of the impact of spending cuts imposed to eliminate a $500 million deficit.

"Those dollars are going away, and there's no way to sustain those positions moving forward," said Hal Woods, chief of policy at Kids First Chicago, a group that helps advocate for parents and their students, mainly on the South and West sides.

July 25, 2024 CBS News Chicago | WATCH

A lifeline for CPS and other school districts is ending. What's next?
With federal COVID recovery funds running out, Luz Maria Flores worries whether there will be adequate resources for the band, the debate team, tutoring and other extracurriculars at Back of the Yards College Prep High School. Administrators, teachers and parents in the Chicago Public Schools system and districts throughout the region are grappling with the end of federal pandemic aid, a looming fiscal cliff because of the steep decline in the one-time funding.

June 24, 2024 Crain’s Chicago Business | READ

Local School Council Members React to CPS Funding Changes
Chicago’s school funding model is changing. Instead of basing school funding on student enrollment as the district has done for the past decade, Chicago Public Schools is now taking a needs-based approach.

May 21, 2024 WTTW | WATCH

Lawmakers Challenge Chicago School Board’s Choice Policy, Plans to Remove Police
Illinois state lawmakers filed two bills last week aimed at reversing the Chicago Board of Education’s decisions to rethink school choice policies and remove school resource officers from campuses.

March 20, 2024 Chalkbeat & The 74 | READ

Illinois Senate Signs Off on Plan for a Hybrid Elected School Board in Chicago
The Illinois Senate on Tuesday approved legislation finalizing the transition to an elected school board. On Wednesday, the bill passed out of a state House committee. A vote is expected before the full Illinois House of Representatives. Joining “Chicago Tonight: Black Voices” is Jessica Cañas, senior community engagement manager at Kids First Chicago; Natasha Dunn, founder and executive director of Black Community Collaborative; and state Rep. Ann Williams, who represents parts of Chicago’s North Side.

March 6, 2024 WTTW | WATCH

CPS students, parents rally after bus transportation canceled just weeks before start of school year
An impassioned crowd of protesters took over Daley Plaza on Tuesday. The group was made up of Chicago Public Schools students whose bus transportation to and from school was canceled just weeks before the start of the school year.

February 6, 2024 ABC7 | WATCH

As Chicago gets its first elected school board, Local School Councils may become a proving ground for candidates

Chicago’s LSCs are unique and powerful. There’s nothing quite like them in other school districts across the U.S. The Chicago School Reform Act of 1988 established that every CPS-run school would have a Local School Council. Today LSCs are made up of six parents, two teachers, one non-teacher representative, two community members, one to three students, and the school’s principal.

February 5, 2024 Chalkbeat Chicago | READ

2023

Mayor Johnson promised to stand up for CPS families. Instead, he’s shutting them outOpinion by Daniel Anello and Hal Woods
The administration’s refusal to engage families in any public process has created distrust and is a far cry from the inclusive governance he talked about during his campaign, two nonprofit leaders write.

December 27, 2023 Chicago Sun-Times | READ

State Lawmakers Seeking Community Input on Chicago’s Elected School Board Map. Here’s What to Know
Chicagoans are set to see a new office on their ballot in November 2024. For the first time, voters will elect members to the Chicago Board of Education. It’s a massive transformation as board members were previously appointed by the mayor. For Jessica Cañas, senior community engagement manager at Kids First Chicago, the issue with the Senate’s proposed maps is the lack of Latino representation.

October 10, 2023 WTTW | READ

What Progress Has Been Made in Closing the K-12 Digital Divide?
Experts say communities across the U.S. have made significant progress in efforts to expand Internet access, largely through private-public partnerships and localized initiatives to make broadband affordable to families.

September 12, 2023 Government Technology | READ

Three big questions, asked and answered, about Chicago’s move to an elected school board
Starting in January 2025, Chicago will move from a school board appointed by the mayor to an elected board. This shift is stirring great hopes and great fears – hopes this will create a more responsive education system and fears it will open the door to instability and a board mired in politics.

September 7, 2023 WBEZ | READ

Chicago Public Schools is becoming less low-income. Here’s why that matters.
Even though the number of students from low-income families has dropped, nearly three-quarters of the district’s student body is still considered “economically disadvantaged.” But if the downward trend continues, Chicago schools could continue to see fewer dollars than expected from the state, which funds districts in part by considering how many students from low-income families are enrolled.

September 6, 2023 Chalkbeat Chicago | READ

Commentary: CPS has a Chance to Create an Equitable School Accountability System
Measurement is imperfect, and the associated accountability has been misused in the past. Which is why CPS launched an extensive redrafting of its own school accountability policy, spending the past two years leading its most extensive stakeholder engagement process in district history. This effort has been purposeful in centering those most impacted by the policy as its lead designers.

April 24, 2023 Crain's Chicago Business | READ

How Lawmakers can Create Fair Voting Maps for Chicago’s Elected School Board
Lawmakers have until July 1 to draw maps for school board elections in 2024. The process must be transparent, and the maps should reflect the city’s racial makeup, two parent activists write.

April 2, 2023 Chicago Sun-Times | READ

From funding to testing, here’s how Chicago mayoral candidates differ on plans for CPS
Paul Vallas plans changes to CPS’ structure and to prioritize testing while Brandon Johnson wants to guarantee a baseline of resources for each school.

March 29, 2023 WBEZ | READ

Hal Woods: Chicago’s 21-Member School Board is too Large. Springfield Should Shrink it.
After the April 4 mayoral runoff, all eyes will turn toward Chicago’s foray into an elected school board, the most consequential transformation in governance of the city’s public school system in a generation.

March 23, 2023 Chicago Tribune | READ

Back of the Yards Residents Push Back Against Plan to Merge New Library with Public Housing Project
Some residents in Back of the Yards are pushing back over a proposal that would incorporate a new public library into a public housing project.

Feb. 15, 2023 WTTW | READ

Families are leaving public schools. How will that change education?
Changes in enrollment inevitably mean school districts are going to have to make hard choices,” says Ray Hart, executive director of the Council of the Great City Schools.

Feb. 15, 2023 Christian Science Monitor | READ

Declining enrollment, empty schools, union battles: Mayoral candidates grapple with big challenges in Chicago Public Schools
Whoever becomes mayor for the next four years will face enormous challenges and a daunting transition from a school board selected by City Hall to one elected by voters.

Jan. 29, 2023 Chicago Tribune | READ

2022

Student achievement has plummeted since COVID-19. Parents must be part of fixing that.
The latest scores from the National Assessment of Education Progress show steep learning loss during the pandemic. If the district is serious about addressing the problem, parent engagement is essential.

Oct. 27, 2022 Chicago Sun-times | READ

Chicago Offers a Blueprint for Expanding Urban Internet Access
Remote schooling during the pandemic spotlighted the urban digital divide — and spurred the largest school broadband program in the US.

May 31, 2022 Bloomberg | READ

New report details factors in CPS enrollment drop
The report, produced by Kids First Chicago, says the slowing growth of Latino families and a steady out-migration of Black families from Chicago are big reasons for the downward trend at Chicago Public Schools.

Jan. 31, 2022 Chicago Sun-Times | READ

2021

Millions of Students Got Free Home Internet for Remote Learning. How Long Will It Last?
After COVID-19 forced the nation’s schools online, thousands of districts scrambled to partner with internet service providers to cover the cost of broadband for low-income students.

March 10, 2021 Education Week | READ

Case Study: How Chicago is Providing Stable High-Speed Internet Access to Students who Need it the Most
With the possibility of remote learning returning this fall, the City of Chicago, Chicago Public Schools (CPS), the philanthropic community, and leading Internet Service Providers (ISPs) recognized a historic opportunity to eliminate broadband accessibility as a barrier to digital learning.

EducationSuperhighway | READ

2020

Anxiety about Chicago’s neighborhood schools persists amid the pandemic
Black students in Chicago are less likely to choose their neighborhood schools. They spend the longest time commuting to school. And yet they remain much less likely to attend the city’s top-rated campuses than their white peers.

July 16, 2020 Chalkbeat | READ

Chicago Hopes Broadband Plan Could Help Other Cities Address Digital Divide
Officials and donors involved in an ambitious plan to provide free broadband access to students in Chicago’s poorest neighborhoods hope that the public-private partnership can be a model for efforts to address digital equity issues elsewhere in the U.S.

July 9, 2020 Wall Street Journal | READ