Category Archives: Education

“Englewood! Those Kids Are Animals”

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A little over a year ago I was on the bus headed downtown from the South Side, a lady next to me on the bus struck up a conversation. Eventually she found out that I was a teacher and where I worked. As soon as I finished the last syllable of Englewood, her face showed complete disgust and she promptly said, “Englewood! Those people are animals you should never go there”. I responded, “I’ve worked there 5 years (at the time) I have good kids and parents, have a nice night. “ Thankfully it happened to me by stop.

Sadly, many of the other teachers that I work with have had similar experiences to the one I described. If you’ve never spent time with kids from Englewood and believe the stereotypes about everyone in the neighborhood then I can understand why this lady said what she did.

I could provide many examples during my 7 years of teaching in Englewood to easily disprove the statement made by this person, however let me share my most recent and by far most personal and emotional experience to disprove her mass and faulty generalization.

My partner (also a CPS teacher) and I were expecting our 2nd child. She was 17 weeks pregnant. About a week ago while getting a checkup we found out that we had lost our baby.

I do not have the words nor the desire to describe the pain we felt and the emotions we still feel about our loss.

We took some time off of work to spend time together and with our young son so we as a family could grieve this loss. While going through the grieving process I became upset that we had told so many people about the pregnancy. All of our friends, family, co-workers, and all of my 120 students knew.

Every email we sent to our family and friends explaining there had been a late miscarriage was painful. I had asked my friends at work to tell the students what had happened, because I knew I wouldn’t be strong enough to and I didn’t want them asking about it.

I was hesitant to return to work because my emotions were still all over. My first day back while standing in the hall before the start of the first period, nearly every student I had taught or am teaching this year came and hugged me, gave me a handshake, or just simply asked if I was okay and said they were glad to have me back.

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You see these Englewood animals, I mean Englewood kids, I mean kids reached out to me (as they always have) and showed their care and love.

These kids, my kids that are labeled as thugs, gang bangers, and criminals have made the toughest point in my life easier.

The beauty of my students sadly reminded me of the vile spewed by this lady on the bus. If I ran into her now I would just ask her to picture the darkest point in her life and think about who came to her side and supported her.

Because for me during my darkest point, it was 120 “animals from Englewood”.

**And if my personal example was not enough one of our students from our school, TEAM Englewood decided to donate his kidney to a stranger, because his mom has needed a kidney transplant for years and he is not a match for her.

(Feel free to share this piece, but due to the very personal nature of this post, please do not tag me if you share via Facebook)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dave-stieber/englewood-chicago-students_b_4282347.html?utm_hp_ref=chicago

http://gapersblock.com/mechanics/2013/11/19/englewood-those-kids-are-animals/

Rahm Hoping Chicago Forgets Everything in Time for 2015

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The city of Chicago is littered with historians. Depending on where you are in the city, people can remember and share stories of buildings, businesses, train lines, or movie theaters that used to be in certain locations that are no longer there. For example, many people on the South Side can remember how the Green Line used to stretch all the way to Stony Island, but has now been reduced to only going as far as King Drive. No matter where you are in the city if you talk to enough people you will find out what used to be at certain corners or how certain buildings used to look.

Our Mayor Rahm Emanuel though is betting that the citizens of Chicago will not remember and will forget everything he has done.

Rahm Emanuel is betting that we will forget how he closed the most schools in the history of the United States. He is hoping we forget how neighborhood schools are the backbone of communities.

You see since Rahm has been elected (by less than 25% of all the eligible voters in Chicago) he has become infamous. On top of closing the most schools in the history of our country, he has also been mayor as Chicago has become the murder capital of the country, or as my students say ChiRaq (Chicago + Iraq).

He gives press conferences where he talks about his “great” new initiatives, but has little follow through. Remember when he promised to get rid of Chicago’s food deserts?

Through his time as mayor, Rahm has been taking public money and investing or giving it to private businesses or organizations, like Depaul’s new basketball stadium. He also made sure that bad privatization deals like the parking meter contract stayed in place. Another privatization scheme by our Mayor that has slipped under the radar is the fact he has leased the Port of Chicago to a company based in Denver for 62 years. Just another move by our mayor to make a select few wealthy while allowing money to leave our own city. He almost privatized Midway Airport, but the deal thankfully fell through at the end.

Yet when he wants to (which is often) Rahm claims the city has no money for, in his eyes, not important things like public schools, CTA employees, and fire and police people. He has implied these public workers to be greedy.

He has slashed school budgets which often resulted in 15% of an entire school’s staff being cut. Schools are reporting there is not enough money for basic school supplies like paper and books. And now reports are coming out that schools do not even have enough money for essential sanitary supplies like toilet paper.

But now all of a sudden Rahm is changing his tune. He is announcing the building of a new school on the far South East Side.

Never mind that is on a toxic site.

As Rahm proudly says, ““For all of you that have been asking for this for years, this is your day. Take pride in it.”

Wow, surely Rahm is now finally listening to the people right? Wrong.

As Jackson Potter from the Chicago Teachers Union said, ““Most of these projects are getting completed in 2015 when he’s running for re-election.”

I couldn’t agree more. Rahm is betting that the voters of Chicago will forget about the countless things he has done to continue to harm working class communities across the city. He is attempting to do a few “good” things just in time for his attempt at a 2015 re-election.

Unfortunately for Rahm he doesn’t realize that Chicago is a city of historians, that don’t forget. (I hope)

http://gapersblock.com/mechanics/2013/09/25/rahm-hoping-chicago-forgets-everything-in-time-for-2015/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dave-stieber/rahm-hoping-chicago-forge_1_b_3983580.html

Mike McConnell Radio Show

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After the story in The Guardian about my experiences working in Englewood, I was contacted by the Mike McConnell radio show on WGN radio. After doing some background I was a little hesistant to go on, because Mike McConnell is on the more conservative side and has a history of attempting to bully his interviewees. Other than him trying to get me to talk bad about my student’s parents, calling my kids gang bangers, and implying that because I worked in Englewood I must not be a good teacher, because I couldn’t get a job somewhere else, the interview went pretty well.

Featured in The Guardian: A Day’s Work

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I was featured in The Guardian in the “A Day’s Work” section. I had to answer 6 questions then live respond to questions from the readers.

Please make sure to read the comments as that was the most fun part of the whole thing.

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http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/03/chicago-teacher-south-side

The Intentional Impoverishment of Neighborhood Schools in CPS by CPS

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Over the past 6 years I have seen the public high school I work at on the South Side, TEAM Englewood, lose funding little by little, that is until this year. Our school was part of Arne Duncan’s Renaissance 2010 plan which was based on the faulty premise that one could simply make education better by closing schools, firing everyone that worked in the building and opening a new school. Being new to Chicago and not knowing anything about this plan, school closings and turnarounds I decided to work at TEAM Englewood (which replaced Englewood Tech Prep). I chose to work in the Englewood community, not because I didn’t have job options of where to work, but because I wanted to work in the Englewood neighborhood.

Our school’s motto is simply “Opportunity”. We want to give our students in Englewood the same opportunities that students all across the city get. I am one of the original teachers who started at this school when it first opened.

During the past six years I have seen our school do amazing things. Maybe the most impressive is that we average about a 93% graduation rate for our senior classes. However, the opportunities that we are able to give our kids are slowly dwindling and being taken away by CPS and this city in the name of “mandatory” budget cuts.

These cuts started small. 4 years ago we had two counselors, we had to cut one. In that same year, we had to cut our librarian (we are “lucky” to be a school that actually has a library). 3 years ago we cut our Assistant Principal position. Last year we did get an Assistant Principal back, but we cut our College Readiness Coordinator. Also that year we had to cut our attendance clerk, school accountant, and tech coordinator.

The implied message from CPS was to do more with less.

Obviously little by little our computers stopped working, school staff had to take on more and more roles. Our Curriculum Coordinator now became in charge of fixing technology, organizing all the CPS mandated standardized testing we are forced to give, helping teachers, observing classrooms, acting as an administrator, among other roles.

All these cuts though very large and detrimental at the time now pale in comparison to the cuts CPS is forcing our school (and all CPS public schools to make) this year. Our school of 500 students had our budget reduced by about 15%, which translated into a $400,000 budget deficit. So now our school, due to the CPS budget, is being forced to eliminate 3 teaching positions and 3 non-teaching positions (for example: clerks, deans, assistant principal, curriculum coordinators).

Now that we have less staff, larger class sizes, and less resources our school will be demanded to improve or have the threat of being “turned around”.
Every neighborhood school in the city is facing similar or even worse cuts.

Our city claims it doesn’t have money to fund schools or teachers’ pensions. Yet our city has money to build new stadiums, river walks, give $85 million to charter schools, and a host of other “necessities”.

I agree with the late John Henrik Clarke who said, “Powerful people cannot afford to educate the people that they oppress, because once you are truly educated, you will not ask for power. You will take it.”

The people who run this city truly do not want a fully educated public. They want great magnet schools that are fully funded with experienced teachers for a select few and neighborhood schools that are poorly funded with an inexperienced teaching staff for the majority.

This is not some conspiracy there is historical precedent for the actions of limiting educational opportunities in lower income communities of color around the world. What this city is attempting to do is a human rights violation. If what was going on here in Chicago was happening in a different country we would easily classify the actions of this city as a human rights travesty.

As Nelson Mandela said, “Education is the most powerful weapon in which you can use to change the world.” Our city clearly agrees as it is restricting the education of the majority to keep in power a powerful largely white minority.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dave-stieber/the-intentional-impoverishment_b_3671623.html

http://gapersblock.com/mechanics/2013/07/31/the-intentional-impoverishment-of-neighborhood-schools-by-cps/

The Real Status Quo of Chicago Public Schools

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Barbara Byrd-Bennett, Mayor Emanuel, and Becky Carroll the CPS spokesperson have used the justification (among many others over this year) that we must close schools that children are in under-utilized schools. They have even blasted the Chicago Teachers Union saying that, “union leadership remains committed to a status quo that is failing too many children trapped in underutilized, under-resourced schools.”

As a high school history teacher in Englewood for the past six years I agree that we must break the status quo. We (parents, teachers, and tax payers of this city) must break the status quo that CPS and our Mayor allow to go on. The status quo of having a mayor control the school system. If as a mayor you have to close any schools you obviously are failing at running the schools. If as a mayor you have to close the most schools in the history of our country you have obviously failed at running the schools.

The status quo that allows the Mayor to give lucrative deals to his friends like dodgy head of UNO Charter Schools Juan Rangel who in turn has had millions of dollars of state funding cut off, because he was caught giving tax payer money to his relatives businesses.

We have to break the status quo of having the dubious distinction of being the only school district in the entire state with an appointed handpicked NOT elected school board. The mayor not only controls the schools, but then he gets to pick who will be on his school board. The appointed school board is made up of people who do not send their children to public schools and in some cases do not even live in the city. As I teach my students this is called Paternalism. An outsider who claims to know what is best for everyone.

Speaking of outsiders and the status quo we also are on our 4th CEO in 5 years. Barbara Byrd-Bennett who replaced Brizard, who replaced Manzany, who replaced Huberman in 2009 is not even from Chicago. In fact she is still registered voter in Ohio. So like the school board someone not from Chicago telling Chicago parents and students what to do. To see Byrd-Bennett’s true policies just look at her brief but damaging time spent in Detroit.

The notion that students are trapped in under-resourced schools is partly true. I disagree with the trapped part of the statement but the under-resources part I strongly agree with. CPS and the Mayor say to get more resources for our schools we must close 50 schools. Yet the status quo is allowing some schools to be fully funded using TIF money and other schools like mine and many in the black and brown neighborhoods of this city to not be fully funded.

You see with TIFS the neighborhoods with more political clout are allowed to keep their TIF money and have it used for the purposes it was intended such as funding schools. In other neighborhoods the TIF money that is supposed to be used for schools is actually be siphoned from the neighborhoods that really need it and that money is taken downtown for building things like the $100 million River Walk, $300 million to a private university to build DePaul’s new stadium, $55 million for the new Maggie Daley Park.

The status quo allows the mayor to take from the poor and give to the rich. The status quo allows school board members like Penny Pritzker to use TIF money to build new hotels while having her bank accounts located in the Bahamas. This means that the status quo allows her to make decisions for schools, take money earmarked for schools, and then not pay taxes that in part should be helping schools.

So when the regurgitated rhetoric comes from our CEO, Mayor, or anyone high up in CPS about the Teachers Union wanting to keep kids trapped in the status quo, remember that the Teachers Union is made up and run by 40,000 people who work with students and have committed our professional lives to improving the opportunities for our students. We want our kids to have every opportunity and resource possible. We have a plan for education in this city unlike the Mayor. We demand that instead of closing schools to get the resources our kids should have had all along that the status quo of how the resources are allocated be changed. Since teachers are forced by law unlike the appointed school board and certain higher ups in CPS to live in Chicago these are our children. Barbara Byrd Bennett while talking a good game and using catchy sound bites is really just pretending to care about other people’s children, because like her CEO predecessors she will be gone shortly too.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dave-stieber/the-real-status-quo-of-ch_b_3359636.html

http://gapersblock.com/mechanics/2013/05/31/the-real-status-quo-of-chicago-public-schools/

Live on Politics Tonight CLTV May 23rd 2013

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On the night that the largest public school closings in the history of this country were approved by the appointed Board of Education in Chicago I was on CLTV talking about this.

Before me on the show was Jesse Ruiz the Vice President of the Board of Ed. It was tough for me to sit about five feet away from him watching him lie on camera while waiting my turn to speak truth.

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http://landing.newsinc.com/shared/video.html?freewheel=91047&sitesection=68_Politics_Tonight&VID=24837807

Live From the Heartland Radio Show

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This is the video version of my radio interview this past Saturday morning on the Live From the Heartland Radio Show on 88.7 FM here in Chicago. I am talking about school closings, unions, and education in Chicago.

The coolest part is that my dad Arny Stieber was on the same show talking about Veterans for Peace and the militarization of Chicago Public Schools his interview starts at 32 mins.

Chicago Students Always Lead the Way

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Those of us who work with students day in and day out know the brilliance and potential that our students have. We also find ourselves as educators, parents, and tax payers becoming increasingly frustrated by a mayor, “CEO” and appointed school board that consistently and blatantly does not have the best interest of our students at heart.

Have no fear our students will lead the way. Yes, our students that the media far too often labels as “gang bangers” “thugs” or “criminals” will lead the way against the harming polices implemented by CPS.

Students have been organizing to fight the ill proposed school closings and over testing taking place in our schools. This student led group made up of hundreds of students from various schools across the city goes by the name Chicago Students Organizing to Save Our Schools or CSOSOS.

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This student led group meets weekly, creates agendas, plans and organizes. These students from various parts of the city cross gang lines, racial lines, to come together to improve this city from the inside out. CSOSOS has organized a walkout/protest of Day 2 of the PSAE testing. Students from other schools have followed in their footsteps and walked out of school to protest the unfair firing of their teachers like what happened at Lincoln Park High School last week.

These student groups and student actions aren’t just happening out of thin air, there is a long historical precedent of students leading this city.

As a history teacher I decided to do some research and find out as many examples of student actions in Chicago as I could. The following list is not conclusive, but it is a start to give us all the understanding that our students are not only brilliant but are capable of leading this city. The student actions are well rehearsed and organized. Their actions cannot be measured with a multiple choice bubble test.

1.Freedom Day 1963 : 200,000 students walk out city wide to protest funding cuts to education

2.Equal Rights Walkouts 1968 : City wide student demand for equal rights for all students led by African American & Latino students

3.Anti-Immigration Law Walkouts 1995 : City wide student protests against legislation that would take away basic human rights for immigrants.

4.Iraq War Protest Walkout 2003: City wide students walked out of class to protest the U.S. led war in Iraq.

5.Senn High School Student Walkout 2004: Students and community protesting becoming a Military School .

6.School Closing Walkout 2009: City wide walkouts against the proposed school closings.

7.System Wide Proposed Funding Cuts Walkout April 2010: CPS was thinking about cutting extra curricular activities and programs.

8.Social Justice HS Students protest firing of teachers & principal Aug. 2012

9.King High School Student Sit In to Protest Principal Dec. 2012

10.Lane Tech Students Protest Banning of Persepolis March 2013

11.Day 2 PSAE walkout April 2013: Students walked out on the 2nd day of PSAE testing against school closings and over testing.

12.Lincoln Park High School students walkout May 2013: Students protesting the wrongful firing of many of their teachers.

Needless to say our students are intelligent and partake in the democratic process that this country was founded on. So if our students feel forced to have a protest to make their voices heard, join them. They are teaching all of us what Democracy looks like, sounds like, and feels like.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dave-stieber/chicago-students-always-l_b_3244417.html

http://gapersblock.com/mechanics/2013/05/10/chicago-students-always-lead-the-way/

1 of 150 Arrested for Protesting School Closures

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Yesterday I a Chicago Public Schools history teacher, a father, and husband was arrested for sitting down on La Salle Street in front of City Hall and refusing to move when asked to do so by the police. I along with nearly 150 others was taking part in an act of civil disobedience against the school closing policies implemented by Mayor Emmanuel, Barbara Byrd-Bennett and the CPS Board of Education.

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You see those of us that chose to get arrested and the other couple thousand marching legally against the CPS plan to close over 54 public schools are beyond frustrated that we live in a city that is governed by lies and press releases.

The “justifications” that CPS are using to try to convince the public how “necessary” it is to close public elementary schools in African-American communities are typically these main four points:

1) CPS says closing schools will save money.

In two separate reports by the Catalyst and by CReATE both studies found that school closings either do not save any money or it only saves a very miniscule amount of money.

2) CPS has been toting an alleged $1 billion budget deficit, which is again not true. CPS actually has a $500 million SURPLUS not deficit.

3) The formula that CPS uses to determine if a school is “under utilized” is not a valid measure of deciding under utilization according to research done by Raise Your Hand Illinois.

4) CPS claims that students from closed schools will go to “better” schools. Again this is untrue in a report released by the Sun-Times.

So with all this in mind when I was originally asked if I was willing to participate and be trained for a civil disobedience that would lead to my arrest I stopped to think;

How much longer can I go on letting my students in Englewood be treated as second-class citizens by a school system that says it cares about them?

I believe and am constantly telling my students that if you work hard enough you can overcome many obstacles in life. The issue is that CPS has forced my school (and many like it) to have to get rid of our librarian, second counselor, attendance clerk, technology coordinator, schools accountant, and only have half a nurse for a half-day on Fridays all in the name of “budgetary reasons”. It seems to me that our mayor and CEO no matter what they claim about their policies not being racist are very much in fact promoting and implementing racist policies while letting institutional racism permeate through this district.

Before the disobedience I also thought of my one year old son and what kind of person I want him to be. I thought of my wife who is an amazing CPS teacher, but because of many of the harmful CPS policies like schools closings sometimes she thinks about other careers besides teaching that she could do.

I thought of every person that inspired me to be a history teacher and all the amazing actions they took. I knew that I had no choice but to participate in this act of civil disobedience.

While I sat on the cold cement among lunchroom staff, custodians, teachers, and clergy I couldn’t help but feel angry that we live in a society that tries to close public schools. While sitting on the ground next to a man in his seventies with bad knees waiting to be arrested I couldn’t help but wonder how many more arrests will it take before this racist mayor actually listens to the people?

While the police treated all of those arrested with the upmost respect, while the crowd of protestors cheered for us and our disobedient actions, I thought to myself we get arrested for sitting on the cold cement in front of city hall, yet our mayor is legally allowed to close 54 public schools and praise that his actions are a positive step for communities he never even visits.

This whole fight around school closings and public education comes down to whom will you believe?

Will you believe a mayor who sends his kids to one of the best private schools in the state with art, world languages, counselors, and resources?

Will you listen to Barbara Byrd-Bennett who was responsible for closing public schools in Detroit in the name of “what’s best for the community”?

Or

Will you listen to the students, parents, clergy, school employees, and people of the communities where these schools are located that are demanding and have been demanding that NO schools be closed?

As Gandhi eloquently states, “All through history the way of truth and love has always won.  There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall, always.”

Remember everyone this is our 4th CEO in three years and Barbabra Byrd-Bennett will soon be gone like Brizard, Manzany, and Huberman.

Our Mayor only has a 19% approval rating so then in a few short years hopefully he will be gone too.

The important thing is to make sure that NONE of their policies like school closings last any longer than either of the people attempting to implement them.

It will take many more arrests, sit-ins, occupations and forms of civil disobedience to bring these school closings to a halt, but once again to quote Gandhi, “First they (CPS) ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win”. CPS and the Mayor are in a full on attack against truth and against democracy, but as we will see, truth always wins.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dave-stieber/cps-protests_b_2972567.html