Showing posts with label fair funding. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fair funding. Show all posts
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April 1 #ShutDownChi Day of Action!

March 27, 2016 0 comments

Join TSJ for the April 1 #ShutDownChi Day of Action!

Friday April 1 All Day, Everywhere  

RSVP Here to get text action alerts!

April 1 in Chicago will be a day of mass action against austerity politics, racist violence, anti-immigrant and Islamaphobic attacks, the savaging of human needs in Illinois, growing poverty, attempts to smash unions, and economic violence against the vast majority of people in our state. And, it will be a day FOR justice, fair distribution of wealth, progressive revenue solutions, full funding of our schools and human needs, and racial and social justice.

Map of April 1 Events 

Click on a star to see what events you can plug into.
Link to share the map: https://goo.gl/ePT0tr

Hashtags    #ShutDownChi   and    #FightForFunding  


On April 1, 2016, we are asking all concerned Chicago citizens to unite in a day of action by:

• Withholding your labor
• Joining morning pickets at CPS schools
• Attending events at CSU and NEIU 
• Marching from UIC to the Downtown Rally
• Withholding your dollars
• Boycotting the Magnificent Mile
• Protesting Governor Rauner, Mayor Emanuel and billionaire Ken Griffin
• Protesting banks such as Bank of America
• Engaging in nonviolent direct action protests
• Demanding progressive taxation
• Demanding the release of the TIF surplus

Join families, students, teachers, workers, and all those who thirst for justice.


More than 100,000 workers in the state of Illinois are out of a contract and are bargaining directly with our adversaries—Governor Bruce Rauner, Mayor Rahm Emanuel, bankers and billionaires like Ken Griffin, who are calling for school closings, university closings, budget cuts, lower wages for workers and restrictions on collective bargaining.

Racial injustice fuels the prison industrial complex by sending poor Black and brown men and women to prison each day. Chronic disinvestment has caused poverty in the state to grow considerably. Law enforcement agencies are under federal scrutiny for the murder of unarmed people and the mentally ill. Child-care workers and low-income parents are under attack. Yet multimillion-dollar arenas, museums and millionaire condos are being built all around us.

Tax cuts for those with the highest incomes, an unfair, regressive flat-tax system, and corporate loopholes galore have put Illinois in this fiscal distress. In Chicago, the mayor refuses to renegotiate bad deals with the banks profiting off of our “broke on purpose” schools. The mayor's TIF program siphons money from schools, parks, libraries and other public needs and hands it to wealthy developers. Rahm's handpicked board of education wastes millions on excessive testing and mismanagement while they cut and cut from school budgets. Enough is enough!
Read the Full Story

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Brought in for reform, UNO Chairman Martin Cabrera Jr resigns after 3 months! "UNO: Corruption, profit and public accountability"

September 14, 2013 0 comments


After joining UNO as Board's Chairman, Martin Cabrera Jr. resigns. During his short time, Gov. Pat Quinn restored the $98 million school-construction for UNO to complete construction of a new high school in the Southwest Side.

Read more at: http://www.suntimes.com/22550221-761/brought-in-for-reform-uno-chairman-resigns-after-3-months.html

Letter to Tribune's editorial team
"UNO: Corruption, profit, and public responsibility"

 We are very disappointed by the Tribune’s June 6 editorial, “UNO scrambles to save itself” supporting Juan Rangel as UNO’s CEO, even though, as the Sun Times reported, many Latino community organizations and leaders are demanding that Rangel step down in order to have a transparent investigation of UNO and its real transformation.

  UNO is a publicly-funded institution and should be accountable to the public and taxpayers who support it. The crisis in UNO reinforces the need for ALL schools that receive public funding—including charter schools—to have elected Local School Councils. This is particularly so for UNO which has received more public funding than any other charter school operator. Only an elected LSC of parents and community members can restructure and hold accountable an organization that has misused public funds with the consent of the current UNO Board.

  What is the real reason Juan Rangel wants to remain the UNO CEO and Cabrera the new Board chair? Rangel admits that he failed as CEO, as he knowingly signed inappropriate millionaire contracts with "people he trusted." He put family members on the payroll, and made significant donations (through UNO staff) to political campaigns for candidates who are likely to protect UNO practices. This corruption and politicking secured UNO roughly $70 million in public bonds (that UNO Board President, Martin Cabrera and his financial firm helped sell to wealthy investors). If the Tribune were to investigate the economic interests at stake, it would find that investors can double their investments in charter schools in only seven years by using New Markets tax credits. But this depends on UNO continuing to grow and get money from CPS. Is UNO helping investors to profit from our children's educational funds?

  The Tribune’s claim that UNO runs “excellent schools” needs fact checking. The consequences of UNO’s financial schemes and its flawed education model are already felt at some UNO Schools, at least two of which- UNO Tamayo and UNO Las Casas—perform at the lowest level. We predict that it is just a matter of time before more taxpayer funds will go towards paying UNO’s investors, rather than addressing the educational needs of Latina(o) students. This is a disservice to our community and our children.

  Byron Sigcho,
Vice-President
Hispanic Literacy Council and Teachers for Social Justice

 Pauline Lipman,
Professor Educational Policy Studies,
UIC and Teachers for Social Justice Read the Full Story

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Popular Education Pieces are Available for Download - Spread the word!

September 1, 2013 0 comments

TSJ has created Popular Education Pieces that set forth a vision of what public schools should look like while connecting the dots of between many of the corporate style "reforms" that are in opposition to that vision. These 10 page booklets can be downloaded and printed for use at meetings, in classrooms and other gatherings where people are fighting for social justice in education. They can be used as full booklets, or as individual issue fact-sheets. Please distribute widely.


Download the English version here. (revised 9.11.13)

Download the Spanish version here.

(Note: The Spanish version is missing some of the cartoon images while we try to locate Spanish language versions.) Read the Full Story

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