Shortening school year is ‘ not the right choice’: Rahm
Staff Reporters
Mayor Rahm Emanuel said Wednesday it’s not “the first choice” or the “right choice” to end the school year three weeks early, but “there are consequences” to Gov. Bruce Rauner’s veto of a bill providing $ 215 million in pension help to the Chicago Public Schools.
Chicago Public Schools asked a Cook County judge on Monday to fast- track the district’s civil rights lawsuit against the state of Illinois, warning of “devastating, immediate and irreparable harm” to students if a funding issue isn’t resolved quickly. At worst, CPS said it may have to end the school year three weeks early, chopping off 13 school days in June, to save, according to the district’s “conservative” estimates, $ 91 million.
“I don’t take that decision lightly. It’s not the first choice, and it’s not the right choice. . . . [ But] there is a reality. The governor vetoed a bill that would have provided pension equity and fairness across the system making Forrest [ Claypool] and the CPS system try to make some very difficult choices keeping those cuts away from the classroom,” Emanuel said at an unrelated news conference.
“There are real consequences to what the state and the governor have done. The governor vetoed a bill because he was angry that Senate President [ John] Cullerton said something. That’s not how you make decisions.”
More than $ 100 million in the red and on the hook for a $ 721 million teacher pension payment in June, CPS said it could cut the school year as short as June 1 and shrink summer school if money doesn’t come through soon from the state. That’s 13 class days knocked off of Emanuel’s signature longer school year, which was scheduled to end June 20.
Rauner’s office warned that shortening the school year would cost the district dearly in state money. CPS stands to lose about $ 6 million in general state aid for each day it falls short of the number of class days required by the state.
By state estimates, CPS could be docked as much as $ 45 million, according to Illinois Education Secretary Beth Purvis.
“It seems that the history of mismanagement at CPS continues, because this proposed ‘ solution’ hurts students, teachers, and reduces state funding to CPS by $ 45 million,” Purvis said in an email. “Instead of blaming someone who’s been in office for two years, it would be helpful if the mayor was asking why his district’s chief created a budget that depended on revenue that hadn’t been appropriated by the General Assembly.”
ISBE requires 180 class days but also counts additional parent conferences, teacher institute and school improvement days toward that number.
CPS’ “conservative” estimates puts the district at 171 student attendance days if school ends on June 1, according to spokeswoman Emily Bittner.
And since it costs more to keep a school open than CPS receives from the state, the district wouldn’t feel the loss, she said.
“The goal is not to figure out how to shorten the school year,” she said. “The goal is to figure out how to get the funding our children deserve from Springfield and avoid having to consider ugly options to begin with.”
On Wednesday, the mayor stressed that ending the school year on June 1 is just “one of many things they’re gonna look at.” He’s clearly hoping the mere threat of such an inconvenience to Chicago parents will spur the Illinois General Assembly into action on the Senate’s “grand bargain” plan, which includes pension equity for CPS.
“Everybody knows that we have a broken school formula that penalizes poor kids of color vs. rewarding wealthy districts of kids like in Winnetka, Naperville and across the suburbs. It is broken. Everybody recognizes it. Rather than do a study, let’s fix the system,” Emanuel said, in an apparent jab at the commission created by his fellow Democrat, House Speaker Michael Madigan, D- Chicago.