Thanks to Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie's office for forwarding a letter from CPS CEO Ron Huberman to me with an attached school closings report (both documents are here). I guess our copy is still in the mail.

It's good to read in CEO Huberman's letter that he intends to post this kind of information on the CPS web site at some time in the future. That will make our four-month journey to get this report no longer necessary. He also states that, while there was no report done last year, he has asked for a report on last year to be included with this year's report.

General comments about the report

It's a disappointment that the report is not about students; the CPS school closing policy requires a report on "the impact school closings have on CPS students." This report is clearly labeled as a report of "whole schools."

It includes fairly basic data about the closed and receiving schools including enrollment, attendance, misconduct reports, student transfers under NCLB, test scores, graduation rates, and "on track" rates. 

Some comparisons can be made. A rough eyeballing of the data suggests that more indicators improved in those comparisons than worsened, but it's impossible to say that the closed schools would not also have improved with the rest of the system.

The report will certainly give advocates (and reporters) a lot of information to work with. For example, this is the only CPS document I've seen that gathers together the closed schools with their receiving schools from 2002-2007. 

What's missing?

Well, we thought the point of this report was to monitor any harm that might come to individual students as a result of school closings. For example: 

• How many students dropped out instead of going to their receiving school?
• Did any students lose academic ground as a result of their transition to a different school?
• Did any students experience bullying or other acts of violence, or report feeling less safe in their receiving school?
• Did students in the receiving schools experience problems?
• Where's the demographic data???   

There is nothing like that in this report, and I have shared these concerns in a response to Mr. Huberman.

It may be up to HB 363 to assure that the safety and well-being of CPS students is monitored and protected.