Students from various "under-achieving" schools have begun submitting proposals to CPS CEO Ron Huberman on how to improve their schools. Not to shamelessly plug or anything, but here is proof that good writing coming from anyone, students or adults, can change things up. From Chicago Public Radio's "City Room":
"High school students are turning in a special assignment to Chicago Public School's chief Ron Huberman this week. Huberman asked them to come up with ideas for improving the city's high schools."
Such proposals have included:
Number 21: students should have an “option of choosing a customized curriculum starting their sophomore year"
Number 2: “all students should be part of an extracurricular activity, outside organization or have a part-time job within or outside the school…”
Number 9: “instead of suspending students…parents should come in…[and] shadow”
Many of the proposals are presented to Huberman by those who wrote them. Students going straight to the top (if there is such a thing in a decentralized school system).
I think Huberman is on to something here. As much as we can guess at what students need or want in school, there is no way we can ever know. Its about time that CPS embraced two truths: 1) students are intelligent and 2) they know themselves better than we could ever hope to. Given “Turn-Around,” “Gear-up” and the whole score of Charter School approaches that continous role through CPS, why not try an approach given from those who will benefit from it in the end?
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