Youth activists organized a peaceful march to Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s home on Aug. 13, 2020, to demand the removal of resource officers from Chicago Public Schools. (Matt Masterson / WTTW News)

A new resolution from the city’s Board of Education directs Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez to enact a new whole school safety policy, which “must make explicit that the use of SROs within District schools will end by the start of the 2024-2025 school year.”

(Michael Izquierdo / WTTW News)

District officials are lauding the findings from Harvard and Stanford researchers, which showed CPS was first in reading recovery following the COVID-19 pandemic among large school districts across the country.

(WTTW News)

The Board of Education next week will vote on whether to replace Aramark with seven other vendor companies to provide custodial and professional services for district schools.

(WTTW News)

Chicago Teachers Union-backed educators at two Instituto del Progreso Latino charter schools are going on strike after they say little progress was made during the latest round of contract negotiations over the weekend.

(Michael Izquierdo / WTTW News)

CPS on Thursday released its proposed calendars for the 2024-25 and 2025-26 academic years, which included a start date of Aug. 26 for the upcoming year due to the “estimated influx of 75,000 visitors: coming to Chicago for the convention.

Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates appears on “Chicago Tonight” on Aug. 22, 2023. (WTTW News)

According to a copy of the Jan. 26 police report obtained by WTTW News, William Hozian, principal of Stevenson Elementary School reported that Stacy Davis-Gates spoke to attendees at a union meeting and said, “In talking to my Stevenson brothers and sisters, I told them they should punch their principal in the face.” 

Larry Snelling and Mayor Brandon Johnson shake hands while addressing the media during a press conference announcing Snelling’s appointment as the Chicago Police Department’s superintendent Aug. 14, 2023. (WTTW News)
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Speaking Wednesday before the Economic Club of Chicago, Police Superintendent Larry Snelling said police officers will always have some role in school safety, even if they’re no longer working inside schools.

Students at Lane Tech High School staged a walkout on Jan. 30, 2024, in support of a cease-fire in Gaza. (Paris Schutz / WTTW News)
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Students from Ogden International High School and Walter Payton College Preparatory High School marched to City Hall, carrying signs and chanting slogans such as “Viva Vida Palestina” and “our tax dollars are being used to commit war crimes.”

(WTTW News)

Chicago Teachers Union-backed educators at a pair of Instituto del Progreso Latino charter schools could go on strike early next month after more than two years of bargaining.

School hallway file photo. (WTTW News)

The controversial program known as Invest In Kids took donations from people and businesses. It used that money to subsidize student tuition for low-income families at private and trade schools before expiring last year. Critics of the program say it takes away resources from the public schools the majority of state children attend. 

(WTTW News)

More than 5,000 English learners have enrolled in Chicago Public Schools over the course of the year, many of whom are the children of migrant families. The influx is shining a spotlight on the shortage of bilingual instructors and services at schools.

Prussing Elementary (Google Earth)

The seven-member board voted unanimously in favor of the agreements, which would settle a pair of lawsuits filed by Prussing parents after at least 71 students and seven adults were taken to the hospital as a result of the leak.

(Michael Izquierdo / WTTW News)
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Files released to WTTW News in public records requests identify 42 district security personnel disciplined between January and October of 2023. The records included individuals terminated in cases with a controversial video in Albany Park, and a sexual assault investigation in West Ridge. 

State Superintendent of Education Tony Sanders, left, and Illinois State Board of Education Chair Stephen Isoye speak at the board’s regular meeting on Jan. 24, 2023. (Peter Hancock / Capitol News Illinois)

PreK-12 education spending currently makes up about one-fifth of the state’s entire General Revenue Fund budget. The proposed increase, if approved, would bring the state’s total GRF spending on public education to just over $11 billion.

Prussing Elementary (Google Earth)

Chicago education officials this week could vote to approve more than $800,000 in payments to settle a pair of lawsuits filed in response to a 2015 carbon monoxide leak at a Northwest Side elementary school that left several dozen students and staff members hospitalized.

(WTTW News)

The Chicago Board of Education will take public comments on proposed changes to the district policy. That move comes weeks after CPS Inspector General Will Fletcher published investigatory results showing that $23 million worth of electronic devices had been unaccounted for.