The awkward departure of Jean-Claude Brizard from Chicago Public Schools seemed to surprise no one. Many figured the deed was already done when the Chicago Tribune (on August 31) started speculating about his future. Given the ending of the teachers’ strike, given the looming fights over school actions, given new leadership untarnished by old fights, it would be wonderful if Chicagoans could take a step back and think for a moment about the larger issues of how the education debate is being framed in our city.
I’ve spent considerable time recently trying to understand why schools in several other cities seem to be outperforming ours. If we take reading proficiency in 4th grade as one measure of doing well, for example, about 18% of Chicago’s children reached that mark on the 2011 National Assessment of Educational Progress. Of 21 cities tested, NAEP ranks 12 of them as doing significantly better than Chicago, among them Boston, New York, Austin, Atlanta , Houston, and Miami; at least 7 districts have 30% or more of students reaching proficiency. Chicago does better than a few cities, including Milwaukee, Cleveland, and Detroit, the latter trailing the nation at 7%...