Exploring Chicago Connected

Key Findings

  • 28% of eligible students participated in Chicago Connected by May 2021—68,385 of 242,471 eligible students.
  • Participation rates were higher for students in households for lower economic means.
  • English Learners and students with disabilities were more likely to participate in Chicago Connected—but differences in participation rates for students with disabilities was not statistically significant in our multilevel models
  • There wa

Investing in Adolescents

Key Takeaways

  • When schools foster socioemotional development (SED), students are more likely to thrive in high school and beyond.
  • Many 'school quality' measures miss the important ways in which high schools foster student thriving. 
  • School climate is strongly and positively tied to school effectiveness.
  • Effective schools are rigorous and relationship-oriented. 

Key Findings

  • High schools that fostered eighth- to ninth-grade student growth across multiple dimensions positively influenced students’ social and academic tra

Believe the data

Steven Herkert is director of ROE services at Regional Office of Education 8. He is also a principal mentor with the Illinois Principals Association, and a passionate advocate for the 5Essentials Culture and Climate Survey. In this episode, he talks about mistakes he made as a principal, what he got right, and how principals can use data to make their schools better...

Skyline Early Literacy

To support learning acceleration post-pandemic, and ensure all teachers have access to high-quality instructional materials, Chicago Public Schools developed an all-inclusive system of online curricular resources, called Skyline, as well as related professional learning (PL). The Consortium is conducting a three-year mixed-methods study examining the ongoing implementation of Skyline+PL.

Kaitlyn Franklin

As a Research Analyst at the UChicago Consortium, Kaitlyn provides data and analytic support across Consortium projects by cleaning and building large-scale databases. She is currently working to identify key indicators of student success and academic attainment for English Learners in Chicago Public Schools. Before joining the Consortium, Kaitlyn served as the Education Policy intern for Clarke County School District in Athens, Georgia.

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