Thank you for your #GivingTuesday support and closing out a strong 2019 with us! Thank you for considering Raise Your Hand in your end of year giving if you have not yet donated. We are looking to bring on more staff in early 2020 to address significant LSC parent rep shortages. If we can raise $2,000 more by the end of the year, we would be able to start right in January. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! 😍

Our new(ish) Executive Director, Jianan Shi, is celebrating his birthday! Wish him a happy, relaxing birthday weekend by BUYING YOUR Raise a Glass for RYH TICKETS TODAY! 🥳

On Wednesday, September 11, we joined our fellow plaintiff, Grassroots Collaborative, and our lawyers, Chicago Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and national Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights, and 60 supporters at the Circuit Court, Daley Center. The City filed a motion to dismiss our TIF litigation case which was filed in April. We heard the oral arguments from both sides. We expect a written ruling from the judge in a few weeks.

It’s just a start. We parents know that the reality on the ground, in our schools, ultimately doesn’t reflect the promises made by a mayor- we heard too many promises made at press conferences by Rahm.

Blocks Together and RYH hosted Schools As Anchors: Communities Planning for Their Schools last weekend. We learned about best practices in planning for school facilities and programming from local experts and from national expert Mary Filardo, Executive Director of the 21st Century School Fund. You can find all of the resources from the event- and more!- here.

Check out Chalkbeat Chicago’s coverage: Are there alternatives to closing schools? Chicago parents consider options.

We are grateful to Crossroads Fund who supported this event! We also want to thank Alexios Rosario-Moore for all his work organizing the agenda, materials, and workshops!

Make sure you follow us on social media this summer! Find out how here.

On Monday, Mayor Lightfoot officially appointed the new CPS Board of Education: Miguel del Valle (president), Sendhil Revuluri (vice president), Luisiana Melendez, Amy Rome, Lucino Sotelo, Elizabeth Todd-Breland, and Dwayne Truss.

We are pleased by the appointment of Dwayne Truss, former vice president of the RYH board. He played an instrumental role in shaping our organization and is a phenomenal human and advocate for public schools. Read this from Austin Talks to learn more about Dwayne: Austin Resident Dwayne Truss appointed to the Chicago Board of Education.

It was a huge relief to hear CPS Board of Education president Frank Clark announce at Wednesday’s meeting that it was his and the entire Rahm appointed board’s last meeting. There will be a whole new unelected CPS BOE seated at the June meeting!

Chalkbeat Chicago: ‘It’s our last meeting’: New mayor Lori Lightfoot moves to disband Chicago’s school board, setting up major shift

Sun-Times: All 7 members of the Chicago Board of Education step down

And, in case you are wondering about the CEO position...

Chalkbeat Chicago: Lori Lightfoot makes it official: She’s keeping Janice Jackson as Chicago schools chief

As you know, Jennie Biggs, our Communications and Outreach Director, participated in the three meetings of Mayor-elect Lightfoot’s Education Transition Committee. There were about 50 people in the Committee. We shared information about this Transition Committee and a link to the RYH Memo to the Mayor here. We were skeptical and wary of the process and we still are. We are dedicated to our parent powered and informed advocacy in Chicago and Illinois and we will continue to hold elected officials and decision makers accountable.  

In a historic election, Lori Lightfoot was elected mayor on April 2. For now, the mayor still controls the school system. On September 5, 2018, we released this statement: Rahm’s not running- What does that mean for the public schools? In it, we reflect on our time with Rahm and we list the ed policies we have deep concerns about. We stand by this list and look forward to Mayor Lightfoot using it as she works with all stakeholders - students, parents, educators, and community members -- to reimagine Chicago Public Schools. More on what parents want from our new mayor, here.

Chalkbeat Chicago: Lori Lightfoot is Chicago’s next mayor — which means big changes are coming to schools and check this out: Letters to Lori Lightfoot: Tell Chicago’s mayor-elect about your school