The Illinois House of Representatives Elementary & Secondary Education Committee passed House Bill 466. This bill, sponsored by State Representative Monique Davis (773-445-9700, 217-782-0010), is dangerous because it seeks to limit public school options by prohibiting all charter public schools from opening additional campuses.Currently there are 10,000 students on waiting lists to attend charter public schools and HB 466 would take away that option.
Ask your state representatives to oppose this bill, which would take away hope for those who most need it.
This is a civil rights issue, and the teachers' union and others who continue to stand in the way of parents and children trying to better themselves are in part responsible for the consequences. Clarence Page remarked on the sad state of the NAACP, locked in the past, as they rejected their new head:
And at the national level, there is recognition from some Democrats, joining with Republicans, that more merit pay, school accountability and at least more public school choice are the only way to help kids, especially the most needy, excel.Gordon had the audacity to hope for an expanded NAACP mission. He set out with a corporate CEO's sense of urgency to target, for example, the continuing crises of undereducated black males.
Gordon understood something that NAACP Chairman Julian Bond and numerous others in the organization's breathtakingly huge 64-member board refuse to face: White racism is not the biggest problem holding back the advancement of people of color.
Yes, overall black poverty is down to about 24 percent today from well over 60 percent in the mid-1960s. But since the mid-1990s, recent studies show young, undereducated black males are worse off by every statistical measure of unemployment, drug abuse, disease and imprisonment.
Some kids, like Rontrell, are able to break free and work to achieve their dream.
Others need more help. Those legislators who stand in the way are dream killers.
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