CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) — Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez said he and his team are planning a major push to address disparities in educational quality among the schools.
It’s a long-standing problem: Schools in some neighborhoods do better and seem to have better resources and achievements than others. Martinez said two years of COVID amplified the inequities.
“The wealthy got much wealthier during the pandemic, and those who had less — and we didn’t even think it could get worse for them — it was worse for them,” Martinez said.
But Martinez said he’s already taken some action to balance the scales.
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“What we did this year for our schools is we put — for the first time — strong, foundational resources across every school,” he said. “Whether it was access to the arts [or] intervention teachers. For those schools who have newer teachers, academic coaches on-site that can work with the principals and the teachers.”
This month, he said, they’ll look at the big picture to ensure all programs are doing what they should in all neighborhoods.
“We want to look at all the programs that we offer across the city,” Martinez said. “We’re going to map those out, inventory them, [and] set a standard for quality.”
For example, they’ll determine whether the international baccalaureate programs in the schools are performing equally well.
Martinez is the guest on WBBM’s “At Issue” program, which you can hear Sunday at 9:30 p.m.
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