From the Readers

Thank you, CPRTV

Thank you so much for the opportunity to share my story with our kababayans Ms. Vero. I am grateful for your time and I hope its not the last time we speak. All the best, Aurea de Guzman (Filipina pepper grower in Chicago)

__________

Our First OFW’s-New book From Amazon

Long before the launch of the Overseas Filipino Workers program in the early 1970, there were groups of Filipinos, as many as a thousand, already at work in the mainland Asian country of Laos. Sandwiched between Thailand and Vietnam, and gripped by a civil war that was already engulfing South Vietnam, Laos sought the help of our technicians in building up their livelihoods in healthcare, education, training, agriculture, engineering. The Philippines responded by sending volunteers in a technical assistance program called Operation Brotherhood. Some 600 served there for years between 1957 and 1975.

In this newly published book, this little-known history of this unique effort at Asian-to-Asian cooperation is described. The volunteers tell how their experiences transformed their lives. Jose Fuentecilla Author, “Memoirs of Shared Histories”

__________

CAMOC’s Pride Month

We are thrilled to announce CAMOC – the Chinese American Museum of Chicago’s Pride Month event series! This special program, curated by Ji Yang in collaboration with 6018|North, aims to highlight and celebrate queer experiences within the Chinese American community through art, storytelling, and conversation. Explore LGBTQ-themed works from artists Hai-wen Lin, Eugene I-Peng Tang, and Linye Jiang. Join us in celebrating Pride Month and supporting the Chinese American LGBTQ+ community. The program will run through July 13th, 2024. Samantha Ocampo Marketing Coordinator CAMOC | The Chinese American Museum of Chicago

__________

Chicago Schools Spending Nearly Doubles As Scores Drop

If you were given $68,000 per student and two staffers for every three students, what do you think the result would be? National Honor Society graduates with Ivy League schools clamoring for their presence?

Well, not if you gave that money to the Chicago Teachers Union. You’d get zero 11th graders able to do math or read at grade level. Worse, 86% of those students would read at the lowest level.

This is a reality in Chicago at Douglass Academy High School. It has only 35 students in a school built for 900. It is only open because the CTU in its wisdom refuses to let Chicago Public Schools consolidate it or any of the other vastly underutilized buildings: one-third of Chicago schools are less than half full.

Douglass has 23 staffers to teach those 35 students. CTU wants to compound all that inefficiency by adding eight more staff positions at Douglass.

The current demands by CTU are for $1.7 billion in new spending on eight new staffers at each of Chicago’s 623 schools. If former CTU lobbyist, Mayor Brandon Johnson, gives his buddies what they want, Douglass and the other schools would each get a librarian, librarian assistant, social worker, newcomer liaison, case manager, restorative justice coordinator, reading specialist and interventionist (elementary schools), three elective teachers (middle schools), technology coordinator, “Climate Champion,” and gender support coordinator and/or LGBTQ+ lead/specialist and option to expand LGBTQ+ faculty support teams at each school.

So that would give Douglass 31 staffers to manage the educations of 35 students.

With fewer than 10 incoming freshmen each year, it’s hard to imagine what Douglass’ newcomer liaison would do each workday or how much assisting an assistant librarian could do.

Chicago’s taxpayers can see the results when you spend over $68,000 per student. That’s a generous amount to spend on a top-notch college education, but it’s an abomination to yield teens who can’t read at grade level.

Too bad Douglass is not the only indictment of CTU’s ability to educate Chicago’s children. About three-quarters of students in CPS can’t read at grade level and even fewer can do math. The only thing rising in the district are costs, which means CTU’s getting fatter on failure.

If anything, the numbers show the more Chicago spends on public education, the worse the academic results. And CTU is demanding Chicago spend a whole lot more on public education.

For perspective, the current CTU contract added $1.5 billion in new costs. The costs that can be estimated for CTU’s new set of demands comes in at between $10.2 billion and $13.9 billion. Plus, there are likely billions more in costs for the demands without obvious price tags such as climate justice, student housing, fixing racial disparities in health care and providing new teachers with free housing.

Over $14 billion in new costs could be added in a district already projecting a nearly $400 million deficit in the upcoming school year.

CTU seems determined to make something worse from the trainwreck, but maybe in a byzantine way they are doing Chicago’s schoolchildren a favor. Drive up taxes to unaffordable levels for failing schools and parents will find a way out. Maybe then they can find a decent education and future for their children that doesn’t cost $68,000.

THE ILLINOIS POLICY INSTITUE