Rev. Sen. James Meeks is the announced speaker for the June 1 lunch presentation at the City Club of Chicago.  Details to follow.
City Club of Chicago

Discussions on school choice in Illinois are currently focused on the Rev. Sen. James Meeks’ school voucher bill and the use of public funds to pay for children from failing schools to be educated in private schools. But the debate – and proposals from legislators – shouldn’t stop there. School choice isn’t just about vouchers and failing schools, it’s about making a wide range of educational options available to parents.

In addition to the restricted vouchers proposed by Sen. Meeks, other vouchers could target the needs of special education students. A …

From Illinois State House NewsA new school voucher program proposed by Democratic state Sen. James Meeks of Chicago has cleared its first test, but murky waters loom ahead.
His voucher proposal would allow parents of students in the academically lowest 10 percent of Chicago Public Schools to have the option of sending their children to a private school, if space is available.
Meeks, formerly a strong advocate for improving Illinois’s public schools, said his plan comes as a result of violence and increasingly poor test scores in CPS schools.
“Right now, our General …

‘The voucher movement seems to have been born, or seems to have been started as a Republican idea. That’s the way Democrats look at it. That’s the way black lawmakers look at it. This is a Republican idea. This is what the Republicans want to push on us. . . . We don’t seem to see public schools not working in your area.”

The speaker was the Rev. James Meeks, explaining black resistance to vouchers. The venue was a sold-out lunch put on by the Illinois Policy Institute (IPI). The result? Something …

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