Vol. 72/No. 37      September 22, 2008

In the weeks leading up to the boycott state and city officials denounced the planned protest and pressured organizers to call it off, arguing that the boycott would cause students to miss a day’s education and cost Chicago schools more than $100,000 in state education funds.

But boycott organizers and others responded as did Mara Munoz who told the Militant, “If this protest doesn’t do anything else it will educate our people and other people as well on the reality of inequality in the schools. It’s important that we stand up and fight for equal education.”

According to the Education Trust, in 2005 the average gap nationwide between “high-income” school districts and “low-income” ones was $938. In Illinois the gap was $2,235. Only New York had a larger gap that year.

“Illinois is the seventh wealthiest state in the country in terms of income,” Meeks told the press at a news conference outside New Trier High School, “yet it is 49th in terms of state funding of public schools.”

Nadell Jackson, 13, a student on Chicago’s South Side who joined the protest, told reporters that because there are not enough books to go around, he often has to share books and can’t take them home to study.

De’Erica Munoz, 17, already commutes two hours each way to a school on Chicago’s North Side from her South Side neighborhood because the schools are supposed to be better. Even there, she said, “We need more computers; the auditorium has broken seats.”

“This looks like a college campus,” she said looking at the New Trier school. “We should have the same opportunities as suburban kids.”

At one of several news conferences held throughout the day, organizers of the boycott announced plans to enlist other school districts to join the Urban League’s civil rights suit against the state government and board of education for unequal funding of state schools.
 
 
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