Eloquent testimony from Karen Zaccor on Noble Street.

Alderman Joe Moore, the Mayor’s water-carrier, stands alone among elected officials in not opposing Noble Street Charters.

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– From Tim Furman’s blog.

This is Karen Zaccor’s testimony at the recent almost-under-the-radar hearing for the Noble Street insertion into Buena Park.

Testimony in opposition to the relocation of a Noble St. high school to the 46th Ward

Children learn what they live. At my school, Uplift, like many neighborhood high school, our children learn that they are important whether they are the most successful student or the least, whether they are the best behaved student or the worst. In our schools we strive to educate every single child to the best of our ability. In our schools, we understand that too many students are struggling with devastating life challenges and act out at times when they are overwhelmed by events like a sibling being shot or the toll of being homeless, and we look for ways to support those students despite the loss of resources that could help with that.

In our schools, we strive to give our students a voice in what happens in school. We want them to be active participants in our democratic society so we want them to practice what that means in school. We want them to learn that they should always stand up against oppression wherever they see it. We teach them not to just accept what they are told, but to investigate and demand evidence, knowing that the path of unquestioning obedience to authority has led to all manner of evils throughout history in our country and elsewhere.

Children learn what they live. At Noble Street charter schools, children learn that they are not all important, that they only matter if they are going to contribute to better statistics for the school, that if they are not successful or not well behaved, they should find another school. They learn that it does not matter if they are dealing with traumas so extreme they would weigh adults down—that will not be accepted as an excuse for a less than perfect performance. A full one-third of its students leave because they can’t or won’t stay in a place where they don’t matter.

At Noble Street charter schools, children learn that it is unacceptable to question authority, no matter how repressive and unjust that authority becomes. A draconian system of discipline makes even the smallest “offense” punishable by a demerit. Demerits quickly add up to detentions—get too many detentions or fail to serve one and students can end up in summer school or failing regardless of success in the classroom. They learn that obedience is more important that scholarship, and that action will be taken against them if they stand up to this unjust system.

Michael Milkie, the CEO of Noble Street, proudly touts the “broken windows” theory as the basis for Noble’s discipline system. The broken windows theory is a theory that promotes fighting crime through criminalizing petty offenses and cracking down on them. So despite the fact that many of us have in our youth done things like break windows or jump turnstiles (or perhaps worse), those actions that were once accepted as natural parts of growing up are now considered signs of criminal tendency and treated accordingly. Young people—virtually exclusively low income inner city youth of color—become part of the criminal justice system through these minor events. At Noble Street, thyey are proud to say that behaviors that we all exhibit every day are criminalized—failing to have one’s shirt tucked in, not looking at the person who is speaking, resting one’s head on one’s hand for a moment in class, talking at lunch. Students are not allowed to question this system: if they disagree with it, they are encouraged to leave.

Now Noble Street want CPS’ blessing to expand its authoritarian empire. Despite the fact that CPS itself is promoting expanded use of restorative justice methods, rather than invest in making those methods work in our existing high schools, CPS instead is poised to invest in the Noble Street network which does just the opposite, promoting instead the widening of the school to prison pipeline.

It is a false argument to say CPS is just offering “choice.” It’s only choice when parents and students have full information. Clearly they do not when the Noble Street network, CPS, the media, and the mayor all promote only the positive elements of the school and completely ignore the number of students pushed out or the problems inherent in a punitive system of enforcing compliance. Let’s be honest: all of our schools would look great if we only had to educate the top students and those who never break any rules.

Mayor Emanuel says Noble Street has the “special sauce.” Apparently the special sauce is the suppression of any challenge to a repressive punishment system that flies in the face of recent actions across the country against this type of discipline in schools and the elimination of any student who struggles to meet the challenges of school.

CPS, you need to use our public tax dollars to support our neighborhood schools, who educate every child, not just the best and the brightest. You need to invest your limited resources in full development of restorative justice programs that keep students in school and teach them better ways to resolve actual conflict. You need to invest in wrap around services to help students who are dealing with the traumas so often inflicted on poor children of color in our city.
Say NO to Noble.

Submitted by Karen Zaccor
Teacher, Uplift Community High School
Resident of the Uptown Community