The Chicago Board of Education withdrew a proposal Thursday that would have allocated millions of dollars to save the conservatory model at the Chicago Arts High School, capping months of back-and-forth between board members, families and district leaders.
The resolution would have given an extra $5.5 million to the Humboldt Park school — formerly known as the Chicago High School for the Arts, or ChiArts — to preserve its unique daily schedule, in which students dedicated three hours each day to a chosen arts discipline.
Many ChiArts families and supporters of the resolution argued that the school’s new, compressed schedule stripped away what made it one of a kind, including the dozens of teaching artists central to the model.
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But critics countered that the proposal would have siphoned money away from the Chicago Public Schools’ 72 other fine and performing arts campuses. The extra funds would have come on top of the $5.7 million already set aside to transition ChiArts from an independently managed contract school to a district-run school.
Board member Michilla Blaise, who represents District 5B on the West Side, said she withdrew the resolution in part because classes have already begun. The proposal was first up for a vote in July, but was postposed twice as board members debated where the additional money might come from.
“I still 100% stand on the fact that the school does not have the necessary staff to perform in the ways they have in the past,” Blaise said, describing the school as “truly a world-class reflection of what our city has to offer.”
For months, ChiArts students, parents and alumni had pleaded with the board to intervene as the district unveiled plans to shift the model.
CPS leaders, meanwhile, said the nine-hour schedule was not sustainable. The new school day is shortened by 50 minutes, in part to comply with labor agreements, but still longer than the day at most schools nationwide, according to the district. CPS also said it created 20 teaching artist positions to serve students across the city.
In a July memo to the board, CPS CEO Macquline King wrote that “from the outset, the commitment was bound by feasibility.”
District-run arts schools receive an average of $53,000 in extra programming support, according to the memo. Granting $5.5 million to ChiArts, on top of existing transition funds, would “result in one school receiving almost 100 times more support than its counterparts,” the memo said.
CPS leaders also told the board that the previous bell schedule didn’t give students the required 60 hours of instruction per semester, averaging about an hour less instruction per week per course. The district flagged 224 students between 10th and 12th grade as needing additional credits to be on track for graduation. The school is offering online credit recover courses.
Since the transition, preliminary enrollment has dipped by about 40 students, with just under 500 students this year, according to CPS.
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The district has already incurred significant costs from absorbing, transitioning and closing charter and contract schools. Including ChiArts, CPS is expected to spend $18.8 million this fiscal year and last, including costs associated with closing EPIC High School and the ASPIRA network, as well as $13.1 million to absorb and transition Acero schools.