The 'Chicago Model'

Coffee and...

Two articles in this morning's Sun-Times caught my cynical eye. The first was about a speech our fearless leader, Mayor Daley gave yesterday at Juarez High School, to salute the latest Chicago class of 328 National Board Certified teachers--highest among the large, urban districts. The district now has about 1,200 of these "master teachers." This good news comes however, amid more exaggerated Arne Duncan myth-making and about the "Chicago miracle" and Chicago's school reform being the "model" for the rest of the nation. In a moment of startling candor, hizzoner said:

"If we're leading the way, God help the rest of the country. I feel sorry for them. You wonder what has happened to public education in the rest of those cities."

The second S-T article shifts the spotlight away from the district's great teaching corps and onto the school bureaucracy. It's about, of all things, cappuccino makers.

Chicago public school bureaucrats skirted competitive bidding rules to buy 30 cappuccino/espresso machines for $67,000, with most of the machines going unused because the schools they were ordered for had not asked for them, according to a report by the CPS Office of Inspector General.