Ghosts in the Schoolyard : : Racism and School Closings on Chicago's South Side

Locations
Call Number: 370.89 Ew, Black Studies 370.89 Ew
On Shelf At: Downtown Library

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	370.89 Ew	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	Black Studies 370.89 Ew	4-week checkout	On Shelf

What a school means -- City of losses -- Dueling realities -- Mourning -- Conclusion: an open door.
"Failing schools. Underprivileged schools. Just plain bad schools." That's how Eve L. Ewing opens Ghosts in the Schoolyard: describing Chicago Public Schools from the outside. The way politicians and pundits and parents of kids who attend other schools talk about them, with a mix of pity and contempt. But Ewing knows Chicago Public Schools from the inside: as a student, then a teacher, and now a scholar who studies them. And that perspective has shown her that public schools are not buildings full of failures--they're an integral part of their neighborhoods, at the heart of their communities, storehouses of history and memory that bring people together. Never was that role more apparent than in 2013 when Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced an unprecedented wave of school closings. Pitched simultaneously as a solution to a budget problem, a response to declining enrollments, and a chance to purge bad schools that were dragging down the whole system, the plan was met with a roar of protest from parents, students, and teachers. But if these schools were so bad, why did people care so much about keeping them open, to the point that some would even go on a hunger strike? Ewing's answer begins with a story of systemic racism, inequality, bad faith, and distrust that stretches deep into Chicago history. Rooting her exploration in the historic African American neighborhood of Bronzeville, Ewing reveals that this issue is about much more than just schools. Black communities see the closing of their schools--schools that are certainly less than perfect but that are theirs--as one more in a long line of racist policies. The fight to keep them open is yet another front in the ongoing struggle of black people in America to build successful lives and achieve true self-determination.

COMMUNITY REVIEWS

Should be required for educators submitted by flynna on July 28, 2020, 5:22pm I am a huge fan of Eve Ewing's poetry and found much of the same attention and care in this non-fiction book. I particularly loved the way she explained her research methods, and the way she did not attempt to claim objectivity but rather demonstrated why her personal investment in Chicago's public schools is what drove this work. I think most solutions come from their own communities and this book is a great example of that.