After bumpy year, CPS hires new network chiefs from within

Following a particularly tumultuous year, with about a month to go before classes start, Chicago Public Schools rearranged a number of administrators, promoting several high-performing principals into well-paid district leadership roles.

In a letter sent to schools on Wednesday, CPS also announced the retirement of longtime employee Annette Gurley, who will depart as head of the Teaching and Learning department after nearly 40 years of service to the city's schools.

The cash-strapped district did not, however, consolidate any of the 17 midlevel network offices that directly oversee clusters of schools, and it does not immediately plan to do so, Chief Education Officer Janice Jackson told the Chicago Sun-Times on Wednesday. That's despite a program that has in the past year freed more than 50 principals from network control.

Jackson said she would consider reducing bureaucracy in the future, but meanwhile she defended the network structure because of its relative stability in recent years despite turnover at the top.

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