Rainbow PUSH tours U-46 schools

Local members of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition spent much of Monday eyeing socioeconomic disparities between Elgin Area School District U-46 schools.

Traveling by school bus, seven of the Elgin-based Northwest Suburban Chapter's board members, accompanied by U-46 officials, toured Coleman and Otter Creek elementary schools, Larsen and Kenyon Woods middle schools and Larkin and South Elgin high schools.

Coalition members requested at an Aug. 4 school board meeting that they be allowed to tour a number of schools, some of which have predominately white, middle-class student populations, and others that are more ethnically and economically diverse.

At the top of the group's list of concerns is the number of mobile classrooms being used in schools with high minority populations.

"We've had community members come to us who went to school in U-46 mobiles, and now their children and grandchildren are going through the same thing. Just how long is temporary?" chapter Vice President Lenora Scruggs asked.

Of the schools toured Monday, Otter Creek Elementary, Kenyon Woods Middle School and South Elgin High School are predominately white. None have mobile classrooms for the school year that begins Wednesday.

Coleman Elementary, Larsen Middle School and Larkin High School all have minority student populations greater than 50 percent; Coleman and Larkin each have at least two mobile units this school year.

"When they have a school that is under capacity, why are we not giving the parents the choice their kids could be bused to a less crowded school?" said the Rev. Walter Blalark, head of the local Rainbow PUSH group.

Crowding in schools with minority populations is a pillar of the class-action racial discrimination lawsuit pending against the district. Twenty-two of 53 U-46 schools will have mobile classrooms this school year. Of those 22, 19 of them have minority populations of 50 percent or more.

U-46 officials base their decisions on which schools get mobile classrooms on enrollment projections, district spokesman Tony Sanders said.

This fall, the district will begin a capital planning and facilities study, the first for the district since 1998.

Projected to be completed by spring, the study aims to find a way to eliminate the use of mobile classrooms and may lead to an analysis of the district's boundary system, U-46 lawyer Pat Broncato told the group.

Among the coalition's other concerns are the percentage of minority students attending the district's gifted programs and academies, and access to early childhood education programs. Blalark said the group plans to continue its dialogue with U-46 officials and hopes to have some of its members join the district's Citizens Advisory Committee this fall.

"A large portion of the U-46 is underrepresented," he said.