Instead of boycotts, try charter schools

Recently, Sen. James Meeks has been making headlines, encouraging inner city children to boycott their first day of school to try signing up at New Trier in protest of the huge gap in the quality of their education in comparison with their suburban peers.

However, a recent editorial by the Illinois Policy Institute points out there is already a solution right in the heart of the city: Charter schools, which have "an average graduation rate of 77 percent... compared with a citywide average of 51 percent."

These schools prove even more viable when you consider that many have a graduation rate matching or surpassing the suburban and downstate averages of 84 percent.

Charter schools give parents and students a choice in their education, putting them in a school where they can be pushed to excel.

Extending these choices to more children will allow them to get a quality education, which is shown to help break the cycle of violence and poverty.

Unfortunately, the demand for these schools is higher than their capacity, with a wait list of around 13,000 for Chicago charter schools.

What is stopping more schools from opening to meet this obvious demand?

State law, which currently caps the number of charter schools allowed in the city at 30. Lifting the cap will allow more students to have these educational opportunities, without having to resort to extreme, wasteful measures like busing inner-city children out to the suburbs.

These children and their families need educational choice the most, and they can have it now, right in their own neighborhoods, by lifting the current cap so new schools can be created.

Michelle Friedman

Des Plaines