Chicago school councils bridging language gap

MEDILL NEWS SERVICE

Local school councils are busy formulating plans for April's elections, and like any successful campaign team, they're working to attract people from all backgrounds.

The deadline for submitting each council's publicity plan to area offices is Friday. And an increasing number of council representatives and organizations, along with Chicago Public Schools, have been getting the word out to parents who don't speak English.

Jose Alvarez, CPS officer of School and Community Relations, said it's important to provide information in other languages so future representatives will know what they're getting into.

"People get involved without knowing what the council means, their roles and responsibilities," Alvarez said.

Each school's council consists of teachers, parents, community members and students. Together, they select the principal, renew the principal's contract, create a plan for academic achievement and develop a budget for the school year.

CPS is running a marketing campaign for this year's elections, which includes Spanish television and community newspaper coverage. They also have candidate nomination forms and translators available for seven languages, including Arabic, Polish and Urdu.

"We come to their rescue when they don't have materials and tools," said Valencia Rias, a senior director of the Design for Change organization that partners with CPS to provide bilingual training for council representatives.

Rias said the parents are also doing a lot of recruiting themselves. They're bringing in different backgrounds, but also different concerns, like those of special-needs children.

Amelia Morales, clerk assistant at Ortiz de Dominguez School in Little Village, said the parent feedback has been positive.

"It's been a very good experience," Morales said. "They're accommodating to parents, so they don't have any problems."

CPS has received a lot of requests for Spanish, Polish and Chinese forms. After the March 12 deadline for nomination forms, officials and translators will tally the number of forms in each language, Alvarez said.

"My goal is to make sure we have contested elections, not just the bare minimum," Alvarez said.