This article was originally published in Chalkbeat.
Mayor Brandon Johnson on Monday selected 10 of 11 people to complete the city’s new half-elected, half-appointed school board — including some who ran unsuccessfully in Chicago’s first school board elections in November.
The new board will be sworn in on January 15, 2025 and will consist of 10 people who won in November. State law required the mayor to choose the remaining 11 people, including a board chairman, on Monday.
The shift to an elected school board in Chicago has been in the making for years. The process laid out in state law is complicated. Although there were ten school board races in November, each district was split into two subdistricts. State law limited who Johnson could choose – allowing him to choose only people who did not live in the same subdistrict as the winners of the election.
Chicago’s first school board race brings with it a mixed bag of ideologies
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Johnson announced the school board appointees late Monday, just hours before the deadline.
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Sean Harden, a South Side native and former CPS employee, will chair the Board of Education and represent the city as a whole.
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Ed Bannon, who ran for alderman in 2023 and served on the Dever Elementary School Local School Council, will represent District 1a alongside Jennifer Custer in 1b.
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Debby Pope, a current appointed school board member and former CTU employee and retired teacher who has filed campaign finance paperwork and considered running for an elected seat on the school board, will represent District 2b alongside Ebony DeBerry in 2a.
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Norma Rios-Sierra, an artist who also works as cultural events manager for nonprofit Palenque LSNA, will likely represent District 3a alongside Carlos Rivas Jr. in 3b.
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Karen Zaccor, a retired teacher and active CTU member who finished second in a six-way race in the November election, will represent District 4a alongside winning candidate Ellen Rosenfeld in 4b.
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Michilla Blaise, a current school board member who withdrew as a candidate a month before Election Day, will represent District 5b alongside Jitu Brown in 5a.
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Anusha Thotakura, a former teacher who also lost her bid in November, will represent District 6a alongside Jessica Biggs in 6b.
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Emma Lozano, Pilsen pastor and advocate for bilingual education and immigrant rights. It is not clear which district Lozano lives in, but it would probably be district 7b or 8b, next to Yesenia Lopez in 7a or Angel Gutierrez in 8a.
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Frank Niles Thomas, a current board member who was appointed last month, will represent District 9a alongside Therese Boyle in 9b.
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Olga Bautista, a current board member who was appointed last month, will likely represent District 10b alongside Che “Rhymefest” Smith in 10a.
It was not immediately clear why the mayor announced only 10 of the 11 choices before the deadline. State law does not spell out the consequences of partially missing the deadline.
Johnson’s picks will form a majority of the board, giving him significant influence over a governing body that has been controlled exclusively by Chicago’s mayor for the past three decades.
The mayor’s appointees included most of the current school board members, as well as losing school board candidates backed by the Chicago Teachers Union, a close ally of the mayor.
Johnson’s office released the names after the mayor struggled to reach an agreement with councilors on his second city budget. Late Monday, after multiple amendments were introduced and Johnson completely rejected his proposed property tax increase, the City Council approved a $17.1 billion city budget by a vote of 27-23.
After that budget vote, when he called for more state revenue, Johnson told reporters he was looking for school board members “who understand the urgency of this moment, people who know they have to organize and work collectively to to fight for progressive revenue in the state.”
“But the big attribute that I’m proud of and that people showed was real care for the families doing the work,” Johnson said, adding that he also looked for people who weren’t “dismissive” of teachers.
The mayor’s influence on the school board can extend beyond his own choices. Four of the election winners were supported by the union, which is ideologically aligned with the mayor. That means 15 of the 21 members could often vote in line with his policy preferences, such as avoiding school closures and sending more money to neighborhood schools.
It could also mean that the board could vote to borrow money to cover pension obligations and union costs, as Johnson urged CPS to do in the spring and summer, which could lead to the resignation of the entire previous management.
Before taking office, school board members must complete a state-mandated training course. Last week, newly elected board members were notified by the school district’s administrative office that the training scheduled for this week would be postponed, at the request of the current board. Carlos Rivas, who was elected to represent District 3 on the West Side, said that in light of the district’s cancellation, the National Louis University Academy for Local Leadership is now conducting training this week. Rivas was part of an inaugural fellowship with ALL Chicago this spring.
“In the end, the most important thing is that we are prepared to govern on day one,” Rivas said.
Rivas said the school district’s board office still plans to hold five days of sessions with new board members from Jan. 6 to 10.
This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site about educational changes in public schools. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters.
