Chicago Public School (CPS) system is the most understaffed in Illinois, where throughout the state the average student to staff ratio is 11 to one. In the CPS system, it is 16 to one—16 students to every one teacher, and that is just going by averages (Sepeda-Miller, 2018). As Laraviere (2019) puts it, “the 20 most adequately staffed school districts in Illinois have 100 staff members for every 500 students.” Yet in CPS, it is just 29 staff for every 500 students (Laraviere, 2019)—which means when compared to the best that Illinois has to offer, Chicago looks like the worst. That is a serious shame for a city and school system that should be recognized and hailed as the state’s top district. Instead, the reality is that there is no maximum limit on classroom size in the CPS system (Guerrero, 2019), and some classes can grow much larger than already woeful average student to teacher ratios. What all this means is that teachers are at a severe disadvantage and students at an even worse disadvantage since it is their future that is really the concern here. And students are getting short-changed. They and their families seem to know that, too, because enrollment in the district has been declining for years as an exodus—student...
In short, the CPS is in a pitiful state—underfunded, understaffed, with too few teachers, nurses, social workers, and psychologists on hand to provide the school system with the support and guidance it needs. The overall impact is that the CPS system is negatively impacting children by what amounts to a case of educational negligence. This paper will describe this negligence and show what needs to be done to fix the situation and make CPS better for students.
The problem of understaffing is first and foremost the biggest issue that CPS faces. It is caused by the issue of underfunding and a pension plan disaster plaguing the city’s public sector jobs. Teachers do not want to take up jobs not knowing what the future holds and many are already striking to show that they mean it: they want change and they want it now. As Guerrero (2019) notes, “teachers citywide are striking for a better contract that’ll provide more nurses, social workers and a cap in classroom size in CPS.” As the third largest school district in the United States, CPS teachers should be heard loud and clear, but the city’s leaders do not seem to be listening.
