Kelly Students Support Progressive Immigration Legislation

As part of Chicago Youth Service Day on Saturday, April 30, 2011, more than 100 Kelly High School students traveled to St. Nicholas Church on Chicago's southwest side to join immigrants, community leaders, and elected officials to raise their voice for progressive immigration legislation.

Kelly students have long been interested in the DREAM Act and have fought for passage of the act which would enable thousands of children of immigrants to access loans and scholarships to attend colleges and universities. Currently, children of undocumented immigrants are not able to attend college because of funding being denied.

A second piece of proposed legislation, the Smart Enforcement Act, would enable local governments to choose whether they want to cooperate with a federal enforcement program that targets hardened criminals but also has led to the deportation of undocument immigrants arrested for misdemeanor crimes.

Immigrant advocacy groups say they hope Illinois can begin to reverse the trend of pro-enforcement state measures that have been sweeping across the country.

By participating in the rally, Kelly students learned about first amendment rights to assemble and petition the government. They also learned to raise their voice for causes the believe in.

According to Service-Learning Coordinator Raul Magdaleno, Kelly students brought energy and spirit to the gathering on Saturday. The rally was sponsored in part by the Illinois Caucus for Immigrant and Refugee Rights.

A Thousand Youth Join Chicago Youth Service Day

A thousand CPS middle school and high school students participated in the second annual Chicago Youth Service Day on Saturday, April 30, 2011. Students worked with senior citizens, restored natural areas in parks, wetlands, and forest preserves, served in homeless shelters, built community gardens, and advocated for immigration reform and passage of the DREAM Act throughout the city.

At the Linne Woods natural site north of Chicago, Lincoln Park High School students removed invasive growth and built natural erosion control mechanisms using downed invased treee species. Students also enjoyed the burn pile where they cast the remaining invasive plants which will make room for natural plant species.

At the Ruth Shriman Senior Apartments complex in Uptown, students from Von Steuben High School served breakfast, socialized, and played games with residents seniors.

Three groups of Amundsen High School students traveled to Pilsen to help with the annual Dia de los Ninos celebration and parade, to Foster Avenue Beach to continue work on their adopt-a-beach site, and to the Just Harvest organization to assist with the food pantry, while 100 Kelly High School students participated in a rally to advocate for immigration reform at St. Nicholas Church.

Curie High School students teamed up with students from Gary Elementary to develop a mural about the enrivonment while Dyett and Fenger students partnered to assist at the Roseland Boys and Girls Club. Middle School students at Jackson Language Academy created a memorial garden to honor a teacher who recently passed away.

Countless partner organizations including BuildOn, Chicago Cares, Friends of the Parks, Alliance of Great Lakes, Public Allies and the Forest Preserve District of Cook County provided opportunities for students to be involved in service throughout the day.

All participating students traveled in the afternoon to McCormick Place for a spectacular Civic Action Rally highlighted by community partner tables, 15 activity stations including hip hop dancing, art, spoken word, and theatre, and a rally featuring the outstanding and amazing dance performance by FootWorkingz and spoken word performance by the Half Pint Poetics of Kuumba Lynx.

As emcee Steve Mayberry noted: Now don't let today be the end of your journey. Let it be the beginning. Let generations to come look back on this day and say something bold and proud and beautiful was let loose on the City of Chicago on that day, April 30, 2011, and the city was never the same again.

Vaughn Students Support The Night Ministry

This year freshmen at Vaughn Occupational High School participated in our yearly fundraising activity for the Night Ministry. The Night Ministry (www.thenightministry.org) aids homeless youth and adults and provides basic supplies along with free healthcare, housing, and supportive services.

Throughout November and December the freshmen participated in activities in their courses to learn more about homelessness and the impact it has on their communities. Also in November the students sold healthy snacks in their lunch periods to raise money. Although the snacks only ranged in price from $0.25 to $0.50 they were able to raise $180.00 in just three weeks! Just before winter break all of the freshmen came together to create and stuff stockings with basic supplies for Night Ministry’s annual winter holiday party.

This service learning project had obvious benefits, such as having the students learn more about homelessness and helping those serviced by Night Ministry, but it also had other less obvious benefits. The first was introducing our freshmen to service-learning. At the beginning of the year many of our freshmen students were unsure of what volunteering or service-learning meant. While we worked on this project we also discussed the importance and benefits of volunteering. If you speak with our freshmen now, they all are excited about doing more projects and volunteering outside of school in their communities.

Through this project the students also got to learn and/or practice some important job skills such as selling items, making change, sorting items, and sewing (which they all protested they couldn’t do before our project). We will continue to support Night Ministry in the coming years and if you would like to get more information about how we run our project please contact Sara Manseau or Catalina Fernandez at Vaughn.

300 CPS Students Celebrate Cesar Chavez

On Saturday, March 26, 300 CPS high school students celebrated the work and legacy of Cesar E. Chavez, the farm worker organizer, in the Pilsen community. Students participated in a series of morning workshops in which they created various works of art including drums, poetry, street theatre, banners, and posters. They then took to the streets for a commemorative march through the streets of Pilsen. The march honored the work of Chavez and fellow workers and organizers as they sought to bring justice to field laborers. For the sixth consecutive year, students have participated in service projects throughout the month of March. The projects address those issues important to Chavez: environmental justice, immigration, worker's rights, food and nutrition, and community development. In all, 70 groups of students served throughout the city of Chicago. At the culminating event hosted by Juarez Community Academy on March 26, students had the opportunity to meet and hear from Marcos Munoz, a fellow organizer of Chavez who helped to promote the successful grape boycott. As students took to the streets for the march under glistening blue skies, community members honked their approval as student chanted for unity, justice, and solidarity. It was an excellent opportunity to practice first amendment rights granted by the U.S. Constitution.

Vaughn Freshmen are Saving the World, One CFL at a Time

Freshmen at Vaughn Occupational High School have been participating in a brand new service- learning project called Lights for Learning. Lights for Learning is a project sponsored by the Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity, the Midwest Energy Efficiency Alliance, and APT. This program provides schools and organizations the opportunity to earn funds by selling Compact Fluorescent Light bulbs (CFLs) and other energy efficient items. 80% of the sales go back to the school. Since Vaughn is a zero waste grant school, Lights for Learning fits in perfectly with our current school culture. The freshmen have learned more about saving energy and CFL light bulbs in their classes. They also participated in a Lights for Learning assembly and got to learn more about the differences between CFL and traditional light bulbs by riding an energy bike. After learning more about saving energy, they then created informational handouts and posters advertising the sale. Our first sale was during Vaughn’s annual Fall Festival. Although the students had only been in school for a few weeks, over fifteen freshmen came to the Fall Festival to pass out their energy saving tips and to sell light bulbs. Parents, teachers, and visitors alike were impressed with their confidence in the process. From that event alone we raised $142.00. Our next event was at our third quarter parent teacher conferences. We are also creating videos about saving energy to enter in the Lights for Learning “How Do You Shine Like an Energy Star?” contest. At the end of the year the freshmen will be working together as a class to decide what type of energy saving items they would like to buy with the profits and donate to Vaughn to make our school more energy efficient. This project has taught our students more about saving energy, reinforced important work skills, and will help us as a school become more energy efficient. If you would like to know more about this program or would like to order light bulbs from Vaughn, contact Sara Manseau.

Register Now for 11th Annual Service-Learning Conference

Social Justice: Context, Critical Thinking, Civic Action. The theme for the 11th Annual CPS Service-Learning Conference will highlight the amazing work teachers and students are doing throughout the city and world to understand and respond to issues of social inequity. On Friday, April 1, 2011, more than 200 teachers and students are expected to participate in the conference at Malcolm X College. Register now at https://www.

Service-learning has grown as a pedagogical strategy in CPS during the past years. During the 2009-10 academic year, more than 900 teachers used service-learning in their classrooms. We expect even more teachers to engage their students in service-learning projects in the coming year as the District moves from hours to projects as a new graduation requirement. The conference is an excellent opportunity for teachers to learn more about authentic, teacher-tested service-learning strategies that work.

Raby and Curie Students Discover Peace Circles During Chavez Month

As more than 65 student groups participate in Cesar Chavez Month of Service activities, students from Curie and Al Raby High Schools spent full days receiving training in peace circles methodology. Hosted by the Chicago Youth Justice Institute, the peace circle training provides participants with insights in how to facilitate peace circles in their own schools

Originally a restorative justice concept, the peace circles are now widely recognized as an effective social/emotional learning strategy that helps students identify and give voice to issues they are facing at home, community, and school. Using a talking piece that travels around the circle, students begin by constructing a safe environment for discussion. They then explore topics that engage participants in reflection. The focus is not on debate and argumentation, but simply to enable young people to express their feelings in an open and honest environment where respect, integrity and caring are foundational values.

In the spirit of Cesar E. Chavez, peace circles represent a strategy of non-violence by enabling students to get to know each other and thereby break down isolation, preconceived notions, and ignorance of each other. One student said: "I have been in class all year with you and barely noticed you. Today I got to know you. I'll see you in such a different way from now on."

Following their training, the students are challenged to return to their schools and develop a strategy to implement peace circle strategies at their schools to complete their service-learning projects.

More than 300 studens will come together on March 26 at Benito Juarez Community for the annual Day of Reflection. Students will create banners, murals, street theatre skits, songs and chants, and then join together for a Chavez Commemorative March through the streets of Pilsen.