LA CASITA! The endangered field house at Whittier Elementary is cleaned up, but its future remains murky
Trying to create a bright future for “La Casita,” parents are doing more than simply continuing their occupation of the one-story field house on the grounds of Whittier Elementary School, located in the 1900 block of W. 23rd St. in the heart of Chicago's Pilsen community. On Tuesday, July 5, 2011, they held a clean-up day, as they prepared for media visits Wednesday.
By July 5, 2011, the library inside La Casita had more than 4,000 donated books and other materials for the children. Parents at Whittier Elementary School have collected more than 4,000 books for a school library, and identified funding to complete renovations of the space.. Now all they need is permission from the Board of Education to implement their award-winning plans.
This temporary space in the La Casita field house at Whittier Elementary School holds a small fraction of the books that have been donated to the parent-run library. Whittier is one about 160 Chicago Public Schools that lack a formal library staffed by paid librarian. Substance photo by David R. StoneA variety of media have been covering the Whittier parents’ fight to get approval from the Board of Education to turn the old field house into a school library and community center for their children. CAN-TV (the cable channel that videotapes Board of Education meetings) may send a camera crew Wednesday to Whittier, the only dual-language Chicago Public School in the Hispanic neighborhood of Pilsen.
The parents are also planning a day-long picnic and rally on Saturday, July 9, beginning at 10 a.m., at Whittier school, 1900 W. 23rd Street (just east of Damen Ave.). They plan to have food, music, games and speakers to attract neighbors and friends. The parents hope a crowd fills the play lot around the school field house they call “La Casita” (Spanish for “The Little House”).
The parents also plan to continue their round-the-clock occupation of La Casita, which is now in its second week. An earlier occupation last fall lasted 43 days. It ended after the parents identified sources of funds for renovating La Casita, and the Board of Education agreed not to demolish the structure, but to lease it for $1 a year for use as a community center.
The current occupation of La Casita began when parents learned that the Board of Education had renewed a permit to demolish the field house, and also was beginning work to create a library inside the school building in a classroom used by special education students. The parents have already taken steps to create a library inside La Casita, and argue that none of the funds for renovation should be spent on a library inside the school building.
After Tuesday’s cleanup day, a large room in La Casita is filled with donated books, neatly arranged on bookshelves by grade level, with furniture spaced to create separate reading areas. Many boxes of books have not yet been unpacked, and await creation of a larger library. The parents say they have collected more than 4,000 books for the library.
An architecture and design firm has donated its services to create a plan to turn La Casita into a flexible, multi-use space that will not only house the library, but can also be used for after-school tutoring, community meetings and a summer day camp. The plan won a “green” design award and is said to be the first “environmentally friendly” building in the heavily polluted Pilsen neighborhood.
Even before the renovation, La Casita has been used for after school tutoring, according to Lisa Angonese, a Whittier parent who has testified in favor of the La Casita renovation at the monthly Board of Education meetings. She said Whittier mothers volunteered their time to tutor an average of about 15 students a day.
In the parents’ plan for after the renovation, teachers would bring their classes to La Casita to use the school library during school hours. They expect it would be staffed by a full-time librarian hired by the Board. At the end of the school day, volunteers could take over, keeping the library open and maintaining tutoring programs to provide students with a safe space until evening, Angonese said.
The Board of Education has said that, due to the parents’ protest, it has cancelled its summer project to create a library inside the school. Yet by no means has the Board agreed to place the school library in La Casita. In his latest letter to the parents (dated June 29, 2011), the Board of Education’s new Chief Executive Officer, Jean-Claude Brizard, says the library and the renovation of La Casita are “separate projects.” His letter argues that a library inside the school will NOT displace special education students.
The parents welcome the announcement that the Board of Education has halted, at least for now, its work on a library inside the school. Yet, just in case, they are working in shifts to maintain a presence at the site. They are ready to call people to set up picket lines to block the entrances quickly if construction workers arrive.
And they hope that continued media attention to their occupation of La Casita will encourage Brizard and others at the Board of Education to sit with them to finish negotiations that could get them the new library that want, where they want it – in a renovated La Casita.
By: Kathy Jacobs
If This Is Such a Challenge...!
According to Brizard the Special Education students are not going to be displaced. Since the library is going to be put in the room where Special Education students meet, I guess two entities CAN occupy the same space at the same time.
What's the big deal with saying where the children are going to be housed? Are they going to sit among the books? Are they going to meet in the lunchroom? Will they meet in the basement? Will they meet in the hall?
What happened to the desire to establish great relationships with parents? Could it be there is no plan? Could it be that the Board is making it up as they go along?
Raise your hand if you smell a transfer of the Special Ed kids to other schools?