The Chicago Public Schools hearing on Crane High School’s closure was designed to be a rote affair. A dry, drab presentation, read directly from PowerPoint slides set it up, and we were expecting to see people rant predictably for two minutes at a time before being pulled away from the microphone with a hook.

But a group of Crane teachers, parents and community boosters tried a different tactic. They were denied the opportunity to show their own presentation at the meeting. That was entirely predictable and even understandable from CPS’ perspective. However, their silent protest worked the crowd up to such an incredible frenzy that it forced CPS to let them show it — or else deal with a meeting that had totally devolved into madness.

We commend their devotion and tactics. Their measured, calm effort brought attention to their cause, and rallied the audience behind them.

However, we’re still dubious that it’ll mean anything — in part because they squandered an opportunity to present an alternative to CPS’ closure plan. You can manipulate numbers with bureaucrats all day, but at the end of it, they still have the final say on what happens.

What the Crane team has to do is present a concrete alternative, one that shows a clear path going forward for the school that will indeed change the way things are going. Crying out “save our school” over and over again without any ways to actually save it is a massive waste of everyone’s time.

They missed a key opportunity to do that on Friday night, and for all we know, it might be the last one they have. We’re hard-pressed to figure out when CPS will give them more time in the limelight, after being pantsed at Malcolm X on Friday.

We’ll see how this plays out. We do think Crane is a valuable institution for the community, and we’d like to see it stay — but only with a concrete plan for how the school can recover.

Until we see that plan and details of how it’ll be executed, we can’t get on board with saving Crane just for the sake of saving Crane. And we know CPS won’t.

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By Crane Neighbor
Posted: 01/12/2012 2:05 AM

Ben, CPS went public a little more than a month ago, late November. Not leaving months of time for preparation. Their 1st 6pm on a Friday community meeting was only the first round, the school improvement plan is being finalized by the Crane Coalition presently. What you saw Friday was a group of teachers, parents, students and community members peacefully refute CPS's claims in depth, factually by the numbers. The busloads of paid protesters sent to intimidate community residents was sickening.