CPS Black Student Success Working Group

Clients: Chicago Public Schools

Partners: Protiviti 

Challenge: While Chicago Public Schools (CPS) has made efforts to address long-standing racial inequities in education, Black students continue to suffer from historic and persistent gaps in educational opportunities and outcomes. To address these systemic inequities that have stood in the way of Black student achievement, CPS committed to co-create a Black Student Success Plan alongside key community stakeholders. A robust process was outlined for the Black Student Success Working Group to develop recommendations that included the community voice through feedback from focus groups of students, teachers, and guardians, as well as open community round tables.

CPS faced two challenges as it embarked on this process: the Office of Equity sought support to build a thoughtful approach to engaging the community, which included navigating a trust deficit with many people whose voices had been overlooked in the past. The complex process of convening community round tables needed to happen in a short timeframe so that the Black Student Success Plan recommendations could be considered for incorporation into the five-year strategic plan, which was released in 2024.

Action:  The Civic Consulting Alliance team, along with a Protiviti pro bono fellow, worked alongside volunteers with strong community ties – parents, principals, nonprofit leaders, and engaged citizens – to co-create and co-lead eight roundtable discussions that catered to specific community contexts. Recognizing the importance of lived experience, we took extra care to maintain data fidelity and sent both the raw data and synthesized data to co-leads for approval to ensure we captured the voice of the community.

Result: Together with CPS and community leaders, the community roundtables offered a respectful space that acknowledged systemic inequities, and structured intentional sessions that led to impactful recommendations to advance holistic Black student success. Input from the community roundtables was codified into a list of approximately thirty recommendations that span three categories: Student Daily Experience, Adult Capacity and Continuous Learning, and Inclusive Community Partnerships.

Ultimately, the Black Student Success Plan marks a heightened commitment and accountability to Black students and is being built by individuals and organizations who spent decades advocating to give Black students the resources and support that they deserve. The recommendations will be a core strategy in the new CPS Five-Year Strategic Plan.