This story was published in partnership with Chalkbeat Chicago.
Hundreds of Chicago Public Schools students at predominantly Black and Latino high schools were forced to participate in what is supposed to be a “voluntary” military-run training program, according to a new report released Wednesday detailing an investigation by the district’s watchdog.
The practice of automatically enrolling students in JROTC, or the Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, has drawn scrutiny for steering teens from under-resourced schools toward military careers and away from other educational or job opportunities.
The probe by CPS’s Office of Inspector General was prompted by a Chalkbeat investigation that found that over the past two years, nearly all freshmen at 10 CPS high schools were automatically enrolled in JROTC, a daily class led by military instructors covering military science, leadership development and citizenship. JROTC students are required to dress in military uniforms weekly, march in drills and adhere to the program’s grooming standards, the OIG stated.
Automatic enrollment has continued this year at five high schools that are majority-Black or Latino, CPS data show.
CPS did not dispute the OIG’s findings and said it would enact a number of changes to stop the practice, such as requiring written parental consent for JROTC participants.
The OIG found that all or nearly all freshmen at some South and West Side high schools were enrolled “without any choice in the matter” and often placed in JROTC “in lieu of” physical education. By contrast, larger North Side high schools, where more students are white, had significantly lower percentages of freshmen enrolled in JROTC.
The OIG’s investigation also found:
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One school overenrolled students with disabilities in JROTC. At the school, 68% of participants were students with disabilities.
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One student who is a practicing Jehovah’s Witness was unable to opt out of the program even after she and her mother raised religious objections.
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Military instructors destroyed parental consent forms, in some cases out of “COVID-19 safety concerns.”
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CPS paid military instructors using a different, higher pay scale than the district’s unionized teachers.
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JROTC enrollment at six high schools was below the threshold required by law to maintain the programs.
The evidence of automatic enrollment raises questions about how CPS came to have what it says is the country’s largest JROTC operation, with nearly 10,000 students at one point, making the program a point of pride for city politicians from former Mayor M. Daley to current Mayor Lori Lightfoot.
“Chicago has for so long been this poster child of military schools,” said Seth Kershner, a researcher at the University of Massachusetts Amherst who studies the military’s role in public education. “So much of these numbers and success story in Chicago is based on compulsion, coercion.”
“This is a landmark case”
The OIG’s nearly yearlong probe reviewed JROTC enrollment procedures over the past five years at the 37 CPS high schools with JROTC programs, not including the district’s six military academies, where JROTC participation is mandatory.
The OIG identified four high schools that enrolled 100% of freshmen in Army JROTC programs in each of the past two years, starting with the 2019-20 school year. It found another four high schools enrolled more than 90% of freshmen in Army JROTC programs over the same span.
The OIG did not publish the names of schools or those it interviewed, which included students, parents, principals, military instructors and district JROTC leadership. According to Chalkbeat’s reporting, automatic enrollment has occurred at seven small and predominantly Black high schools — Bowen, Fenger, Harlan, Julian, King, Manley and Michele Clark — along with Kelvyn Park, Gage Park and Spry Community Links, three schools where the majority of students are Latino.
In response…
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