This November, Chicago will elect all 21 members of its Board of Education for the first time in the city’s history. A hybrid board, half elected and half appointed, has served since 2025. This year, every seat is on the ballot.
The stakes are hard to overstate. The Chicago Board of Education (CBOE) approves an annual budget of roughly $10 billion; levies approximately half of all property taxes in Chicago; approves every district policy, labor contract, and charter renewal; and hires and evaluates the CPS Superintendent/CEO. Its decisions reach 316,000 students and 46,000 employees.
What will not change after November is the job itself. The Board governs the district. The Superintendent and staff manage it day-to-day. That distinction sounds simple, but in practice, it is one of the hardest lines a board has to hold.
The Six Principles
Earlier this fall, The Fund joined Kids First Chicago (K1C) and the Chicago Education Alliance (CEA) in releasing six principles of good governance for Chicago’s Board of Education. More than 20 organizations across the city have signed on in support, and the list continues to grow.
The principles hold that good governance means a board that governs rather than manages, by:
- Centering every decision on student learning and well-being in all of Chicago’s school environments, especially for students furthest from opportunity
- Respecting local school community decision-making and authentic parent and stakeholder voice
- Demanding accessible data, accountability, and results for students
- Using research and evidence, quantitative and qualitative, to guide policy decisions
- Ensuring the district’s long-term financial sustainability
- Operating with integrity and transparency
These principles advocate for a set of standards for how board decisions should be made and communicated. While they are not a scorecard and do not endorse any candidate, they do inform voters on what questions to ask candidates and lay the groundwork for holding members accountable once elected.
The Series
Over the past several weeks, Fund CEO Heather Anichini walked through each principle on LinkedIn, pairing each with the tools the Board already has and the questions voters can ask of those seeking to use them.
Start here: Six Principles of Good Governance: an overview, introducing the principles and the OpEd Heather co-authored in Board Rule with Daniel Anello of K1C and Arnie Rivera of CEA.
Then, principle by principle:
- Student learning and well-being: Good governance starts with student learning. A strategic plan promising rigor, joy, and equity only matters if it shapes what the Board spends its time on.
- Local decision-making and authentic voice: Good governance depends on respect for local decisions. More than 500 Local School Councils select and evaluate principals, approve budgets, and approve improvement plans. Voters deserve to know whether candidates intend to protect that authority.
- Accessible data, accountability, and results: Good governance depends on accessible, accurate data. Chronic absenteeism is the clearest test case, and other cities and states have shown what a regular cadence of data reviews can achieve.
- Research and evidence in policy decisions: Good governance depends on evidence. CPS already requires evidence for edtech purchases. What is missing is consistency and policy.
- Long-term financial sustainability: Good governance includes financial sustainability. Fewer than 1 in 5 Chicagoans believe the Board is a responsible steward of CPS finances. Short-term fixes move the problem to next year’s board.
- Integrity and transparency: Good governance depends on them. A board can follow every rule and still leave the public wondering how it reached a decision.
Bottom line: How will a candidate hold themselves and their colleagues accountable to these principles once in office?
Ask Them Yourself
On Saturday, Sept. 19, The Fund joins K1C, Mikva Challenge, Educators for Excellence, and the CEA to host an All-Candidates Forum at Intentional Sports, 1841 N. Laramie Ave. Come with your questions. Register here.
If you cannot make it, CEA has built a voter resource at votechicagoschoolboard.org. It compiles candidate information for races across the city, includes a district locator for residents unsure which district they live in or who is running to represent it, and links to other materials for voters working through the ballot.
Accountability to these principles does not begin or end on election day. It falls to all of us, as voters, parents, and neighbors, to keep asking long after the ballots are counted. Chicago’s students deserve a Board that governs with these principles in view every day after.
If your organization wants to add its name, you can sign on through Kids First Chicago.