2013
50 school closures and Student Based Budgeting In 2013, 50 schools were set to be closed. Ostensibly the goal was to reduce the number of underutilized schools in CPS. This drastic policy though, which closed more schools in one year than were closed in all of the 80's or 90's, displaced swathes of students. Besides that, while targetting underutilized schools may seem neutral, these school closures happen to disproportionately impact marginalized neighborhoods. At the same time, the switch to Student-Based Budgeting hurt small schools. Under student based budgeting schools recieved budgets based on how many students they recieved. This leads to economies of scale. At a large school, costs like heating and cooling, and ploughing, cost relatively little per student. This choked small or underutilized schools budgets, further hindering these already struggling schools.