Civic Consulting Alliance supported Chicago Public Schools with the design, preparation, and execution of eight community round tables that would lead to impactful recommendations for the Black Student Success Plan. These recommendations could be considered for incorporation into the district’s upcoming five-year strategic plan.

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 out 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 in the five-year strategic plan, which is set to be released in summer 2024. 

As a close collaborator on other CPS strategies including the post-pandemic three-year Blueprint, Civic Consulting Alliance was brought on to support the development of community round tables, which was bolstered by a pro bono Fellow committed by partner Protiviti. Further, our position as a neutral, client-serving organization ensured that we could be more intentional about our process and center the voices of the stakeholders.

“Civic Consulting Alliance’s structured approach to our Black Student Success community roundtables allowed for efficient feedback gathering and, even more importantly, transparent reporting of what was said in the roundtables sessions. This transparency is crucial as we move forward to address persistent disparities in educational opportunities for Black students.” 

– Dr. Fatima Cooke, Chief Equity Engagement & Strategy Officer, Chicago Public Schools

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Two weeks, eight community roundtables 

Civic Consulting Alliance supported the design, preparation, and execution of eight community round tables over two weeks in March 2024. Our goal was to build a space that felt respectful by acknowledging the systemic inequities, and structuring intentional sessions that would lead to impactful recommendations to advance holistic Black student success both in the classroom and beyond. 

The Civic Consulting Alliance team worked alongside volunteers with strong community ties – parents, principals, nonprofit leaders, and engaged citizens – to co-create and co-lead roundtable discussions that catered to specific community contexts. 

Recognizing the importance of lived experience, we took extra care to maintain data fidelity throughout the eight community roundtables. We adjusted our data synthesis procedures to capture verbatim responses and avoid misinterpretations. While a quicker turnaround might have been achieved with AI tools, we opted for a thorough manual review to mitigate potential bias and gain a richer, more accurate understanding of the community’s perspectives. We sent both the raw data and synthesized data to co-leads for approval to ensure we captured the voice of the community. 

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Publishing the raw data to increase transparency and accountability

Many roundtable participants called for transparency about the outcomes of these sessions. In response, CPS created a website that includes Civic Consulting Alliance’s deliverables, which synthesized data from 450 attendees, can be found here: 

• Community Roundtable Overview and Summary Deck
• Participant Demographic Dashboard
• Raw Data From Small Group Recommendations
• Raw Data From Individual Response Handouts

Next steps to improving the Black student experience

The 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. By honoring community advocates’ historical and ongoing work and expertise, CPS can create the best plan possible for Black students.

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. An update on the engagement process and recommendations were presented to the Board in June and this effort will be a core strategy in the CPS five-year strategic plan to be released in summer 2024. Additionally, CPS is in the process of hiring a Director of Black Student Success to oversee and drive strategies, initiatives, and districtwide implementation plans to enhance the experiences and outcomes for Black students across the district.