Chicago Public Schools teachers say they were told by administrators to give migrant students passing grades

Since 2022, nearly 50,000 migrants have been bused to Chicago from the Texas border. While not all of these new arrivals have opted to stay in Chicago, many who have chosen to make the city their new home have been resettled in predominantly Black neighborhoods on the South and West Sides. Now, WGN News can exclusively report that several Chicago Public Schools (CPS) teachers who work in these communities say they were told by school administrators to give migrant students passing grades last school year.

The teachers we spoke with work in CPS elementary schools and say they spoke no Spanish, while their migrant students spoke no English, making communication virtually impossible. They also added that because their schools were located in predominantly Black neighborhoods, they offered no English as a Second Language (ESL) support. Despite this, they say they were instructed by school administrators to give their migrant students a 70 percent in every subject and pass them on to the next grade.

Teachers say this was the case even if their migrant students displayed severe academic deficiencies.

In a recent appearance on WGN Radio’s Lisa Dent Show, prior to being made aware of our investigation, Chicago Public Schools CEO Dr. Pedro Martinez initially maintained that migrant students were held to the same academic standards as CPS students born in Chicago . However, once confronted with our reporting, a CPS spokesperson acknowledged in a statement that the district’s promotion guidelines are “modified to serve the specialized needs of English Language Learners.”

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