For the past several weeks activists in Edgewater have been working behind the scenes to cut a deal with school officials on the proposed naval academy at Senn High School. “We wanted to get the board an out so they could back away from the academy,” says one community organizer who asked to remain anonymous. “We thought we had an arrangement.”
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It looked like the system would get the navy’s money at no political cost. Schools like Whitney Young or Northside or Payton would make a fuss if the board suddenly announced it was taking away a third of their space for a military academy. But Senn had no strong local school council. A lot of its 1,700 students are immigrants and refugees, many of them still learning English. They probably wouldn’t protest, and if they did, who would listen? Smith obviously didn’t think the proposal would cost her many votes or she wouldn’t have signed on without even a community meeting.
“They overlooked us,” says Ross Freshwater, a history teacher at Senn.
Smith made it clear she wouldn’t budge from her support of the academy. But its opponents thought they had an ally in Schakowsky, who’d spoken out in favor of community input on the issue.
From the get-go Duncan was the center of attention. He sat at a table in the front next to Schakowsky as speaker after speaker blasted the idea of a naval academy and implored him to change his mind, to remember that he believed in community participation.
For a moment there was silence.
People in the crowd gasped. “Jesus, Jan, it’s not the navy–it’s community control!” one man yelled. “What happened to giving the community a voice?”
