By Jim Talamonti, The Heart Sq.
(The Heart Sq.) – The Chicago Board of Schooling’s Workplace of Inspector Common has launched a report detailing falsified federal grant purposes, false experiences on worker revenue statements, and vital ranges of sexual abuse at Chicago Public Colleges.
In line with the lately launched annual report, the OIG’s Sexual Allegations Unit closed 335 instances with 55 substantiated findings of misconduct, with practically half of the allegations involving lecturers or substitute lecturers. The workplace stated it substantiated 26 instances in fiscal yr 2025.
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson was requested in regards to the report on Tuesday at Metropolis Corridor.
“Properly, clearly, that is completely disturbing to listen to. Our communities, notably our college communities, should be a secure area,” Johnson stated.
The OIG stated it discovered “many cases” of adult-on-student sexual misconduct throughout two excessive faculties positioned on one campus. Whereas the report didn’t identify the colleges, the allegations align with Better Lawndale Excessive Faculty for Social Justice in Little Village. The varsity’s former dean, Brian Crowder, was sentenced in August to 22 years in jail for sexually assaulting a pupil. CPS agreed to pay $17.5 million to settle a civil go well with filed by the sufferer.
In a single case, an worker started grooming a pupil for sexual exercise when she was 15 years previous and started partaking in sexual acts with the scholar through the summer time earlier than her junior yr. That worker was convicted of aggravated legal sexual assault and different expenses and sentenced to 22 years in jail.
In line with the report, a number of different workers on the identical campus engaged in sexual misconduct towards college students and/or focused former college students for intercourse. The OIG stated the incidents at this campus occurred years earlier, largely through the 2010s, however got here to gentle years later when victims and witnesses stepped ahead.
The OIG report additionally discovered {that a} program supervisor repeatedly falsified federal grant purposes in a CPS program, even after the OIG advisable that CPS right the supervisor’s misconduct as a part of an earlier investigation that exposed this system’s falsified purposes.
On the conclusion of its first investigation in 2021, the OIG discovered there had been a longstanding apply of overstating the variety of college students enrolled in this system on this system’s grant purposes.
The U.S. Division of Schooling then carried out a follow-up investigation and located that CPS acquired $1,194,935 in federal funding below this program based mostly on information that CPS was unable to confirm. CPS agreed to pay these funds again by October 2026.
The report additionally discovered that greater than 600 CPS workers listed incomes on types for the 2023-24 college yr that “appeared to falsely determine them as ‘low-income’ — together with greater than 100 who have been making a minimum of $100,000 a yr at CPS.”
The low-income identifications certified the workers’ youngsters for pupil price waivers and entitled their faculties to additional funding.
In line with the report, on the OIG’s suggestion, CPS this college yr stopped utilizing Household Earnings Data Types, stuffed out yearly by mother and father, to find out college funding.
Republican gubernatorial candidate Ted Dabrowski detailed what he referred to as “authorized corruption” in CPS throughout a press convention in downtown Chicago on Monday.
Dabrowski stated the Chicago Lecturers Union pressures the Illinois Common Meeting to maintain failing faculties open.
“And the legislature buckles,” Dabrowski stated.
Since Gov. JB Pritzker took workplace in 2019, CPS enrollment has fallen by 45,000 college students, however employment is up by 8,000.
“Most of that’s coming from administration and assist workers,” Dabrowski stated.
The Chicago Board of Schooling’s OIG full report will be considered on-line.
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The publish Report particulars sexual abuse, falsified grant purposes at Chicago Public Colleges appeared first on CWB Chicago.
