Mayor Rahm Emanuel is in full control of the public schools and enthusiastically represents corporate interests. CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett of the Chicago Public Schools(CPS), answers directly to Rahm.
CPS currently is proposing 61 school actions involving a total of 133 schools. Students from schools that are closed must go to what CPS calls “welcoming schools”, whence the figure of 133 affected schools. Most of these proposed school actions would take place in working class neighborhoods of color, many of them predominantly African-American. Some of these school actions could have deadly consequences.He goes on in the article to explain the "deadly consequences", and points to some answers to the question posed in the headline.
After referring to the establishment crackdown on the Black Panthers who were making successful efforts at organizing multiracial communities in Chicago in the 1970s, he suggests that their current efforts are designed to serve corporate interests and to sow disorganization among the poor. In other words, a renewed class war.