Perhaps we'll be closing high schools in the near future...

The first story to discuss is the debate over possibly closing at least 50 more schools in Chicago. WBEZ wrote an article about this last month.

Nearly five years after Emanuel closed 50 schools could he repeat with another 50? https://t.co/6oq9W9iqCK

— WBEZeducation (@WBEZeducation) November 26, 2017

From the article linked in tweet above:

Nearly five years after shuttering a record number of under-enrolled schools, Chicago once again confronts the same stark realities: plummeting enrollment and more than 100 half-empty school buildings, most on the city’s South and West sides, according to a WBEZ analysis of school records.

Chicago Public Schools has lost 32,000 students over the last five years, nearly the same enrollment drop as in the 10-year period leading up to the closures of 50 elementary schools in 2013. Those missing students could fill 53 average-sized Chicago schools.

This massive enrollment decline comes as a self-imposed five-year moratorium on school closings lifts in 2018. Despite that, political observers and CPS insiders said they are not betting on Mayor Rahm Emanuel closing 50 more schools — at least not all at once.

They say if Emanuel opts to close more schools, they hope he does it more slowly and over time. In fact, that’s already underway, despite the moratorium. Since 2013, CPS has quietly shuttered more than a dozen schools, many of them charter schools.

The school system must announce by Dec. 1 any proposed closures for its more than 600 schools. Officials have already indicated they will recommend closing only a handful of schools for next year, the first without the moratorium.

Then these other stories were in the news yesterday:

Special report: 17 Chicago high schools struggle to survive as enrollment plummets and performance falters https://t.co/62e2phNpTj pic.twitter.com/COCVS9oqey

— Chicago Tribune (@chicagotribune) November 30, 2017

17 high schools are suffering from declining enrollment and the Tribune provides a list:

These 17 neighborhood high schools have been hardest hit by dwindling enrollment and poor academics:

Bowen, Corliss, Fenger, Gage Park, Harlan, Harper, Hirsch, Hope, Julian, Kelvyn Park, Manley, Marshall, Orr, Richards, Robeson, Tilden and Wells.

OH NO NOT HARLAN - GO FALCONS!!!! Why is the dwindling enrollment important?

In September, Tilden Principal Maurice Swinney fretted over the number of students trickling in through a metal detector for the first day of classes.

CPS projected that 252 children would enroll at Tilden this year. Swinney was concerned he was 10 kids short of the district's estimate. Because CPS doles out money to schools based on enrollment — CPS this year gave high schools about $5,300 per general education student — Tilden's annual budget of about $3.9 million faced significant cuts if those kids didn't show up for classes in the first weeks of the new school year.

"Let's say if every kid is about five grand — you really lose about $50,000 or so," he said while greeting students.

Swinney and his staff spent the following days compiling lists of missing students, calling homes and knocking on neighborhood doors in an effort to preserve resources that would help Tilden make it through the year after several years of budget cuts.

More than 2,300 high school students live inside the school's attendance boundaries — which stretch north from Garfield Boulevard, past a stretch of industrial sites and Canaryville homes before encompassing Bridgeport's emerging hipster enclave along the South Branch of the Chicago River.

But most have elected to go anywhere but Tilden. Students within the school's attendance boundaries attended 147 different district high schools last year, an overwhelming share of the district's roughly 170 high schools.

Over the last decade, the district has expanded the number of high school options families can choose from, with the growth of independently run schools such as charters and of selective enrollment programs, for example.

Wait a minute of those 2,300 students in Tilden High School's attendance boundaries their families chose to send their children to 147 different schools? Wow, this kind of boggles my mind the number of choices the students made as far as their choices in schools. Regardless school choice is hurting Tilden although what are the wider trends:

At the same time, enrollment has plummeted. From 2006 to 2015, overall CPS enrollment declined by more than 21,000 students. Since the start of the 2015-16 school year, the district has lost close to 21,000 additional students. District officials blame much of the enrollment loss on falling birthrates, slower immigration patterns and the well-documented flight of residents from the city’s South and West sides. 

Not just school choice, just some demographic issues affecting enrollment. Now once again we have to face the difficult choice of having to close down more schools and this time it's some of the neighborhood high schools.

And you know it's time for artistmac to update this video, you've seen it here before. [VIDEO]