Salazar v. Edwards

Salazar v. Edwards case was a class-action case on behalf of thousands of homeless students and parents. It was initially filed in 1992 and settled in 1996. The case was filed because of the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) failure to comply with state and federal law and constitutional provisions protecting homeless students’ right to an education.

At the time of filing, it was not uncommon to walk into a homeless shelter on a school day, during school hours, and find the shelter full of school-age children. These children were not in school due to CPS’ refusal to enroll the children in violation of the law.

The Legacy of Salazar

In the 1996 Settlement, CPS committed to following the law and providing immediate enrollment to thousands of homeless children. In 1999, the CCH Law Project, in what turned out to be a landmark case, took the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) to court for failing to comply with Salazar v. Edwards.

After the trial, Cook County Circuit Judge Michael Getty issued a sweeping injunction: CPS was ordered to name homeless liaisons for each of the more than 600 city schools, provide busing or CTA passes for homeless children and parents who need rides to and from school, and otherwise remove all barriers to the ready enrollment, attendance and success of homeless students.

The homeless families and CPS entered another settlement in 2000, which embodied many of the elements of the 1999 court order. Since that time, the Law Project has worked closely with the CPS Homeless Education Program to improve its service to the thousands of students who experience homelessness in Chicago every year.

In 2004, however, the Law Project was compelled to take CPS to court for violating the Salazar agreement. The CPS Renaissance 2010 plan called for closing between 60 and 90 Chicago public schools and ultimately replacing them with 100 new schools, two-thirds of which would be privately run. The school closings threatened to displace thousands of homeless students from their schools of origin in violation of the Salazar agreement’s guarantee to allow homeless students to remain in the same school.

In this case, the Law Project, along with the law firm of Winston & Strawn, did not seek to stop the school closures. Rather, the Law Project fought for high quality school placements for homeless children affected by the closures and transitional services to help them succeed.

As a result of the case, hundreds of homeless students displaced by school closures in 2004, 2005, and 2006 received transitional services and/or the opportunity to attend significantly higher performing schools. Ultimately CPS shifted to a model of restructuring schools that did not displace any students. In addition, CPS indicated its intent to offer any homeless children affected by school closures in future years a choice to attend better performing schools and the necessary transition services.