By Jerel Ezell
Publication Date: 2026-02-14 13:30:00
Chicago Public Schools consists of a vast, labyrinthine system with over 316,000 students at 630 campuses. Many are among America’s best. Many other schools are chronically worse than Title 1 schools because many students come from economically disadvantaged families and are among the worst performing in the country. AI could play a huge role in eliminating the socioeconomic and racial disparities in educational outcomes that characterize American metropolises like Chicago. But there’s a problem: AI programming is growing much faster in the country’s high-income K-12 schools.
I was an evaluator for a non-profit organization that provides student support services to high schools in Chicago. Whenever I made my first visits to a school, a quick look at its technological resources was often a reliable indicator of its ability to meet students’ overall needs. The differences in the quality and scope of computer labs at a school like Lincoln Park High School in Chicago’s affluent…
