Chicago’s public schools are a monument to bureaucratic inertia and misplaced priorities, where large sums of taxpayer dollars disappear into underutilized buildings while student achievement plummets. Frederick Douglass Academy High School is an example of the dysfunction. The school was built to accommodate 1,008 students and now has only 27 students. Yet it remains open with 28 full-time employees – more staff than children. A one-to-one staff-to-student ratio is a luxury that even private schools cannot provide, but here it yields zero academic progress.
In 2024, operating expenses at Douglass exceeded $93,000 per student, and that figure excludes capital expenditures and debt service, making total expenses even higher. Despite this generous funding, the latest state data from 2024 shows that no 11th grade student is proficient in math or reading.
Poor attendance compounds the failure: 65.6% of enrolled students are chronically absent, missing more than 10% of school days. Fewer than a dozen children show up with any regularity, making the building little more than an expensive daycare facility for a handful of children—and even that description overstates its educational value.
Douglass is not an outlier in Chicago Public Schools (CPS). At least 255 school buildings are underutilized, representing more than half of the district’s standalone public schools. Of these, 145 are more than half empty, and 24 operate with a vacancy rate of more than 75%. These ghost schools drain resources that could transform education elsewhere.
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Members of the Chicago Teachers Union gathered during a rally ahead of a possible teacher strike on September 24, 2019 in Chicago. (Photo by Scott Heins/Getty Images)
Since 2019, CPS has lost 10% of its students but increased its workforce by 20%, increasing costs without improving outcomes. In 2024 alone, 80 Chicago public schools reported zero students were proficient in math, and 24 had no proficiency in reading. The pattern is clear: putting more money into failing structures does not contribute to improving student performance.
The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) bears much of the blame for perpetuating this inefficiency. The union fights tooth and nail against the closure of any public school, no matter how empty or ineffective it is. Union leaders claim that shutdowns disrupt communities, but the real disruption comes from propping up zombie institutions that trap families in mediocrity.
In 2023, the CTU successfully lobbied to end Illinois’s Invest in Kids grant program, which had provided school choice options to more than 9,000 children from low-income families. That program allowed parents to escape failing districts, but the union prioritized monopolistic control over student opportunities.
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The union has also successfully limited the number of charter schools in the city, stifling competition and innovation — a policy that must be reversed if higher-performing options are to flourish.
This stance has pushed the CTU to record-low favorability in a new poll, with a net favorability of 26.1% negative, with most Chicago voters reporting a negative view.
Hypocrisy runs deep in the leadership of the CTU. President Stacy Davis Gates once called the school choice “racist,” but she still enrolls her own son in a private school, giving him the options she denies to others. Such double standards expose the union’s true agenda: protecting jobs and dues revenue, not serving children. By blocking closures and options, the CTU ensures dollars flow into empty hallways instead of effective classrooms.
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Supporters of the status quo claim that more funding will solve all problems, but Chicago’s empty schools shatter that myth. If money alone were the answer, Douglass High School—with its exorbitant per-student and personal staff expenses—would produce scholars, not dropouts.
Instead, the district’s failures stem from a lack of accountability and competition. Public schools operate as monopolies, insulated from the pressures that drive improvements in other sectors. Families cannot easily vote with their feet, and unions have veto power over reforms.
Even as union membership has declined since 2000, an increasing number of Americans approve of unions, a 2022 Gallup poll shows. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)
Closing these underutilized schools would not harm teachers and students. It would benefit them. Redirecting money from vacant buildings could boost teacher salaries at thriving schools, attracting top talent and rewarding performance. The savings in fixed costs – utilities, maintenance and overhead – could also offset staff replaced by closures, allowing them to earn more at consolidated sites with fuller classrooms.
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Before any closures occur, charter or private schools should be given the right of first refusal on these vacant buildings, allowing them to repurpose the space for better educational models.
For the few students in these failing environments, even a fraction of that $93,000 per child could fund tuition at a private or charter school tailored to their needs.
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Enrollment in the district has steadily declined as families flee to suburbs or seek alternatives, but bureaucrats continue to cling to outdated infrastructure. Just closing the 24 most vacant schools could save tens of millions a year, freeing up resources for class size reductions, technology upgrades or pay in high-performing buildings. Teachers unions denounce such measures as attacks on public education, but the real attack is maintaining a system that wastes billions while illiterate students graduate.
Nationally, similar patterns are emerging in urban districts from Detroit to Los Angeles, where enrollment is falling but spending is rising unchecked. The solution lies in empowering parents through universal school choice programs that tie funding to students rather than buildings. When money follows the child, schools must compete to attract enrollment, driving innovation and efficiency. States like Arizona and Florida have embraced this model and are seeing an increase in choices and better outcomes across the board.
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Critics warn that choice is draining public schools, but evidence shows otherwise: competition drives reform. Research in Milwaukee shows that voucher programs increased performance in both the private and public sectors. Chicago could follow suit, but the CTU’s grip is hindering progress. Until unions prioritize students over self-preservation, the cycle of waste and failure will continue.
Chicago’s empty schools serve as a cautionary tale for policymakers everywhere. More money funneled into broken systems only creates more broken systems. Real reform requires responsibility, agency and a willingness to close failing institutions. Families deserve better than ghost schools and empty promises. By embracing competition and efficiency, Chicago can focus its resources where they matter most: the education of its children.
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