Walter Henri Dyett High School For The Arts (formerly known as Dyett Academic Center and commonly known as Dyett High School) is a

public In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichk ...

four–year arts

high school A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...

located in the Washington Park neighborhood on the south side of

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rockf ...

, United States. The school opened in 1972. Dyett is a part of the

Chicago Public Schools Chicago Public Schools (CPS), officially classified as City of Chicago School District #299 for funding and districting reasons, in Chicago, Illinois, is the third-largest school district in the United States, after New York and Los Angeles. ...

system and is named for American

violin The violin, sometimes known as a '' fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone ( string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument ( soprano) in the family in regu ...

ist and

music educator Music education is a field of practice in which educators are trained for careers as elementary or secondary music teachers, school or music conservatory ensemble directors. Music education is also a research area in which scholars do original ...

Walter Henri Dyett (1901–1969). The school became an arts high school for the 2016–17 school year.

History

Dyett first opened in September 1972 as a neighborhood

middle school A middle school (also known as intermediate school, junior high school, junior secondary school, or lower secondary school) is an educational stage which exists in some countries, providing education between primary school and secondary school. ...

. Connected by a tunnel to the Dyett Recreation Center, it was built under a joint governance agreement with the

Chicago Park District The Chicago Park District is one of the oldest and the largest park districts in the United States. As of 2016, there are over 600 parks included in the Chicago Park District as well as 27 beaches, several boat harbors, two botanic conservatorie ...

, under which the community had access to the recreation center when school was not in session. The recreation center's pool provided a particularly important community asset, because no other public pools were available in Bronzeville. At the direction of CPS head Paul Vallas, the school became a high school in 1999. Two years later, the recreation center was closed to the public. In contrast to the limited-admission

King College Prep Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. College Preparatory High School (commonly known as King College Prep or locally as King) is a public 4-year selective enrollment magnet high school located in the Kenwood neighborhood on the south side of Chicago, Illi ...

that was opened nearby at the same time, Dyett was deliberately starved of resources, suffering "over a decade of CPS disinvestment and destabilization." By 2011, only 19% of students in the school's attendance area were attending Dyett, with most parents choosing to send their students to less under-resourced schools. By 2012, Dyett students were deprived of all advanced placement classes and had to take art and physical education classes online. Dyett's dropout rate rose over the years, hitting a high of 81% during the 2009–10 school year. Despite persistent opposition from parents and community leaders arguing that CPS had set Dyett up to fail, the CPS board voted to close Dyett in 2012. The closure took place as a

teach-out A teach-out or teachout is an arrangement by which an educational institution provides its current students with the opportunity to complete their course of study when the institution closes. One common teach-out arrangement is for an institut ...

, with the school closing after the students who were freshmen in 2011–2012 had graduated. During this phaseout period, members of the school community protested continuously, with several Dyett supporters being arrested for refusing to leave

Chicago City Hall Chicago City Hall is a 10-story building that houses the official seat of government of the City of Chicago in Illinois. Adjacent to the Richard J. Daley Center and the James R. Thompson Center, the building that includes Chicago City Hall ho ...

and 36 students filing a federal civil rights complaint against CPS. In 2013 Dyett supporters organized the Coalition to Revitalize Dyett, presenting detailed plans to convert Dyett to a school focused on "global leadership and green technology." CPS nonetheless closed the school in the spring of 2015, after graduating a final class of 12 students.

Hunger strike and Re-opening

During late–August through mid–September in 2015, a group of education activists went on a hunger strike for over 19 days in an attempt to save the school, which was the only remaining open-access school serving Bronzeville. In September 2015, CPS announced that the school would open again as Dyett High School For The Arts, an open enrollment arts-focused neighborhood high school for the 2016–17 school year. Bronzeville resident and

Michele Clark Magnet High School Michele Clark Academic Prep Magnet High School (commonly known as Clark Prep, Clark Academic Prep and Michele Clark Magnet High School) is a public 4–year magnet high school located in the Austin neighborhood on the west side of Chicago, Illinois ...

principal Beulah McLoyd was picked by the school board to serve as principal of Dyett in October 2015. The re-envisioned school also featured an innovation lab to offer training in technology for the Bronzeville/Washington Park community and nearby schools.

Athletics

Dyett competes in the Chicago Public League (CPL) and was a member of

Illinois High School Association The Illinois High School Association (IHSA) is an association that regulates competition of interscholastic sports and some interscholastic activities at the high school level for the state of Illinois. It is a charter member of the National Fe ...

(IHSA). The school's sport teams are known as the Eagles. The boys'

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

were regional champions in 2006–07.

Works cited

Notable alumni

* Chief Keef (attended) –

rapper Rapping (also rhyming, spitting, emceeing or MCing) is a musical form of vocal delivery that incorporates "rhyme, rhythmic speech, and street vernacular". It is performed or chanted, usually over a backing beat or musical accompaniment. The ...

References

External links

* http://www.cps.edu/Schools/Pages/school.aspx?unit=1600 * https://web.archive.org/web/20150308131909/http://schools.cuip.net/dyett/ {{authority control Public high schools in Chicago Art schools in Illinois Schools of the performing arts in the United States 1972 establishments in Illinois