When we look at charts showing how U.S. students are performing, it is easy to get lost in numbers, test scores, and performance gaps. But as urban school board members, we don’t just see data. We see children. We see the real faces behind those percentages—smart, capable young people striving to succeed in a system that often fails to provide the resources they deserve.
We cannot expect our children to achieve at high levels if we ignore the physical condition of their schools or the unfair funding decisions made by state and federal governments. To give every child a fair shot at academic success, our investments must align with the needs of our students. The future of our nation’s urban centers is being written in our classrooms today, and we must ensure those classrooms are environments where excellence can flourish.
How Aging Buildings Hinder Success
Before a student even opens a textbook or turns on a laptop, their environment directly dictates their ability to learn. Across the country, urban school districts are facing a quiet crisis: a legacy of old, deteriorating buildings that were never designed for the demands of 21st-century education.
We see this clearly in our own community. In East Chicago, even our “newer” facilities, such as Central High School, were built 40 years ago. Many of our other buildings are significantly older, reflecting a time when educational technology and environmental standards were vastly different.
When a school suffers from broken heating and cooling systems, poor ventilation, or structural neglect, the impact is immediate. Students get sick and miss crucial instruction time. It is physically impossible to focus and do your best when you are freezing in the winter or sweating through a lecture in the spring. We ask our children to compete in a modern, high-tech global economy, yet we expect them to prepare for that world in functionally obsolete facilities. Fixing our schools is not a luxury; it is a fundamental requirement for student success.
Local Success Stories: Proving What Works
We have proven that when we secure the right investments, we put our students first. Innovation in urban districts often happens on the front lines, and Indiana’s School City of East Chicago serves as a testament to this progress.
A few years ago, our district secured a grant from the Indiana Department of Environmental Management. With support from the South Shore Clean Cities organization, we leveraged that funding to replace aging, polluting diesel vehicles with clean propane school buses, actively improving the air quality for our students on their daily commute.
This is exactly how healthy environments protect student achievement. Cleaner air means healthier lungs, fewer missed school days due to respiratory issues, and students who arrive at their desks ready to focus and learn. However, local districts cannot be expected to fund these vital health and safety upgrades entirely on their own. We need reliable, long-term, and sustained partnerships from state and federal leaders to scale these successes across every district.
The Federal Threat to Classroom Support
Unfortunately, instead of receiving the increased support we need, urban student achievement is facing massive instability originating in Washington, D.C. There is a concerted effort to significantly diminish the U.S. Department of Education’s footprint and function.
The current administration has already substantially reduced the agency’s staff. Furthermore, it has used “Intra-Agency Agreements”—internal contracts that bypass normal legislative and oversight rules—to quietly transfer critical duties, such as K-12 oversight, special education management, and civil rights protections, to other federal agencies. This disorganized approach has already led to significant paperwork backlogs, funding delays, and widespread confusion among local school districts.
Standing Up and Fighting Back
Urban districts require stable, specialized federal support to run programs that help our most vulnerable students thrive. In response, local leaders are refusing to remain silent in the face of these threats. As the legislative landscape shifts rapidly, a coalition of education advocates has mobilized to oppose these bills.
NSBA is among these advocates, having officially signed on to oppose these measures. Furthermore, based on feedback from our Legislative Committee, NSBA is issuing its own direct warning to Congress against dismantling federal education protections.
Join Us at the 2026 CUBE Annual Conference in Chicago
The hurdles facing urban education are high, but we can overcome them if we work together and fiercely advocate for our communities. The fight for our schools is not just about policy—it is about the dignity of our students and the viability of our cities.
In October, urban school leaders from across the country are gathering at the CUBE Annual Conference to tackle funding and facility disparities head-on. We will share strategies, analyze the latest data, and build the coalitions necessary to unlock our students’ potential.
Our students possess the talent, drive, and intellect to achieve anything. As their leaders, it is our duty to ensure that the environment we provide matches their potential. We must continue to advocate for the funding, safe buildings, and fair treatment required to make their success a reality.
Joel Rodriguez (CUBEChair@nsba.org) is the 2025-27 chair of the CUBE Steering Committee and vice president of Indiana’s School City of East Chicago Board of Trustees.