This article explores the controversy surrounding Chicago’s first elected school board race, focusing on candidate Karin Norington-Reaves’ allegations of ballot errors that may have influenced the outcome. I interviewed candidates, voters, and experts to examine the implications of the election and the broader shift toward a fully elected board.
Che “Rhymefest” Smith made history after securing a seat on Chicago’s first elected Board of Education, but one candidate says she will not accept defeat just yet. South Side voters elected the Grammy award-winning rapper to represent District 10 Tuesday, who was neck and neck with nonprofit CEO Karin Norington-Reaves for most of the night. She says she has evidence that polling employee carelessness may have influenced the race results in Smith’s favor.
“If this thing is close and doesn’t go my way, I will be suing,” Norington-Reaves said at Reggio’s Pizza in Chatham where she held her watch party. “It is absolute negligence, it’s incompetence… it’s a sh*tshow.” By the time the election was called, most supporters had gone home except her family, close friends and campaign manager. But Norington-Reaves stayed, anxiously tapping her foot with her eyes glued to her phone screen, as restaurant employees stacked chairs and threw away leftover pizza.
Norington-Reaves said it took six hours before the Board of Elections realized that at least five of 153 precincts erroneously provided District 10 voters with District 9 ballots. Therefore, hundreds – potentially thousands – of residents cast their votes in the wrong district, causing concern among the three losing candidates. “I texted Adam Parrott-Sheffer, and he said he heard the same thing was happening in precinct 17. At the fifth precinct, over 350 people had already voted before we realized what was happening,” Norington-Reaves said.
After making calls all morning, she said an attorney for the Chicago Board of Elections texted judges at 1 p.m. to notify them of the ballot mistake, but the damage was already done.
A spokesperson for the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners did not respond to a request for comment.
At midnight, Norington-Reaves had acquired a little over 20,000 votes, less than 2,000 behind Smith. Candidate Rev. Robert Jones was not far behind, earning 15,000, while education consultant and former CPS principal Adam Parrott-Sheffer arrived in last place, ending with nearly 11,000.
State Senator Elgie R. Sims Jr., whose children go to school with Norington-Reaves’ daughter, says he is proud of the race his friend ran. “She is fit for the job because she’s seen all sides of the equation. She’s a mother of a CPS special needs student, and she understands what students need to be successful after leaving school which is just as important.” He says it is too early to tell if interference swayed the outcome but trusts that her attorney’s “investigation will be diligent.”
For the first time in 30 years, the city’s public schools will no longer be controlled by the mayor now that Chicago voters have elected half of the school board. If Smith’s election win is certified, he will become a member of the hybrid board, composed of 10 elected members and eleven members who will be appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson. But by 2026, the transition will be complete, and the board will be entirely elected. For years, advocates have been calling for a system overhaul to democratize the process and elect a board of people, including CPS parents, who have a stake in student learning outcomes. As a former CPS student and parent, candidate Karin Norington-Reaves says she is the candidate her district needs because she has a “vested interest in South Side students’s futures.”
District 10 encompasses a dozen neighborhoods along the South Side lakefront, including Hyde Park, Bronzeville, Woodlawn and Kenwood. There, roughly 34,700 students attend 89 district-run and charter schools.
The school board race has been defined by an ideological split between Chicago Teachers Union-backed candidates and proponents of school choice. Money poured in from outside of Illinois, politically polarizing the race. According to the Chicago Sun-Times and WBEZ Chicago’s joint campaign finance tracker, District 10 candidates raised nearly $725,000. Some of that cash paid for political action committee attack ads in the form of flyers.
A CBS Chicago investigation found CTU-funded mailers characterized Norington-Reaves as a Donald Trump surrogate, in hopes of turning voters in the opposite direction. “I believe the CTU deliberately targeted the mailers to low-information voters. It’s really interesting to see who it was sent to and who it wasn’t sent to.” Nevertheless, she said that she does not believe the lies cost her the election, because “the people who support me have done their research and know what I’m really about.”
At the South Side YMCA on S. Stony Island Avenue earlier in the afternoon, dozens of voters rushed in and out of the recreation center, either to escape the rain pouring over Woodlawn or to get their vote over with. Some, including an 80-year-old Hyde Park resident who identified herself only as Heidi, said they wish they had known more. “My granddaughters are grown-up so I didn’t pay much attention to the school board election, but I wish I had done more research to learn about the candidates,” Heidi said.
Others said the consequence is personal. “I only vote for CTU-backed candidates. I trust them as a teacher of 28 years,” said 67-year-old elementary school teacher Kathleen Dewey. “I can sleep at night knowing I did my part to help students thrive.”