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A Chicago Principal Dies Fighting to Give His Students the Best Education Possible

Mar 9, 2018 12:00:00 AM

by Marilyn Rhames

What if every teacher approached his or her work with legacy in mind? What if all educators viewed the future of other people’s children—i.e., their students, not just their own biological kids—as a significant part of their legacy? I imagine that more teachers would stand up and fight for their students. I imagine that more educators would die fighting for our students. That’s what Robert Croston, principal of Jenner Academy of the Arts elementary school in Chicago, did. On March 5, Croston, 34, passed away from Marfan syndrome, a genetic disorder that affects the body’s connective tissues. But five days before his death, he lived to see the Chicago Board of Education approve his hard-fought proposal to merge Jenner—an extremely under-enrolled, low-income African-American school in what remains of the Cabrini Green projects—with nearby Ogden International School—an incredibly overcrowded, mostly White and Asian school in the highly affluent Gold Coast neighborhood. For urban districts like Chicago, where neighborhoods are segregated based on race and income, a Jenner-Ogden merger only exist in one’s dreams. But like Martin Luther King Jr., Croston, who was also a preacher, actively worked to make his dreams come true. Croston, who held a master’s degree in school leadership from Harvard University and a master’s in social work from the University of Chicago and a master’s in teaching from Dominican University, also served as a youth pastor on the Far South Side of Chicago. He fought to consolidate Jenner and Ogden—even as he underwent multiple heart surgeries due to his disease. He, along with Ogden principal Michael Beyer, who is White, joined forces and modeled the racial collaboration they both hoped to create by blending both of their schools. Croston helped lead the charge, writing articles and speaking to the press to lobby for the merger. He and Beyer eventually took a back seat to allow the Jenner-Ogden steering committee made up of local parents, teachers, clergy and community members, to lead the effort. There was a small but loud group of Ogden parents who resisted the proposed merger, commissioning multiple studies, convening public meetings and launching petition drives against it. They argued that Ogden wasn’t all that crowded; that the eight-block walk to Jenner would be too dangerous for their young children; that it would inflict too much cultural dissonance for the kids; that the quality of education their kids received would plummet. [pullquote position="right"]It was hard not to interpret their coded language as racially charged.[/pullquote] And in a district that, with little public debate, closed 50 schools in 2013 in mostly Black neighborhoods due to under-enrollment, I found myself frustrated that the school board spent two years deliberating the Jenner-Ogden merger. Good thing Croston, Beyer and their supporters never gave up! https://twitter.com/eveewing/status/970871970383454209 While I regret that I never had the pleasure of talking to Croston, though we followed each other’s blog posts about Jenner-Ogden and connected several times on Facebook. I once got to know his wife Sheena, who is also an educator, at a citywide professional development meeting. Without a doubt, the two of them were deeply in love. Rob Croston’s illness caused him to miss a year or more of work, which put a financial strain on the family. He spent a significant amount of time in the hospital, and “Rise Up Rob” became a rallying cry of a support campaign. I learned of Croston’s death during a casual check of email on my phone during a professional development meeting in San Francisco. A wave of sadness came over me. I sat there and silently cried. Rob Croston was the real deal. He loved God. He adored his wife. He was genuinely invested in his students—and all students. He believed that education equity could be achieved, stressed the research that shows that White children benefit from learning alongside Black students and teachers, just as much as, if not more, than the reverse. Rob Croston left a legacy of doing right by other people’s children because he saw them as a bit of his own. When I think about it, that’s a legacy for us all.
Photo from Robert Croston's Twitter account.

Marilyn Rhames

Marilyn Anderson Rhames is an educator, writer, thought leader and social entrepreneur. She is founder and CEO of Teachers Who Pray, a faith-based nonprofit that has more than 100 chapters nationwide. She is also the author of the upcoming book, “The Master Teacher: 12 Spiritual Lessons That Can Transform Schools and Revolutionize Public Education.” She is currently on the design team for Harvard University's Leaders' Institute for Faith and Education (LIFE). Marilyn has 14 years experience teaching in Chicago Public Schools, but before becoming an educator Marilyn worked as a journalist for People and Time magazines and for newspapers including New York Newsday and The Journal News. She currently writes for Education Post and has published pieces in the Huffington Post, Black Enterprise and RealClearEducation. Marilyn was named 2013 Commentator/Blogger of the Year by the Bammy Awards for her Education Week blog, entitled “Charting My Own Course." She was a 2016 Surge Institute Fellow and a Teach Plus teaching policy fellow from 2010-1012. Through her consulting firm Rhames Consulting, Marilyn offers a full range of services from education content editing to providing professional development on community engagement to public speaking on issues of faith, race, writing, and education. Marilyn has served as an education commentator on 90.1 FM Moody Radio Chicago; the presenter of a 2013 TEDx talk entitled “Finding the Courage to Voice the Taboo”; and a 2017 speaker at the Yale University Education Leadership Conference. She holds a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University and a master’s degree in education from National Louis University. Marilyn is a wife and mother of three. In August 2017, she came together with more than 40 other African-American parents, students and teachers to talk about the Black experience in America's public schools. These conversations were released as a video series in Getting Real About Education: A Conversation With Black Parents, Teachers and Students.

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