Races Take Shape for April 2011 Election

Seats are up for grabs on the Oak Lawn village, library and park boards and local school boards. A citizens group is also working to get a referendum on the ballot.

Matchups for the April 2011 consolidated election were finalized last week as candidates filed their petitions for local elections by the appointed Dec. 20 deadline. The races to watch include the Village of Oak Lawn Board of Trustees. Incumbents Bob Streit and Carol Quinlan both will face opponents in the 3rd and 5th districts, respectively. Contested school board races include Ridgeland District 122 and Oak Lawn Community High School District 229. Mike Sawicki is challenging three board members who are up for re-election to the Dist. 122 school board. Three challengers will battle it out with Stephen Trotto, president of the Dist. 229 school board, and board member Joseph Amado. Three board seats are up for grabs, and there will be a …

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Dist. 122 to Hold Bond Sale in 2011

District anticipates a new bond sale of $5.1 million to $5.3 million for capital improvement projects at district schools and to offset deficit spending over the next five years.

Ridgeland Dist. 122 is planning to sell a working cash bond of $5.1 million to $5.3 million in early 2011. Proceeds of the bond will be used for capital improvement projects in the district's elementary schools. Board members held a public hearing at their Dec. 15 board meeting at the district's administrative office. The district made its final payment on a three-year, $3.3 million bond, which was paid off on Dec. 1. Assistant Superintendent Eric Trimberger said the final amount of the new bond will be determined by current interest rates. Trrimberger anticipates the bond to be payable over four years. While the district finished in the black this year, the budget was balanced largely because of federal stimulus money. The district's new …

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Lost Oak Lawn

“The Good Old Days”

Voices from the past shed light on a farming community at the turn of the 20th Century.

As I drove down the ever-bustling 95th Street en route to the Oak Lawn Public Library, I couldn't help but think about this town's past.  With cars merging to the left and right and commuters traveling to and from Chicago, it's hard to imagine that less than a century ago, most of this area was lush farmland, dotted only by quaint cottages that might be typical of any rural village in Southern Illinois.  Settling among my typical pile of legal pads, ready to research, the voices of the past beckoned to be heard as I looked through photographs of Oak Lawn's first intrepid settlers.  They had staked their claims on a wide expanse of countryside once known as Black Oaks Grove.  With the grit and determination that any settler must count …

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Harnew Students Hitch Ride on Space Shuttle

A poster bearing the signatures of Harnew Elementary School students will be stored on the Discovery for its final mission into space.

When the space shuttle Discovery blasts off for its last mission on Wednesday, a little piece of Harnew Elementary School will go with it. A poster bearing the signatures of all 607 students at Harnew, along with signatures from senior administrators and school board members from Ridgeland District 122, Oak Lawn's mayor and village trustees, and a couple of Chicago Blackhawks, is being stored aboard NASA's Discovery for its last flight into space. Harnew is one of 500 schools from around the world to be represented on the STS-133 mission, and the only school from Illinois. Trying to spark students' interest in the space program last May, Harnew Principal Tom O'Donnell told students to research the space shuttle on the Internet. "I went on …

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Lorraine Swanson

8:22 pm on Friday, February 11, 2011

That's very cool, Karina. Thanks for reading Patch. I hope you come back often.   more ›

Real Boys Read

One Oak Lawn elementary school took a "novel" approach to raising boys' reading scores. The idea was that they just need the right books.

These days, boys at Harnew Elementary School sometimes find themselves in the principal's office — not because of bad behavior — but because they want to tell Mr. O'Donnell all about the latest book they've read. Harnew principal Tom O'Donnell says this hasn't always been the case. "It was about four years ago, we were looking at the boys not really equaling what the girls were doing in terms of reading," O'Donnell said. "So we talked to a variety of people, and one of the things we wanted to do was to make sure that we get books that were available for the boys to get them challenged." In 2006, O'Donnell noticed that boys' reading scores on the Illinois Standards Achievement Test (ISAT) were significantly lower on average compared to …

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