Curious. Inauspicious. So totally 209-ish.
That’s our reaction to the arrival of Krish Mohip as the new superintendent of the District 209 Proviso Township High Schools.
Mohip has impressive credentials, if somewhat top-heavy with high-level bureaucratic leadership posts in both the Chicago Public Schools and the Illinois State Board of Education. While notable career accomplishments, those posts must already feel far removed from the rough and tumble — or more accurately, vicious and knife-fighting — ways of D209’s politics.
Consider that Mohip attended his first meeting of the school board on Dec.10 and was welcomed with oddly stern warnings from elected officials serving Proviso Township, but outside the school system, that he should forget the charm offensive and focus on results.
Is Mohip going to turn around this deeply troubled school district with a ready smile and an open door? Not entirely. But when he says he will focus on English as a Second Language students and academic performance and financial transparency, he sounds as if he has a proper focus on students, a focus nearly entirely lacking in the last, utterly failed, permanent superintendent.
How Mohip resurfaced in D209 is not fully clear. He was announced in April 2024 as one of three finalists in the search process to replace James Henderson. Then, in typical D209 board dysfunction, school board member Della Patterson pronounced the entire search process as flawed and called for a new search effort.
But now he is here. The superintendent of three high schools with a history of unstable administrative leadership, dysfunctional elected school boards, unhappy but powerful teachers, poor test scores in two of the schools, a seemingly healthy financial picture (but bring on the transparency), and a community that is both tuned out and frustrated.
Mohip, to his credit, professes excitement to be at D209. We welcome him.
A presence on Madison
In one of the more creative and unexpected turns, Forest Park’s village government is about to take possession of a storefront on Madison Street. It comes in the form of a gift, from the current owner of the commercial condo at 7410 Madison St., to the village.
The space, in a quite new mixed-use building on the street, most recently housed a cigar store and lounge. The village will take the space off the tax rolls and make minor updates to the interior and its systems.
Then it will offer the space to possibly three local nonprofits who will benefit from the exposure and access of being on the main commercial strip in town. The Forest Park Chamber of Commerce will be making a return to Madison. Also likely moving in will be the Historical Society of Forest Park and the Forest Park Arts Alliance. The village may also use a meeting space in the storefront as a place to meet prospective new businesses considering locating in town.
This is an altogether positive move that elevates key nonprofits and centers Madison Street as the hub of Forest Park.