Big Social Studies Gap At Hinsdale Central, South

HINSDALE, IL – For more than a year, a school district committee looked into possible gaps in opportunities at Hinsdale Central and South high schools.

Last spring, the committee conceded it failed to get good data on the schools' rates of fulfilling course requests. It then disbanded.

But a couple of Burr Ridge residents continue to make the case that South gets a raw deal compared to Central.

At this week's school board meeting, Adolph and Elena Galinski told the school board about a disparity they see in social studies offerings.

In August, district officials celebrated a report that showed an increase in students taking Advanced Placement tests.

But the Galinskis noted 40 Central students took the AP World History exam last spring. No South students did.

Over the last three years, the district saw 136 takers of the AP World History exam. Zero were from South.

The couple said that public records show that from 2014 to 2024, 384 Central freshmen took the AP World History exam. Only two South ninth-graders did.

They pointed to the fact that Central offers World History Honors, which is seen as more aligned with the AP test. South has World Studies Honors, which is considered unaligned.

In 2025, the board was poised to offer World History Honors at South, but ultimately decided against doing so.

Two years before that, the social studies faculty at the two campuses recommended aligning their curricula, which the board rejected.

"World History Honors provides a concrete test of that unresolved (committee) problem," Adolph Galinksi told the board. "Central students can enroll in World History Honors; South students cannot. The participation disparity has persisted year after year."

He continued, "Course access must be fair and nondiscriminatory. That cannot be determined simply by whether a course appears in a program of studies, whether a student technically can register for an exam, or whether participants earn high scores. Achievement among participants is not the same thing as access to participate."

The Galinskis have spoken to the board for years about the district's disparity. Their children have also weighed in.

In June 2025, Patch pointed to the district's widely varying statistics in the previous year for course conflicts at Central and South.

Earlier that same month, the administration contended the district had largely wiped away course disparities between the schools. The smaller South has long gotten the short end of the stick.

After Patch's June 2025 story, the district largely backed away from its numbers. And Catherine Greenspon, the board's president, said bad data "completely erodes and degrades trust in our district."

Central offers a greater course selection because its enrollment doubles South's.

A third of South's students come from low-income families, compared with 9 percent at Central.

Board members have long dismissed proposals to change school attendance boundaries to balance enrollments. Only two of the board's seven members come from the South zone.