CHICAGO URBAN LEAGUE

The Chicago Urban League supports and advocates for economic, educational and social progress for African Americans through our agenda focused exclusively on economic empowerment as the key driver for social change.

The Chicago Urban League provides African Americans with the tools, the programs and the experiences to help them reach their full economic potential. We are committed to growing Chicago's African-American workforce and business community with well-informed pursuit of the following four strategies:

Ensuring that African-American children are well-educated and prepared to lead in the global economy; Helping individuals and families attain economic empowerment through employment, homeownership, entrepreneurship and wealth accumulation; Advocating for policies and programs that ensure equal participation by African Americans in the economic and social mainstream; Creating positive cultural images.

The Chicago Urban League (CUL) was one of the first affiliates of the National Urban League (NUL) organized in this country to address the needs of African Americans migrating from the rural South to the northern cities in unprecedented numbers at the dawn of the 20th century. As noted by Arvarh E. Strickland in his History of the Chicago Urban League (University of Illinois Press, 1966), the Chicago affiliate's establishment was seen as an important step in the NUL's program of expansion and as a base of operations for movement into the Middle West and parts of the West.

During Berry's tenure, the League purchased a building at 4500 South Michigan Avenue to become its new headquarters. In 1972, James W. Compton became the League's executive director and was elected president and chief executive officer six years later. The League built a new headquarters at 4510 South Michigan Avenue, which opened in January 1984.

In the fall of 2006, Cheryle Robinson Jackson became the first woman to be elected president and chief executive officer of the Chicago Urban League. In February 2007, Ms. Jackson announced the League was "getting out of the social services business" and launched ProjectNext---a new agenda focused exclusively on economic empowerment as the key driver of social change. In the fall of 2009 Herman Brewer became acting president and chief executive officer of the Urban League.

The impact of CUL's nine decades of service to Chicagoans is beyond measure, but it is illustrated by the fact that upon hearing the name of the organization, community members often comment that they (or a parent or grandparent) got their first job through the Chicago Urban League. Still true to its founding mission of advancement for those who are least advantaged in our society, today the work of CUL focuses upon education, economic development and community empowerment for African Americans, other minorities and the poor.