Campaign for charter school amendment: The heat is on
To provide a sense of the pressure under way to prod 10 House members to change their votes on the controversial charter school amendment, I would like to share with you — in the inimitable phrasing of Judith Viorst – my terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
It began late Wednesday night with my decision to tear up the Monday print education op-ed page and refocus it on the bitter charter school amendment debate. Earlier Wednesday, the House had failed to pass the amendment by 10 votes after emotional floor speeches. The House Leadership made it clear that it was not going to accept defeat in its march to greater school choice in Georgia, and would reposition the amendment for a second vote this week.
In addition to writing and moderating this blog, I assemble and edit the Monday education op-ed page for the print edition. My deadline is Thursday evening. The Feb. 13 page was already edited and ready, but I thought the amendment battle was important enough to tear it up and ask the designers to redo it.
I decided to pair a pro charter amendment piece — the one I posted here by the sponsor state Rep. Jan Jones of Milton — with a con by another lawmaker.
But Thursday afternoon, the author of the con piece asked me not to run it in the newspaper, saying that it would marginalize him with his colleagues. Even though I had edited the piece, a line editor had also read and edited it and a designer had placed it on the page, we pulled it.
I fell back on Plan B. One of the education organizations had sent me several requests to run an op-ed it had written criticizing the chamber’s role in pushing House Resolution 1162. So, that piece was substituted. The designer did the Monday ed page for a third time.
And then, watching my 13-year-old play volleyball at Meadowcreek High at 8p.m., I received a call from the education group. Please pull its piece as well. (I then came home to a husband with food poisoning from a bad mussel at a Decatur restaurant but I will leave out those grisly details.)
So, the designer — who will probably never speak to me again — had to junk design No. 3, and I had to start anew as soon as I arrived home from Norcross. (It was also my oldest’s birthday, hence the restaurant dinner that I missed to be in Norcross with my younger daughter. I sang one chorus of “Happy Birthday” and went to work on creating a new page.)
In my entire career, I have never had two op-eds collapse in a single day.
But then again, I have rarely seen this much pressure exerted on an education issue. It makes me wonder how great our schools could be if the House leadership could get this impassioned about education in general rather than just about charters.
Given the magnitude of the political pressure on opponents of HR 1162, I think it will pass this week when it is put to a reconsideration vote in the House.
–From Maureen Downey, for the AJC Get Schooled blog
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116 comments Add your comment
MS Man
February 13th, 2012
9:00 pm
Its really a shame that this resolution will pass because they feel so strongly that school systems can’t do right. This amendment is not really about choice, its about a handful of charters that want to take the money from local boards. Charters, in GA, are really about selecting who attends and creating enclaves for “special” groups. Charters arose out of a desire to allow flexibility from teacher unions and their policies that hamstrung school boards in Minnesota, NY, and other large cities. Georgia doesn’t have those issues. It is also frustrating that there are just as many bad charters as there are good ones and there is no discussion about differentiating between good and bad. GCSA and the National charter Organization talked at the conference this summer about the importance of governance and oversight to ensure funds are used appropriately in charters. GA is heading down the road of throwing money at charter management organizations that will have little oversight and accountability. The Charter Commission will NOT exercise much control or oversight over charters across the state, that is why local boards are authorizing agents. It would be wiser to pass legislation that put more pressure on local boards and local schools to be innovative and to be free from the bonds of Ttitle 20 and other state regulations rather than throwing the baby out with the bath water. I don’t the average tax payer understands that this resolution will take money you are paying to your local board and give it to a school somewhere else that doesn’t necessarily serve you or your kids and you will have no control over it at all. The choice advocates are confusing the issue instead of clarifying it with this amendment. John Q. Taxpayer isn’t getting all the facts.
Mary Elizabeth
February 13th, 2012
9:14 pm
I posted the followed, related to HR 1162 on Kyle Wingfield’s blog at 3:15 pm today. I am reposting it here, with slight editing.
===============================================================
Plan B: “. . .if a local board doesn’t follow that commission’s recommendation, the board could find itself receiving significantly less state education money.”
===============================================================
I hope that I am not the only citizen who sees a “bully tactic” at work in Plan B, which would continue to insist upon some form of State Commission for charter schools review. I do not see this issue as a conflict between “the educational establishment trying to protect its turf” vs. innovative ideas in education, offered mainly through public charter schools.
I see this issue as a conflict between sustaining public education, itself, which serves the “common good” of all citizens through taxes levied on all citizens vs. having special interests educate select children through establishing “public” charter schools, which are often operated by private enterprise.
As a taxpayer, I have no objection to paying my property taxes to serve the common interests of society through public schools (even though I have no child in school), but I do object to having my tax money used toward backing so-called “public” charter schools, that are now (or will be in the future) operated by private enterprise, which has its own special interests to safeguard. (See link below.) However, I have no objection to charter schools which are established by local Boards of Education. These charter schools would work in harmony with local Boards of Education, both instructionally and financially. They would not be based on a private business ideological model, as I suspect a State Commission for Charter Schools would be, in Georgia, especially at this time, because of the heavy-handed politics, which I believe is operative behind the attempt to form a State Commission for Charter Schools.
I must state, again, that Thomas Jefferson was a proponent of public schools, paid for by taxes from all citizens. This issue involves more than “the educational establishment trying to protect its turf” but is, instead, an assault on public education, itself, as so well-stated last week by Herb Garrett, spokesman for the Superintendents of Schools of Georgia, on GPB-TV’s “The Lawmakers.” We must improve traditional public education; we must not attempt to dismantle it through backdoor tactics.
Now is the time for legislators not to be afraid of what their colleagues will think, and vote their own consciences, as statesmen and stateswomen, for the long-ranged continuation of public education, in reality, in Georgia.
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Be more informed about private enterprise’s interest in the charter school movement by reading the information in the following link, in full, which I found last week by googling “private business interests/charter schools.” Please do not be put off by the name of the source, but instead read for the facts and illustrations included, within.
http://www.isreview.org/issues/62/feat-charterschools.shtml
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GNGS
February 13th, 2012
9:14 pm
This amendment is not about school choice, it is about who controls school. Law has unintended consequences. You may like the party in control of state government now, but you may not like who will be in charge in twenty years. Once you lose control of your local schools, you will never get it back. What prevents the state from setting up parallel school systems in any school district? Right now, funding is an issue. If the state can siphon money away from local districts as this amendment allows, the local control will be a thing of past.
KIM
February 13th, 2012
9:18 pm
Your difficulty in getting the piece written speaks loudly to the issue of charter schools. it is not clear, cut and tied up. It is a complex issue and one that needs much closer scrutiny than the public has given it. The questions begs to decifer: should funds tied to public education go to charter schools that function in all ways as if they are private schools? You will never be able to write a perfect piece on this and the politicians playing with their own position are just playing politics…again.
irisheyes
February 13th, 2012
9:29 pm
” (It makes me wonder how great our schools could be if the House leadership could get this impassioned about education in general rather than just about charters.)”
That, Maureen, says it all.
Dred Scott
February 13th, 2012
9:46 pm
One Tuesday, June 21, Newark Mayor Cory Booker addressed the crowd at the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools’ 2011 National Charter Schools Conference.
We have underestimated the profound genius, the infinite capacity, the unbelievable ability of our children. One of the worst sentiments in our nation is this toxic resignation to a school system that fails children. We have become comfortable with, not mediocrity, we have become comfortable with failure.
It is time for a wakeup call. And folks don’t like to be woken up. My dad used to it to me all the time. You don’t like to be woken up. You get angry. You get frustrated. People like being comfortable. But we are here to disturb the comfortable. We are here to wake people up to the truth of our nation. We were not born for mediocrity. We were not born to fit in. We were born to stand out. This is the call of America. This is the call of our country, and our children say it every single day, like a call to our consciousness; like a demand upon our moral imagination. They say it from Newark to Oakland, those five words: Liberty and justice for all. But we are failing in that.
We fought the greatest war on American soil for the liberation of our people but yet we imprison more and more of our own in the prison of ignorance every single day, snuffing out their options and their potential.
They do not let their fear grow bigger than their faith. They do not let their inability to do everything undermine their ability to do something.
Don’t tell me there is something in America we cannot do. But woe to the people who want to protect the status quo. Woe to the people who want to defend mediocrity and failure. Woe to the people who want to attack others for trying a different way.
We are a nation that was born from innovation; innovation of our ideals, innovation of agriculture, innovation in industry, innovation in science and technology. Why has the one sector of our society most in need of innovation been left in the agrarian age, and that is education? No more!
But I would be irresponsible if I didn’t make one point. We are part of a charter school community that’s under attack in every single state. We are a part of a charter school community that is trying to show the nation not that we’re better than anybody but that our children—our children—should be our focus.
If we become a sclerotic movement, if we become an establishment that begins to protect charter schools just because they are a charter school, then we have failed as a movement. A charter school must be a school of accountability. A charter school must be a school of excellence. We cannot protect mediocrity or failure within the charter movement.
MAY
February 13th, 2012
10:14 pm
I, too, heard Mayor Cory Booker in 2011 and the Oprah show before that. Thank you for reminding me why I want to continue to make calls and support this change. I will keep my fingers crossed that HR1162 passes this week upon reconsideration.
Rick in ATL
February 13th, 2012
10:18 pm
Wow, there are more dinosaurs here than Fernbank. This is where the bitter, dwindling anti-charter, anti-choice faction comes to kvetch about how diverting “resources” away from traditional public schools will prevent those schools from succeeding, as if those schools’ decades-long record of consistent failure was about to reverse course AT ANY MOMENT NOW, if only a few thousand more dollars per student could be carefully placed on the pyre and then set aflame!
You don’t see which way the wind is blowing because you have your heads where–well, where wind isn’t much of a factor. But this IS happening. Parents and taxpayers are finally saying no to your traditional public-school model because now, at long last, we really can no longer afford your wretchedly uncompetitive graduates.
The world is driving Chryslers–Clint Eastwood told me so!–and GA public schools are still making Trabants. What did you THINK was going to happen?
If you didn’t have five absolutely pathetic SUPCO justices as allies you might have postponed this day of reckoning, but their outrageously inappropriate activism energized the pro-school-choice factions. Thanks, judges! You disgraced yourselves, but hastened a much-needed evolution.
Brace yourselves, Whinysauruses–extinction approaches. It’s just sad it’s so long overdue.
3schoolkids
February 13th, 2012
10:21 pm
Here, read this it explains everything.
http://www.gppf.org/article.asp?RT=&p=pub/Education/EdImpact120206.html
The amendment would ensure taxpayers that the State is reaffirming its full authority to monitor all schools, not simply to authorize charters and steer local funds their way. It is being billed as an amendment to “fix” the constitution.
The Georgia Public Policy foundation also has a Charter Startup Manual that makes for interesting reading. Every argument for charters that has been posted on this blog looks like it was practically copied and pasted from the “manual”. I’m sure with all the money being thrown at it we’ll see it on the ballot in November.
Rick in ATL
February 13th, 2012
10:34 pm
Wow, Cory Booker. My man. Can we please clone him? And send Cloned Cory Bookers to every black inner-city neighborhood in America?
When I played against black players as a high school athlete, I couldn’t tell if they were more genetically gifted, but I knew they sure as hell wanted it more, expected to prevail against me and my white teammates, were mentally tougher, and generally played with more effort than we did. Sports for me were fun; for those athletes, they were much more important; it’s how they measured themselves in the larger world.
If blacks ever decide they want to dominate classrooms the way they decided to dominate sports and entertainment (where their skill and popularity is wholly out of proportion to their numbers), watch out. I hope that day comes, and IF it comes, it’ll be because of the Cory Bookers out there.
historydawg
February 13th, 2012
10:34 pm
Rick, it is nice that you resort to name calling and simplistic headlines when the evidence is clearly against your opinion. Portraying folks who have a brain and understand the history and realities of education as “dinosaurs” is childish and clearly representative of all that is gross about our democracy.
Atlanta Mom
February 13th, 2012
10:37 pm
My representative did not vote for this legislation. When I emailed her afterward, she stated:
Thanks ____ You must trust me on how important it is to be able to say I have heard from my constituent on so many topics. I got more than 1,000 emails asking me to vote yes…with no address of course.
If you don’t want this legislation passed, you must contact your representative.
Mary Elizabeth
February 13th, 2012
10:47 pm
Dred Scott, 9:46
“We are a part of a charter school community that is trying to show the nation not that we’re better than anybody but that our children—our children—should be our focus.”
======================================================
And that is, precisely, why we need to support public schools in this nation. When private enterprise invests in the education of children, then the profit margin becomes the focus, not the children. I am supportive of charter schools which work in harmony with local Boards of Education, but I am not supportive of a charter school movement that would, ultimately, create the privatization of America’s schools by business enterprise. Alexander Hamilton might support that, but Thomas Jefferson would not. It is Jefferson whom we remember today, and not Hamilton, because Jefferson’s vision centered on the expansion of and freedom of thought. Private enterprise centers on profit. Children must not be used for profit. Public schools must not be dismantled.
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From the link I posted, above, at 9:15 pm:
“The New York Times, in an editorial titled ‘Exploding the Charter School Myth,’ uses statistics from the National Assessment of Educational Progress to argue that fourth-graders in freestanding charter schools showed worse performance than their public school counterparts in math and reading scores. (The data were different, however, for those students in charter schools affiliated with public school districts.)”
Atlanta Mom
February 13th, 2012
10:53 pm
@Ric Rick in ATL
” This is where the bitter, dwindling anti-charter, anti-choice faction comes to kvetch about how diverting “resources” away from traditional public schools will prevent those schools from succeeding”
Or not.
This is where people who have read the studies and understand that most of the postive results from charter schools are the result of charter school not educating ” all comers”
We need to talk about how to educate the poor. That is the issue.
3schoolkids
February 13th, 2012
10:55 pm
From the AJC article “Lobbyists Handouts not Fully Disclosed”:
On Jan. 17, the Georgia Charter Schools Association booked a banquet hall at the Depot and invited lawmakers for refreshments and a showing of the documentary “Waiting for Superman.” The association was in the midst of an intense lobbying campaign for a constitutional amendment restoring the state’s ability to create charter schools; even though it has several registered lobbyists, the association did not disclose how much it spent on the event.
Atlanta Mom
February 13th, 2012
11:02 pm
Maureen,
You should have asked Mary Elizabeth to offer a alternative view
Dred Scott
February 13th, 2012
11:32 pm
Mary E: All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.
- thomas jefferson
Charter Schools are PUBLIC Schools
February 13th, 2012
11:58 pm
Mary Elizabeth,
Please, please, please read the Georgia Department of Education charter school FAQ (see link below). It will help you craft a more believable argument if you know the basic governance facts about Georgia charter schools.
It will also help you determine credible sources (a GPS benchmark!). The International Socialist Review article you quote above is certainly going to have a bias against charter schools, and that bias shows through in their incorrect statements about charter school governance.
http://public.doe.k12.ga.us/External-Affairs-and-Policy/Charter-Schools/Pages/General-FAQ.aspx
From the link above:
“Who runs a charter school?”
“A non-profit governing board holds the charter for the school. The governing board is responsible for ensuring that academic performance measures set forth in the charter are met. The governing board’s duties and responsibilities include school-level decision making, fiscal management, and a variety of school operations such as personnel decisions”
“What authority does the board have if the school contracts with an educational management organization (“EMO”)?”
“The charter school’s governing board has the decision making authority, not the EMO. EMO representatives cannot sit on the governing board of a charter school, as this presents a conflict of interest.”
Brandy
February 14th, 2012
12:36 am
I’m going to say it again and I’ll keep saying it, even though no one really listens: this is legal segregation, plain and simple.
This is no different from when cities and districts split into smaller districts to try to get around desegregation. “Our kids need to be with kids like them”. Like them, like them, like them. Yeah, that’s going to work. Eventually, these charters will be forced to accept any and all comers (including the disabled, the “bad”, and the less than academically minded) and, whoops!, the schools won’t be shinning stars of success. It happened when we tried to get around desegregation and it will happen again; maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but it WILL happen.
Instead, what if we, gasp!, invested this energy in struggling public schools? Perhaps we could improve them instead of improving charter schools at the expense of the public schools.
Now, if you want your kid to have what you deem a world class education you have a plethora of options that existed long before anyone thought up school choice: private or parochial school, homeschool, enrichment outside the school day, moving to a school zone you approve of, and getting involved in the school board and fighting for changes you want made that those who elected you approve. All of these might cost you more money, but let’s face facts. Your kids aren’t guaranteed a world class education–they are guaranteed a free, appropriate, public education. Anything beyond that is your responsibility.
Ok, go ahead and criticize what I’ve said. You’re still not going to change my mind and you still aren’t fixing the problems.
Like I said before...
February 14th, 2012
1:11 am
Dr. Steve Perry has a high performing magnet school. Get the book and duplicate!! Just saying.
MannyT
February 14th, 2012
1:53 am
If I really want something new, I have to divert money from an existing activity. I do not get to tell someone else to pay for it. Why can’t the state politicians fund the next year’s worth of charter schools from another bucket? Why do they have to take the money from the existing schools?
If the feds did this, you would hear scream of “unfunded mandates” all day.
I am not against charter schools. I am against taking these funds from existing schools at this time.
ScienceTeacher671
February 14th, 2012
4:37 am
The representatives who are against this are afraid to speak publicly about their opposition?
Georgia’s education associations are afraid to speak publicly about their opposition?
If the advocates for public education are afraid to take a stand publicly, where does that leave the rest of us?
I’ve always heard that people get the government they deserve. In Georgia, we apparently do not deserve leaders with the courage of their convictions.
SAD.
Special Interest
February 14th, 2012
6:09 am
More special interest hype.
ScienceTeacher671
February 14th, 2012
6:41 am
Perhaps we should give up the idea of local control altogether, and have the state own and fund all public schools in the state.
At least then they would all be funded equally. Or at least equitably.
mift
February 14th, 2012
6:54 am
Maureen,
As many have said.. there must be balance in this debate in the ATL media. We have not really heard why school districts are opposed. I am sure there are some school supers who are eager to have their voices heard. The issue is not as simple as the money follows the student as many charter advocates contend.
catlady
February 14th, 2012
7:03 am
Many of you know I have not been a fan of “charter schools,” and Mary Elizabeth well stated why. I am completely opposed to “for profit” charter schools. Period. However, I AM coming around to believing in giving parent-initiated charter schools a chance, under certain conditions; foremost, that they be open to every child in the district, and that they are unable to dismiss a student back to the “regular” schools. There is a movement in my area to start a charter school. This effort is being led by parents and former educators. THIS TYPE of charter school has my support. Unfortunately, the school board sees this as a threat to the money they control, and thus to the education they provide the other students (who knows, other communities within the system might want their own schools, instead of busing all the kids to town every day). For this reason, a state charter school commission would be helpful in securing the funding, and in letting the ideas/curriculum/methods of this charter school be tested here, on a very local basis.
It seems like to me, the only charter schools that BOEs are willing to okay are those for the very rich (Reynolds Plantation) or the poor/black that no one wants to deal with. Those in between are too valuable to “lose” to the charter school.
catlady
February 14th, 2012
7:05 am
Why is my comment awaiting moderation? Have I been intemporate in the past?
C Jae of EAV
February 14th, 2012
8:01 am
@Maureen – Your discription of the struggle pulling together the op-ed piece for the print edition, highlights everything thats wrong with this present public policy debate.
I would suggest to you that many opposed to voting for this admendment have flimsy arguements for doing so. Why be so afraid of standing on your position? Furthermore, this particular issue has turned into a HUGE poltical bargining chip!
At this stage I’m inclinded to say enough with the grandstanding, vote up amendment and put it before the voters of the state and let us deside!!! Clearly our elected representatives are more concerned with their own individual poltical interests.
C Jae of EAV
February 14th, 2012
8:08 am
@MS Man – GA has worse issues than what you describe. Public education in GA is hamstrung by deeply entrenched political & business interests in the status quo. Many local BOE’s across this state are perpetual thief-dom’s that often thumb their nose at the will of the people they are purported to serve.
C Jae of EAV
February 14th, 2012
8:25 am
@Mary Elizabeth – The point in all of this that I think you consistently fail to acknowledge is that private enterprise has over the last ten years has invested HEAVILY in public education and not just via the charter school movement. Heck there are many businesses (of all shapes and sizes) across this country that would not exist but for business contracts with public education entities! Thus as I’ve repeatedly referenced to you public education has become BIG BUSINESS!!! Look at how large districts (APS as a local example) rabidly chase after grants from large foundations like that of the Walton’s & the Gate’s, which often have profound impacts to how public policy is conducted. Add to that technology contracts, book contracts, food service contracts, transportation contracts, not the mention the myriad of “expert consultants” hired to come in and reorganize business/governance structures of central offices which only seem to succeed in telling local BOE’s what they already know, they operate in-efficiently.
We don’t like to hear it but it’s a fact with which we much contend. The public education landscape is changing and I agree with you that an environment of collaboration among a mix of traditional & charter public institutions WILL result. The harder I see those heavily vested in the present model perpetuating itself with little reform, the more I have the question the motives of those stakeholders. It’s not enough for me to see an individual or group reject an idea without offering anything substantial in rebuttal as an alternative to deal with the real concerns on the table regarding public education governance and academic achievement. Asking people to hang on for the by and by while suffering more of the same is no longer a idea that can be allowed to rule the day.
teacher&mom
February 14th, 2012
8:31 am
“But then again, I have rarely seen this much pressure exerted on an education issue. (It makes me wonder how great our schools could be if the House leadership could get this impassioned about education in general rather than just about charters.)”
Well said and duly noted.
The House members may bend on this vote but they will pay a price. This may be THE VOTE that swings control of the Gold Dome to more capable hands. In the past week, I’ve heard more comments against this vote from parents and non-educators.
Jan Jones, Chip Rogers, and others may be “influenced” by Students First and various Charter School representatives but…at the end of they day, it is the voter who will decide their fate.
Voters in rural communities are tired of the shenanigans under the Gold Dome.
chuck
February 14th, 2012
8:54 am
Maureen,
I know this is not on the topic at hand, but I have a concern with what I am hearing about the new “teacher evaluation” system that is being piloted and was wondering if you could confirm it or debunk it for us. A teacher friend in a county that is piloting the program told me that the “student growth” portion of the evaluation in middle school will be based on an average of previous 2 years’ CRCT scores. For instance, in the 8th grade social studies and science teacher evaluations, CRCT scores for 6th and 7th grade will be AVERAGED, and teachers will get a poor evaluation if the 8th grade score is not higher than that average. From a statistical standpoint, this is LUDICROUS. We do not have a “3 year curriculum”. It is IMPOSSIBLE for there to be ANY statistically appropriate measure using this model. The 6th and 7th grade social studies curriculum is WORLD STUDIES. 6th grade does western hemisphere, 7th grade does eastern hemisphere. How does THAT line up with Georgia Studies?!?!?, the 8th grade course. I have no problem with the growth model IF we give the CRCT at the beginning of the year and again at the end of the year. My students will show SIGNIFICANT GROWTH. This model is akin to evaluating a science teacher on how well the students do on the English test. It makes no sense.
In addition, STUDENTS will evaluate us, yet we don’t know what questions will be asked NOR will we get the results of that evaluation. How does THAT help us to improve?
Can you check this out for us? THANKS
APS Parent
February 14th, 2012
9:00 am
The suburban Metro Atlanta Republican leadership has apparently brought great pressure to bear on their rural colleagues to vote against their own constituents’ interests and support the state charter schools constitutional amendment or risk losing any influence in the General Assembly. According to Maureen’s post, the leadership would appear to be succeeding. I don’t envy those ten legislators, but hope for the sake of public education in Georgia that they can retain the courage of their convictions.
Parent In North Fulton
February 14th, 2012
9:04 am
I have had my children in traditional public school, private school, charter school, and even home schooled for a short time. All were wonderful experiences for my children. This is an emotional issue, but I strongly feel it is one that needs to be available to the citizens of Georgia to vote on in November. The educational system in Georgia is not working. No one can debate that. Are charter schools the only answer. No.They are part of the answer. The school boards are failing. The superintendents are failing. Instead of finding the answer, they are shutting down charter schools (or making it impossible for them to exist). Allowing the school boards to take away options from parents on where they children attend school will not help. It just gives them more power and money. Take Fulton County School System. They have no Ethics Commission. They denied a Charter School with an outstanding record. Now they are re-writing the Charter rules so that they can close any charter school for basically any reason and then take the charter school assets. Go to their website, don’t take my word for it. In another Middle School they allowed child abuse to go on for years and hid it from the state. Linda Schultz knew about it, ignored it, and now says she never read the 2007 report warning the Board that the abuse was continuing. The Fulton County School System is about to pay out millions of dollars on the lawsuits…MY TAX PAYER MONEY. We sit here worried about money going to charter schools while this is going on ??? The students in a charter school are from the county that they are chartered in. If my child is going to a charter school, then my tax payer money is going to him/her…just like it would if my child was going to a traditional public school. Charter school do not tax money from other children, they are using the same money that would follow them to any public school. Charter schools fill a purpose..at a minimum more teachers are employed and schools are less crowded. The Fulton County Board needs to spend their efforts on educating and protecting our children (which they have failed at) and stop worrying about money and power. Children have been traumatized and abused and they spend their time, our money, on fighting a tiny charter school. How can they sleep at night?
Batgirl
February 14th, 2012
9:10 am
@Atlanta Mom, my representative, Thom Dickson, voted for the amendment. Mr. Dickson is a former superintendent of Whitfield County schools, so you would think he would know better. I e-mailed him and asked that he vote against it if i t came up for vote again. I also signed my name, but he has seen no need to respond to my e-mail.
Mary Elizabeth, as always, thanks for your words of wisdom.
Shar
February 14th, 2012
9:11 am
@Dred, Rick and May: There is absolutely no evidence, none, none at all, that charter schools do a better job of educating “our people” (and what an offensive, racist term that is, Mayor Booker! As if every American is not “ours”!) than do our admittedly oft-wretched traditional public schools. If there were, this would not even be a debate. But there is none. At all.
On top of that, charter schools are within reach of every American school — they just have to have local support from parents and taxpayers who will be most involved with them, either through their children or by paying for them. Traditional systems may be resistant to them (and APS was among the worst of the offenders in this regard, as in so many others), but parents, educators, private foundations and taxpayers can and do exercise their right to start charters to respond to particular community needs or experiment with high-potential ideas, and in Georgia they can appeal to the state BOE if their local systems reject their applications unreasonably.
This resolution has nothing to do with improving education, expanding choice or supporting the schoolchildren of this state. The dirty fact is that none of those considerations bring in political donations. This resolution is about political payoff and a money grab. That’s it.
The Legislature wants to pay off their political supporters in the ranks of the business community and the religious right. Both of those constituencies have been frustrated in their efforts to force local Boards to fall in line with their agendas – to put religion into the classroom, to excise references to inconvenient historical and literary reminders of when America did not behave with perfection, and to get large, efficient procurement contracts statewide. The Legislature, in turn, has long eyed the huge local budgets for schools that are derived from property taxes and are thus out of their greedy reach. With the state budgets under greater scrutiny and pressure their ability to pay off their supporters has been constricted, and they are salivating at the prospect of accessing a whole new source of payola.
The House resolution on permitting religious instruction in the classroom goes hand in hand with this charter resolution. Neither will do a single thing, offer one new opportunity, to improve the educational situation for Georgia’s children. This is all about the ability to pour money and influence into the hands of conservative supporters. As the poster said above, there may be those who think this is a good idea under the current political environment. Just wait a few years and see how you feel when the tides shift, or when the state mandates that your property taxes pay for, say, an Islamic-based school with all services and teachers provided by politically-protected factions with no local accountability.
The Legislature and the Republican leadership are pushing so hard because they can almost feel those unreachable dollars finally resting in their greedy hands. They couldn’t care less about the children or the wishes of the local taxpayers and parents.
I am not a supporter of the current incarnation of the traditional public schools, but this resolution offers nothing that is not currently available and will only open the schools to even more graft and politicization. It should be rejected.
Reader
February 14th, 2012
9:11 am
@Teacher&mom – I hope you are correct about rural voters, because they certainly stand to lose here. My fear is the wording of this proposed amendment is so ambiguous that it will lead uninformed voters who otherwise would not support it, to vote in favor. Of course, that was the intention.
@APS Parent – I hope so, too! I am eager to see where the DISCLOSED contributions to these amendment backers come from.
Maureen Downey
February 14th, 2012
9:17 am
@reader, Another reader sent me this link on the issue of contributions from charter companies to Georgia legislators
http://www.empoweredga.org/Articles/make-grade-morgan.html
Reader
February 14th, 2012
9:19 am
Thank you, Maureen. As always, you rock!
WAR
February 14th, 2012
9:25 am
wont matter because the charter schools will be overrun by children whose parents do not realize the following: teachers fail children because parents fail children. so, open charter schools on every block in Georgia and it wont matter because the same kids and parents will be in them. not much will change.
charter schools = segregation
Democrat For HR1162
February 14th, 2012
9:27 am
This is not a democrat or republican issue. It is an issue for every parent in the state of Georgia. The schools in my home zone have failed and my school district will not make it better. I drive 25 miles every day to take my daughter to a safe charter school where she is now a straight A student. This is my only option. I cannot afford private school and I will not allow my daughter to go to a school where there have been drugs, violence, and attempted rape. My school district does not report these incidents to the parents. I had to find it out from my daughter. My state representative do NOT have convictions. They are being pressured by the school board superintendent to the school board. They have told her that she will not be re-elected if she votes for HR1162. Perfect. Playing politics with my child’s life. I know that soon the school district will close my daughters school if they can. Without oversight, what will stop them? I will have to find another job and move. So to all of you who talk about “taxation without representation”. Look at what is really happening out there and start thinking about the children. I know I am, but I know the school board is not. It’s nice that people writing in this blog can be so passionate about this bill, but if you live where there are “community meetings” and PTA meetings, then don’t worry. Your children are safe. This bill and the charter schools are not going to hurt you. If you are like me, it is a life changing decision.
Batgirl
February 14th, 2012
9:32 am
Maureen, could you please tell us which education organization asked you to pull their piece opposing the amendment?
rascal
February 14th, 2012
9:34 am
How can so many sheep continue to support the 100 year failed effort at fixing public education in Georgia? Don’t you recognize that without competition, the public school monopoly does nothing except fail the kids stuck in its’ grasp. It isn’t the rich nor the “for-profit” schools that lose when you fail to open up the system to competition. It is the poor families stuck due to the zip code zoning of children into a system run by corrupt, bureaucratic-minded, teacher and administrator unions with no focus on real change, only on protecting their financial interests. Funny how these leeches protecting their interests is so highly valued by the blinded citizenry while a private businessman protecting his financial interest is demagogued as evil by the same group of people.
Rick in ATL
February 14th, 2012
9:37 am
@historydawg: What “evidence is against (my) opinion?” The resolution had a large majority of “yes” votes and, with some tweaking, will pass. In fact, I’m happily paddling with the current on this one and you’re swimming against it.
We only needed to tell local BOEs to stop denying valid charters. This resolution has become more than that, and lawmakers need to scale it back and address some of Shar’s concerns, among others. But I imagine those conversations are happening right now.
WAR
February 14th, 2012
9:38 am
charter schools provide cover for parents and children who do not want to deal with the problems of public schools. the problem however is whether charter schools will be selective or inclusive. if they are selective then the charter school will thrive. if they are inclusive, then the same problems at traditional schools will continue and the end result will be the same: failing schools.
this is why i believe charter schools = segregation, but not based on color. its based upon the well behaved kids vs the bad kids. smart kids vs kids the kids who want to be dumb. involved parents vs the latch-key parents.
chuck
February 14th, 2012
9:46 am
I have posted this before on the topic of Charter Schools. ALL of the studies show that when you control for SES (Socio-Economic Status), charter schools do not perform any better than public schools. WAR is right…this is about who we don’t want our kids to go to school with. It IS NOT about performance.
GeeMac
February 14th, 2012
9:46 am
This is from a piece written by Diane Ravitch which appeared in The Washington Post. Read the entire column at http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/ravitch-why-states-should-say-no-thanks-to-charter-schools/2012/02/12/gIQAdA3b9Q_blog.html
“* Many of the “high-performing” charter schools succeed by skimming off the best students, even in poor districts. The more they draw away the best students, the worse it is for the regular public schools, who are left with the weakest students.”
This point of Ravitch’s is what most concerns me about the charter school amendment. Especially in rural areas like mine, charter schools could decimate already struggling local systems. Why cannot we put this energy toward revitalizing and improving local systems? In my corner of the state, the charter commission has effectively re-segregated the local system using public dollars. Maybe the US DOE should come back down here to investigate why we have two public schools, funded with taxpayer dollars, directly across the street from one another, one 98% minority, the other 75% white, and neither truly reflective of our area demographics, which is roughly 60% minority and 40% white. Would a charter supporter please explain to me how this is justified?
chuck
February 14th, 2012
9:46 am
Maureen, did you read my earlier post to you?
Maureen Downey
February 14th, 2012
9:48 am
@Batgirl, It was the first time in 25 years that this group had ever asked to rescind a piece it submitted, so I am not going to name them. I understand second thoughts on writing an op-ed on a controversial issue — although I think people should have those second thoughts before they submit the piece for publication.
I have been told that some lawmakers are even telling ed groups at the Capitol that if they oppose this amendment, they can expect to see voucher bills.
The bizarre thing to me is that we have charter schools. We will continue to have charter schools whether or not this amendment passes. As I noted in my column a few weeks ago, I think it is because the local boards have been careful in approving charters that we do not have the failure rate of many other states. Are some boards too careful to the point of inertia? Yes, but that’s where local communities ought to exert pressure.
Given the increasing national attention to the mixed results of charter schools, why would the Legislature want to get into the approval process? Why not let the locals make the decision so if a charter does not work out, it falls on the locals to deal with it?
I have little confidence in the ability of the state to monitor charters it approves. And that has been the problem in many states where there are now investigations into fiscal mismanagement. In every case, the cause was the lax monitoring by the state or the state-created entity.
I can predict a newspaper series here in five years about the lack of oversight of state-approved charters, and the story will be full of finger pointing by state officials as to whose responsibility it was supposed to be to provide oversight.
I will bet lunch or dinner on it.
Maureen
Shar
February 14th, 2012
9:48 am
A Constitutional amendment requiring the parents of current students in public schools to spend a minimum of 20 hours per year volunteering at the school AND to send their children to school properly prepared to, at minimum, allow other children to learn under penalty of loss of government benefits or tax deductions would go a lot farther to improve education in Georgia’s classrooms and wouldn’t cost anything. I’d be all for that. But it wouldn’t pay off one Legislative briber – er, lobbyist.