NewOrleans , do you have anything good or bad on charter schools in MN? One of my good friends is an admin at one and I'm pretty sure they're just public schools that have a specific focus (arts, language immersion, etc).
I do, actually! Just this year, I read an article about how like 75% of them didn't meet the state proficiency goals, the achievement gap widened in like 75% of them (give or take a few %), and like half of students were not proficient in reading (but the TPS students were again, like 75% proficient).
I love when voodoo goes all Erin Brockovich in here.
I was feeling invested early on, but it set me off for real when I gave a serious series of answers and was told it was meaningless bullshit because anecdotes. Kids' civil rights are violated at every minute and people are good with it if it ***might*** benefit themselves in terms of their property values?
You know what is not desirable in any study ever? Schools with 99% poverty. You know what changed that in the communities I mentioned, charter schools. You know who benefits, all kids who go there, especially the kids who cannot move. What you are suggesting, is basically lets all wallow in the crap school and drive away the parents who have other options, and thus, the people who can help things get better. I do not consider schools with >68% reduced lunch and 85% minority to be "gentrified", but you clearly have your own definition of what is acceptable.
In the interest of fairness, I put gentrified with a ? because I don't know the area. Apologies if I was mistaken! I do NOT want to spread misinformation. I do want to correct it, though. And I tried with you, but I was apparently just "waving data." Come back when you're ready for a serious discussion!
All the neighborhoods cited in the previous comment made are gentrified neighborhoods. The Charter's here to pick and choose, and something that makes me EXTRA pissed in one Charter who constructing a fucking building, stayed for a few years, and left the building empty. Folks stay in the area because they like the people and don't want to drive 1 1/2 hours to get to work everyday.
ETA: Charters are how Fethullah Gülen makes all his money. They are not all in poorer areas either. He used to have a school in a pretty upscale part of the county, but the secular Turks had a fit* and had it shutdown.
In the interest of fairness, I put gentrified with a ? because I don't know the area. Apologies if I was mistaken! I do NOT want to spread misinformation. I do want to correct it, though. And I tried with you, but I was apparently just "waving data." Come back when you're ready for a serious discussion!
All the neighborhoods cited in the previous comment made are gentrified neighborhoods. The Charter's here to pick and choose, and something that makes me EXTRA pissed in one Charter who constructing a fucking building, stayed for a few years, and left the building empty. Folks stay in the area because they like the people and don't want to drive 1 1/2 hours to get to work everyday.
ETA: Charters are how Fethullah Gülen makes all his money. They are not all in poorer areas either. He used to have a school in a pretty upscale part of the county, but the secular Turks had a fit* and had it shutdown.
*This was back when Gülen was tight with Erdoğan
Thanks for clarifying. In DC the charters seem to follow gentrification, they are not what leads the charge. I find it difficult to believe that many will send their children to charters in neighborhoods where it has not already been identified as an up and coming area. It is also not the catalyst for changing the community. For the successful charters the face of the community began changing first and then the young gentrifiers start having kids and whoops a school is needed and the current one is not acceptable. It still doesn't result in long term commitment though. Since it is a lottery system you still have to navigate middle and high schools. If the charters haven't yet increased the number of grades offered in time then there are a still a number that pursue private options or move to Maryland / VA suburbs.
All the neighborhoods cited in the previous comment made are gentrified neighborhoods. The Charter's here to pick and choose, and something that makes me EXTRA pissed in one Charter who constructing a fucking building, stayed for a few years, and left the building empty. Folks stay in the area because they like the people and don't want to drive 1 1/2 hours to get to work everyday.
ETA: Charters are how Fethullah Gülen makes all his money. They are not all in poorer areas either. He used to have a school in a pretty upscale part of the county, but the secular Turks had a fit* and had it shutdown.
*This was back when Gülen was tight with Erdoğan
Thanks for clarifying. In DC the charters seem to follow gentrification, they are not what leads the charge. I find it difficult to believe that many will send their children to charters in neighborhoods where it has not already been identified as an up and coming area. It is also not the catalyst for changing the community. For the successful charters the face of the community began changing first and then the young gentrifiers start having kids and whoops a school is needed and the current one is not acceptable. It still doesn't result in long term commitment though. Since it is a lottery system you still have to navigate middle and high schools. If the charters haven't yet increased the number of grades offered in time then there are a still a number that pursue private options or move to Maryland / VA suburbs.
A group of parents in Grant Park , went to the Principal of the local public school, when their kids were toddlers asking how they could help. They were like" We aren't moving to the burbs, who do we need to write to, how can we volunteer, we want this school to be great. " I would also like to touch on a point made in one of the earlier discussions we had where people see majority minority schools and automatically assume they are subpar.
Does "charter school" mean the same thing everywhere? DD attends a charter school that does have a board of directors, but is still also a denver public school. It was started to offer an elementary school in an area is undeserved (downtown denver) and draws students from all 27 denver zip codes and more. I can't say if it's really changed the neighborhood (it's only the 3rd year) but there hasn't been a school in downtown in many, many years and it's offering opportunities to children who wouldn't otherwise get them. Their goal is to have 50% FRL and they're at 35% right now I think. The first 3 years a school can't prioritize any students in the lottery, but they'll start prioritizing FRL when they can. We do have to lottery to get in, but we have to lottery into any of our neighborhood schools too so it's not any different for us. We chose it because it's an expeditionary learning school and has much more diversity than our neighborhood schools do.
Post by cookiemdough on Dec 14, 2015 12:13:14 GMT -5
I have to say the not-prioritizing in bound students kind of bothers me. If the goL is to provide a better option,shouldn't the people who live there get that option?
I am sure there are abuses, but what I see here, is that charters have the ability to transform communities, especially those where the schools are awful, and the city has not been able to improve them for many years. Great schools is not working correctly for me right now, or I could give some examples. If someone makes money on them, like the guy running a major operation and getting paid $475K, I am fine with that because the increase in property values, and thus, tax revenues, not to mention actually educating kids, rather than warehousing them, is worth 100X that from a societal standpoint. The schools I am familiar with are not run by for profit companies, but if the guy is saying that charters are buying the schools from the government, using the money that the government gives them to educate kids, then maybe governments should look for ways work better with charters to use existing facilities, where the land doesn't have to be transferred. The district next to us has all kinds of empty campuses, other schools (charter and private) would love to use, but they make it so hard, that it is essentially impossible. So empty they sit, like giant mausoleums to failure.
I have to wonder where you are. This is not my experience or my immediate family's experience with Charter schools in two states. Private schools maybe - mostly catholic/Christian - but not charters. Charters are not community builders, they are alternatives for more affluent people to build their own school and still not expand into the community to lower socio-economic areas or attract long-term, highly educated teachers. They are usually run like a company/business more than a school and therefore fall short on adding useful infrastructure/community buildings, help for those students who are having trouble achieving, don't take on any of the costs of special education or special needs, and indiscriminately kick out kids or make it hard for kids to stay who aren't easy b/c they don't have to deal with their baggage.
ETA: Whoops, I should have read first. Looks like you have discussed a lot of this.
Does "charter school" mean the same thing everywhere? DD attends a charter school that does have a board of directors, but is still also a denver public school. It was started to offer an elementary school in an area is undeserved (downtown denver) and draws students from all 27 denver zip codes and more. I can't say if it's really changed the neighborhood (it's only the 3rd year) but there hasn't been a school in downtown in many, many years and it's offering opportunities to children who wouldn't otherwise get them. Their goal is to have 50% FRL and they're at 35% right now I think. The first 3 years a school can't prioritize any students in the lottery, but they'll start prioritizing FRL when they can. We do have to lottery to get in, but we have to lottery into any of our neighborhood schools too so it's not any different for us. We chose it because it's an expeditionary learning school and has much more diversity than our neighborhood schools do.
Pretty much means the same everywhere. There are variations. Some are schools that got converted to a charter because they were failing or whatnot. Some are entrepreneurial startups. They're all directed by a board (sometimes it's the state board of ed, sometimes it's an appointed [corporate?] board. And sometimes it's managed by for-profit management companies.
I think another problem with charters is that kids don't tend to stay in the same school (like, they transfer out). I remember in particular KIPP had a big turnover. I don't know any exact numbers or details on why there was so much turnover, though.
All the neighborhoods cited in the previous comment made are gentrified neighborhoods. The Charter's here to pick and choose, and something that makes me EXTRA pissed in one Charter who constructing a fucking building, stayed for a few years, and left the building empty. Folks stay in the area because they like the people and don't want to drive 1 1/2 hours to get to work everyday.
ETA: Charters are how Fethullah Gülen makes all his money. They are not all in poorer areas either. He used to have a school in a pretty upscale part of the county, but the secular Turks had a fit* and had it shutdown.
*This was back when Gülen was tight with Erdoğan
THanks for the clarification. I suspected gentrification but didn't want to talk out of my ass.
@kirkette I hope you'll talk more about the ELi Broad stuff to fill me in.
Most definitely! Ooh, you know I'm watching that stuff like a hawk! I will keep you, and the board, posted as stuff rolls in around LA. My gut tells me it's going to be a complete mess. I predict for every 1 quality charter school that pops up, there will be 5+ shark charters that are in it for the wrong reasons. Call my cynical, but I think I'm being realistic. It's sad.
Sadly I think you are right.
We don't have charters in my county and have neighborhood schools. Do you know what neighborhood schools build, cohesive communities. The developer of my subdivision knew this. that's why he donated land for a public school. It is the focal point of our community. Where gossip is shared at the hook up line, fundraising efforts directed, etc. Charters pluck kids out of their community. Why would should I be vested in my community (the streets, the landscaping, the politicians) if I'm not part of the the glue of the community--the school?
The neighboring county has charters. They can't stop charters but have tried to use charters to at least handle the growth in some parts of the county, but do you know where the charter operators want to open shop? In the wealthier parts of towns.. not the parts of town that have had huge population growth and over-flowing neighborhood schools.
These charters have also been accused of "counseling out" the kids who aren't going to pass the state test sending them back to their neighborhood schools with just days left in the school year. They may be legally obligated to educate special ed kids, but how many kids with Downs or Apraxia are in the charters? None. Additionally, the charters are on the same playing field. Many have corporate sponsors, etc which means they are spending more per kid since the local PTOs can't raise that sort of $$$. Additionally, there can be hidden fees to attend these schools that keep the poorest of the poor out, like uniforms, books fees, etc.
Charters can't solve poverty. They can't solve transient families. I wish Zuckerberg had spent his $100M in Newark insuring that every kid had the same roof over their head for 13 years. You know what would have happened.. those kids would have had phenomenal results instead of consultants getting rich and nothing changing.
Adding- I was sent on a teacher field trip to a Charter school and some of what I saw was pretty neat and innovative, HOWEVER I thought at the time, and still do, that the fact that they could require parental involvement, remove kids who were disruptive, and worked their teachers to the bone, made any comparison to my own school seem absurd. Yes, of course they had some good results- any child whose parents didn't show up for 10 hours a month or a child who had behavioral issues was asked to leave the school. That, my friends, is called skewing the results. They were no longer controlling for all the variables in the comparison!
And despite the fact that I was already working to my ultimate human limits as a public school teacher, the teachers at the Charter were working even more- it sounded like they never went home. They worked full days, stayed late into the evenings, were expected to run clubs and activities before school and on weekends. They were pretty much all 21-25 years old, single, and childless, without education degrees. I wonder how many of them are still teaching now, six years later? I'm guessing very few.
But their student handbell choir was quite lovely. (said semi-snarkily and I'll own that.)
another huge issue here with charters is the "no excuses" discipline. It looks a lot like prison. Kids are given "demerits" for not making eye contact who cares if they have aspergers...