Orleans Parish School Board fighting for relevance in charter-dominated system

[funkybutt]

Source: Times Picayune, New Orleans

The Orleans Parish School Board's new proposal to operate Charles R. Drew Elementary School signifies more than an attempt by a sidelined player to get a piece of the action in a field dominated by the state and dozens of independent charter operators.

It is a symptom of a mounting unease over the lack of details and formal public conversation so far about who -- or what -- will govern the city's public schools in the future.

-snip-

The state-run Recovery School District now runs Drew, but district officials said this month that the school's lower grades would be turned over to a charter operator. The 9th Ward school is one of more than a hundred programs the state took over from the School Board in the months after Hurricane Katrina.

Read more: http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2009/03/orleans_parish_school_board_wa.html

[biopowertoday]

1. I distrust charter schools --which are run

in the shadows---away from the public for the most part. Yet they receive Federal funds.
Arne Duncan is our new school czar who favors charter schools.

............. "There must always be local, elected accountability, " Bonin said. Without that, he said, "you have the potential to lose touch with the community."

Pastorek has never said that he wants to eliminate the School Board. But he and other leaders have hinted at a future where it does not directly manage many schools, but instead focuses on broader policy issues, such as school admissions practices.

In the meantime, widespread chartering has, in effect, insulated most city schools from the prospect of being returned to board oversight any time soon, said Recovery District Superintendent Paul Vallas. Because charters contract directly with the state, the local board would have to get the state board of education to revoke charters of each school individually -- an unlikely prospect, politically.

"This (newly elected) school board is a good school board, " Vallas said. "And these new members are good guys. Hopefully they'll be educated and maybe they'll see that it's in their best interest to wither away or evolve.

"Sometimes you can't fix things. Sometimes you just have to start all over."

School Board President Woody Koppel said the board does not intend to "sit idly by" and wait for someone else to determine its fate.

"I believe we need an opportunity, as a community, to openly govern our schools, " he said. "I think that people want to have schools that are run by people who live near them."

[jody]

2. What has CA done with 750 charter schools serving over 276,000 charter school students?

http://www.myschool.org/AM/ContentManagerNet/Default.aspx?Section=About_Charter_Schools&Template=/TaggedPage/TaggedPageDisplay.cfm&TPLID=2&ContentID=3538