In Defense of Teachers What charter schools really tell us about education reform

Raina Kelley:

I think it's fair to say that most people know we're in the midst of an educational emergency. Just this week, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan told CNN, "There isn't one urban school district in the country--Chicago, L.A., New York, D.C., Philly, Baltimore--there's not one urban system yet where the dropout rate is low enough and the graduation rate is high enough." And for those people who work in the school system, no issue has come to represent the struggle to save public education more than the fight over charter schools. For the sake of clarity, let me just note that a charter school is one which uses public funds to run a school that is managed privately, thus giving them the freedom to experiment as well as hire nonunion teachers. Charters such as the Harlem Children's Zone HCZ in New York have longer school days (and a longer school year) with kids often required to come in Saturdays to work with tutors. The most successful charter schools (and they are not all the same in either quality or mission) have produced stunning results. At the Harlem Success Academy, 100 percent of third graders passed their state math exam and 95 percent passed the state English exam.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at May 29, 2010 2:13 AM
Subscribe to this site via RSS/Atom: Newsletter signup | Send us your ideas