Seattle Schools Community Forum

I've been talking a lot about charter schools lately and both Charlie and I have been speculating what will happen to them due to the Supreme Court's final ruling that the Washington State charter law is unconstitutional.  But I did have an epiphany this morning as the thunder woke me up.  (I'll again state - I'm not a lawyer but I think the issue has been made clear by the Court.) It's really just three days left that charter schools in the state of Washington will exist as charter schools.  How do I know this? One, Monday the 14th is the likely cut-off date for state funding for the schools themselves AND their authorizers.  (I think I understand that the charters have enough state money to finish their December school month.) If a charter school has no state funding and no state oversight, under the current charter law, it's not a charter school. And, to boot, there is no charter law left. Two, the Supreme Court struck down the ENTIRE law.   There...

That was one uneventful and less-than-insightful Charter Commission meeting.

By Representative Gerry Pollet, 46 th  District: Thursday offered a “learning moment” for students in charter schools , parents  and legislators. Blue-shirted charter school students and parents came to the state capital to urge that legislators “save” their schools. Ironically, the Supreme Court released its opinion the same day reaffirming its prior unanimous opinion that charter schools were not “common schools” and its majority opinion striking down the entire charter school initiative as unconstitutional. A group of 8 or 9 Summit Sierra Charter  HS  9 th  graders and two parents were leaving my office as I returned from committee hearings. Although I had a large group waiting for their scheduled appointment with me, I didn’t want to disappoint high school students who had made the trek – and, were eager to tell me about the “unique” learning experience offered by their school. So, I stopped to engage them. It was a learning moment for me, an...

I may have mentioned it but to clarify, this "new" group, Act Now for Washington Students, is an astro-turf, Gates-funded group made up of DFER, League of Education Voters and Stand for Children.  You don't get more ed-form and Gates-guided than those three.

The Court released its ruling today and upheld its decision to strike down the charter school law.   The ruling was 6-3, 5-4. The decision in the original ruling becomes final on December 14th. The majority did strike out one footnote ( page 11, footnote 10) about the use of School District No. 20 v. Bryan.  A bit interesting as this does revolve around Article IX on funding but they were likely addressing the issue of funding for other education programs. 

Where are we with the Washington State charter law? As usual, waiting on the Supreme Court.  The last action that I see is that four former state attorneys general — Slade Gorton, Ken Eikenberry, Chris Gregoire and Rob McKenna - filed a friend of the court document, asking the Court to reconsider. This was filed right at the end of October which may have been on purpose - the Court does have to read and consider everything filed. I think the Court will politely tell all these people - thanks for the input but we got it right the first time.  They will say thanks for the input but outcomes from the ruling ("this will hurt other education initiatives the Legislature funds") fall on the Legislature to solve.  But the ruling on charters is separate from those. I think the one bone the Court will throw out is asking the Legislature to fund the existing charters thru the end of the school year.  Given how late the Court ruled on the challenge and now, the lateness o...

In what can only be called the pot calling the kettle black, ten Washington State legislators have filed an amicus brief (friend of the court) to the Washington State Supreme Court about the Court's ruling on the charter school law. Folks, apparently we may have a pissing match going on.  While I appreciate that there are some in the Legislature who really like charter schools, this kind of amount to telling someone their job.  Now perhaps some in the Legislature (maybe a majority for all we know), believe that the McCleary ruling (and all that has come after) was treading on the Legislature's delicate toes.  So maybe this is some of those legislators trying to toss this back into the Corut's face and telling THEM that they don't know how to do their jobs.  And maybe some are trying to be deliberately provocative.  It should tell us all that when January starts, charters may be the wedge to get McCleary done.  From the News Tribune :

State Superintendent of Public Instruction Randy Dorn announced this morning that he will not seek reelection.  He said that he will continue to fight on to see schools fully funded because of his "extreme frustration" over the system of funding public education. But such a system doesn't exist to day, and I see little, if any, progress toward creating one." He calls out the Governor, the Legislature and even the Supreme Court for not imposing "sanctions meaningful enough to compel the Governor and Legislature to act." 

Some items I have mentioned before and some items are probably new to most readers.

There will be three threads to this topic. Overview of Reaction to the Ruling The Ruling Itself Current Overview Part One: Overview of Reaction to the Ruling Simply put, many people - from the unscrupulous folks who wrote this law to those overseeing charter schools to those running charter schools - made a deliberate choice to gamble with children's academic lives.  And they lost.