Seattle Schools Community Forum

Watching the charter school movement in the U.S. has certainly been both intriguing and discouraging. I don't think anyone could have been against charters as they were originated - one or two classrooms in an existing school that were little hotbeds of innovation.  Successes would be sent out to other classrooms and schools and failures duly noted with lessons learned. But that is not how it has played out.  What is the honest truth about charter schools looks like this:

There's yet another pro-charter op-ed in the Seattle Times . This one by Robin Lake of the Center for the Reinvention of Public Education. While pretending to offer cooperation and reconciliation to charter school opponents following the passage of the new charter school law, Dr. Lake takes a number of shots at the other side and defines cooperation as "You abandon your position and adopt mine."

This topic weighs on my mind all the time and certainly is a valid question for all of us. What is public education supposed to be doing?  I would love if anyone who comments would write a 2-3 sentence reply to that question.  To aid in this discussion, I bring up two articles.  (For now, I'm leaving out the growing - and coming-to-your-child's-classroom like a freight train - issue of so-called "personalized learning" via technology.)  (All bold mine.) One article is from the Center on Reinventing Public Education.  Along with being a charter thinktank, they also like to put forth ideas about what they think public education should be (but they are not interested in any discussion and, of course, you can't comment on their articles.) I Ain’t Talking to You If You Ain’t Talking About Structural Reform spins off from remarks from the Washington State Teacher of the Year, Nate Bowling, who said, "“If you ain't talking about the teacher in the clas...

Gee whiz, what level of craziness out of Crosscut via Paul Hill at the CRPE and his new idea about a "constitutional system" for schools and the role of school board. Here's the comment I put in: Dr Hill gets a few things right and several things wrong. He's right that rearranging who gets to be on a board or whopicks the board hasn't shown any major promise. (And it's interesting that Mayor Murray still seems to want to try this takeover with the Seattle School Board. It would be good political theater but bad policy.) I would also agree that the confusion/tension over the role of the school board (and being on the school board is a team sport, not an individual one) vis a vis the running of a district can be a problem. But he gets much wrong - at least for Seattle - one what the Board does. The Board does not: - decide how the money will be spent - the Superintendent and staff do and the Board okays it. - hiring and assign teache...

It used to be that you could give CPRE a little credit for caring about other education issues than just charters schools.  It would appear that time has passed.  I'm on their listserv and if you go just by that, it's all charters, all the time.  What is worrying is that if they feel this way about charter schools in other states, I can't wait to see what they think should happen in Washington State. For example, you may have heard that newly-elected NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio came into office with a willingness to stop giving favors to charters in NYC and quit forced co-locations.  This has turned in to quite the epic battle with one charter operator (and quite a big mover and shaker in NYC), closing her schools and requiring parents and students to march in a rally.  (Try closing a real public school for this kind of thing - not going to happen.) The issue really was that the former mayor was not charging state-mandated rents to charters and the new mayor ...

In yet another "look how backwards Washington State is and how terrible public education is here" op-eds at the Seattle Times, their newest one features Robin Lake of the Center on Reinventing Public Education.  Basically, our state is not doing enough to train more STEM graduates.  I use that word "train" deliberately because she seems to think you can just churn out these grads and that is not the case. First, it would help to understand that it is a societal problem.  Girls are encouraged to think "math is hard."  Every single profile about Bill Gates and his life is guaranteed to use the words "nerd" or "geek."  Something has to change for it to be okay to be a smart kid in the U.S.  (And NOT supporting all the kids who are doing well also kills the chances for more STEM grads.) Second, the Center on Reinventing Public Education is a mostly charter school think tank. Remember that when you read this op-ed. Ms. Lake says...

Fascinating reading provided via the Center on Reinventing Public Education (our local ed reform think tank).  They are recommending the list "top eight books that schools reformers should read" from Dropout Nation.  Boy, are there some interesting picks. One is I Got Schooled by none other than "I see dead people" director, M. Night Shymalan.  Here's what Dropout Nation says: Written as a travelogue of sorts about his six-year exploration of education policy issues, the director of The Sixth Sense manages to do in a mere 249 pages what most think tankers fail to do after thousands of pages: Quickly explain flaws in traditionalist thinking — including class-size reduction efforts — and outline five key steps (including giving power to principals to make hiring and firing decisions, and embracing the use of data) to transform education.  Really?  Just 249 pages and he has all the answers (and watch out CRPE because he apparently does that thinkin...

Over at UW's Center for Reinventing Public Education, they wrote a one pager about "lessons for Washington State" on getting high-quality charter schools.  I have to laugh as I wonder if they even read I-1240. Highlights: • Strong authorizing is key to quality o Districts cannot be only authorizer, but authorizers need to build competency o Weak or negligent authorizing leads to many low-performing schools - Promote authorizer clarity/accountability in law, implementation  So the CRPE must be against I-1240 because: - the Charter Commission does NOT have to be pre-authorized in the same way School Boards do.  It seems odd that an elected board would have to go through a process that the members of the Charter Commission don't.  (This isn't explained in the initiative.) - also, CRPE doesn't like " weak or negligent " authorizing?  Well, unfortunately, the Charter Commission has no oversight, elected or otherwise AND there's no way to...