Imagine if your child’s assigned elementary school had puddles of urine in the bathroom, mouse droppings in the cafeteria, and clogged water fountains. Now imagine if your complaints were rejected by the principal.
Parent Revolution, the Los Angeles-based group at the center of the “Parent Trigger” or “Parent Empowerment” movement, reports that these were the deplorable conditions at Washington Elementary School in Lynwood, Calif., when parents organized to help turn things around. The parents put pressure on school officials and formed a committee to help develop solutions.
This idea — empowering parents to take ownership of reforms long overdue at a child’s school — is at the heart of one of the most innovative education reform programs proposed in recent years. Parent Empowerment laws let parents vote to convert a chronically failing school to a charter school or even close its doors entirely. Laws have passed in California, Texas, and Mississippi, and lawmakers in at least 14 other states are considering bills.
The concept is simple: If at least 50 percent of parents vote for reform at a failing traditional public school, they can convert the school to a charter, change school leadership or enact other reforms. Parents can give their children better opportunities immediately, without having to wait for district officials or school boards to act.
In December 2010, more than 61 percent of parents at McKinley Elementary School in Compton, Calif., signed a petition to reform the school. Stiff union opposition and legal complications nearly ended all hope for McKinley students, but the surge in parent demand helped propel a charter school to open nearby.
Arizona parents should have the same freedom to call for change and, if necessary, close chronically failing schools. Putting a law like this into place won’t be a cakewalk. Teachers’ union officials will fight it tooth and nail. But the lawmakers can learn from the experiences at Washington and McKinley Elementary Schools in California and do what’s right for children.
Jonathan Butcher is education director for the Goldwater Institute.
samkat posted at 7:02 pm on Tue, Jan 3, 2012.
Typical right wing philosophy. Use any excuse to close public schools and use taxpayer money to fund charter schools. Why not devote the same amount of energy into correcting the deficiencies and setting the school back on course?
concernedcitizen posted at 11:09 am on Wed, Jan 4, 2012.
Agreed. If eventually all public schools were either closed or converted to charter schools, then charter schools would become the "public" schools of today, and they would be required to take EVERY student and work with EVERY student, regardless of disabilities, deficiencies, transient-ness, etc.
It's like a blueberry selling company-they can pick and choose which ones they want and throw out the "bad" blueberries, public schools cannot. Do people also realize a lot of charter schools require a certain number of parent "volunteer" hours per month? Boy, if my schools' parents all committed to that, we'd be #1 in the nation!
I agree that reform needs to be done, but we need to be careful when we look at "what has worked" to decide on what reforms can and will work, especially when the environments are totally different. Parents and citizens should investigate on their own what has and hasn't worked in their own school settings and then contact their legislators, the state superintendent of public education, and their local school boards to let their wishes be known. Unfortunately, it seems not enough can do this to get the most important changes pushed through, so only those that the lawmakers (99% of whom have never taught in a classroom or ran a school) want get pushed through, and most of the time those reforms do more harm than good and make teachers work harder and do more paperwork, rather than focusing on quality teaching.
chatmandu002 posted at 11:18 am on Wed, Jan 4, 2012.
Typical left wing nut philosophy to let the schools deteriorate to the point of infection and abuse of the children. Teach to the lowest common denominator, then force children to accept racism( i.e. La Raza classes in Tucson), class warfare, government dependency and not personal responsibility. I could go on and on, but you get my point. After 40+ years of federal control our schools are worse. Get the federal government out of the education business. Eliminate the federal Dept of Education and return control to the states and local boards.
VofReason posted at 12:38 pm on Thu, Jan 5, 2012.
This is a crazy thought, but in the CA examples noted above, wasn't it someone's job to keep the bathrooms and cafeteria clean. Likely a Janitor or cafeteria worker overpaid for the job with platinum benefits and a pention. Isn't it someone's job to make sure their school is working and kids are getting educated? Like a Principal? How about let the person responsible explain why what they are responsible for is not getting done and fire them if it doesn't make sense. However, this isn't likely in the Union contract. However, if the same were happening at a Charter School- you could fire them- no?
mnjcpa posted at 10:33 am on Tue, Jan 17, 2012.
My high school debate/English teacher was one of my best early educators. She taught us that if you can't debate on argument, then pass. I find it ironic that it's the teachers in this column that do just the opposite. Instead of arguing the merits of the points folks like @VofReason and @Rich provide - they choose to insult people with name calling.
No one argues that you work hard. Guess what? A lot of people do. I haven't worked less than a 60 hour week in 25 years but I wouldn't have it any other way. What conservatives have a problem with is Big Government running your business. Everything from what our children eat, to what they study, to what you can ask or not ask a child, to manage every aspect of that child's life is what is at stake.
Big education is liberalism pure and simple.
Stripping away our humanity & attempting to make everyone the same is what's at stake. Rather than insulting people, argue those points.