Morning Shots

December 11, 2012

This is what the Superintendent of Brockton Massachusetts has time to do, when the students in this district, a very heavily minority district barely passing the state’s requirements for performance in any grade, and in most, are below 45% proficiency. SABIS, a proven leader in charter school management that has been praised by media and state officials, is trying to open a charter school for a group of community leaders.  Students at comparable SABIS schools outperform all of Brockton’s performance.  But I guess this guy is just about the money.

by Jeanne Allen

December 7, 2012

Remember the board game Risk, where the goal was “world domination,” or “to occupy every territory on the board and in so doing, eliminate all other players“? Well unfortunately this scenario is playing out in real life in the charter school world in the form of increasing regulations. The problem is autonomy at flexibility are at the very heart of the charter school movement, and this regulatory creep puts these essential elements in danger.

But as Jeanne Allen notes while discussing these increasing rules on John Stossel: “Good Intentions Gone Wrong”, the name of the board game itself is an important piece of the puzzle as well:

“Even the charter movement is so afraid to make a mistake. It fears risk because they are so afraid that if they don’t show themselves to be the very, very best, then they will go out of business. But the reality is, risk is in every great innovative business. It’s what makes America tick. And so when you want high quality, you want to take a risk on someone who wants to start a school.”

Speaking of making America tick…

Tim Cook, the new CEO of Apple, was asked by Brian Williams what it would take for Apple to become a “Made in America” company and what that would do to the price of iphones. “It’s not so much about price, it’s about the skills, etc.,” Cook told Williams. “Over time, there are skills that are associated with manufacturing that have left the United States. Not necessarily people, but the education system has just stopped producing that. It’s a concerted effort to get them back.”

by Kara Kerwin & Michelle Tigani

December 6, 2012

“The teacher body are all inspiring. They make us well rounded. Notice the halls? At my old school, the halls are never quiet. You can’t even walk. There are fights everywhere.”

That was from Michael, a 15 year old freshman at Howe HS in Indianapolis, one of the four worst schools in the state, which thanks to legislation were able to be taken over from the district and turned over to new management. There is nothing like students to tell it like it is, and at Howe, Manual and Emma Donnan – 3 of the 4 I visited this week, order is more the norm than the exception these days. Pages could be written but this media piece tells part of the story as does this. If we just listened to the kids more we may actually make real progress some day.

by Jeanne Allen