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Feedback ForumCan charter schools do for American kids what traditional public education often cannot?Submissions for this question are no longer being accepted. Previously submitted comments appear below. Comments may have been edited for content or space. Poster: Kent Manthey Comment: I agree with Ms. vanHorn. Charter schools appear to be a bait and switch. At the end of the day, this effort to undermine the public schools under the frequent guise of charters appears to fit the Bush agenda: privatize it all. Newsflash: kids aren't commodities. Public education needs reform at several levels, but to farm this out to the private sector, laughable. Market forces and teenagers might work all right at the mall. However, commodification of education suggestive of quantitative solutions puts learning into finite boxes of profit. Perhaps student performance should be gauged by accountants. Is education such a rip off? As a nation America turns nobody away. That is the profit. For those who attack the public schools on accountability (see George Bush), where's Halliburton's bottom line? Why were billions, billions, if not trillions of dollars unaccounted for in construction contracts in the Iraq War? If charters did not have this shady underbelly with the private sector, then they may hold some promise. For now, I have serious doubts. Poster: C.H. Comment: We have two of our children enrolled in public school and one in a virtual charter school. It appears that what works depends highly upon the child. It turned out that our youngest is more kinesthetic and active and entirely resisted being placed in a chair for hours on end. There is much more flexibility with the virtual charter school. We are able to modify lessons to include more physical activity--for instance, having the child paint math problems on a sidewalk outside or reading while swinging. Our child will also request phonics readers,but usually prefers to stand up and walk around the room while reading. These activities can require more time than even the best public school teachers have available. In terms of accomplishments, our child went from being sorely behind in Kindergarten to conquering half of first grade math and language arts in four months! Poster: Denise Durkin Comment: From my perspective as a therapist working with school children, if public and charter schools were to focus more on the social-emotional development of children, the goal of closing the gap might become more feasible. The roles of schools and of teachers is obviously changing as the needs of our children are changing due to increased school violence and declining academic performance. By teaching children critical thinking skills to help them regulate their own emotions, children learn to approach and manage relationships with themselves and others in healthy, supportive, peaceful ways and may gain the security and confidence they need to succeed in other ways, such as in academics. Poster: Terry Daugherty Comment: Education seems to be a low priority for many; parents, students, politicians, and community members. We play new tricks with education. We do things like reflection writing, co-operative learning, authentic learning, and problem based labs. . I know as a teacher for 35 years, that I work really hard to stay up-dated with all the new tools and methods. I work at least 3 times harder now, than I did 20 years ago. We jump through many hoops to get students to care about education. If charter schools will help then good. Just make sure that the people in charge care most about the students they are teaching. Poster: Kate Baum Comment: I am a retired primary school teacher from Portland, OR. I have had no experience with Charter Schools, but my niece taught in one in Michigan for several years. Teachers in her school had no Union affiliation. She took a cut in pay when she signed her contract. She was a very well qualified Dance Teacher but was expected to integrate the subject matter chosen by the Principal into her dance classes. Her planning periods were few and far between and there was little time to work cooperatively with her fellow teachers. This Charter School had enough money to remodel their school building to make it attractive to prospective students and parents. Unfortunately, the administration did not provide adequate funds for teacher salaries and adequate staffing to allow for planning periods. My niece decided to leave the Charter School, even though she could only find a part time teaching position. Poster: Claire Nail Comment: I'm an idealist, but having worked in various public schools and having put my own children through them, I have little confidence public schools have the flexibility to innovate for children. There are too many political/legal/economic hurdles for public school to jump. Charter schools don't rob money from public systems; bad priorities in local, state and national government do. Remove the hurdles for visionary public school adminstrators, support and hold accountable charter programs. Poster: J. H. Anderson II Comment: In the inner city, charter schools have a lot to offer. It has been my experience that parents are attracted to an alternative environment that appears to be energetic -with much smaller class sizes. My kids had recess daily at their charter school and this occured very rarely at their former local elementary (outside of a fire drill). They had dance class, music class and other extracurricular activities that they would have had no chance of taking a part in, in their OLD school. Our faculty was fresh out of Teachers College, Columbia University. They're eager, friendly and competent, unlike some of their public school colleagues (who had a penchant for yelling at children). A few times a year the whole charter school retreated to a wooded camp with the parents (mandatory attendance) sleeping in the cabins and participating in the day classes and events. You should witness the bonding that takes place - it's very unique. Test scores aside (which were better than all public schools in its area), would you think my charter school sounds like a mediocre environment? The charter school concept is fairly new. When public schools had no competition, look what they did with our money? Look at the dropout rates today? Very clearly, it's a broken system. Unfortunately, too often, when we place our kids on the front end of this proverbial conveyor belt, we are not too impressed with the outcome on the opposite end. Why does this happen? It's true a lot of our parents, simply are awful parents. Additionally, commercial media has a part in dumbing down America, so our kids, who are lacking critical thinking abilities end up watching too much BET, MTV, VH1 etc. and can not discern fact vs truth vs fiction. Ultimately, these kids end up with poor mental, emotional, and social wiring that wreaks havoc upon their 'True North'. Those are the tensions of the system - another three-legged stool: Parent(s), Student, School. 80% of the responsibility falls on the parents and system. Let's face it, if you placed a street savvy 6 year old from the hood/ghetto (they exist, just trust me on this), ...place them in the middle of Russia. What language would he/she speak 4 year from now???? Russian! We adapt to our environment - it's a powerful phenomenon. For most parents, I think charter schools represent a big chance to 'make it right,' before it is too late. A new environment and its language is success! Poster: Liz Craig Comment: So far, charter schools have not lived up to their promise. If public schools are given the resources and money, and teachers are paid more, so that better quality teachers enter the field, public schools can do very well indeed. Robbing the funds from public schools to funnel them into charter schools only breaks down the public school system further -- and apparently without any gain in academic achievement. Poster: Brenda Christianson Comment: Whatever the name...public, private, home-schooled, or charter, it must be the individual's decision to willingly participate in the educational process. Professionals are willing and highly qualified to teach content subject areas. However, our children have other issues before education. Issues such as poverty, hunger, poor health, and abuse. To many, it is survival of the fittess. Education is last on the list. Poster: Kate vanHorn Comment: As a retired school psychologist for the autistic population, I do not believe the effectivenes of charter schools has been apprasided honestly. Conservatives are trying desperately to eradicate teachers' unions and integrated schools. The performance appears variable. I wonder if we can ever achieve the democracy of vision and fairness. We spend our resources on weapons and killing people instead of educating our children with vision and foresight. Poster: im Ryan Comment: In many situations Charter Schools are hard to compare with traditional schools with respect to outcomes because of the self-selection factor that operates for kids going into Charter schools. Better educated parents aremore likely to be aware of and have knowledge about Charter schools and have kids more oriented toward eductional activities than the average kid. In New Orleans, meaningful comparisons may be difficult to make because the kids now living in N. O. may not be equivalent in academically relevant ways to those who previously lived there - the ones they are being compared to. |
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