Submitted by rcane on
By Robert Cane
Earlier this week, Mayor Vincent Gray, through his DCPS Chancellor Kaya Henderson, announced a “Proposed Consolidations and Reorganization” plan to close 20 under-enrolled DCPS schools in 19 buildings across the city. DCPS school closings should be good news for charters, and the thousands of students on their waiting lists, since the law gives them first crack at any buildings DCPS doesn’t need any longer for its own programs. But, unlike when former chancellor Michelle Rhee closed schools, the mayor is permitting the Chancellor to keep control of all of the buildings, keeping them out of the hands of the charters.
And what will she do with all of these buildings, from which she’s kicking out 3,000 DCPS students? Five will be saved and reopened "should population/demand increase" (DCPS, which has lost half its student body since the first charters opened in 1996, predicts—fantastically—that its enrollment will increase to nearly 70,000 in that period). Five will be saved until DCPS "works with the community to identify uses for the buildings that will benefit the children and families of those neighborhoods." Most of the rest will be saved for a variety of new and expanded programs that the shrinking school system promises to provide to its diminishing student body. Only three are slated for a “strategic partnership with a high-performing charter school.”
Needless to say, the FOCUS team was very disappointed by this news. We believe the mayor should get as many of the closed buildings as possible into the hands of higher-performing charter schools as soon as possible. The District needs thousands more quality seats now to meet current demand--he shouldn't be sitting on the buildings in the vain hope that DCPS's enrollment will increase by 2016 or 2022. DCPS has predicted large enrollment increases in every facilities master plan that has been published over the last 15 years but has lost tens of thousands of students in those years. All the evidence points to further DCPS enrollment declines no matter how many families with children move into the District. We need a reality-based policy on school building use, not a fantasy-based one.
It's incredibly unfair to the thousands of kids on charter school waiting list and their families for the mayor to let DCPS keep so many buildings they don't need and won't be able to use. These buildings were built at taxpayer expense for the purpose of public education, and charter schools are public schools and their kids are public school students.
No case can be made for this discrimination against charters and their students on performance, social justice, or any other grounds. D.C.'s public charter schools serve a higher share of economically disadvantaged students than DCPS and these students score 14 percentage points higher than their DCPS peers on the DC CAS.
It shouldn't be forgotten, either, that many charter schools still operate in less than satisfactory facilities often lacking playgrounds, playing fields, libraries, gymnasia, and cafeterias. Also, because the government spends less than half per student on the charter school facilities allowance as it spends on the DCPS capital budget, charters on average offer far less space per student than DCPS schools. Being able to get into real school buildings would help solve these problems.
And then there's the small matter of the law. Under the D.C. School Reform Act, once the mayor closes a DCPS school building he has a legal obligation to offer it to the charter schools before considering any other non-DCPS use. The mayor should follow the law.