- Op-Ed: D.C. mayor still discriminating against charter school students
- This D.C. schools proposal deserves a chance
- The Fight for Children Quality Schools Initiative Awards Luncheon [Capital City Public Charter High School, D.C. Bilingual Public Charter School, and Center City Public Charter School Brightwood mentioned]
The Washington Examiner
By Robert Cane
May 13, 2013
D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray pledged throughout his 2010 mayoral campaign to end years of systematic city underfunding of the District's public charter school students compared to their peers in the city's traditional public school system. Yet, after three budgets, he has failed to deliver on his promise. The mayor's fiscal 2014 budget underfunds the District's public charter school students by more than $1,700 per student in school operating funds, compared to students enrolled in DC Public Schools.
The mayor also proposes to set funding for school facilities at $3,000 per charter student, but at $9,693 for each DCPS student.
Charters are tuition-free, city-funded public schools that operate independently of DCPS. Free to shape their own academic curriculum and school culture, charters are held accountable for improved student performance by the city's Public Charter School Board. These public charter schools, which will educate 45 percent of the District's public school children next year, have delivered. D.C.'s charters have an on-time high-school graduation rate 21 percentage points higher than regular DCPS high schools.
And African-American students enrolled in charters score on average 16 percentage points higher in math, and 13 points higher in reading, on D.C.'s standardized tests than their DCPS peers. Over the past six years alone, the gap in school operating funding has totaled $260 million -- an average of $4.5 million for each current public charter school in operation during those years.
Under D.C. law, school operating expenses are supposed to be funded through a Uniform Per Student Funding Formula to ensure that DCPS and D.C. public charter students who are at the same grade level, or have similar special education needs, are funded equally. Sadly, this mayor, like his predecessors, has flouted city law by funding DCPS, but not charters, with millions of dollars every year outside the funding formula. This year, the mayor's budget would provide an additional $80.4 million to DCPS, but not to D.C.'s publicly funded charters. Gray has also continued many other city policies which unfairly penalize charter students.
Charters are funded only for students who actually enroll, whereas DCPS gets city funds based on estimated enrollment that proves to be overly optimistic every year.
DCPS also routinely receives additional funds from the city when it overspends its budget, while charters have no choice but to live within their means. The mayor also has attempted to keep surplus DCPS school buildings out of the hands of charters, who desperately need to buy or lease adequate school space. Of the 15 schools slated for closure by DCPS Chancellor Kaya Henderson, none is scheduled to be leased to a public charter school.
Gray's attitude toward these precious public resources is unfortunate on many counts. mFirst, District law states that charters must be offered school buildings no longer being used by DCPS to buy or lease before they can be offered to private developers. mSecond, under successive mayoral administrations, the city has allowed school buildings DCPS is unable to fill to rot, or sold them off to private developers for luxury condominiums. Consequently, many charters are forced to rent and renovate costly former office, warehouse or retail space with expensive commercial loans. Charters' annual facilities allowance often proves insufficient to fund this, forcing them to use funds which should be invested in academics.
Other unfair city funding practices have yet to be addressed by the mayor. How can the administration justify, for example, routinely providing crossing guards at DCPS campuses but almost always failing to do so at charter campuses? Recently, District public charter school leaders testified before the D.C. Council on how the city's unfair funding undermines their effort to provide students with a quality public education. Charters disproportionately serve the city's disadvantaged neighborhoods. Will council members take a stand for these students?
Robert Cane is executive director of Friends of Choice in Urban Schools.
The Washington Post
Letter to the Editor
May 14, 2013
Regarding the May 10 Metro article “School hybrid proposed in D.C.”:
Many who have admired D.C. Council member David Catania’s (I-At Large) interest in charter schools and education policy will be surprised if he proves unwilling to entertain Chancellor Kaya Henderson’s proposal to merge a charter school and a traditional public school. Questions of oversight and finance are important, of course, and would need to be addressed, but that would be the case with any innovative response to the charter-public school confrontation — as it has become — in the District. Communication between different parts of the D.C. government has seemed to be in short supply. But a proposal such as this one, which involves both an important matter and two of the city’s most impressive public servants, should not be allowed to perish for want of a common language.
John C. Hirsh, Washington
The Fight for Children Quality Schools Initiative Awards Luncheon [Capital City Public Charter High School, D.C. Bilingual Public Charter School, and Center City Public Charter School Brightwood mentioned]
The Examiner
By Mark Lerner
May 15, 2013
Last Friday I had the great opportunity to attend Fight for Children’s 2013 Quality Schools Initiative Ceremony. One thing about this organization, anytime you are fortunate enough to join one of their events you know that you are going to have a first class experience. Last week’s luncheon was no exception. Held in an elegant room with a soaring ceiling at the Ronald Reagan Building, the guests heard from Fight for Children Chairman Raul Fernandez; Janeece Docal, Principal of Powell Elementary School, a 2012 Quality Schools Initiative Rising Star; Abigail Smith, the new D.C. Deputy Mayor of Education; and Belicia Reaves, a rising Principal of Capital City Public Charter High School, a 2012 Quality School Initiative Champion of Quality.
I was able to speak to a couple of my heroes among the participants including Michela English, Fight for Children’s President and CEO who was also a speaker; and Kathleen Bradley, President of the CityBridge Foundation.One interesting fact that Ms. English illuminated during her remarks is that over the last eight years the average increase in DC CAS scores for all public schools, both traditional and charter, has been five points, while the average increase in standardized test results for schools that have won a Quality Schools Initiative Award has been 10 points.
I thoroughly enjoyed all of the presentations. Ms. Reaves gave an especially moving address in which she revealed that she derives much of her motivation to work at her best from the memory of her deceased father. One traditional school and one charter school was selected to receive a Quality Schools Initiative Rising Star Award of $100,000 each. A professionally produced video introduced each institution to the audience. The Columbia Heights Educational Campus, a sixth to twelfth grade school educating over 1,200 students in Ward 1, was the winner in the DCPS category. For charters, D.C. Bilingual Public Charter School, also a Ward 1 facility teaching 349 Pre-K3 to fifth grade pupils, was selected to receive the prize. The runner up for the traditional schools was Kelly Miller Middle School, a sixth through eighth grade school situated in Ward 7. For charters the second place went to Center City Public Charter School Brightwood Campus, a Ward 4 school educating 227 pupils in grades PreK4 through eighth.
The vivid pamphlet containing the details of the program states that the Columbia Heights Educational Campus will use the Quality Initiative grant to “implement a strategic plan to close the achievement and graduation gaps for its students by expanding an enhanced and research based dual-language immersion program for its high school students.” DC Bilingual Public Charter School plans to allocate the funds to “invest in Common Core supports in the form of technology and professional development for its teachers with the goal of increasing reading and math proficiency for all children including its large population of English language learners and special education students.”
But the highlight of the afternoon for me was the comments by D.C. Mayor Gray. Like so many others, I have been disappointed in his job performance almost from the time he was elected. However, on this occasion I heard from him in the positive way I did during his campaign for office. He spoke passionately about the work of Fight for Children’s founder Joseph E. Robert, Jr. Mr. Gray stated that Mr. Robert was a force for good that is desperately missed in this city, and the Mayor asserted that he was here watching the festivities from above.
Mr. Gray then went on to talk about his selection of Ms. Smith as Deputy Mayor. He informed the guests that she has a lot of difficult decisions to make, including one about the disposition of closed DCPS facilities. I took this observation as another affirmation of the influence charters are having with the argument that these shuttered classroom buildings should be turned over to them. He then went on to assert that for Ms. Smith to be successful it will take everyone in this room supporting her in her position.
That’s when I thought, “Boy wouldn’t that be nice. Imagine if each individual in this town was working towards a common goal. What if we all strove to provide every child a quality academic seat, especially for those less fortunate than ourselves?” It made me think of Mr. Robert and his principle of giving more of yourself to those who need more help. Not a bad lesson for the day.
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