- FOCUS Runs Advertisement Criticizing the Mayor’s Charter School Budget [FOCUS is mentioned]
- D.C. Children Left in the Lurch
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Jonetta Rose Barras: Rebooting Education Reform
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District Considers Running Own School Security
FOCUS Runs Advertisement Criticizing the Mayor’s Charter School Budget [FOCUS is mentioned]
DC Charter Schools Examiner
By Mark Lerner
May 23, 2012
Word has it that Friends of Choice in Urban Schools will run an advertisement today in the Current Newspaper critical of Mayor Vincent Gray’s broken promise to fund charters on an equitable basis compared to DCPS. Remember that Mary Levy estimated recently that DCPS is receiving between $72 million and $127 million to which charters don’t have access that is going to the traditional schools outside of the Uniform Per Pupil Funding Formula. Of course, D.C. law mandates that the two school systems be funded out of the UPPFF.
Mr. Gray campaigned on the notion that he was going to provide charters the same level of revenue that DCPS now receives. His current draft budget, however, does no such thing.
My guess is that FOCUS has contracted with Pioneer Strategy to create the Current Newspaper ad. Pioneer Strategy created the bus and metro campaign in Southeast DC promoting charter schools that I blogged about. The Current has editions that cover Northwest, DuPont, Georgetown, and Foggy Bottom.
I’m sure the hope is that public pressure changes the Mayor’s mind. However, my belief is that the only way that the 33,000 public school students currently enrolled in charters will receive the justice they deserve is through the courts.
The Washington Post
By Editorial Board
May 22, 2012
The nonprofit that administers the District’s program of federally funded school vouchers held two open houses to solicit interest from low-income families for the upcoming school year. The response was overwhelming; nearly 1,200 new applications were received. Most applicants are likely to end up disappointed because of a misguided decision by the Obama administration to effectively deny new students access to the successful program.
House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) and Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) met last week with Education Secretary Arne Duncan to urge him to lift what they see as an artificial cap on the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program. The popular program, now in its eighth year, allows children from low-income families to attend private schools with federally funded vouchers of up to $12,000 annually. The cap of 1,615 students is well below the number of students previously accommodated by the program (1,903 in 2007-2008, for example) and has meant that new students aren’t being admitted. Not only does that close the door to better schools for students most in need, but it would also make it impossible for researchers to conduct the congressionally mandated evaluation of the program. Patrick Wolf, an investigator for the Institute for Education Sciences who has done past studies of the program, told congressional staff that a credible study could not be done without the addition of several hundred new students.
The administration insists that a cap is necessary because it’s unclear whether the program will be funded next year; funds must be held in reserve to ensure the continuation of scholarships for currently enrolled students. It’s a rich argument, since any uncertainty about funding is entirely due to administration actions. As Mr. Boehner wrote on a blog Tuesday, it was President Obama who “inexplicably” zeroed out funding for the program in his budget proposal, a decision in direct contradiction to a law he signed last year that authorized full funding for vouchers, along with monies for D.C. charter and traditional public schools. That legislation contains no cap on enrollment.
Mr. Boehner has made clear that Congress will provide the funds for this program, but because the group in charge of the program is now being forced to abide by the artificial cap, many students will unnecessarily be deprived of scholarships. In other words, when the money becomes available, it will be too late.
Now is the time that families are making decisions about schools for the fall. Unless Mr. Obama and Mr. Duncan are intent on denying hundreds of underprivileged D.C. students the chance for a quality education, they should work with Mr. Boehner to ensure the uninterrupted continuation of this important program.
The Washington Examiner
By Jonetta Rose Barras
May 22, 2012
When DC Public Schools Chancellor Kaya Henderson begins her "State of Education" meetings Wednesday, she should expect this question: Why, after billions of dollars in facilities and program investments, teacher firings and school closings, have dramatic improvements eluded many traditional schools?
Some have done well; those have been in communities -- Wards 2, 3, 4 and 6 --where children already received a decent education. In other areas, gains have been minimal or nonexistent.
"We want stuff to be fixed tomorrow. I get that," Henderson told me. "I'm trying to create the kind of school system that I would send my children to."
Residents have wondered whether Mayor Vincent C. Gray, Deputy Mayor for Education De'Shawn Wright and Henderson have morphed into "relinquishers" -- reformers who advocate putting charters in control. That's happening in Detroit and Philadelphia.
"I didn't take this job because I want to be superintendent of charter schools," said Henderson, adding she "value[s] traditional schools."
Still, she and Wright, with Gray's approval, have been plotting school closures -- the third round since 2006. While acknowledging the potential dangers of eroding DCPS' portfolio, they have scheduled community meetings for this summer.
"I am never going to shy away from closing a school not serving students well," said Wright, adding he's primed for the summer. "We are going to understand which school with the right intervention and the right investment can become a healthy body."
"For there to be long-term gains, you have to make short-term sacrifices," said Henderson, asserting closures are more about quality academic programs than buildings -- though the city spends too much operating 123 schools for only 47,000 students. Some schools are underenrolled because "we played around with feeder patterns, so they don't have enough feeders to be viable." Boundaries and feeders haven't been adjusted for decades.
Closures should be halted -- until new boundaries have been established and tested. More important, officials should reboot reform, deep-sixing failed policies and strategies.
Why cling to a per-pupil funding formula? It's politically correct but ignores this reality: All schools aren't the same.
Instead, the District could establish education development zones, allowing greater financial support for schools within those boundaries and aggressively recruiting more middle-class families. It could create "strike forces" of academic volunteers and persuade foundations to provide at-home assistance for underperforming students.
As Ward 6 demonstrated, schools can be economic engines. "People moved in because of neighborhood schools; they stayed and they spent money," Ward 6 D.C. Councilman Tommy Wells told me. The District's growing population may force Henderson to reopen Van Ness Elementary School.
Standard development tools should be applied to education reform: The city could offer tax incentives to families willing to purchase homes and enroll in schools in education zones. That program would lessen their mortgage burden while reconstituting struggling traditional institutions.
Those changes could produce a win-win -- unless Gray, Wright and Henderson are determined to tread an overworn path, ascribing to that definition of insanity: the one about repeatedly doing the same thing but expecting different results.
The Washington Examiner
By Lisa Gartner
May 22, 2012
D.C. officials are considering moving school security in-house, after running into continual problems with contracting companies over the years.
The District's auditor estimated Tuesday that 291 full-time guards would cost the city $11.4 million a year -- less than the $18 million annual contract that U.S. Security Associates, which provides personnel at city buildings and public schools, holds with the District. The city also contracts with Securitas USA to patrol its public schools.
But the cost is not the reason District has opened the bidding process for next year. Undercover D.C. police officers were able to repeatedly sneak bombs into local government buildings, according to a memo first obtained by the Service Workers Employees International Union.
Between July 2010 and June 2011, police and recruits documented more than a dozen potential security breaches, including an October 2010 incident when recruits took a "simulated cellphone bomb" past security officers at X-ray machines at two entrances to the John A. Wilson Building, where the mayor and D.C. Council work.
The city's troubled history with security doesn't stop there. Before U.S. Security Associates and Securitas were brought in, the city used Hawk One, fired in 2009 for filling city buildings' schools with poorly supervised, inadequately trained employees who failed to contain violence and tended to fraternize with students, city officials told The Washington Examiner at the time.
In February, at-large Councilman Phil Mendelson asked D.C. Auditor Yolanda Branche to review the merits of contracting out, which is supposed to be done every three years.
"As far as I know, this [review] has never happened," Mendelson said.
Branche responded Tuesday with the cost of paying hourly wages and benefits to 291 guards. The District would hire 269 guards who could not make arrests and 22 who could. None would carry firearms.
The $11.4 million price tag likely would increase with associated costs, such as equipment, training, drug testing and background checks. The District is expecting to make a decision about the contract in June.
Confidence in schools' security guards varied widely on student surveys across D.C. high schools last school year. At Cardozo Senior High School, 44 percent of students said their security officers do a good job patrolling their campus; 84 percent of students at Benjamin Banneker Academic High School said the same.
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