FOCUS DC News Wire 7/18/13

 

 

I guess because this is the nation's capital it was not sufficient that just the Mayor, the Deputy Mayor of Education, the Public Charter School Board, the DCPS Chancellor, and the D.C. Council are setting the rules under which our public schools operate. Now the U.S. Congress is getting back in the game since the No Child Left Behind law is about to expire. You remember NCLB, the 2001 legislation that was going to guarantee that every student was proficient in English and math by the year 2014.

 

Since this Federal mandate didn't quite work out as planned our Senators and Congressman are taking another stab at it. House Republican Leader Eric Cantor and other politicians and public officials flocked over to the high academic performing Two Rivers Public Charter School a couple of days ago to promote their latest plan, called the Student Success Act, that is promised to once and for all fix what is wrong with the American public education system. From my extensive research on the 520 page bill, it appears the law has virtually no chance of final passage.

 

Fortunately, Congress did take one positive step forward. Yesterday, the House Appropriations Committee passed its D.C. spending bill and inserted funds for the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program. President Obama, in keeping with tradition while reneging on a promise he made to House Speaker Boehner, had again zeroed out money for the tremendously popular andsuccessful voucher program in his latest budget proposal.

 

 

 

WASHINGTON — The House is ready to make the final tweaks to its Republican rewrite of the sweeping No Child Left Behind education law that governs every school in the country that receives federal education dollars.

 

Teacher evaluations, school improvement plans and academic standards would be up to each state — with no say from the U.S. Education Department — under the revisions being considered Thursday. The bill faces near-unanimous opposition from Democrats and President Barack Obama has threatened a veto.

 

The legislation would undo many of the accountability provisions implemented under the existing version of the law that Republican President George W. Bush championed. The bill would eliminate dozens of school improvement programs and give state and local officials the power to implement reforms as they deem appropriate.

 

 

Charter schools are poised to gain a much larger foothold in Virginia thanks to a plan under consideration by the Norfolk School Board to transform 10 traditional public schools into charter schools in the coming year. Norfolk Superintendent Samuel King proposed the idea, called the Transformation Initiative, this spring as part of a broader plan to reform schools districtwide. His proposal would triple the number of charter schools operating in Virginia from the current five charters, including one scheduled to open in the fall.

 

The city’s School Board has given King the green light to keep developing the concept. In October, it will vote on official applications for each of the schools. Meanwhile, the Richmond School Boardapproved a new charter school this week. The Richmond Career Education and Employment Academy will teach basic life and job skills to students who might struggle to live independently after graduation.

 

The new embrace of charter schools has not reached the northern part of the state. The Loudoun School Board turned down a charter application this spring, and another proposal, in Fairfax County, did not meet approval last year. The Norfolk plan targets 10 high-poverty schools that have been struggling to meet state standards, including two schools that had been identified for a state takeover. Each charter will have a specialized theme, such as Montessori, International Baccalaureate, or science and technology, as well as a more flexible year-round schedule and a lottery system so students from across the city can apply.

 

Norfolk’s School Board will continue to oversee the charter schools, a departure from the typical charter model, in which outside groups run the schools. Norfolk school officials are calling the schools “public conversion charters,” said Elizabeth Thiel Mather, spokesman for the city’s public schools.

 

“We know there are different definitions of charters. We wanted to be clear about what we meant,” she said. “A public conversion charter is a school that will have some elements of charter school but will remain under the oversight and policy of the School Board in the City of Norfolk. This is not a circumstance where an outside entity has said, ‘We’d like to take over your schools.’ ” The transformation plan also includes a new open-campus high school for students at risk of dropping out. It would also be managed as a charter school, but with the help of an outside operator.