Good news from Detroit, the lowest performing urban district in the nation. After years of outsourcing students to privately managed charter schools, the new superintendent says he is considering no longer authorizing charters but focusing instead on improving traditional public schools.
Imagine asking a business to jumpstart competitors and you can see how wacky the current policy is.
I am very impressed by what I have heard about Superintendent Nikolai Vitti. Unlike his predecessors, who collaborated with the plan to destroy public education in Detroit, Vitti wants to fight for the public schools.
To seal his argument, Detroit’s much-maligned public schools outperform its charter schools.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I did think it was nice, to have someone enthusiastically supporting public schools rather then depicting them as some neglected, disfavored default “back up system” for the preferred “choice” schools.
Public schools need committed advocates- the same kind of advocacy the whole ed reform gang shower on charter and private schools.
I’m tired of public employees either ignoring or bashing public schools. Our schools are not your political agenda punching bag and they don’t exist to serve as the back-up to “choice” schools.
We deserve real advocates. We don’t have any.
“May not” that’s not an answer, it’s PC for I’m going to Fk you.
“Charter schools can innovate more easily and more quickly than public schools, said Doug Ross, an advocate for charter schools.” When “advocates” say that, why isn’t the automatic response, innovation — what are you even talking about?!? Corporate charters have been widespread for twenty years. What are the examples of innovation? What is one example? (Required, unpaid overtime is not an acceptable answer.) Kudos to Vitti for not listening to the con artists calling themselves charter advocates.
LCT,
I think it was Peter Greene who first wrote a post saying he could not think of a single Innovation that came from charters. I have visited KIPP schools and was reminded of what public schools were like a century ago.
EH? WHAT WAS THAT?
Vitti should not just ‘consider’ supporting public education. He should support democratic, transparent public education. He should work for fair funding, and then he could really see how much he can “move the needle.” In a public school district, he can put the money into resources, not profit.
If public schools are out performing public schools, why not redirect money that would be used for vouchers back into the schools.According to Casey Quinlan’s article, “Vouchers don’t help Disadvantaged Students” ( https://thinkprogress.org/vouchers-dont-help-students-73d120597c35) shows that an increase in funds improved school quality. There was a major impact for disadvantaged students including those from low income families. The achievement gap was decreased by 1/5th lowering the gap between low income and high income households. The money that is used for vouchers takes away from much needed funding for the already struggling public schools. I think that Superintendent Vitti is doing the right thing by concentrating on reconstructing the Detroit Public Schools in lieu of pouring funds into private school that are not showing any results. Betsy DeVos’ support of vouchers has not worked for Detroit and I don’t see if working for the country.