Sad.
Seven charter schools are closing due to poor performance on tests.
These are schools that were supposed to “save” poor kids from their “failingpublic schools.”
Who will save the students from “failed charter schools?”
“Seven Shelby County charter schools are being forced to close at the end of this school year due to low performance.
The seven schools were listed as “Priority Schools,” meaning they were the most in need of support and improvement.
The State Department of Education designates schools Priority Schools for one of two reasons:
Being in the bottom 5 percent in 2015-16 and 2016-17 AND not meeting the TVAAS safe harbor, which allows schools to not be identified if they are showing high growth.
Having a graduation rate of less than 67 percent in 2017-18.
State law requires that a public charter school agreement shall be revoked or denied renewal if the school is identified as a Priority School for 2017 and beyond.
There were 27 schools placed on the Priority list, including 18 SCS-managed schools. Most will be given time to improve.
Unfortunately, the seven charter schools will have to close.
The seven charter schools that are set to close are as follows:
City University School Girls Preparatory
DuBois ES of Arts Technology
DuBois MS of Leadership and Public Policy
DuBois MS of Arts and Technology
Granville T. Woods Academy of Innovation
Memphis Delta Preparatory Charter
The Excel Center
The DuBois High School of Leadership and Public Policy and DuBois High Schools of Arts and Technology had already closed at the end of the last school year.
Its not “unfortunate” that they are closing. It’s unfortunate that the people of Shelby County were sold a bill of goods.
Will Bill Gates and his billionaire friends be accountable?
No.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
So where are all the children going to go now? They’ve closed so many schools!
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Do you know, Nancy or anybody else, if these schools were part of the Achievement School District, that is, if they had been taken away from the public and given to charter operators?
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I’m asking since my understanding is, most schools in ASD are also stuck in the bottom 5%.
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I could not find them on the current list. I think they’ve always been separate.
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Closing these schools on the basis of “poor performance on tests” is as wrongheaded as praising schools like Eva’s military academies for great performance on tests. Performance on tests, in either direction, either promulgates bad teaching or punishes children needlessly.
However, these cases are different in that the schools utterly failed to meet the promises they made, however stupid the promises might have been.
If only children could be in schools where they are unconditionally loved and supported as they progress from wherever they are, with acknowledgment of whatever obstacles have cluttered their childhood.
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Reform=Churn.
Not good for children.
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Can we all finally admit that the standards-based, test-and-punish
approach to education is an abject and utter failure – at every level.
Our 100,000 public schools
have NEVER
and
will NEVER
have students with . . .
standardized intellects
standardized psyches
standardized brain wiring
standardized talents
standardized abilities
standardized anatomies
standardized health histories
standardized experiences
standardized parents
standardized families
standardized home lives
standardized neighborhoods
standardized friends
standardized influences
standardized opportunities
standardized teachers
standardized curricula
standardized pedagogies
standardized motivations
standardized support systems
standardized goals and aspirations
Yet somehow,
the HOLY GRAIL of
the 21st century
education reform movement
was STANDARDIZATION.
Calling it a “Fool’s Errand”
is an insult to every fool.
Any doubt as to why it has
FAILED?
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Like!
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But then again, Rager, you’re being way too logical! 😉
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It is obvious to me that Bill Gates thinks all we have to do to educate children is to program them like coding a computer program.
“Cut out the influence of parents and teachers,” he thinks. “We’ll just cram the code into their little minds starting at age two or three in a private-sector for-profit early childhood education program that is not accountable to anyone but Bill Gates and his highly paid minions that know nothing about how human children learn.
I’m also sure Gates does not think Microsoft Windows has ever been flawed and riddled with repeated failures.
Imagine the damage he has already caused to hundreds of millions of children by forcing his ignorant, arrogant education agenda on the nation starting in the early 21st century.
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I’m a bit confused. Since the school year has just started, are these schools closed now or will they continue to flounder for the remainder of the year doing untold damage?
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Gotta at least get past that magical payment for student enrollment date, eh!
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By my spreadsheet, Gates put $91.8 million into programs in Shelby County/Memphis schools and a lot of that money went to dog and pony training from groups way beyond Tennessee–even to the Broad management training program and trying to spread the Green Dot charter chain model in Californai cross-country to Tennessee.
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