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The Hoax of Ohio’s So-Called “Community Schools”

By dianeravitch
January 14, 2024 //
5

Denis Smith worked for the Ohio Department of Education, where he oversaw the burgeoning charter industry. When I was in Ohio a few years back, another former state official told me that charter lobbyists wrote the state’s charter school law. In their effort to make it palatable to give public money to private entities to run schools, the lobbyists decided to call them “community schools.”

As Denis Smith points out in this article, Ohio is the only state that calls charter schools by that name. In fact, “community schools” have their own definition. They are public schools that offer a wide range of social and even medical services. There are federal programs for charter schools and for community schools: they are not the same. Some charter schools in Ohio operate “for profit.” No community school does.

Smith writes:

More than a quarter-century ago, in a move that undermined the status of the state’s public schools, Ohio Republicans approved legislation that authorized the use of public funds to operate schools run by private management companies. These entities that use public funds to establish and maintain a parallel system of education are called charter schools.

Except in one state, where the legal title for these schools may be an issue that is bound to confuse both policy makers and the public over time.

Indeed, in this nation 44 of the states refer by law to these public-private hybrids as charter schools. Sadly, the Ohio Revised Code calls them something else, community schools. That poor choice of language terminology, an awkward construction from the very beginning of Ohio school privatization, may now pose a problem and continuing confusion as the result of legislation in the U.S. Senate that will expand the existing federal community school program.

That’s right, the federal full-service community school program.

On Nov. 29, Ohio U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown introduced the Full-Service Community School Expansion Act of 2023 in the U.S. Senate. The legislation seeks to increase the number of school districts and schools in the federally-funded community school program, which shares the same title with the hybrid schools in Ohio but otherwise has no resemblance.  

What policy experts define as a full-service community school was codified in 1991, when Florida legislation defined such an educational program as “the integration of educational, medical, and social and or human services that meets the needs of youth and their families on school grounds or in easily accessible locations.” Indeed, the basic idea of a community school and the terminology for it predated the Ohio legislation that renamed charters as community schools. More on that later.

The initial legislation that established the FSCS program defined the “four pillars of a community school” as having integrated support for students from health and social service agencies, an expanded instructional day for added learning opportunities, community engagement, and collaboration by the school leadership with community service providers.

The federal definition of a community school is instructive, where the school day is extended to enhance learning, and where community organizations provide dental, vision, nutrition, and other key services to help children thrive and be successful in their school experience. If it has been said that it takes a village to raise a child. But it also takes a community to educate a child through public participation in providing the care and support for those who are the future.

This idea of a community school, now defined in federal law, complements the historical image of the little red schoolhouse, which has served as the center of the community since the early days of the republic. In fact, the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 required that a portion of the land in new territories be set aside to support the establishment and funding of public schools. It is also fitting to know that Ohio was the first state to be formed from the Northwest Territory in 1803.

With this historical background and the federal legislation that defines a community school, let’s compare the federal concept of a community school with what is called a “community school” in Ohio.

In 1997, the legislature established in the Ohio Revised Code Chapter 3314- Community Schools, a strange entity that is a hybrid of public funds received by private management companies to educate students. But the problem with these “community schools” is that they are neither of the community nor public in their structure.

As an example, the very idea of a national charter school chain operating multiple schools, whose headquarters may be elsewhere, where its board members sit on the governing bodies of several schools and may not be residents of the communities where the schools are located, is antithetical to the concept of a community school.

So we are back to a contradiction in terms that needs to be addressed. Of all the 45 states that have chosen to operate publicly funded but privately operated schools, Ohio has chosen to use the term “community school” in law when these schools are anything but.

And the reason? You shouldn’t be surprised to know that in this state of gerrymandering and supermajorities, it’s all about politics. Here’s why.

About 15 years ago, a former Republican legislator told a colleague who worked with me in the Ohio Department of Education’s Community (Charter) School Office that there was a concern the initial legislation would not have passed in 1997 if the word charter was used. Community was a “word that sells,” it was thought back then. To this day, it appears that Ohio is the only state which uses such unique language to describe these schools, where community replaces the term charter and sponsor replaces another key term, that of authorizer.

In light of the confusion that will only grow as real community schools continue to develop, public schools with extended-learning formats and support programs provided by collaborating community organizations governed by elected and not appointed community members, it’s time for the legislature to do the right thing and amend Chapter 3314 of the Ohio Revised Code. To put it bluntly, and in light of prevailing federal definitions as found in the Full-Service Community School Program, Ohio community schools are not and cannot be identified as community schools.

Conclusion: Ohio politicians, watch your language. Real community schools, particularly the full-service variety and not charters masquerading as such, are the real thing. Thank you, Senator Brown, for your precise use of language in sponsoring this valuable program and advocacy for community schools. After all, it takes a community to govern, oversee, and support a school, a real community school, that belongs to all of us, and not a national chain or profit-centered business enterprise.

Categories Charter Schools, Community Schools, Education Industry, Education Reform, Ohio

Jan Resseger: Education and Democracy Are Entwined

By dianeravitch
October 10, 2023 //
6

Jan Resseger writes brilliantly about the importance of education in a democracy. She reads widely in the work of authors who understand why education should not be privatized and turned into a consumer good. You will enjoy reading this essay.

She writes:

I find myself struggling these days to understand how those of us who prize our U.S. system of public education seem to have lost the narrative. As I listen to the rhetoric of today’s critics of public schooling—people who distrust or disdain the work of school teachers and who believe test scores are the only way to understand education, I worry about the seeming collapse of the values I grew up with as a child in a small Montana town whose citizens paid so much attention to the experiences its public schools offered for the community’s children. The schools in my hometown provided a solid core curriculum plus a strong school music program, ambitious high school drama and speech and debate programs, athletics, a school newspaper, and an American Field Service international student every single year at the high school. While many of us continue to support our public schools, what are the factors that have caused so many to abandon their confidence in public education?

It is in this context that I found myself reading “Education and the Challenges for Democracy,” the introductory essay in the current issue of Education Policy Analysis Archives. In his essay, Fernando M. Reimers, a professor in the graduate school of education at Harvard University, explores the interconnection of public education and democracy itself. Reimers explains, for example, that the expansion of our democracy to include more fully those who have previously been marginalized is likely to impact the public schools in many ways and that these changes in the schools will inspire their own political response:

“(T)he expansion of political rights to groups of the population previously denied rights (e.g. women, members of racial or religious minorities) may lead to increased access for these groups to educational institutions and a curriculum that prepares them for political participation. These changes, in turn, feed back into the political process, fostering increased demands for participation and new forms of representation as a result of the new skills and dispositions these groups gained by educational and political changes. But these increases in representation may activate political backlash from groups who seek to preserve the status quo. These forces may translate into efforts to constrain the manner in which schools prepare new groups for political participation. In this way, the relationship between democratic politics and democratic education is never static, but in perpetual, dynamic, dialectical motion that leads to new structures and processes. The acknowledgement of this relationship as one that requires resolution of tensions and contradictions, of course, does not imply an inevitable cycle of continuous democratic improvement, as there can be setbacks—both in democracy itself, and in education for democracy.”

Reimers continues: “Democracy—a social contract intended to balance freedom and justice—is not only fluid and imperfect but fragile. This fragility has become evident in recent years… In order to challenge the forces undermining democracy, schools and universities need to recognize these challenges and their systemic impact and reimagine what they must do to prepare students to address them.” While Reimers explains that the goal of his article is not only, “to examine how democratic setbacks can lead to setbacks in democratic education, but also how education can resist those challenges to democracy,” he presents no easy solutions. He does, however sort out the issues to which we should all be paying attention—naming five specific challenges for American democracy:

“The five traditional challenges to democracy are corruption, inequality, intolerance, polarization, and populism… The democratic social contract establishes that all persons are fundamentally equal, and therefore have the same right to participate in the political process and demand accountability. Democracy is challenged when those elected to govern abuse the public trust through corruption, or capturing public resources to advance private ends… Democracy is also challenged by social and economic inequality and by the political inequalitythey may engender… One result of political intolerance is political polarization… Political intolerance is augmented by Populism, an ideology which challenges the idea that the interests of ordinary people can be represented by political elites.” (emphasis in the original)

Reimers considers how these threats to democracy endanger our public schools: “The first order of effects of these forces undermining democracy is to constrain the ability of education institutions to educate for democracy. But a second order of effects results from the conflicts and tensions generated by these forces….” As the need for schools and educators to prepare students for democratic citizenship becomes ever more essential, political backlash may threaten schools’ capacity to help students challenge the threats to democracy.

In their 2017 book, These Schools Belong to You and Me, Deborah Meier and Emily Gasoi articulate in concrete terms what Reimers explains abstractly as one of the imperatives that public schools must accomplish today: “(W)e need a means of ensuring that we educate all future citizens, not only to be well versed in the three Rs, and other traditional school subjects, but also to be able to see from multiple perspectives and to be intellectually curious and incisive enough to see through and resist the lure of con artists and autocrats, whether in the voting booth, the marketplace, or in their social dealings.” (These Schools Belong to You and Me, p. 25) Schools imagined as preparing critical thinkers—schools that focus on more than basic drilling in language arts and math—are necessary to combat two of the threats Reimers lists: corruption and populism.

But what about Reimers’ other threats? How can schools, in our current polarized climate, push back against intolerance, inequality, and polarization? Isn’t today’s attack on “diversity, equity and inclusion” in some sense an expression of a widespread desire to give up on our principle of equality of opportunity—to merely accept segregation, inequality and exclusion? This is the old, old struggle Derek Black traces in Schoolhouse Burning—the effort during Reconstruction to develop state constitutions that protect the right to education for all children including the children of slaves—followed by Jim Crow segregation—followed by the Civil Rights Movement and Brown v. Board of Education—followed by myriad efforts since then to keep on segregating schools. Isn’t the attempt to discredit critical race theory really the old fight about whose cultures should be affirmed or hidden at school, and isn’t this fight reminiscent of the struggle to eliminate the American Indian boarding schools whose purpose was extinguishing American Indian children’s languages and cultures altogether? Isn’t the battle over inclusion the same conflict that excluded disabled children from public school services until Congress passed the Individuals with Disability Education Act in 1975? And what about the battle that ended in 1982, when, in Plyler v. Doe, the U.S. Supreme Court protected the right to a free, K-12 public education for children of undocumented immigrants? Our society has continued to struggle to accept the responsibility for protecting the right to equal opportunity. As Reimers explains, action to address inequality has inevitably spawned a reaction.

Educators and political philosophers, however, have persistently reminded us of our obligation to make real the promise of public schooling. In 1899, our most prominent philosopher of education, John Dewey, declared: “What the best and wisest parent wants for his own child, that must the community want for all of its children… Only by being true to the full growth of all the individuals who make it up, can society by any chance be true to itself.” (The School and Society, p. 1)

In 1992, political theorist Benjamin Barber advocated for the very kind of public schooling Reimers would like to see today: “(T)he true democratic premise encompasses… the acquired virtues and skills necessary to living freely, living democratically, and living well. It assumes that every human being, given half a chance, is capable of the self-government that is his or her natural right, and thus capable of acquiring the judgment, foresight, and knowledge that self-government demands.… The fundamental assumption of democratic life is not that we are all automatically capable of living both freely and responsibly, but that we are all potentially susceptible to education for freedom and responsibility. Democracy is less the enabler of education than education is the enabler of democracy.” (An Aristocracy of Everyone, pp. 13-14)

In a 1998 essay, Barber declared: “America is not a private club defined by one group’s historical hegemony. Consequently, multicultural education is not discretionary; it defines demographic and pedagogical necessity. If we want youngsters from Los Angeles whose families speak more than 160 languages to be ‘Americans,’ we must first acknowledge their diversity and honor their distinctiveness. English will thrive as the first language in America only when those for whom it is a second language feel safe enough in their own language and culture to venture into and participate in the dominant culture. For what we share in common is not some singular ethnic or religious or racial unity but precisely our respect for our differences: that is the secret to our strength as a nation, and is the key to democratic education.” (“Education for Democracy,” in A Passion for Democracy: American Essays, p. 231)

These same principles are prophetically restated by William Ayers in his final essay in the 2022 book, Public Education: Defending a Cornerstone of American Democracy: “In a free society education must focus on the production—not of things, but—of free people capable of developing minds of their own even as they recognize the importance of learning to live with others. It’s based, then, on a common faith in the incalculable value of every human being, constructed on the principle that the fullest development of all is the condition for the full development of each, and conversely, that the fullest development of each is the condition for the full development of all… Schools don’t exist outside of history or culture: they are, rather, at the heart of each. Schools serve societies; societies shape schools. Schools, then, are both mirror and window—they tell us who we are and who we want to become, and they show us what we value and what we ignore, what is precious and what is venal.” (Public Education: Defending a Cornerstone of American Democracy, p. 315)

Please open the link to complete the reading.

Categories Citizenship, Civil Rights, Community Schools, Democracy, Education Reform, Equity, Ethics, Freedom, Freedom to Read, History, Real Education

John Merrow: How to Save Public Schools! Involve the Community!

By dianeravitch
October 1, 2023 //
10

John Merrow has some excellent ideas about how to broaden the base of support in your community, town, or city. Reach out and involve others, people who have little direct contact with the schools. Seeing what the students are doing is a big counterweight to the lies and propaganda of extremist groups. Long before people had television sets, the school was the hub of community life. Friends and neighbors turned out to watch the spelling bee, to see the football games, to enjoy student performances. No one dreamed of opening up corporate chains or using taxpayer dollars to fund competing schools.

Open the link to finish reading the post. If you have more ideas, please comment.

Merrow writes:

The problem with the truism “It Takes a Village to Raise a Child” is that most villagers have no direct connection to children or to the schools they go to. Only about 25 percent of homes have school age children, and in some communities that number drops into the teens. Even if one includes households with grandparents, the percentage probably won’t reach 40. And although support for local public schools is at an all-time high (54%), that may not be high enough to withstand the vicious attacks on the institution by “Moms for Liberty” and other radical right groups. Educators need to do more to win the support of ‘outsiders.’

The 60-80% of households without a strong connection to public education will determine the future of public schools.  Because they vote on school budgets, their opinion of schools, teachers, and students matter.  That’s why educators must develop and adopt strategies to win their support.  It’s not enough for good things to be happening in schools; ‘the outsiders’ need to be supportive, and a good way to win their support is to get them involved.

Because students who are engaged in their work are the best advertisement for public education, adults need to do two things:  1) Make sure the work is engaging and 2) that it involves the world outside the classroom.  Substitute “Production” (meaning that students are actually producingknowledge) for “Regurgitation” (where students parrot back what their teachers have told them).

Start with a public website and a YouTube Channel that features student productions done outside of school–in their community.  Whatever their ages, kids should work in teams, because it’s safer and it’s also how the adult world functions.  Every smartphone is also a great video camera, and so young people can interview adults in their community, then edit those interviews to create oral histories of people and places in their neighborhood–a sure crowd pleaser because everyone loves talking about themselves. When students know that their work is going to be out there for everyone to see, they will go the extra mile to make them as good as possible.  Adults can help set high standards, of course.  

The possibilities are endless:

*Students can create a photo gallery of the residents of their apartment building or their street and then post portraits on the web for all to see and talk about. Include photos of how the neighborhoods have changed over time.

*Art students can sketch portraits of business storefronts, or workers and bosses, also to be posted on the web.

*The school’s jazz quintet can perform at community centers and post the recordings on the YouTube channel.

*Video teams can interview adults in senior citizen centers around a chosen theme (best job, favorite trip, et cetera), to be edited into a short video for the web. Producing short biographies of ordinary citizens will teach all sorts of valuable skills like clear writing, teamwork and meeting deadlines.

*Music and drama students can rehearse and then present their productions at retirement homes and senior centers — but with a twist: involve some of the adults in the process (a small part in the play, a role in selecting the music, and so on).

Categories Community Schools, Creativity, Education Reform, Hope, Joy, Love, Propaganda, Students

Johann Neem: Begin the New School Year with Gratitude for Public Schools

By dianeravitch
August 28, 2023 //
4

Johann Neem is author of Democracy’s Schools: The Rise of Public Education in America. He teaches history at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington.

A Plea for the New School Year- Johann Neem

I am so excited for the new school year to begin. I admit that I am a bit sentimental when it comes to public schools. That’s because public schools are one of the few institutions that almost all of us have been through, which means that the experiences of schooling connect us within and between generations. There are the common schedules and rituals. There will be the first day of school. There will be school pictures. There will be holidays and dances. There will be field trips. And, of course, homework and tests. It’s part of the growing up experience in America. In a diverse society, it’s easy to focus on our differences. But public schools not only bring diverse people together, they give us something to share for a lifetime.

As we head back for another school year, then, I hope that we can put aside some of the loudest and most extreme voices of our partisan culture wars. Actually, most Americans want the same things. We want our kids to have a fair shot. We want our kids to be part of a shared national community. We want our kids to be challenged, and also supported. We want our kids to be safe.

That’s why public schools, I still believe, can bring us together.After all, the overwhelming majority of parents support their local public school. And for good reasons. There is strong evidence that public schools are effective for students at all income levels. Yet partisan rhetoric has eroded support for public schools. From the right, advocates of parental rights and privatization urge parents to find schools that reflect their familyvalues, rather than see the schools as places where we forge common values. But too many on the left, including many educators, also question whether we Americans can share the same histories, holidays, values, and rituals. In the name of cultural pluralism and diversity, they challenge the public schools’ longstanding mission of socialization.

We need to keep the faith. As an immigrant, I know that public schools can be our welcome mats. Our nation has had, and still has, its share of nativism and prejudice, but what other nation welcomes so many people from so many different backgrounds? In public schools, we all become Americans. We read the same books, eat the same cafeteria food, play the same games, studythe same subjects, and get to know each other.

So this is my plea for the new school year. We will always argue over what we should teach, and in a democracy we should. But let’s enter this year focusing on what we share and what binds us together, rather than what separates us. There is so much pulling us apart today. It’s a shame that our public schools have become one more thing to fight over because we need them. We benefit individually and collectively from an educated public.

As the new school year begins, I hope we can all take a deep breath and remember that despite all their flaws, despite all our disagreements, at some deeper level, we Americans all agree that the rituals of American schooling—the academics, the bell schedules, the band concerts, the football games, the fieldtrips, the prom decorations—define us. We maintain them because they maintain us.

Categories Citizenship, Community Schools, Education Reform, Ethics, Supporting public schools

Linda Darling-Hammond: The Promise of Community Schools

By dianeravitch
August 25, 2023 //
33

Linda Darling-Hammond is a prominent professor at Stanford and president of The Learning Policy Institute. She has been a public school teacher, a researcher, and president of the California State Board of Education. In this essay, she explains why the community school model may be the best path forward for school reform.

She writes:

“Kasserian ingera”—the traditional greeting of Masai warriors—asks: “And how are the children?” It is still a greeting among the Masai, acknowledging the high value they place on their children’s well-being. The traditional answer, “All the children are well,” means that the safety and welfare of the young are protected by their communities.

Unfortunately, in the United States, we know that all of our children are not well. Indeed, by any measure, children and youth in the United States are struggling. The aftermath of the pandemic has brought with it an epidemic of mental health issues, from anxiety and depression to suicidal ideation. A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report from 2022 found that 44% of adolescents said they felt sad or hopeless most of the time during the spring of 2021, and 20% seriously considered suicide. During that time, 29% had an adult in their household lose a job and 24% went hungry; 55% said they were exposed to harsh verbal or physical treatment at home.

Many report continuing to feel disconnected from school. Among high school students from 95 districts surveyed by Youth Truth in 2021–22, a minority (40%) reported feeling like part of their school community or enjoying coming to school, and just 39% reported having an adult at school they could talk with when they feel “upset, stressed, or having problems.” (See figure below.) These proportions are even lower for students of color, LGBTQ+ students, and students in large schools.

It is in this context that a diverse and growing chorus of educators, students, families, and policymakers are calling for a reimagining of our schools. They are highlighting the need to center relationships, belonging, and community; to create structures and practices to support relevant and engaging learning; and to organize resources, supports, and opportunities in ways that mitigate the pernicious effects of structural racism and decades of disinvestment in low-income communities of color.

As Learning Policy Institute Senior Fellow in Residence Jeannie Oakes noted recently, “We need to have schools really change the way they operate to compensate for deficiencies, not in the kids, but in our social safety net.”

Responding to the uniquely challenging moment we’re in, many districts and states are making big bets on community schools—both to address the tattered social safety net Oakes refers to, as well as to provide a catalyst for the deeper cultural and practice changes needed to better serve students and adults alike.

These initiatives are underway in large urban districts like Albuquerque, Baltimore, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York City, and Oakland, as well as in smaller rural communities in California, Kentucky, New Mexico, New York, and Vermont. A number of states have also established funding and supports for community schools. Maryland established the Concentration of Poverty grant program to provide annual community school personnel grants to eligible schools, along with additional per-pupil grant funding for each eligible student. New York created a community schools set-aside in its school funding formula for high-need districts and funded three regional technical assistance centers for community schools. California, for its part, has leveraged multiyear budget surpluses in 2021 and 2022 to make a historic $4.1 billion investment in planning, implementation, and coordination grants—as well as technical assistance—for the state-funded California Community Schools Partnership Program. This investment is intended to provide sufficient resources for every high-poverty school in California to become a community school within the next 5 to 7 years.

Community schools are a place-based strategy deeply rooted in their local context—the needs, assets, hopes, and dreams of students, families, educators, and community partners. They leverage a complex web of partnerships and relationships, like those at Mendez High School in East Los Angeles, to support and engage students and families. By integrating access to services—from medical care to housing and other supports—and making them available to students and families on school campuses, community schools provide a much-needed alternative to the fragmented and bureaucratic social services gauntlet that families in need are typically required to navigate. As we have seen time and again during the COVID-19 pandemic, these services and supports—provided in the context of trusting and caring relationships—can be life changing and can mean the difference between academic success and struggling students and families.

At Mendez, because of the infrastructure created through its community schools approach, the school and its partners were able to provide vital services to students and families as soon as schools shut down in 2020. A mobile clinic that already served the school began COVID-19 testing for the community; mental health providers already in place conducted regular mental health check-ins with students via devices or at a safe physical distance. Other partners created care packages with food, toilet paper, electronic benefit transfer cards, and other essentials, and teachers organized to provide Wi-Fi hot spots to families before the district had the capacity to do so.

But to achieve the transformation our students need and the times demand, community schools must be about much more than providing an efficient structure for integrated student supports (or wraparound services, as they are sometimes called). Transformation requires that we also address the structural barriers to student well-being and academic success that are encompassed by the other foundational elements of community schools: a culture of belonging, safety, and care; community-connected classroom instruction; expanded and enriched learning opportunities; empowered student and family engagement; and collaborative leadership. Foundational to all of this is a grounding in whole childeducation.

When implemented well, community schools are guided by principles for equitable whole child practices that are grounded in the science of learning and development. This whole child framework is at the center of the community schools initiative in California, where the State Board of Education has thus far approved $1.5 billion in planning and implementation grants from a larger initiative that is intended to reach one third of the state’s schools in high-need communities.

The key elements of a whole child framework should be foundational to our vision of transformational community schools:

  • Structures and practices to foster positive developmental relationships and ensure that students are known and supported. Examples include looping in the elementary grades, where a teacher stays with the class for more than one year, and utilizing advisory systems in middle and high school, which create small family units that offer personal attention, space for sharing needs and feelings, and family connections that support each student.
  • Supportive and caring school communities where students feel a strong sense of belonging and are safe to bring their full selves, without fear of being bullied by peers or stereotyped or negatively judged by students or adults at school.
  • Culturally affirming social and emotional learning that is infused throughout the school day and includes skill-building, as well as educative and restorative approaches to classroom management and discipline, so that children and young people learn responsibility for themselves and their community.
  • Rich learning experiences that support inquiry, motivation, competence, self-efficacy, and self-directed learning.
  • Integrated student supports that remove academic and non-academic barriers to learning by providing health and social services as needed, tutoring and other academic supports, and a focus on children’s individual talents and needs.

Move at the “Speed of Trust”

Just as we need to rethink how students are engaged and supported in schools, we also need to reimagine adult interactions—among families and educators, as well as among school staff. That means treating families as trusted partners in their students’ well-being and academic success and intentionally supporting their capacity building and leadership development.

As importantly, it also means investing in educators and school staff, so they have the necessary tools, agency, and support—including support for their mental health and emotional well-being—to shift practices in ways that expand the capacities of students and adults alike. This includes enabling new teachers’ success with strong induction and mentoring, while providing leadership opportunities for more experienced teachers. It means providing the collaboration time essential to advancing meaningful and engaging instruction and supporting teacher-led professional development. And, just as with students and families, it means nurturing trust and collaborative leadership among staff and with school and district leaders.

Open the link to read the rest of this article and to see the graphs.

Categories Community Schools, Education Reform, Equity, Ethics, Parents, Students, Teachers

Jersey City: The Secret to Retaining Teachers!

By dianeravitch
August 9, 2023 //
16

Something exciting is happening in Jersey City, New Jersey. As schools adopt the community schools model, teachers are teaching, enjoying it, and not jumping ship. Pay attention!

Joshua Rosario wrote in the Jersey Journal:

We swear on Dumbledore’s Elder wand, no spells were cast to keep teachers from walking out the door of this Jersey City school.

At a time when schools nationwide are struggling to keep and recruit educators, the preK-through-8 Mahatma Gandhi School has retained its staff by using a community-based model that allows them to focus solely on teaching; as well as a Harry Potter-type friendly competition in which students and teachers are split into four teams to accumulate points throughout the year.

Teachers Michelle Duarte and Lindsay Boland said before the school, located at 143 Romaine Ave., transitioned to the community-based model, teachers had to be attendance officers, guidance counselors, therapists, nurses and even act as another parent for students.

“It just comes down to you can teach, you can interact with students and not worry about all the extra stuff that used to get thrown at you in the past,” Duarte, a teacher for 23 years at the school said.

At least 55% of teachers, many of whom take on multiple roles beyond educating their students, are considering leaving the profession earlier than they planned, according to a survey by the National Education Association, one of the largest teacher unions in the country.

“I am not saying that I don’t think about work when I get home … but when I get home I can shut my computer down and not have to type up lesson plans,” said Boland, who has taught at three schools. “I had one of my students tell me he missed school for a week because he had no shoes.”

Superintendent Norma Fernandez and Mahatma Gandhi Principal Peter Mattaliano credit the community-based school model for a 95% retention rate. The community-based model allows the school to give its 1,000 students, of which 62% are considered economically disadvantaged, and their families access to more services than traditional schools can provide.

Out of the 85 teachers at the school, also known as School 23, only five teachers had filed for retirement this past year, Mattaliano said.

While many teachers would pay out of their own pocket to provide a student with shoes, teachers at Mahatma Gandhi can reach out to the school’s community coordinator. The children and their families are not only connected to needed financial help, but the school provides a food pantry, clothing shop and even a full medical clinic that includes visits from a pediatrician and dentist.

“They didn’t even know what a dentist was or owned a toothbrush, which was really alarming and depressing,” said Boland, who teaches first grade. “A lot of times kids tell you there is no food at home, so a few times a week we take some of our students down there and go food shopping.”

School 23 is one of five community-based schools in the district, along with schools 15, 34, 22, 29 (which opens in September) and Snyder High School.

Open the link and read on.

Categories Community Schools, Education Reform, Funding, New Jersey, Teachers and Teaching

Paul Bonner: How to Build Public Trust in Public Schools

By dianeravitch
May 31, 2023 //
26

Paul Bonner is a retired teacher and principal. He suggests a way to undermine the complaints about CRT, WOKE, and other scarecrows.

Perhaps the greatest injustice of all of this sound and fury for nothing, is that few of the individuals who are the most outspoken concerning cultural disinformation have set foot in a school in the last decade, much less observed or engaged in classroom instruction. Most of the right wing celebrities who profit from all of this noise send their children to private schools. Well intentioned policy makers and Washington politicians also opt for private schools when they are available. It is my experience that when school officials open their doors the reception from the public is very positive. I was principal of an elementary school where my predecessors actually barred members of the community from the building. There was a metal pull down door at the front of the office that was always closed by 4:00 pm. The neighborhood perception of the school was bad because there were no relationships between the school and community.

When I got there, I stopped using the metal door and invited the real estate developers to come and see what we were doing. The overall outlook toward the school from all constituencies, including the staff, improved dramatically. I took similar steps at my previous school, invited the “difficult” parents in, and increased afternoon activities to accentuate the positive. According to Gallup (August 2022) 76% of parents are satisfied with their child’s public school (Compare that to 22% for Congress), it was 82% before the pandemic.

My experience has taught me that if we are open to parents being in the schools and participating in activities, the dissatisfaction reduces significantly. Yes, it is well documented on this blog and through other media outlets that there are nefarious actors pushing a destructive agenda, but it is important that we fight their lies with the good that takes place in schools. The knee jerk firing and isolation of teachers who teach about diversity is one example of the the defensive posture taken by district and state leaders.

Part of the reason, certainly not all, that the right wing disinformation campaigns take root is because school officials too often take cover and act to separate schools from the greater community. We simply don’t know one another. Our best weapon against false opaque charges of indoctrination is to open our doors, invite the community in, and get the positive out.

Categories Accountability, Community Schools, Democracy, Education Reform, Parents, Supporting public schools

LeBron James Is the Greatest Citizen-Educator of Our Time

By dianeravitch
May 4, 2023 //
24

The basketball superstar LeBron James grew up in Akron. He wanted to help children in Akron, so he funded a school. It is not a charter school. It is a community school that operates as part of the Akron public schools. Unlike most charter schools, it doesn’t choose the top-performing kids; it chooses the kids who need help the most, those with the lowest scores. It provides a range of services for them and their families. It offers a food pantry for families, for instance.

Now the LeBron James Family Foundation is reaching out to offer services to the entire community. This family foundation has some valuable lessons for the Walton Family Foundation, which uses its billions to destroy public schools and communities; it could teach lessons to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which has imposed a series of failed programs on schools, dreamed up by consultants who never asked students, parents, or school staff what they wanted or needed.

Now, in a story told by Tawney Beans of the Akron Beacon Journal, the Lebron James program is expanding to offer job training and other services for community members.

It was quite the opening day for House Three Thirty.

The space, formerly home to Tangier restaurant, has almost concluded its two-year transformation into a retail, dining and event community center spearheaded by the LeBron James Family Foundation.

After the complex opened at 6 a.m. Thursday, a steady trickle people made their way through the space. Some simply wanted a hot cup of joe from the first-of-its kind Starbucks Community Store, others couldn’t wait to peek inside and scope out where to have their next church event, and still more came to see just how much impact a self-proclaimed “kid from Akron” could really have.

Some of the first visitors included LeBron James’ mother, Gloria, as well as former St. Vincent-St. Mary basketball teammate and LeBron James Family Foundation employee Willie McGee.

While touring the space, Gloria spoke about her pride in her son for creating House Three Thirty.

“I’m really proud of this venture, especially because it opens the doors to so many opportunities for our community — job training, employment, [Chase] bank being here and helping our community with their banking needs,” she said. “Then a huge ball area where lifelong memories can be made like weddings and receptions and birthday parties, bar mitzvahs and all that goes with that.”

McGee shares that pride and hopes that the new facility, coupled with the nearby I Promise School, I Promise Village and soon to be HealthQuarters, will have a substantial impact on the Akron community.

“We’re offering them the ability to come into a safe space where they feel comfortable, that they can receive resources,” he said. “We’re trying to build something to where whatever you need, you’re able to get in this area, and by being centrally located we want all of Akron to be able to come and join in.”

DeLondia Feaster of Akron had her 45th birthday party in Tangier and was pleased to see that the foundation kept much of the historic building’s integrity. One detail she admired were the picture frames in the main hallway, which were once adorned with photos and posters of entertainers who performed at the previous Akron restaurant and cabaret.

“I feel like I’m in Vegas, somewhere where you can go in somewhere and everything is in one shop,” she said. “It should bring some pride. A kid from the projects bringing something like this to a city is huge, you know, it’s really huge for the city, and I just hope people take advantage of that.”

Another spectator, Karon Boston of Akron, enjoyed the history within House Three Thirty — specifically, the portions depicting James’ progression from his time at St. Vincent-St. Mary to the NBA.

Highland Square resident Barbara Kemper and friend Cheryl Renick took in the new space from its sitting area near Starbucks.

“It’s nice to have something in this area besides bars,” Kemper said.

Sundae Davinport, a barista at House Three Thirty’s Starbucks, said that the family atmosphere of the place has given her a reason to wake up in the morning and be happy to go to work.

Davinport is the mother to a previous I Promise Program student and has spent the last eight weeks training in the facility’s kitchens. She’s learned everything from how to properly cut chicken and fish to ways to cook steaks and vegetables.

“We learned a lot,” she said. “I never knew there was 100 or more ways to cook an egg.”

That happiness to go into work was also influenced by the support she has received from the foundation, even something small like getting her hair braided for free at House Three Thirty’s in-house barber and beauty shop.

Contact Beacon Journal reporter Tawney Beans at tbeans@gannett.com and on Twitter @TawneyBeans.

Categories Community Schools, Creativity, Education Reform, Funding, Ohio, Parents

“School Choice” Will Destroy Public Schools

By dianeravitch
April 12, 2023 //
51

A reader who identifies as “Retired Teacher” sees the school choice juggernaut as a deliberate plan to destroy our common good: public schools. Thomas Jefferson proposed the first public schools. The Northwest Ordinances, written by the founding fathers, set aside a plot of land in every town for a public school.

The origin of the school choice movement was the backlash to the Brown Decision of 1954. Segregationists created publicly-funded academies (charters) for white flight and publicly-funded vouchers to escape desegregation.

What replaces public schools will not be better for students, and it will be far worse for our society.

So much reckless “choice” will make the public schools the schools of last resort for those that have nowhere else to go. Choice is a means to defund what should be our common good. How are the schools supposed to fund the neediest, most vulnerable and most expensive students when so much funding is transferred to private interests? How will public schools be able to pay to maintain the buildings, hire qualified teachers and pay for all the fixed costs like insurance, transportation and utilities?

The billionaires and religious groups behind so-called choice would like to see public schools collapse. Choice benefits the ultra-wealthy and segregationists. Choice empowers the schools that do the choosing, not the families trying to find a school for their child. If public schools become the bottom tier of choice, they will become like the insane asylums of the 19th century where the unfortunate were warehoused, ignored and abused. This dystopian outcome would be the opposite of what the founding fathers envisioned. Their vision was one of inclusion where all are welcome, a place serves the interests of the nation, communities and individuals with civil, social and individual benefits. A tiered system of schools is neither ‘thorough or efficient.’ It is a nightmare, and nothing any proponents of democracy should be supporting.

Categories Accountability, Betsy DeVos, Bigotry, Charter Schools, Community Schools, Democracy, Disruption, Education Industry, Extremism, For-Profit, Funding, History, Hoax, Privatization, Racism, Religion, School Choice, Segregation, Separation of church and state, Supporting public schools, Vouchers

Chicago: Vote for Brandon Johnson for Mayor

By dianeravitch
April 2, 2023 //
3

Julie Vassilatos, a parent activist and blogger in Chicago, writes here about the case for Brandon Johnson. She and others have written passionately against Paul Vallas, but here she explains why Brandon Johnson is well prepared to serve as Mayor. Because of his knowledge and experience, he not only knows the city’s budgetary issues well, but he is able to address the root causes of crime and the real needs of students.

She writes:

Friends, so many of us have been carrying on about the dangers of Paul Vallas so incessantly, you’d be forgiven for thinking that he’s running for mayor of Chicago unopposed.

But Vallas does have an opponent—one who is talented, thoughtful, experienced, and a real true Chicagoan raising his family on the west side: Brandon Johnson.

Johnson is getting a lot of heat from Vallas and his supporters right now. No lesser a personage than Darren Bailey, defeated far-right candidate for IL governor and unofficial endorser of Vallas, has announced that if Johnson is elected, it will be a “dark day” for Chicago. Yes. A dark day indeed. Get it?

I’m pretty sure Darren Bailey fans get it.

Then there’s FOP president/disgraced cop John Catanzara, who foresees that 1000 cops will walk off the job if Johnson wins, and there will be blood in the streets.

Vallas himself, who routinely speaks of Johnson in kind of Godzilla terms, has called him and the CTU a destructive force wreaking devastation on the city.

In addition to its coded race language, this election has rather inflated rhetoric.

I’m trying to keep mine toned down, or at least backed up by evidence. While it’s hard to pin “generational” devastation on Johnson or the CTU, it’s actually possible to do this for Vallas. He has set many destructive policies in motion in urban areas globally that have left decades of harm in their wake. Also financial calamity. But I and many others have told you all this over and over again. And this post is not about that guy.

This post is about Brandon Johnson.


Truth to tell, at the outset of the race I was slow to warm up to Johnson the candidate. But then I remembered that he was at the front lines of a struggle I will never forget—the 2013 mass school closures. So many folks did all we could do to try and stop that, well, generationally damaging policy. And those who led the way in that effort? I’d probably follow them into a fire.

But what about Brandon Johnson now? What are his credentials? Haven’t you, like me, read all that stuff about how he has no experience? How he’s never managed a budget? How he seems (unfathomably) to like crime and together with CTU wants our city to be unsafe, because….because….well, because reasons?

Well, maybe we need to look a little deeper than the media/social media blah blah blah.

In a recent mayoral forum Vallas asserted that “Brandon has run nothing.” Since Vallas hasn’t really lived here much I guess he may not know that Johnson has served on the Cook County Board of Commissioners since 2018 and has managed a great deal, including the $8.75B Cook County budget. The Cook County Board has wide ranging responsibilities, and if you’ve always wondered but never known what the Board does, you should take this time to educate yourself, starting at the Cook County Board website. Here’s a basic summary:

The Cook County Board of Commissioners oversees County operations and approves the budget of elected County officials including the Assessor, Board of Review Commissioners, County Clerk, Clerk of the Circuit Court, Recorder of Deeds, Sheriff, States Attorney and Treasurer.

The Commissioners also serve as the Board of the Cook County Forest Preserve District, a special purpose taxing district. The Board also sets policy, levies taxes, passes ordinances, approves all county purchases over $10,000, and adopts the annual budget for the entire county government.

That 2023 Cook County Budget was praised by the Civic Federation:

The Civic Federation supports the Cook County FY2023 Executive Budget Recommendation of $8.75 billion because it reflects strong financial management and puts the County in a good position moving forward post-pandemic. The County’s FY2023 proposed budget includes a strong level of reserves and positive revenue projections, without any increases in taxes or fees.

The budget gap is smaller than it’s been in years, supplemental payments to the pension fund have been made for the eighth year in a row, and the County’s fiscal position is “strong…following robust revenue performance and built-up reserves.” And observe that there are in this budget, no tax increases. (Here I note we can be grateful to Board President Toni Preckwinkle who has shepherded this budget for 13 years. And I note further, she has endorsed Johnson.)

Now let’s review the budgets Vallas has overseen.

In Philadelphia, Vallas managed a $2B budget and left a surprise $73M deficit on his way out the door. In the Louisiana Recovery District his budget was $176M. He got an extra $1.8B to work with from FEMA, and before he was done with the NOLA job he wandered repeatedly over to Haiti, missing weeks at a time of work in New Orleans (that’s beside the point, but I just thought you should know). And in Bridgeport CT, his budget was $232M. Of course he was pushed out of that job before he could really do much financial damage there.

For those of you keeping score, Vallas hasn’t ever drafted, managed, or implemented a budget even close to the size that Brandon Johnson has worked with as a member of the Cook County Board.

Before his County Board days, Johnson was a teacher. He taught middle school social studies at Jenner from 2007 to 2010 (years when most of his students were able to watch, right from school windows, wrecking balls demolishing their homes as the city brought down public housing), and then at Westinghouse for a year. He then became a CTU organizer and the leader of its Black Caucus. In those years he had a front row view on lots of turmoil in the district: school closures and turnarounds via the failed Renaissance 2010 initiative, the loss of Black teachers in the classroom as a result of closures and CPS policy choices, the 2012 teacher strike, the 2013 mass school closures, a churn of district CEOs, some of whom ended up in prison, illegal special education cuts, and rapid charter expansion.

While Johnson was organizing teachers and collaborating with parents in response to district policies that were crushing schools and services (and I do mean that literally, with at least one occasion of bulldozers bringing down a school library on a day when parents were instead expecting a meeting), he lived the experience of the folks who’ve been at the mercy of “education reform” for decades. He saw first hand what disinvestment has done to CPS students—resulting in teacher cuts, special ed cuts, after-school cuts, nursing cuts, and the whittling away of libraries, down to only 90 remaining in a total of 513 schools. He’s seen the violent legacy of closing the community anchor that is a public school. He’s watched, along with all of us, poor choices at the top—everything from grifting, self-dealing, and bribery, to no-bid contracts and cronyism—and how those things bust budgets and destroy trust. He stood with community members on a hunger strike to save a school, then joined in it himself. He’s seen the negative academic and social impacts of excessive testing, privatization, and vouchers. He’s seen these things from the perspective of 25,000 teachers and hundreds of thousands of public school families.

Vallas, meanwhile, has been the man who set those policies. He set them in motion right here in Chicago in 1995, and traveled the country and globe continuing to implement them from then until now.

He may talk a good game about Doing It All For The Children, but the fact of the matter is, Vallas has never had to stick around and watch the long term impacts of his policy decisions on The Children. Those impacts have caused years of student protests in Chile. Have kept special ed kids struggling for spots in schools in New Orleans. Have left Philadelphia in “constant crisis mode.” Led directly to our own CPS budget crisis.

Brandon Johnson has large scale urban management experience with a Board that’s closing budget gaps and overseeing a vast array of county services. He manages a bigger budget right now than Vallas ever has. And Johnson has face-to-face, personal experience with the folks who live and work and raise their children in Chicago. His years as a teacher and with CTU have given him the perspective of individuals and families on a hyper-local basis. His work has encompassed both the broad span of countywide planning and management, and the particular lens on particular people and particular struggles.

Brandon Johnson is obviously qualified for the job.

You can check out how his qualifications and vision work themselves into a platform on his website. It’s practical and passionate and outlines a vision for the city that benefits everyone, even those struggling folks who never seem to catch a break from city leaders.

Johnson understands we cannot solve violence without dealing with its root causes; more policing, surveilling, and arresting alone won’t do the trick. We can’t fix the schools without listening to communities, parents, and educators; we must reject the failed status quo of Vallas’s “education reform.” And we can’t expect our teachers and police to solve poverty and homelessness all on their own.

The choice we have before us, it seems to me, is whether we’re going to listen to the incessant hype about a “fix-it man”—who has never fixed anything. Or dig a little deeper ourselves and see that the mayor we need has been here all along, working to make our city better for his entire career, with poise and passion.

Are we going to listen to voices that allude to “dark days” and blood baths in the streets? Or are we going to listen to a man who has a vision for his city rooted in love and practical experience?

You pick, Chicago.

Categories Accountability, Character, Charter Schools, Chicago, Closing schools, Community Schools, Courage, Creativity, Democracy, Education Reform, Elections, Funding, Supporting public schools, Vallas, Paul
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