NYT Story: For Detroit’s Children, More School Choice but Not Better Schools

[EastsideAl]

For Detroit’s Children, More School Choice but Not Better Schools
June 28, 2016

Ana Rivera could have had almost any choice when it came to educating her two sons. For all the abandoned buildings and burned-down houses in her neighborhood in the southwest part of this city, national charter school companies had seen a market and were setting up shop within blocks of each other, making it easier to find a charter school than to buy a carton of milk.

But hers became the story of public education in a city grasping for its comeback: lots of choice, with no good choice.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/us...=top-news&_r=0

Enjoy...

[Bobl]

Nice plan: take 1.1 billion dollars that would have gone to public schools, award it to for profit organizations, who skim 33 million right off the top. The new schools have the same or worse results. This, from folks like the Devos family and their allies, who describe themselves as fiscal conservatives.

[ABetterDetroit]

Thanks Al, interesting article.

Now that there is plenty of "choice" how do we get accountability and results from public and charter? Clearly we don't have that from either. Politicizing this issue to death is not a solution unfortunately. If it was, these would all be the best schools in the nation.

[Jimaz]

DetroitYES Home » Non Detroit Issues » Thom Hartmann » Why Does Chris Christie Want To Screw New Jersey Schools?

[renf]

This essay in today's paper about schools in Detroit is very informative. It would be great if the local papers provided such in-depth reporting and discussed real ways to change the funding of schools and municipal governments in Michigan. While there are some successful charter schools, at this point it sure looks like the various attempts to privatize public education through the use of tax dollars accomplished very little.

[Baselinepunk]

This essay in today's paper about schools in Detroit is very informative. It would be great if the local papers provided such in-depth reporting and discussed real ways to change the funding of schools and municipal governments in Michigan. - snip -

Good luck with all that.

The 4th Estate in Detroit proper and Metro hasn't had any balls in quite some time.

[Wesley Mouch]

I read the article. Couldn't find allegations that charters as a whole have harmed students any more than the existing system was/is.

The problems were a litany of philosophical complaints about whether there's room for non-public schools in our educational system, but little to none about harm.

So if our children are doing no worse, and some options are better -- that's the idea. Provide some choice -- and work to kill the bad schools and support the good.

Or whine that charters didn't solve all problems for everyone -- and pine for the good ol' days of DPS monopoly.

[mwilbert]

I read the article. Couldn't find allegations that charters as a whole have harmed students any more than the existing system was/is.

The problems were a litany of philosophical complaints about whether there's room for non-public schools in our educational system, but little to none about harm.

So if our children are doing no worse, and some options are better -- that's the idea. Provide some choice -- and work to kill the bad schools and support the good.

Or whine that charters didn't solve all problems for everyone -- and pine for the good ol' days of DPS monopoly.

Actually, the Stanford research that the article references [[not adequately) showed that the charters were [[on average) better than the DPS schools. The problem is that they were still really bad. What I think the article points out accurately is that Michigan's system for chartering schools is absurd [[and allows very bad schools to persist) and that all the Detroit schools, DPS and charter, are underfunded, especially as they have to deal with a very challenging student population.

I'm not convinced there is any politically feasible solution for most of the current school population. I think the best thing for the future of the city would be to go to a voucher system, but I'm not stupid enough to think that would help many of the students/families in the system now. It might make it more attractive to more affluent families that might consider moving into town and topping up the vouchers with their own funds, but there isn't enough money available to make vouchers large enough to pay for the educational services a disadvantaged population is likely to require.

Frankly. people with children who are likely to need to use the DPS or charters and can't get into the exam schools should strongly consider moving someplace else, preferably to a different metropolitan area, simply because this problem is almost certainly not going to be solved while their children are still in school.

[evergreen]

Hate to say it, but the best way to help Detroit parents is to reinstate tracking in all neighborhood schools. The struggle to get kids to schools all over town, with predictable attendance problems, is heartbreaking. I attended inner city schools until 8th grade, but I was always tracked into high performance groups. There is no way my parents could have transported me out of the neighborhood. Give these kids and their parents a chance.

[belleislerunner]

I'm not sure why anyone should be surprised - we have a mother [[Ms. Rivera) who clearly has never explained to an 11 year old where his body came from and we have teachers who choose to stage political protests by not going to work yet still excepting pay. And we wonder why our students don't perform at the same level as Stuyvesant High School. There's only two excuses - teachers and parents.

[southen]

I'm not sure why anyone should be surprised - we have a mother [[Ms. Rivera) who clearly has never explained to an 11 year old where his body came from and we have teachers who choose to stage political protests by not going to work yet still excepting pay. And we wonder why our students don't perform at the same level as Stuyvesant High School. There's only two excuses - teachers and parents.

Spouting more of this nonsense I see. Your blind dislike of teachers isn't rooted in reality and for some reason you are incapable of understanding why teachers might strike for better working conditions and to receive pay they've already earned.

[Dumpling]

The political spheres seem to still be digesting the background of the recent
attempted coup in Turkey, but it was possibly funded by Gulenists, and Gulenists
get some of their money from their chain of charter schools in the U.S.
[[Hint courtesy of Eclectablog). [[Wesley Mouch, you are totally off the hook for
just this particular case for charters. Don't have to say a word.)

[Wesley Mouch]

The political spheres seem to still be digesting the background of the recent
attempted coup in Turkey, but it was possibly funded by Gulenists, and Gulenists
get some of their money from their chain of charter schools in the U.S.
[[Hint courtesy of Eclectablog). [[Wesley Mouch, you are totally off the hook for
just this particular case for charters. Don't have to say a word.)

I have nothing to add to your guilt by association chain. Even if the coup was possibly funded in part by a chain of charters, how does that change the educational outcome?

[Dumpling]

I am quite sure YOU had no intention of transferring state education monies into slush
funds for foreign adventurism. I am not nearly so sure concerning the motives of the multimillionaire backers of the charter school concept - if this is a side
motive of theirs or not.

There seems to have been no direct negative impact on the quality of education at the
Gulenist schools - it is reported [[I don't have the proper deep background to assess
this) that the schools recruited highly competent individuals from Turkey but had them
turning a large chunk of their pay [[which to me looked to be less than what public school teachers would normally make) over to Gulen. The students themselves seem to have received a reasonable education from their Turkish teachers.

[Wesley Mouch]

My Dumpling, can you explain why you think this is bad?

As to education, Gulenists are doing a good job. Many argue that Erdogen isn't such a great guy. Why shouldn't Gulenists be allow to advocate for change 'back home' with funds earned from productive work with education here?

I'm only vaguely aware of the Gulenists, and had not yet read about their connections to the coup in Turkey. Please do enlighten on your concerns about them.

I don't see fair profit from honest endeavor as being a 'transfer of state education monies into slush funds for foreign adventuring'.

[Dumpling]

Part two. The foreign adventurism part. Suppose, instead of distributing funds
for foreign missions covertly through charter schools, there is a checkoff box on
Michigan State tax returns that reads, "Would you like x amount of your tax dollars
to be used for ventures, including military operations, run by organizations of foreign
nationals that submit requests for funding and are approved by the State of Michigan?"
How well would this be accepted? My feeling is that neither the Michigan taxpayers
nor the State Department would accept this.

[Wesley Mouch]

Part two. The foreign adventurism part. Suppose, instead of distributing funds
for foreign missions covertly through charter schools, there is a checkoff box on
Michigan State tax returns that reads, "Would you like x amount of your tax dollars
to be used for ventures, including military operations, run by organizations of foreign
nationals that submit requests for funding and are approved by the State of Michigan?"
How well would this be accepted? My feeling is that neither the Michigan taxpayers
nor the State Department would accept this.

I do get your point. But if they are being paid for a service, and spending some of their profit on causes they believe in, I don't see that as a problem.

That does not mean I agree with their cause [[although it seems a lot less harmful than some other Islamic causes at the moment).

Seems to me best to simply manage charters well, and make sure that the payments are based on educational outcome and for educational purposes.

Spending your reasonable profits on non-terrorist advocacy does not seem to me like a money-conduit.

[Dumpling]

Caveats!! I am totally not an expert in Turkish internal affairs or the internal
workings of charter schools, so please make any and all corrections to my
viewpoints as needed. Please use other sources for proper understanding of
the situation.

The Gulen charter school issue can be subdivided into two parts. Part one,
the charter schools by themselves. Teachers are being somewhat shortchanged by
the Gulen charter schools. The pay in the first place is not high enough to make
teaching there truly competitive with other professional occupations which is the
case everywhere except in the best public schools in the most concerned communities.
The Turkish teachers, since they are in the Gulen movement, are being additionally
shortchanged as they are de facto required to turn over part of their pay to their
movement. How comfortable are you with that?
Let's say you are comfortable with that! To continue, the teachers in the Gulen
movement are teaching as part of their combined science and religion mission.
The religion is Islam, whatever their Turkish flavor is. You are probably comfortable
with that, but, the former Ottoman Empire was built and fell in some extremely
unsavory ways for the non-Muslim ethnic groups within it, and they have long
memories, and are not assured that there will be no harm or conflict going into the
future.
Plus there are still millions who view the United States as fundamentally Protestant
Christian, notwithstanding the Bill of Rights, and who may view Muslims as a worse
fifth column than Roman Catholics were.
The Gulen schools apparently won't take or will remove students with learning disabilities.
I am spreading pure hearsay, but from what I read, special needs students are
encouraged to attend public schools instead.
But the schools as such are often reasonably effective overall and I would even go so
far as to say they are a needed and welcomed alternative to public schools.

[renf]

Which charter schools in Michigan are Gulanist schools? About 85 years ago, Michigan voters were given the option to vote for a constitutional amendments that would have eliminated private schools at the elementary and secondary level. They turned that down.

[professorscott]

Which charter schools in Michigan are Gulanist schools? About 85 years ago, Michigan voters were given the option to vote for a constitutional amendments that would have eliminated private schools at the elementary and secondary level. They turned that down.

Very shortly thereafter, the Supreme Court made such schemes illegal, in a case which I believe involved the state of Oregon. So if the voters had passed such a thing, it would have been in effect for a couple years at most.

[Dumpling]

Michigan has only one Gulen charter school - it is this one in Center Line:

http://www.mmsaonline.org/