Saturday, April 4, 2009
Charters as a Choice
I think that by providing parents with more educational options for their children we are forcing traditional public schools to maintain or strive to achieve effective practices. Charters schools not only provide parents with choice, but as stated in Kelly's presentation, they can also act as educational laboratories, where new and effective instructional practices can be developed and experimented with. This will force public schools to improve their educational programs in order to compete for student enrollment. If the public schools in an area are not effectively educating or providing for a safe learning environment for students, then parents should have the choice to send their students to a learning institution that gets the job done. I would not continue to use the services of a company if it failed to achieve what it had promised in other areas of my life, so then why should parents have to continue to employ the services of schools that are not effective? In the article "A Defining Moment for Charter Schools," Levin makes a valid point : "It's not about the success of an organization, it's about sharing what works best for kids." If a charter school is able to develop practices that effectively educate students and then those ideas can be shared with public school educators as well, then it is a win for students across the board whether they attend public or charter schools. And really, isn't providing for the success of all students the point?
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I totallly agree that education is suppose to be given to all and that Charter schools can really help the educate students at the Charter schools and also at the public schools around them. I love the thought of using my Charter school as a lab and I have found that a lot of what we do really works well for a lot of our students. i wish I could go and show Cleveland public schools some of the things we do to help the students in CLeveland public schools. They have the same right as my students do to receive an education that will help them in life. The idea of Charter schools have been found to be positive or else we wouldn't see a ton of Charter schools opening up each year. The article, Charter Schools on the Rise, shows the increase in Charter schools so there must be some good to them. Choice is important but we need to make sure that all of the options can work together and rememebr that what they are doing can be shared to improve education for all.
ReplyDeleteMegan your post is very well stated. There are alot of people who are confused with the whole charter school option. I never really got into the whole thing myself but in speaking with my principal just recently she said that we are not taking away any money from the public schools. She said alot of people have been misinformed and they have this notion that charter schools are bad because they are taking public schools over. There is this overlying notion that a charter school is there for when a public school has failed. It is simply to offer another choice to parents. A public school does not have to fail a child or a family for a family to go to a charter school. In some charter schools such as mine, we offer a school based on uniforms, character, state tests, highly qualified teachers, and smaller class sizes. That might be something parents are looking for and maybe not but it is their choice. I do like your statement about giving parents more educational options and forcing traditional schools to maintain effective practices. When Kelly was presenting she discussed how her school could be closed down if in academic watch. Does anyone realize that charter schools are held way more accountable for their actions than most public schools? We all need to work together and this notion of charter schools stealing public schools money has got to stop. Again it all goes back to the best interest of the child....it's the parents choice!
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