Charter high schools in Detroit not making the grade...often trail public schools.

[madfloridian]

From the Detroit News.

Charter high schools in Detroit not making grade

Once touted as a solution to Detroit's public school woes, charter high schools are often doing just about as poorly — and in many cases worse — at educating students and getting them ready for college, a Detroit News analysis of recent test data shows.

Of 25 charters in Detroit or nearby, only six had higher math or science proficiency scores than Detroit Public Schools' average on the most recent Michigan Merit Exam, with most of the others doing worse than the district.

More charters did poorer in reading and writing as well; only in social studies did more charters surpass rather than trail DPS.

The results raise questions about the district's plans to authorize additional charters in its search for improvement and could also renew the debate over whether charters are the answer to the riddle of urban education, where multiple strategies are often producing the same poor results.

Last year I read about the group called Excellent Schools Detroit, which seemed to essentially be taking over education in Detroit.

Group has plan unprecedented anywhere else in the country.


Members of Excellent Schools Detroit talk about the citywide education plan Wednesday. From left, they are: New Urban Learning Founder Doug Ross, Skillman Foundation chief Carol Goss and Detroit Public Schools emergency financial manager Robert Bobb. (PATRICIA BECK/Detroit Free Press)

Releasing details of an ambitious plan to remake schools in the city of Detroit, a coalition of nonprofit organizations said Wednesday that it plans to push for mayoral control of Detroit Public Schools, set up an independent commission to grade every school in the city, including charters, and establish a goal of graduating 90% of kids from high school by 2020.

The group, calling itself Excellent Schools Detroit, announced last week that it planned to replace failing Detroit schools with 70 new ones and make a $200-million initial investment -- a plan unprecedented in scope anywhere in the country. The group has commitments from the Gates Foundation and other national groups willing to come to Detroit, said Carol Goss, CEO and president of the Skillman Foundation, a key leader in the effort.

Here are three of the key components:

• Turning over control of Detroit Public Schools to the mayor.

• Abolishing the elected school board.

• Generating public pressure on DPS and charter school operators to close failing schools or programs

Sounds like another hostile takeover to me, like many that are going on all over the country.

Seems to me it says a lot when your emergency manager of public schools and your governor are "huddling" with billionaire reformers at fancy hotels.

Telling picture...Snyder "huddles" with executives.


Detroit Public Schools emergency manager Roy Roberts (second from right) speaks to a group of executives, including Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, on the porch of the Grand Hotel at the Detroit Regional Chamber's Mackinac Policy Conference earlier this month. Nathan Bomey | AnnArbor.com

I find myself wondering if the fact that charter high schools are not performing as well as public high schools will make a difference? Or if the plans are already in motion no matter what.

[Starry Messenger]

1. Your last line, I ask myself the same question every day.

[madfloridian]

2. I wonder if there will be any going back.

Probably a done deal. :-(

[awoke_in_2003]

16. I doubt it...

as a country we are too far gone in too many areas. At least we have bread and circus :sarcasm:

[Sarah Ibarruri]

3. Charter schools were yet another attempt by Repugnicans to take jabs at the public school sys

The reality is that if kids are not doing that well nowadays, it's not because teachers are lazy, or public schools are lazy. It's because (thanks to the 30 plus year Repugnican influence) the American system has become incredibly f****d up, the quality of life has dropped, and the children are suffering.

Doesn't matter to Repukes. Repukes will continue to lie and say it's the teachers and the public school system.

Repukes long for the day when there is no longer a public school system, so the entire population will be incredibly ignorant, and all vote for Repukes.

[madfloridian]

4. What worries me is that the charter owners may set the teaching agenda.

If they are not answerable to the school district, they often will get to have their own curriculum.

[blkmusclmachine]

6. Oh, that's the plan, all right.

Methinks some good ol' time RW fundy religion will rear its ugly head. Compulsory, too. Look to Texas as an early example. Kids are gonna be propagandadized. Count on it.

[blkmusclmachine]

7. Look up www.chalcedon.edu:

A far RW group with ties to the Presidential Prayer Breakfasts held in DC (every year since 1952). Overthrow of public education is far along their path for creating a "God-based" Country. Education is the last shoe to drop. And an offshoot group, The Oak Initiative, prayed with Obama on Easter Sunday at the WH, delivering a Sermon about merging Church and State.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

8. You know how Repukes spread lies? Well, what's wrong with spreading truth?? Let's spread truth.

Let's speak to anyone and everyone about this. Let's e-mail people about this. If all of us did this, the truth about charter schools would soon be out among the general public.

[Bandit]

9. They can teach how Paul Revere raced to warn the Brittish, ringing his bells and firing off shots of

And how the 2nd amendment was created so we can attack the Government and all government employees if we don't get the election results we want..And how slaves in America had it so much better than blacks in America today..Got to get the "truth" out there to our kids.

[madfloridian]

12. I remember hearing that in school.

About how slaves did not have it so bad, that they had food and shelter, etc. I don't remember which class, but it stuck with me. I did not really believe it, but I never took time to question it because it was said in a school classroom.

[blkmusclmachine]

5. Failing "Charters"? Solution: Throw More Money At Them!

And, while you're at it, BE DOUBLE-EXTRA SURE it's money you steal away from Public Schools. :puke:

[TheKentuckian]

10. Success and failure are not behind this movement. It is purely long term right wing agenda.

[placton]

11. this was another easy prediction, mad

charter schools in MI almost always underperform public ones. Of course, supporting charters is a good way to kill teachers' unions, so they have that going for them - and fuck the kids

[radhika]

13. But taxpayer money went to private pockets...

isn't that the whole purpose of the 'Charter School' hooha?

[KamaAina]

14. From the far-right Detroit News, no less!

Ironically, the more centrist paper is the Free Press -- often abbreviated to "Freep"!

[sulphurdunn]

15. Detroit is 75% African American.

It's median household income is $26,000. No one knows the real unemployment rate, but it is certainly between 30 and 50 percent. One third of the population lives below the poverty line ($19,000 or less annually for a family of four). Childhood poverty is 49%. The city has about 84,000 regular public school students. About 54,000 more are enrolled in charter schools now. Three-quarters of all school age children live with a single parent. Twenty-one percent of children in Detroit 12 or older who responded to The National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (NHSDA) survey in 2001 reported using drugs or alcohol in that month. Detroit is one of America's most socially and economically fucked up cities.

If you listen to the Billionaire Boy's Club Foundations and their hedge fund flunkies, these problems can be easily resolved with more charter schools, lower paid teachers with no rights or job security, and high stakes testing. :evilgrin:

[defendandprotect]

17. kr