GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

I live in San Francisco and just now got back from running across the bay for a midday errand to Oakland, a city I really don’t know that well. Following the directions to get where I was going, I found myself passing the sainted, hallowed American Indian Public Charter School (AIPCS), which has been hailed by Gov. Schwarzenegger and President G.W. Bush, and probably by God Himself, for supposedly closing the achievement gap.

Being a middle-aged, minivan-driving PTA mom, I can lurk even outside a schoolyard without raising anyone’s concern, so I parked, got out and checked out the kids in the yard. Funny — where were all those disadvantaged black and Latino students? There were 20-25 kids in the yard, first jogging and then standing around. Almost all of them were Asian girls (the highest-scoring demographic of any, overall on average). I identified two African-American and one Latino-looking student.

OK, I was only seeing the students who happened to be in the yard. However. This is just what my Oakland friends have been telling me. It’s part of what Ruben refers to as “the flaws I see with the charter movement” — I refer to it as “the charter-school bag o’tricks.” Somehow the at-risk black and Latino students have mostly disappeared and have been replaced with a demographic that tends to be the highest-achieving of all. It’s a miracle! (As far as outsider adults lurking outside the schoolyard, AIPCS management would probably prefer a squad of pedophiles to a flinty-eyed charter-school skeptic checking out their demographics — except that no one will notice. AIPCS will continue to be hailed for closing the achievement gap.)

Educational reform has been a hot topic under the Bloomberg administration up to his present third term. Bloomberg and his cronies believe that charter schools are the answer to education reform. These schools have shown promising results, but these results only come from a handful of students. The schools have not serviced the majority of New York City students yet. Therefore, the evidence showing that the charter schools are the answer to New York City’s education problems is skewed. Until these schools are servicing not only a majority of NYC student population, but the high risk students, will charter schools become more attractive? These schools are not held to the rules and regulations that a normal public school has to deal with. Charter schools also do not have the extensive problems that come along with high risk students, since most of them do not service them. How can we have a solution to our educational problems, when the solution doesn’t even face the problem? Also, to think that some of these schools can pay there teachers what they deem fit, and they are free of unions is scary. This gives way too much power to the administrators and people in charge and does not do enough to protect the teacher. How can a teacher feel comfortable teaching his or her students, when they will have no protection from the wolves(administration)? A union is a vital part to a workforce, it balances the sides of labor, and if an administrator has all the power, this scenario is a scary one. How are teachers’ wages and jobs protected when their armor is removed? Before New York City is ready to call charter schools its savior to all of the educational problems, it needs to review who charter schools are serving, and how they are reaching their goals in education. Another major problem is they are not permanent. They all are on 3 to 5 year contracts, and if they do not show educational progress, than they are closed. Though this method seems sound, if something is failing it should be shut down, there are children involved. Their education and futures are built into the schools they are attending. What if a child attends charter schools that keep failing and shutting down, how is this going to benefit our children? They already have enough instability in their lives. We cannot forget to mention the bonds that students create with their teachers. Constantly moving them from teacher to teacher or from school to school will also hurt their abilities to create these bonds that will help them to grow as young adults. Our children can not be pawns in an experiment. In a regular experiment if it fails, the person who conducted the experiment starts from scratch; we can not do this with education. We can not start from scratch with our students. The damage to their education has already been afflicted.