Policy skirmishing puts LAUSD reform at risk -- latimes.com:
"Disputes by charter operators over boundaries and parents over where reforms are targeted first are threatening the Public School Choice initiative."
It's back to business as usual at the Los Angeles Unified School District, and that's not a good thing. The district's potentially transformational initiative to open about 250 schools to outside management is in danger of being undermined as various interest groups stake out turf. The central goal of the program -- to radically refashion education for the district's most disadvantaged students -- could be lost in the skirmishing.
The Public School Choice policy approved by the school board in August was unfortunately vague, a strategy to overcome resistance from various quarters. Now that Supt. Ramon C. Cortines is crafting the detailed implementation of the policy, groups that sought to put their stamp on it are raising objections.Strange to say, the biggest threat to the initiative comes from charter school operators, which have the most to gain from it.
The program will allow outside organizations to bid to run about 50 new schools and 200 chronically underperforming ones over the next several years, and most of those proposals were expected to come from charter groups. But many charter operators are rebelling against a provision in the initiative that requires them to give enrollment preference to students within each school's attendance boundaries.
"Disputes by charter operators over boundaries and parents over where reforms are targeted first are threatening the Public School Choice initiative."
It's back to business as usual at the Los Angeles Unified School District, and that's not a good thing. The district's potentially transformational initiative to open about 250 schools to outside management is in danger of being undermined as various interest groups stake out turf. The central goal of the program -- to radically refashion education for the district's most disadvantaged students -- could be lost in the skirmishing.
The Public School Choice policy approved by the school board in August was unfortunately vague, a strategy to overcome resistance from various quarters. Now that Supt. Ramon C. Cortines is crafting the detailed implementation of the policy, groups that sought to put their stamp on it are raising objections.Strange to say, the biggest threat to the initiative comes from charter school operators, which have the most to gain from it.
The program will allow outside organizations to bid to run about 50 new schools and 200 chronically underperforming ones over the next several years, and most of those proposals were expected to come from charter groups. But many charter operators are rebelling against a provision in the initiative that requires them to give enrollment preference to students within each school's attendance boundaries.
