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Saturday, October 30, 2010

State’s plan to take over failing schools meets with opposition � Local Education � The Herald Bulletin

State’s plan to take over failing schools meets with opposition � Local Education � The Herald Bulletin

State’s plan to take over failing schools meets with opposition

INDIANAPOLIS — State education officials pushing for major reforms, including merit pay for teachers and more charter schools, got a glimpse of their organized opposition Friday at a public hearing on the fate of failing schools.

Representatives from teachers unions and local school boards spoke out against a plan that would allow the Indiana Department of Education to take control of chronically failing schools and turn them over to an outside manager.

Sparking the most heat were provisions that would allow the state to hire a for-profit company to run the school and give the outside manager the power to fire and hire teachers without having to negotiate