Camden State Superintendent Confirms: There's ALWAYS Money for Charter Schools -
Earlier this week, Stephen Danley posted a remarkable piece of video. Camden's State Superintendent, Paymon Rouhanifard, met with parents to discuss the fate of McGraw Elementary School, one of five schools scheduled to be either closed or turned over to charter school operators under Rouhanifard's plan.
For nearly 40 minutes, Rouhanifard is intensely cross-examined by parents who are against the conversion of McGraw into a charter school run by the Philadelphia-based charter chain, Mastery. Understand that these parents had absolutely no say whatsoever in the takeover of their neighborhood school: Rouhanifard is free to do whatever he wants in Camden, including abdicating his responsibility to the district's schools.
Rouhanifard, like the superintendents in Newark, Jersey City, and Paterson, serves entirely at the pleasure of Governor Chris Christie. He has no need to answer to the parents, students, and taxpayers of Camden, as they have no ability to remove him through the political process if he ignores their wishes. In New Jersey, local accountability through democratic action is reserved for the suburbs; people of color in the large cities do not enjoy the same privileges:
As you can imagine, the parents in this video are clearly fed up with this state of affairs. What follows is a passionate yet ultimately unsurprising confrontation between people who - See more at: Jersey Jazzman: Camden State Superintendent Confirms: There's ALWAYS Money for Charter Schools: