What will next Indy mayor do with charter schools?
The next Indianapolis mayor will inherit a power that gives him direct control in shaping the city’s educational landscape, an elevated role that is essentially unprecedented in the state and across the country.
It’s a political hotbed that will put the city’s new chief executive in charge of a growing network of charter schools, which with about 14,000 students ranks as the fifth-largest school district in Marion County behind Perry Township.
The intent of charter schools was to provide students and parents more options for a public education beyond a traditional public school, particularly in low-performing districts such as Indianapolis Public Schools.
Charter schools enjoy more autonomy than their traditional counterparts. With those freedoms came the hope they would elevate student achievement and new methods for instruction.
While results have been mixed, both candidates for Indianapolis mayor say they support charter schools. But key differences are the pace at which Republican Chuck Brewer and Democrat Joe Hogsett would open new charter schools — and their party-line take on the unionization of charter teachers.
Brewer said any time a neighborhood is at risk of losing residents because of a low-performing school he’d consider opening a charter. Hogsett said he’d focus more on quality , and not quantity, when it comes to charters.
In 2002, former Mayor Bart Peterson’s administration authorized the first round of charter schools under a new power provided by the Indiana General Assembly. The Indianapolis mayor is the only mayor in the state with such authority.
Today, the mayor oversees 33 charter schools, some with multiple campuses.
The winner of the mayor’s race will play a lead role in the opening, overseeing and closing of charter schools in the city. The mayor also will preside over a city that’s seeing an emergence of innovation network schools, a new model similar to charter schools that both candidates say they support.
Brewer said he ultimately wants traditional public schools to win. Until Indianapolis Public Schools and other school districts innovate and raise their level of performance, he said, charter schools are needed to “bridge that gap.”
Hogsett has called for “bold, persistent experimentation” as part of his broader educational platform.
Beyond charters, Brewer and Hogsett also say if elected mayor they’d strongly What will next Indianapolis mayor do with charter schools?:
