Jitu Brown Explains the Reasons for New Anti-Charter School Resolution from National NAACP
In October, the national NAACP, the nation’s oldest civil rights organization, passed a strong resolution demanding a moratorium on the expansion of charter schools and the end of school privatization. The Journey for Justice Alliance (J4J) and the Movement for Black Lives have supported the NAACP in demanding that the rapid expansion of charters be stopped in black and brown communities until:
- “Charter schools are subject to the same transparency and accountability standards as public schools;
- “Public funds are not diverted to charter schools at the expense of the public school system;
- “Charter schools cease expelling students that the public schools have a duty to educate; and
- “(Charter schools) cease to perpetuate de facto segregation of the highest performing children from those whose aspirations may be high but whose talents are not yet as obvious.”
The national NAACP has begun holding regional hearings about the resolution, hearings where controversy has surfaced over a very basic difference in philosophy. While many people support charter schools as an “escape” for able students from what are struggling and underfunded public schools in poor areas, many residents of those very communities have come to realize that the charters themselves are intensifying problems for the public schools that must continue to serve many of the children with the greatest needs. Because charter schools have been around now for twenty years, there is documentation for these concerns.
Jitu Brown is the national director of the Journey for Justice Alliance (J4J), which Valerie Strauss of the Washington Post describes as “a national network of grass roots community organizations in 24 cities. J4J, with more than 52,000 members across the United States, is committed to winning community-driven school improvement and educational equity…. J4J started in 2013, as parent and student organizations who were impacted by school privatization began to organize national mobilizations to protest policies such as school closings and to push for community-driven school improvement.”
Last Tuesday, Strauss published a statement from Jitu Brown about the NAACP’s resolution forJitu Brown Explains the Reasons for New Anti-Charter School Resolution from National NAACP | janresseger:
