The New Orleans public school busing crisis should be treated as the civil rights issue that it is.
“The privatization of New Orleans public schools has created barriers to accessing free and safe yellow school bus transportation, and therefore, access to education altogether.”
New Orleans is the first major U.S. city to have an all-charter school district system. And as we’ve seen, the fundamental rub with the complete decentralizing of urban public school systems – including public school services such as school busing systems – is that decentralization inevitably leads to privatization. The privatization of public services, in a trying to “place a square peg into a round hole” affect, makes such services more prone to not being accessible to, or of less quality for, its recipients. For children attending public schools in New Orleans who rely upon public transportation to go to school, the privatization of New Orleans public schools has created barriers to accessing free and safe yellow school bus transportation, and therefore, access to education altogether.
Here’s how:
In a centralized public school system, like that of a traditional public school system, there is a school district, and the district itself, or what many of us may remember from our K-12 days as the “central office,” is ultimately responsible for ensuring that schools within it comply with all laws. Federal and state per pupil funding is received by the central school district, and with these funds, the district directly provides resources to students attending its schools, such as a school bus fleet, bus chaperones to ensure the safety of students during transit to and from school, and bus drivers.
In New Orleans, on the other hand, most CMOs are their own individual school districts, or local education agencies (LEAs). As such, each CMO provides resources to its schools to support day to day operations, and each CMO is ultimately responsible for ensuring that schools within it comply with local, state, and federal laws. What once was a “central office” under a traditional public school model, the newly re-branded NOLA Public Schools – CONTINUE READING: The New Orleans public school busing crisis should be treated as the civil rights issue that it is. | The Lens
Behind The Lens episode 62: 'My wish is that we start to view this for what it is, which is a civil rights issue.' | The Lens - https://thelensnola.org/?p=551091
