Let’s pause the charter school experiment in Newark: NAACP
The Newark NAACP supports Newark Superintendent Roger León who has requested closure of four low performing charter schools and a halt to the expansion of charters in Newark based on the tremendous strain on the district’s budget and their failure to serve a greater cross section of the city’s children.
The charter schools were first permitted as an experiment to create “greater flexibility for innovation” and advancing education within public schools in the 1980s. Initially, they were a success and special policies were put in place to accommodate low rents for co-locations within existing schools. Extensive renovations by investors divided buildings into two cities. One part of the building with the newest resources and the other side deprived of some of the basics.
Charter schools are also taking fewer students with special needs and fewer students who don’t speak English as their first language, according to the Rutgers’ Bloustein School of Planning and Policy. The percentage of students with special needs in Newark District schools is approximately 40% higher than in the city’s charter schools and the percentage of students identified as English language learners is approximately 11 times greater in district schools than in charter schools. CONTINUE READING: Let’s pause the charter school experiment in Newark: NAACP - nj.com