4 ms·

That may be true for Success Academy but there are some truly awful charters out there. The problem is that what it means to be a charter school varies so much

by galby 11y ago

That may be true for Success Academy but there are some truly awful charters out there. The problem is that what it means to be a charter school varies so much from state to state and even from district to district.

ThomPete 11y ago
There are even more truly awful publicly funded schools out there too. Harlem have their share. That doesn't mean there aren't good public schools too. But that's not a way to discuss this IMO. Teaching is hard, getting a school to run properly is hard in todays environment. Charterschools are good because they allow for differentiation in education. We don't want anyone to be educated exactly the same way. Thats not a good thing. That charterschools allow for people to take advantage of them is another discussion and can be solved in many different ways. Instead of just critiquing the fact that they can be misused perhaps it would be more constructive to discuss how to make sure snake oil salesmen doesn't take advantage of the system. Just like we do with other businesses in general.
- dalke 11y ago
  I feel like you are presenting a fake contrast. When I was in public schools, there was a lot of differentiation in education, and students definitely weren't taught all the same, including different levels (eg, AP vs. non AP history), different tracks (eg, extra courses for those interested in practical arts, or interested in programming, for a career), and special support for students with more specific needs, including in my case speech therapy. Nor do I get the sense that my school system was special in that regard. "getting a school to run properly is hard in todays environment" When was it ever easy to run properly?
  - ThomPete 11y ago
    No fake contrast. I am responding to the OP who seem to want charter schools to go away based on a claim that they are somehow bad. Success Academy was started because the public school system failed to educate kids in Harlem. The philosophy have since then been copied at other schools with success my son is in Williamsburg. This isn't only about the curriculum but about the very approach to teaching the kids AND the parents involvement in their kids education. The difference between today and back then I feel is best illustrated by this http://i.imgur.com/LglSapk.jpg http://i.imgur.com/LglSapk.jpg Success Academy fights this with tooth and nail but in return require quite a lot from their teachers. It's not a perfect system but I prefer it compared to the public school he first went to exactly because its focus on getting parents back on the side of the teacher and their goal and method for getting the kids to love learning.
    - dalke 11y ago
      Which OP is that? You responded to comments from two accounts, which said: galby: "there are some truly awful charters out there" exelius: "To be fair, not all charter schools are for-profit, and there are good charter schools and bad ones. But the entire system stinks; it cuts funding to struggling districts, leaving them in a perpetual budget crisis." Neither say charter schools are categorically bad. Exelius's point is that the funding system to support charter schools is what stinks. Your illustration has no historical basis. You are viewing history through rose-colored glasses. I'll demonstrate with a classic, the 1955 book "Why Johnny Can't Read: And What You Can Do about It". This placed the blame on teachers and the school pedagogy for poor childhood literacy rates, not the students. Parents reacted to that by pushing for policy changes. That book reverberated for decades. At https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=qtZQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ORMEAAAAIBAJ&pg=2065%2C1980872 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=qtZQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ORME... you can see: > Since then, other arguments [besides teachers 'simply using the wrong techniques'] have cropped up. Those who sympathize with teachers blame overly-defensive administrations and boards of education. Still others say parents are responsible for having abdicated social duties to the schools, transforming them from educational institutions into huge day care centers. Sound like a familiar discussion? Here's an example of a letter to the editor from 1976, https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=VdYeAAAAIBAJ&sjid=nVYEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6890%2C3120348 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=VdYeAAAAIBAJ&sjid=nVYE... , where a teacher places the blame on school boards for not letting the teachers apply real discipline to the "hoodlums" who get to pass because of "social promotions." This teacher doesn't think the students are getting any discipline from their parents over poor grades. This Ann Landers humor piece from 1984 reflects the idea that the students are doing poorly because the parents don't care; both parent and child veg in front of the TV: https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=zbUfAAAAIBAJ&sjid=htcEAAAAIBAJ&pg=5781%2C297333 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=zbUfAAAAIBAJ&sjid=htcE... My comment here is surely no strong proof, only suggestive that you may need to research the history which brought us movies like "Blackboard Jungle".
      - ThomPete 11y ago
        Exelius claim was that charter schools in general are bad but there are exceptions. He wasn't just attacking the funding system. Read his post again. You are ignoring his actual critique of the charter system. Galby and I agree, again I would urge you to actually read the exchange rather than cherry picking what you think they basically said. With regards to the past. No one is glorifying anything. But if you want to launch an attack on charter schools and claiming that budgets and teacher salaries are the reason why public schools are doing bad and that charter schools are stealing things then you aren't being true to the discussion. The reason why charter schools work when they work is that they are putting a lot of the effort onto the parents. That bad schools existed before is no secret but it's now almost the rule more than the exception in the public school system. All I can see is that a Charter School like SA changed things for the better in very socially challenged areas while still functioning by the budgetary constraints as a normal public school and that by it's lottery actually is a much more fair way than ex. the zoned principles in NY.
  - vonmoltke 11y ago
    In my district ~20 years ago "mainstreaming" and "well-rounded" were the buzzwords of the day. That meant, aside from a few honors and AP courses, everyone went through more-or-less the same path in high school. I had 28 classes over four years; 20 were proscribed by the general graduation requirements. There was little wiggle room for "tracks"; those boiled down to "Do I take four years of math and science or just three?" and "Do I take four years of foreign language or stop at two?".
    - dalke 11y ago
      "Mainstreaming", which dates became a buzzword around 1980, refers to putting special needs in the same classes as other students. It does not generally mean that everyone was on the same track. See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainstreaming_%28education%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainstreaming_%28education%29 For example, this 1995 article describes how a school for the blind was closing because of the mainstreaming of blind students. https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=_DRQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=pVUDAAAAIBAJ&pg=5274%2C8662108 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=_DRQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=pVUD... . Here's a recent example of a teacher using the term 'mainstreaming', http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2015/10/pa-shutting-down-special-ed.html http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2015/10/pa-shutting-down-... , and doing so only in the context of special ed. Either your school district was using its own definition, or you misunderstood the context. "Well-rounded education" was a bigger buzzword in the 1940s and 1950s. See https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=well-rounded+education&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cwell%20-%20rounded%20education%3B%2Cc0 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=well-rounded+e... . It's part of the American education system that students are required to take course in a diverse set of subjects. It doesn't require that everyone take the same classes. That clarification aside, and assuming I'm completely wrong, how does a charter system, which presumably has the same general graduation requirements, change things? Anything more about your circumstances requires understanding more about your district. Eg, was everyone in the same level of math, so that no one (or everyone) took calculus by the time they graduated? Were there only 25 students in the class? Did everyone take the same foreign language course? Wow! My school has changed. There's a "Drafting / Illustrative Design Technology" track, a "Fashion Design" track, which includes "Fashion Marketing Management", an "Arts, A/V Technology & Communications" cluster, and more http://www.coralgablescavaliers.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?uREC_ID=202886&type=d&termREC_ID=&pREC_ID=403143 http://www.coralgablescavaliers.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?uRE... .
- galby 11y ago
  I completely agree with you there- I'm a huge fan of well run charters (like KIPP for example) but they don't seem like a scalable solution because they demand so much more of their teaching staff. My comment was more just a criticism of charter school enabling legislation - states that allow online charter schools or home school charters just don't pass the smell test (to me at least).
  - ThomPete 11y ago
    Good teachers aren't scaleable thats a problem in its own, which is why the parent's involvement is so crucial IMO. Success Accademy functions by lottery so it has kids from all over new york. Public schools are zoned which means that the best schools are those where the parents have the best incomes. So even on a "fairness" scale I believe at least Success Academy pass the test.

by galby 11y ago

ThomPete 11y ago

There are even more truly awful publicly funded schools out there too. Harlem have their share. That doesn't mean there aren't good public schools too. But that's not a way to discuss this IMO. Teaching is hard, getting a school to run properly is hard in todays environment. Charterschools are good because they allow for differentiation in education. We don't want anyone to be educated exactly the same way. Thats not a good thing. That charterschools allow for people to take advantage of them is another discussion and can be solved in many different ways. Instead of just critiquing the fact that they can be misused perhaps it would be more constructive to discuss how to make sure snake oil salesmen doesn't take advantage of the system. Just like we do with other businesses in general.

dalke 11y ago
I feel like you are presenting a fake contrast. When I was in public schools, there was a lot of differentiation in education, and students definitely weren't taught all the same, including different levels (eg, AP vs. non AP history), different tracks (eg, extra courses for those interested in practical arts, or interested in programming, for a career), and special support for students with more specific needs, including in my case speech therapy. Nor do I get the sense that my school system was special in that regard. "getting a school to run properly is hard in todays environment" When was it ever easy to run properly?
- ThomPete 11y ago
  No fake contrast. I am responding to the OP who seem to want charter schools to go away based on a claim that they are somehow bad. Success Academy was started because the public school system failed to educate kids in Harlem. The philosophy have since then been copied at other schools with success my son is in Williamsburg. This isn't only about the curriculum but about the very approach to teaching the kids AND the parents involvement in their kids education. The difference between today and back then I feel is best illustrated by this http://i.imgur.com/LglSapk.jpg http://i.imgur.com/LglSapk.jpg Success Academy fights this with tooth and nail but in return require quite a lot from their teachers. It's not a perfect system but I prefer it compared to the public school he first went to exactly because its focus on getting parents back on the side of the teacher and their goal and method for getting the kids to love learning.
  - dalke 11y ago
    Which OP is that? You responded to comments from two accounts, which said: galby: "there are some truly awful charters out there" exelius: "To be fair, not all charter schools are for-profit, and there are good charter schools and bad ones. But the entire system stinks; it cuts funding to struggling districts, leaving them in a perpetual budget crisis." Neither say charter schools are categorically bad. Exelius's point is that the funding system to support charter schools is what stinks. Your illustration has no historical basis. You are viewing history through rose-colored glasses. I'll demonstrate with a classic, the 1955 book "Why Johnny Can't Read: And What You Can Do about It". This placed the blame on teachers and the school pedagogy for poor childhood literacy rates, not the students. Parents reacted to that by pushing for policy changes. That book reverberated for decades. At https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=qtZQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ORMEAAAAIBAJ&pg=2065%2C1980872 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=qtZQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ORME... you can see: > Since then, other arguments [besides teachers 'simply using the wrong techniques'] have cropped up. Those who sympathize with teachers blame overly-defensive administrations and boards of education. Still others say parents are responsible for having abdicated social duties to the schools, transforming them from educational institutions into huge day care centers. Sound like a familiar discussion? Here's an example of a letter to the editor from 1976, https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=VdYeAAAAIBAJ&sjid=nVYEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6890%2C3120348 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=VdYeAAAAIBAJ&sjid=nVYE... , where a teacher places the blame on school boards for not letting the teachers apply real discipline to the "hoodlums" who get to pass because of "social promotions." This teacher doesn't think the students are getting any discipline from their parents over poor grades. This Ann Landers humor piece from 1984 reflects the idea that the students are doing poorly because the parents don't care; both parent and child veg in front of the TV: https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=zbUfAAAAIBAJ&sjid=htcEAAAAIBAJ&pg=5781%2C297333 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=zbUfAAAAIBAJ&sjid=htcE... My comment here is surely no strong proof, only suggestive that you may need to research the history which brought us movies like "Blackboard Jungle".
    - ThomPete 11y ago
      Exelius claim was that charter schools in general are bad but there are exceptions. He wasn't just attacking the funding system. Read his post again. You are ignoring his actual critique of the charter system. Galby and I agree, again I would urge you to actually read the exchange rather than cherry picking what you think they basically said. With regards to the past. No one is glorifying anything. But if you want to launch an attack on charter schools and claiming that budgets and teacher salaries are the reason why public schools are doing bad and that charter schools are stealing things then you aren't being true to the discussion. The reason why charter schools work when they work is that they are putting a lot of the effort onto the parents. That bad schools existed before is no secret but it's now almost the rule more than the exception in the public school system. All I can see is that a Charter School like SA changed things for the better in very socially challenged areas while still functioning by the budgetary constraints as a normal public school and that by it's lottery actually is a much more fair way than ex. the zoned principles in NY.
- vonmoltke 11y ago
  In my district ~20 years ago "mainstreaming" and "well-rounded" were the buzzwords of the day. That meant, aside from a few honors and AP courses, everyone went through more-or-less the same path in high school. I had 28 classes over four years; 20 were proscribed by the general graduation requirements. There was little wiggle room for "tracks"; those boiled down to "Do I take four years of math and science or just three?" and "Do I take four years of foreign language or stop at two?".
  - dalke 11y ago
    "Mainstreaming", which dates became a buzzword around 1980, refers to putting special needs in the same classes as other students. It does not generally mean that everyone was on the same track. See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainstreaming_%28education%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainstreaming_%28education%29 For example, this 1995 article describes how a school for the blind was closing because of the mainstreaming of blind students. https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=_DRQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=pVUDAAAAIBAJ&pg=5274%2C8662108 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=_DRQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=pVUD... . Here's a recent example of a teacher using the term 'mainstreaming', http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2015/10/pa-shutting-down-special-ed.html http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2015/10/pa-shutting-down-... , and doing so only in the context of special ed. Either your school district was using its own definition, or you misunderstood the context. "Well-rounded education" was a bigger buzzword in the 1940s and 1950s. See https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=well-rounded+education&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cwell%20-%20rounded%20education%3B%2Cc0 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=well-rounded+e... . It's part of the American education system that students are required to take course in a diverse set of subjects. It doesn't require that everyone take the same classes. That clarification aside, and assuming I'm completely wrong, how does a charter system, which presumably has the same general graduation requirements, change things? Anything more about your circumstances requires understanding more about your district. Eg, was everyone in the same level of math, so that no one (or everyone) took calculus by the time they graduated? Were there only 25 students in the class? Did everyone take the same foreign language course? Wow! My school has changed. There's a "Drafting / Illustrative Design Technology" track, a "Fashion Design" track, which includes "Fashion Marketing Management", an "Arts, A/V Technology & Communications" cluster, and more http://www.coralgablescavaliers.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?uREC_ID=202886&type=d&termREC_ID=&pREC_ID=403143 http://www.coralgablescavaliers.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?uRE... .
galby 11y ago
I completely agree with you there- I'm a huge fan of well run charters (like KIPP for example) but they don't seem like a scalable solution because they demand so much more of their teaching staff. My comment was more just a criticism of charter school enabling legislation - states that allow online charter schools or home school charters just don't pass the smell test (to me at least).
- ThomPete 11y ago
  Good teachers aren't scaleable thats a problem in its own, which is why the parent's involvement is so crucial IMO. Success Accademy functions by lottery so it has kids from all over new york. Public schools are zoned which means that the best schools are those where the parents have the best incomes. So even on a "fairness" scale I believe at least Success Academy pass the test.