Will for-profit charters dampen new schools of hope?

Misguided goals have been driving education policy in Tallahassee. Chief among these is the ill-advised rush to the effective privatization of our public schools via charter schools.

Having taught in public schools for eight years (middle and high school English), I’ve seen first-hand the dedication, professionalism and struggle of our public schools. I’ve experienced overcrowded classrooms, and chafed at being tied to standardized tests that I knew were only a snapshot of a child’s academic performance. Many public schools perform with excellence while others remain in a cycle of failure due to several factors — including poverty and violence in the community.

Yet back-door privatization via an explosion of charter schools isn’t the answer.

Promotion of charter schools, recently referred to as the “schools of hope” plan, fails to solve the problem. That’s because charter schools, even if they perform with excellence, cannot ever have the capacity to serve every student. We know that in some cases, traditional schools seek to remove students with behavioral and other issues — students they don’t want to teach because their academic performance brings the school’s overall test scores down.

In the desperation to produce high test scores, these students are shuffled off, often finding themselves enrolled in for-profit charter schools where they may be expelled back to a traditional public school — as charters can often choose their students — or face verbal and even physical abuse by staff who likely do not have the proper training to address their needs.

Teaching quality can often be low, resulting from the fact that typical charter schools pay less and offer fewer benefits for educators.

We must be honest about the damage done to children when public education is used as a partisan political football or as a means of simply getting rich through for-profit charter chains (some of which failed and had to close quickly, leaving Florida parents and teachers stranded.)

Our legislators would do well to remember what Florida’s constitution says about public education:

The education of children is a fundamental value to the people of the State of Florida. It is, therefore, a paramount duty of the state to make adequate provision for the education of all children residing within its borders.

Rather than wasting taxpayer money on more charter schools, which are too often allowed to operate with public funds yet little or no public oversight, Florida’s leaders should remember that public education is a cornerstone of democracy.

True schools of hope would pay teachers like the educated professionals that they are, be equipped with 21st-century technology, reward rather than punish teacher longevity by reinstating teacher step increases, and use tests as simply one of many ways of assessing student knowledge. True schools of hope would protect all students, regardless of their immigration status, gender identity, language background or anything else.

Such schools would be a beacon of hope for American democracy in the 21st century.