"As I sat through the hearing waiting to testify, I found myself in an odd position. I've always been a firm believer in oversight, regulation, transparency, and accountability for charter schools. As a charter school authorizer for seven years, I built a regulatory regimen that has been praised nationwide. "So…
"When parents recognize which schools are failing to educate their children, they will demand more effective options for their kids. They won't care whether they are charters, non-charters or some other model. As President Barack Obama has called for, states should eliminate restrictions that limit the growth of excellent charter…
Teachers at KIPP AMP are using their voice to part ways with the UFT. (Not linking yet, due to privacy concerns.)In happier times, the “union of professionals” called them “a great group of courageous, intelligent educators determined to do the best by their students and their school.”I have a feeling…
Yesterday's kangaroo court gained a lot of media coverage. Here are some highlights: NY1 News: Charter School Debate Heats Up at Downtown Hearing Daily News: Lunacy Let Loose NY Post: A Furious Class Struggle
What do The Door, East Harlem Tutorial Project, Boricua College and Fordham University have in common ñ besides deep community roots and a commitment to public service?They’re among the institutions hoping for a lift on the charter school cap so they open their own public schools. James Merriman explains in…
Somebody didn’t do the reading.Appearing on Good Day New York this morning, UFT President Michael Mulgrew was asked about the union’s role in losing $700 million for New York public schools in Race to the Top, Round 1.Mulgrew previously argued that the union’s charter bill would have helped the state’s…
"I always wanted [my son] to go to a charter school. I was looking at Achievement First since he was age 1." -- Petrula Aaron, mother and nursing-home worker, quoted in the New York Post ”It's difficult not to think that a community shouldn't depend on luck for a chance of a decent education.”
When NYSUT is right, we should say so. Today is one of those times. Recently, both the State Senate and Assembly’s budget resolutions called for defunding SUNY’s Charter Schools Institute, the entity responsible for overseeing a little less than half of all charter schools statewide. There is, of course, a…
It’s all fun and games until someone loses $700 million. With only one round remaining in the Race to the Top, it’s time for cash-starved New York to bear down and win this thing. That means understanding the rules of the game and learning from experience ñ why did we…
I’ve been the subject of some pretty stiff attacks from the UFT recently. The union’s bloggers can hardly mention my name without reiterating the fact that I once worked for the Walton Family Foundation. For the record, I did work for the foundation (for a little over seven months).† It…
