FYI: New Orleans Charter School Spin

[Bussardre@aol.com]

FYI:
 
In case you haven't seen it before, here's the American  Enterprize Institute 
spin on charter schools in New Orleans. Note the  writer does not talk about 
the abyzmal track record of charter schools across  the nation. You have to 
wonder after reading this piece if the right's new  strategy will be frame New 
Orleans as district  that mirrors corruption in the public schools systems 
everywhere. 
--billee
 
 
http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=111705B


Good News out of  New Orleans 

By Kathryn Newmark :  17 Nov 2005  


In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, many  have blamed the New Orleans 
government for the city's poor preparedness -- and  rightly so. But let's also 
give credit where credit is due: the city government  is making good decisions 
about restoring New Orleans public schools.    

Last month, the school board unanimously approved charter applications  for 
all 13 schools on the relatively undamaged West Bank and for 7 additional  
schools on the East Bank. Charter schools are public schools that must comply  
with state laws and accountability programs but have greater autonomy than  
regular public  schools.                              

It appears that the primary motivation for this action was money. With  much 
of the city's tax base gone, local revenues are highly uncertain. State  
per-pupil funding is also uncertain, as the legislature figures out how to allot  
money when school districts across the state have experienced significant -- 
and  still fluctuating -- shifts in student population. According to the most 
recent  proposal, Orleans Parish will receive less than half of the state 
funding it  received last year.   

Funding for charter schools looks more  promising. A month after the 
hurricane hit, the U.S. Department of Education  awarded Louisiana a $20.9 million 
grant to help repair and expand existing  charter schools, as well as open new 
ones. School board vice president Lourdes  Moran emphasized the financial 
motivation for the charter decision: "I'm not  saying that I want to do this because 
I want to change governance. I am  interested in making sure we access all 
the resources necessary to have a  quality education." Referring to the federal 
grant, she said, "We don't want to  miss an opportunity."   

But taking advantage of this federal  grant is just one of many reasons 
charter schools are good for the New Orleans  school system. Everyone agrees that 
simply re-creating the system that existed  before the storm is not good 
enough. Corrupt, incompetent management and  abominable academic performance made 
the school district a disaster area long  before Katrina hit. Charter schools 
offer hope for a better future.    

Earlier this year, the state's legislative auditor declared that, thanks  to 
promotion policies that put people in jobs they were not qualified for, there  
was "not one accountant working in the accounting department" of the Orleans  
Parish school district. And it showed: before the hurricane, the system was  
projected to run a $25 to $30 million deficit. The U.S. Department of 
Education  reported that nearly $70 million in federal money for low-income students 
in New  Orleans was either improperly accounted for or misspent. Corruption was 
so  pervasive that the FBI and other federal and state investigators opened 
an  office inside the school administration building. Their investigation 
resulted  in two dozen indictments for theft, fraud, and kickbacks.    

This terrible situation forced the school board to cede substantial  power to 
a financial turnaround company this past summer. Alvarez & Marsal,  a 
financial restructuring firm, was given control over hiring, firing, and  contracting 
in the central office, while the school board retained control over  the 
budget and school-based employees.   

Katrina made the  already-monumental task facing Alvarez & Marsal even more 
difficult and  urgent. They may be able to improve the system in the long run, 
but certainly  not with the speed that the post-Katrina reconstruction 
demands; in the short  run, it's likely to be the same bureaucracy in charge as 
before. And why would  anyone want that? Indeed, private foundations, such as the 
Gates Foundation and  the Aspen Institute, are reportedly willing to fund 
brand-new schools for New  Orleans but not if the dysfunctional leadership remains 
in place.    

Therein lies an immediate advantage of the switch to charter schools:  
charter schools sidestep the management mess because, to a large degree, they  are 
self-governing. They handle their own budgets, manage their own personnel,  and 
organize their own curricula, schedules, and policies. The role of the  
school district bureaucracy shrinks to handing out money and administering the  
accountability program.   

Furthermore, the site-based  management at charter schools makes them more 
flexible, a quality that will be  particularly important in the uncertain 
environment of post-Katrina New Orleans.  It will be difficult to predict how many 
students will come back, when and where  they will show up, what their needs 
will be, and what sort of schools they will  prefer. A system of many 
independent schools will be better able to adapt to a  changing, unpredictable situation 
than a system of centralized  control.   

Another advantage of charter schools in New Orleans  is that they may be able 
to, over time, improve the system's miserable academic  performance. 
Recently-released 2004-05 test score data show that 170 Louisiana  public schools were 
rated "academically unacceptable," and 68 were in Orleans  Parish -- over 
half of the district's schools. On the Spring 2005 Graduate Exit  Exam, 
high-schoolers in the district received "unsatisfactory" scores at a rate  twice the 
state average; in many New Orleans high schools, over half of  test-takers 
scored in the "unsatisfactory" range. The high-stakes tests for  fourth and eighth 
graders had similar results.   

While these  poor-performing schools have been allowed to muddle on for many 
years, a charter  school that consistently posted such low test scores would 
likely be shut down.  The difference in consequences faced by charter and 
regular public schools gives  charter schools much more powerful incentives to 
achieve. In addition, because  charter schools are free to innovate -- by trying 
out a new curriculum or  experimenting with longer school days, for instance -- 
they will bring fresh  ideas to the table.   

Many studies of charter schools in other  states have found that charter 
school students perform better than their  counterparts in regular public schools, 
even though they often are more likely  to be disadvantaged or start with 
lower test scores.   

We may  some day look to post-Katrina New Orleans as the model for improving 
failing  urban school districts.   

The author is a researcher at the  American Enterprise Institute.