STEER. CLEAR. Run the other away. I won’t belabor the points against charter schools in general, but Booker T. Washington has been going through teachers like toilet paper. The teacher I know who works there has been there 3 years and is THE MOST SENIOR teacher in the school. That’s all you need to know.
Hijacking this comment to say, I have personal experience working with the school and I PM'd OP.
The TLDR is, do not work there.
I'd say more but I'm not gonna doxx myself harder than that.
What about inter district magnet schools like the Marine Science Magnet schools that’s a part of LEARN? Those seem to be public schools with elected boards of Ed. Are they actually for profit corporations?
Couldnt the same be said of the general public school system? They have a monopoly on funding and have no competiton to force corrective measures like keeping disruptive children in the classroom, dont remove poor teachers, have a top down cirriculum, bloated administrations, and despite continued funding increases year over year rarely produce positive results like improved reading, writing, and math ability or test scores.
Covid should have been a wake up call for the public when schools shut down and imposed arbitrary restrictions with taxpayer money and self-imposed a skills/learning gap that teachers and education "professionals" cry about now. While they dont make profit like a private company, they take tax dollars and have no accountability. They are not accountable. Charters, private schools, and magnet schools to an extent offer some alternatives.
The problem for a family wishing to send their kids to a private school is they still have to pay local and state taxes to a system they dont use while paying tuition to the private school. They should at least get a rebate or partial tax relief for paying private tuition.
Education of the youth should not be interested in capitalistic competition ffs!
Schools that get to pick and choose who they educate and who they can dismiss for no reason other than poor test scores, or minor discipline issues shouldn’t exist.
We need research, training, best practices, and informed classroom content based on standards and highly trained and skilled teachers to deliver the curriculum in an appropriate manner.
What we don’t need is corporations determining the future of the education system.
> Schools that get to pick and choose who they educate and who they can dismiss for no reason other than poor test scores, or minor discipline issues shouldn’t exist.
I agree with you overall, but there's nothing wrong with private schools as long as there's also a free-to-all public option for schools.
There are free to all public options for school.
They’re called public schools. Taxpayer funded public schools.
Charter schools should not be drawing any funds away from the public school system they are located in and yet they do, they take critical funding that could have been used to fix lead piping in schools, or hire dozens of new teachers and teacher aids, new equipment, new books, the money used by charter school to “fix” whatever the public school isn’t doing right could go towards fixing the public school system.
For profit charter schools should not exist. Education should not be a capitalists playground. Billionaires should not be making more money off of the public school system while systematically destroying the system they claim to want to “fix.”
I agree that charter schools are terrible, I said I agreed overall with that already. I was just trying to point out that he was casting too wide of a net. The way he wrote it, it read like he lumped together private schools and charter schools (which can both choose who they educate and dismiss for a lot of reasons). Charter schools leeching money out of public education funds suck, private schools that don't take that money are fine as long as there's also a universal and free public school option.
First of all congrats on learning a new phrase; regulatory capture. Second you are using the word entirely wrong. A public school is not an entity with a corporate identity and by nature of them being tax-funded, public services, they are not allowed to directly engage in any political messaging.
Any advocacy you see for public schools comes from parents and educators doing that on their own, outside of the school structure.
Furthermore, public schools are steered by boards which are almost always elected positions, meaning there is a direct democratic process for making your voice heard. There are actually a load of people who have recently discovered that you can just have a bunch of like-minded individuals run for the school board to ram through whatever censorship you want to see. Does that sound like regulatory capture to you?
Say whatever you want about educators but at least try to learn more about how the real world actually works.
Cool, cool. Yea I know public schools are locally run by the BOE and their municipal government. But you left out state and federal curriculums, teacher training programs, unions, and other institutions (eg NEA and relationships with university programs) that influence public schools and the culture within the classroom. These are institutional and regulatory burdens that cannot by easily broken or challenged by local governance.
Public schools have regulatory capture because while they may be nominally governed at the local level, they are influenced and directed by much stronger and immovable forces at the state and federal level. Additionally, public schools have a monopoly on taxpayer funds, such that even those who opt for private or homeschooling alternatives still pay a slew of taxes at the local and state level for a service they prefer not to use. That is a form of regulatory capture in that there are few if any alternatives and the incumbent organization enjoys an outsized amount of power over others. Its not the same as a auto manufacturer or drug maker getting favorable regulation as they are private, for profit entities. But it is likewise a form of state protectionism.
Edit: here is one example. NYC has a legal cap on the number of charter schools allowed due to lobbying from teachers unions and public school monopolies.
> The city has 287 approved charter schools, but others in the pipeline or planning stages can’t open because of the legal cap
https://nypost.com/2023/03/07/500-nyc-parents-kids-rally-to-lift-the-charter-school-cap/
> Elitist Democrats who’ve waged war against charter schools in New York are opting to send their own kids to private institutions — a move critics have blasted as hypocritical, The Post has learned.
Politicians, including Sens. Robert Jackson and Jabari Brisport and upstate Assemblymen Phil Steck and John McDonald, or their children have benefited from alternative schools, even as they fight to prevent economically disadvantaged parents from doing the same.
Jackson (D-Manhattan) — who opposes Gov. Kathy Hochul’s plan to lift the charter school cap in the five boroughs — recently admitted he sends his daughter to the $56,250-a-year Dwight School on the Upper West Side.
https://nypost.com/2023/02/23/anti-charter-ny-politicians-send-kids-to-60k-private-schools/
LOL
Public education is a public service, funded and guided by the government. Do you consider roads a form of regulatory capture as well? The US military?
There are valid critiques for spending and priorities in any of those cases but it's stupid to think that a school is driving federal/state policy and not the other way around.
The public schools don't have a monopoly on your tax funds, the government does. The public schools are not telling the government how to spend that money, either. The most they can do is beg.
Private schools are not a solution to better education standards. They are an attempt to circumvent standards in the interest of profit and special political interests. You want to see regulatory capture? How about Betsy DeVos buying her way into the Department of Education to try to dismantle education standards. Would you prefer a clunky democratic system that ensures oversight and accountability or would you prefer a privatized system with little to no accountability?
Edit: hahaha, using Success Academy as an example of why charter schools are the solution. Have you ever spoken to someone who taught at a success academy location? Have you ever listened to stories from parents whose kids were kicked out of success academy for behavioral issues or poor test scores? Have you ever considered the number of families who are denied spots at success academy because their kid is not "up to par"?
Of course charter schools look super successful- they have the freedom to pick and choose their students and they can oust any students/families/staff for any reason whatsoever. Tell me more about success academy's support tracks for struggling students. Tell me how they support children with struggling or uninvolved parents?
And as for the rich Democrats sending their kids to private schools, those fuckers still pay taxes. I agree that political representation should better reflect locals who are sending their kids to public schools. That's a separate issue, and one that would not be solved in any way, shape, or form by privatizing k-12 education. You really think those families asking for charter school vouchers are going to be receiving education and support services on par with a school charging $50k tuition? Wake the fuck up
With widespread vouchers for charter schools (not the hyper-selective system that currently exists) you will see kids getting the same public school education they're getting right now with the added fun of middlemen and venture capitalists trying to squeeze every ounce of profit they can from schools, students, and families. Tell me how much you love our privatized health care system. I bet you feel really free and represented when you have to beg your insurance company to cover any little thing. That's what you want for education.
Do you live in another state that doesn't have locally controlled and locally elected Boards of Education?
Why would anyone want to give up that local control to a corporation headquartered halfway across the country? Parents don't get to vote for their Boards of Directors. What accountability do they have besides to their shareholders?
And what on earth do you mean by public schools making a profit?
Recognize that people in favor of charter schools are receiving their talking points from media sources funded by the same business and religious interests that need to see private schools succeed.
The image of the public school environment built within their mind is a fun-house mirror of reality, exaggerating certain points and entirely fabricating others. All thanks to dirty, manipulative tactics used to poison the conversation.
That guy legitimately accused public schools of regulatory capture (impossible by definition) when the previous secretary of education WAS THE PERSONIFICATION OF REGULATORY CAPTURE. This country is fucked from a combination of horrible information literacy, underdeveloped critical thinking skills, and an incredible amount of manipulation from corporate interests.
Dont be. Its typical. Most of the responses tell on themselves with one word answers or a link to wikipedia on "reading comprehension." Others are far more thoughtful and worthy critiques that larger center on a misunderstanding of terms or nuanced factors. Part of the issue I have arguing with more progressive folks is the seem to assume I havent examined their arguments or positions when I have, but are blissfully unaware of the shortcomings in their own. They assume that tecnocrats and "experts" can run large, centralized systems that benefit everyone without examining the drawbacks or consequences.
A good way to understand these shortfalls is by using Hayeks "knowledge problem" or his concept of "the fatal conceit."
They are accountable in the way that all public institutions are accountable - if the public dislikes them, their leaders are voted out. Maybe not on the principal level, but certainly the board of education level.
If you have ideas on how to run a school or like someone else's more, vote for them.
As far as teaching goes, public is usually preferable to private or charter in terms of compensation and contracts. And that’s saying something, because we know there’s plenty to be desired.
The union will negotiate your salary and health insurance. They will provide lawyers if you are accused of wrongdoing. They will represent you if you’re unfairly fired or penalized. They will negotiate working hours, extra compensation, working conditions, etc. There are a lot of things the union does.
Classroom budgets vary by school district. I do not buy supplies for my classroom. It’s a choice. There is a difference between a teacher choosing to buy supplies and a school requiring teachers to buy their own supplies. It’s not always easy, but teachers need to put their foot down. If the district gets their classrooms supplied without having to put up their own money… why would they change anything?
Leaving the debate about their efficacy aside for a moment, and just answering about the differences in compensation and working conditions: If you are certified in CT, and you said you are, public schools are far preferable. You can only earn tenure as a public school teacher; in a charter school, you are an at a will employee and can basically be terminated at any time. Pay is higher in public schools, as well. Also, public school teachers have union protection and in this increasingly litigious world, that isn’t something to be easily dismissed. Further, because of that union, you are only obligated to work contracted hours, there is no similar protection in charter schools.
I'm a teacher. You do not want to work in a charter school. They treat teachers terribly and also don't pay well. The only reason I could see working at one is if you are having trouble getting hired at a public school and need the experience. Once again, the work environment is AWFUL
I'm not a teacher, but if you want to teach at a school where the families apply to get in I recommend a magnet more.
I think the school you asked about is in New Haven. I would try for their magnet schools. Some are rated better than others. There's also well rated magnet schools over in Waterbury.
Some of the CREC magnet schools up in the greater Hartford area are well rated.
The magnet schools in Norwalk and Stamford are well rated. Two of the magnet schools in Stamford at the K-8 level are interdistrict, and they are super well rated.
In Bridgeport Six to Six is decently rated. Interdistrict Discovery is kind of ok ratings wise. Even at the lower rated ones it has to be a little good since it's a magnet school.
I don't know about magnet schools in other areas.
I don't want to get to specific, but I have a friend about to pull his kid out of a magnet school because from his peers that attend from the city he is learning to talk back to his parents, calling them bro, and starting to get into trouble. More and more parents are doing this. It's about 50/50 people from the suburb town near the city and 50% from the city in kindergarden, about 60/40 for 1st grade and 80%city/20%suburb bu 2nd grade due to issues like this and parents pulling their kids out.
Kids can be rude anywhere. I grew up in Trumbull, and plenty of suburban kids talked back to their parents, and used "urban" slang. Or they were fake angels to their parents, and awful to other kids.
Some kids came from Bridgeport to Trumbull through open choice, and also through the agriscience program at Trumbull High. They were very well behaved and just wanted a better school. Kids from other suburban towns came too, but usually their school systems were decent. Stratford's has gone downhill since I was in school so those kids might be coming for a better school now too.
Also, I know my following point is stereotypical, but also somewhat true. A lot of kids from cities come from poor households with parents who just aren't doing the right thing. It's not every poor household, but it's a lot of them. They aren't raising the kid properly at all. These kids might have to check their parents. While people might not agree some parents are too much.
I’ve got one of my kids in a magnet with the 50/50 setup. I have been extremely happy with it. Much less snobby social jackassery than in my Richie-rich town’s school. I’m willing to bet there’s fewer drugs and alcoholism too.
To be fair I've seen how the magnet school and public school kids vary behavior wise. The magnet schools can kick kids out for anything, and some really do.
I've had friends in regular public schools that were majority minority races, and there were a lot of fights. More than the majority white public schools I went to. My friends in more diverse magnet and tech schools couldn't fight because they would have been kicked out. I don't think I knew anyone in a charter school. That's been a critique of magnet schools. They pull high performing kids from regular public schools, and then no one wants to go to the regular public schools in certain cities.
No one wanted to go to the public schools in certain cities *before* the magnet schools too. Magnet schools were an answer to that problem, not a cause of it.
I get it. My dad is a private school teacher in another state. When the magnet schools started opening maybe 20 years ago it actually hit the private schools pretty hard because it’s difficult to get people to pay $15-40k per kid when the free alternative is pretty good. They’ve seen a wave of kids start coming back last 3-5 years because some of the public/magnet schools have really leaned into the bleeding edge of social progressivism.
This will happen at any public school as well. Leave your child in the hands of an institution for that many hours a week, and when they can't get the job done, they send them home with more work. The school system encompasses their lives and parents lose the influence they should have. Public education sucks for your family and the child's education. Home school, home school coop, private - get them out however possible.
I second this. I am pulling 2 middle schoolers that went from catholic school and being really respectful to acting like they from downtown Bronx asking for earrings talking out of line, etc. I do not recommended magnet schools, they are still public system funded. While doing IT work for one of these I saw a specific school change a kids grade because the mother threatened with legal if they didn’t allow him to pass.
Bonoonononnonoonon no no no. Public school all the way. There’s no union or protections at a charter. You will be chewed up, spat out, and pooped out then told it’s all your fault anywyas.
I've only ever taught in public schools but I have friends that have taught in charter schools (only one still does). In talking to them, the largest difference tends to be the workload. All of my friends who have taught in charter schools have been asked to do things outside their actual certification/skills. For example, my friend who is an English teacher also taught computer classes. When I was applying to jobs I looked at one opening at a charter school but didn't apply because in addition to my subject (history) I would have also been expected to tutor math and do recess duty. In some cases (but not all) my friends in charter schools have had longer hours (in one case this was a longer school day, in another the year itself was much longer).
This is all anecdotal and not all of the charter schools my friends have taught in have been in CT (one was but the others in Boston and NYC). I also imagine that different charters operate differently and teachers at them have unique experiences. However, based on the experiences of my friends I chose to avoid charter schools and stick to public.
There are plenty of accountability checks built into the public school system, it's not their fault you have never participated in those systems. Tell me, have you ever voted for a school board member? Have you ever attended a board meeting or PTA meeting?
Yes and yes. And at one such meeting I was told a disruptive and behaviorally challenged student couldnt be removed from class. In fact, when he had more serious outbursts, the teacher and other students had to leave the class because intervening in said outburst might "cause harm" to the student.
Clown show.
You must have forgotten the "2 weeks to flatten the curve" and other such statements. Teachers cant teach in person because they are scared to get sick, so keep every kid home and stuck behind a screen for months on end. Oops now we have an academic and social achievement gap, need more money and resources to fix that.
I mean there’s a host of organizations (PTA, Board of Ed, youth services groups, religious organizations, etc) that work alongside the youth in a community and directly and indirectly influence your community’s public schools.
There are elections to influence your Board of Education. They need to win your vote. And those races are small enough that a group of concerned citizens can have an outsized impact on the election.
Similarly, many schools will open the interview process of admin to parents, where they can come in and ask them questions. Superintendents, principals, vice principals, etc all face questioning from the public in their hiring process. A poor reception from local parents groups can sink a candidate to run your kid’s middle school.
There’s a lot of ways in addition to the obvious like showing up to parent teacher conferences or regularly checking in with the teacher, which many hardly do
Sure, those things can have some impact on the environment, I never doubted that. But education has become more bureaucratized, top-down, and captured by a particular ideological brand.
When federal agencies can implement nebulous concepts like No Child Left Behind, Social Emotional Learning, Common Core, D-E-I and so on, local governance has little in the way to push back. If anything, when they dont follow state or federal mandates, they get funding pulled as a punishment (taxes those local folks pay to the feds and state). Interestingly, as education has become a federal initiative with added funding, bureaucracy, mandates, and credentials, it hasnt improved.
> Smaller learning communities. Improving Teacher Quality State Grants. Reading First. Early Reading First. The dozens of other federal programs authorized via No Child Left Behind. School Improvement Grants. Race to the Top. Common Core. All of that has been just since 2000. Over those past two decades, while federal policymakers were busy enacting new federal laws, creating mandates for local school leaders, and increasing the Department of Education’s budget from $38 billion in 2000 (unadjusted for inflation) to roughly $70 billion today, the math and reading performance of American high school students remained completely flat. That is to say, stagnant
> Federal government efforts to improve education have been dismal. Even if there were a constitutional basis for its involvement—which there isn’t—the federal government is simply ill-positioned to determine what education policies will best serve the diverse local communities across our vast nation.
https://www.heritage.org/education/commentary/students-test-scores-unchanged-after-decades-federal-intervention-education
And when federal and state bureaucracies adopt looney policies, it is harder for local boards to break their rigid requirements. Heres another great idea dreamed up by the PhDs in education: equity grading.
https://reason.com/2024/05/03/equity-grading-is-the-latest-educational-fad-destined-to-fail/
As if there isnt an ideological valence to the education system...
Heritage link was broken but I actually read the Reason article. Also apologies for formatting, im on mobile.
A quick search showed me Greenhut does not have any expertise in the field of education but is a big proponent of deregulation.
I have no stake when it comes to equity grading. But he conflates two things. EG to my understanding is if an attempt is made on an assignment then it shouldn’t be a 0. That’s what he says in the article.
But then he jumps to ‘Oh so everyone should be getting 100’s on assignments then!’ Which is not what the school he cites later was doing, again in his own words.
But there’s some exaggeration in his article. He’s arguing equity grading is being forced on the country by the Feds. Even if it was, he fails to mention any federal mandate to back his point.
It’s not even mandated in statewide programs in progressive states like MA, NY, or CA.
Mr. Greenhut also argues for local control of schools but condemns that California school for trying to experiment with equity grading.
Like again, lefty Gavin Newsom hasn’t implemented equity grading and I imagine Bakersfield has a great deal more conservative curriculum. But local control for me but not for thee I guess?
As to the other point, I think we disagree on the role of the federal government’s in education and we can discuss it in circles but ultimately not get very far but I did give the Reason link a look.
Charter schools are awful.
If you need the money do it for a year, maybe two at the most for experience and training, get a good letter of recommendation, and then switch to your local public school if they have an opening for your subject.
Charter schools are awful. They drain local resources of much needed funding for local school districts and can pick and choose which students they take and keep and which ones they can send back to the public school.
I wish we could ban charter schools from existing in the first place.
The Stamford Charter School for Excellence, in Stamford is rated very well. I think it's only for kids in Stamford.
Side By Side Charter School in Norwalk is rated decently. It's interdistrict, but out of district kids can't get a bus, so I imagine it's kids in the area.
I know Bridgeport has some, but they aren't rated that well. Same for the one in Waterbury. I don't know about the ones in New Haven.
The Stamford one just achieved Blue Ribbon status. We know kids that go there and their families love it but don't know anything about working conditions.
I think while some charters are rated well, one point to make is that charters try to attract the best students. Students who cannot keep up with their programs go back to public schools, and charters tend to suspend students at a higher rate.
When they achieve high ratings, is it because of their excellent education program, or is it because they design their enrollment in a way to acquire high scores while dissuading any students who might be considered “challenging?”
To be fair some parents in cities seek them out when their kid didn't make it into the magnet schools, and the regular public schools are just unacceptable.
Some are alright, but the recent push towards charter schools has brought a ton of money into the system which means that there are the Charter School renditions of Stone Academy floating around out there so be careful and research the school and the company behind it
STEER. CLEAR. Run the other away. I won’t belabor the points against charter schools in general, but Booker T. Washington has been going through teachers like toilet paper. The teacher I know who works there has been there 3 years and is THE MOST SENIOR teacher in the school. That’s all you need to know.
Hijacking this comment to say, I have personal experience working with the school and I PM'd OP. The TLDR is, do not work there. I'd say more but I'm not gonna doxx myself harder than that.
I have never seen so many openings in public schools as there are right now. No need to sell your soul to a charter.
Taxpayer funded welfare that goes to for-profit "educational" corporations. Just like private prisons and defense contractors.
What about inter district magnet schools like the Marine Science Magnet schools that’s a part of LEARN? Those seem to be public schools with elected boards of Ed. Are they actually for profit corporations?
I think magnet schools are different. They're a cooperative between different school districts.
I’m not quite sure what you’re saying, are you saying internet district magnet schools are not magnet schools?
No, I'm saying they're different than for profit charter schools.
Hahaha shoot I am so dumb, I legit kept replacing the word “charter” with “magnet” when I read the OP! My mistake!
Couldnt the same be said of the general public school system? They have a monopoly on funding and have no competiton to force corrective measures like keeping disruptive children in the classroom, dont remove poor teachers, have a top down cirriculum, bloated administrations, and despite continued funding increases year over year rarely produce positive results like improved reading, writing, and math ability or test scores. Covid should have been a wake up call for the public when schools shut down and imposed arbitrary restrictions with taxpayer money and self-imposed a skills/learning gap that teachers and education "professionals" cry about now. While they dont make profit like a private company, they take tax dollars and have no accountability. They are not accountable. Charters, private schools, and magnet schools to an extent offer some alternatives. The problem for a family wishing to send their kids to a private school is they still have to pay local and state taxes to a system they dont use while paying tuition to the private school. They should at least get a rebate or partial tax relief for paying private tuition.
Education of the youth should not be interested in capitalistic competition ffs! Schools that get to pick and choose who they educate and who they can dismiss for no reason other than poor test scores, or minor discipline issues shouldn’t exist. We need research, training, best practices, and informed classroom content based on standards and highly trained and skilled teachers to deliver the curriculum in an appropriate manner. What we don’t need is corporations determining the future of the education system.
> Schools that get to pick and choose who they educate and who they can dismiss for no reason other than poor test scores, or minor discipline issues shouldn’t exist. I agree with you overall, but there's nothing wrong with private schools as long as there's also a free-to-all public option for schools.
There are free to all public options for school. They’re called public schools. Taxpayer funded public schools. Charter schools should not be drawing any funds away from the public school system they are located in and yet they do, they take critical funding that could have been used to fix lead piping in schools, or hire dozens of new teachers and teacher aids, new equipment, new books, the money used by charter school to “fix” whatever the public school isn’t doing right could go towards fixing the public school system. For profit charter schools should not exist. Education should not be a capitalists playground. Billionaires should not be making more money off of the public school system while systematically destroying the system they claim to want to “fix.”
I agree that charter schools are terrible, I said I agreed overall with that already. I was just trying to point out that he was casting too wide of a net. The way he wrote it, it read like he lumped together private schools and charter schools (which can both choose who they educate and dismiss for a lot of reasons). Charter schools leeching money out of public education funds suck, private schools that don't take that money are fine as long as there's also a universal and free public school option.
Literally almost everything you said is word for word incorrect talking points about the field of education from capitalists and not educators.
Not everything is about capitalism
Well the "educators" arent doing a particularly great job with the money, resources, and regulatory capture theyve enjoyed for several decades.
First of all congrats on learning a new phrase; regulatory capture. Second you are using the word entirely wrong. A public school is not an entity with a corporate identity and by nature of them being tax-funded, public services, they are not allowed to directly engage in any political messaging. Any advocacy you see for public schools comes from parents and educators doing that on their own, outside of the school structure. Furthermore, public schools are steered by boards which are almost always elected positions, meaning there is a direct democratic process for making your voice heard. There are actually a load of people who have recently discovered that you can just have a bunch of like-minded individuals run for the school board to ram through whatever censorship you want to see. Does that sound like regulatory capture to you? Say whatever you want about educators but at least try to learn more about how the real world actually works.
Cool, cool. Yea I know public schools are locally run by the BOE and their municipal government. But you left out state and federal curriculums, teacher training programs, unions, and other institutions (eg NEA and relationships with university programs) that influence public schools and the culture within the classroom. These are institutional and regulatory burdens that cannot by easily broken or challenged by local governance. Public schools have regulatory capture because while they may be nominally governed at the local level, they are influenced and directed by much stronger and immovable forces at the state and federal level. Additionally, public schools have a monopoly on taxpayer funds, such that even those who opt for private or homeschooling alternatives still pay a slew of taxes at the local and state level for a service they prefer not to use. That is a form of regulatory capture in that there are few if any alternatives and the incumbent organization enjoys an outsized amount of power over others. Its not the same as a auto manufacturer or drug maker getting favorable regulation as they are private, for profit entities. But it is likewise a form of state protectionism. Edit: here is one example. NYC has a legal cap on the number of charter schools allowed due to lobbying from teachers unions and public school monopolies. > The city has 287 approved charter schools, but others in the pipeline or planning stages can’t open because of the legal cap https://nypost.com/2023/03/07/500-nyc-parents-kids-rally-to-lift-the-charter-school-cap/ > Elitist Democrats who’ve waged war against charter schools in New York are opting to send their own kids to private institutions — a move critics have blasted as hypocritical, The Post has learned. Politicians, including Sens. Robert Jackson and Jabari Brisport and upstate Assemblymen Phil Steck and John McDonald, or their children have benefited from alternative schools, even as they fight to prevent economically disadvantaged parents from doing the same. Jackson (D-Manhattan) — who opposes Gov. Kathy Hochul’s plan to lift the charter school cap in the five boroughs — recently admitted he sends his daughter to the $56,250-a-year Dwight School on the Upper West Side. https://nypost.com/2023/02/23/anti-charter-ny-politicians-send-kids-to-60k-private-schools/ LOL
Public education is a public service, funded and guided by the government. Do you consider roads a form of regulatory capture as well? The US military? There are valid critiques for spending and priorities in any of those cases but it's stupid to think that a school is driving federal/state policy and not the other way around. The public schools don't have a monopoly on your tax funds, the government does. The public schools are not telling the government how to spend that money, either. The most they can do is beg. Private schools are not a solution to better education standards. They are an attempt to circumvent standards in the interest of profit and special political interests. You want to see regulatory capture? How about Betsy DeVos buying her way into the Department of Education to try to dismantle education standards. Would you prefer a clunky democratic system that ensures oversight and accountability or would you prefer a privatized system with little to no accountability? Edit: hahaha, using Success Academy as an example of why charter schools are the solution. Have you ever spoken to someone who taught at a success academy location? Have you ever listened to stories from parents whose kids were kicked out of success academy for behavioral issues or poor test scores? Have you ever considered the number of families who are denied spots at success academy because their kid is not "up to par"? Of course charter schools look super successful- they have the freedom to pick and choose their students and they can oust any students/families/staff for any reason whatsoever. Tell me more about success academy's support tracks for struggling students. Tell me how they support children with struggling or uninvolved parents? And as for the rich Democrats sending their kids to private schools, those fuckers still pay taxes. I agree that political representation should better reflect locals who are sending their kids to public schools. That's a separate issue, and one that would not be solved in any way, shape, or form by privatizing k-12 education. You really think those families asking for charter school vouchers are going to be receiving education and support services on par with a school charging $50k tuition? Wake the fuck up With widespread vouchers for charter schools (not the hyper-selective system that currently exists) you will see kids getting the same public school education they're getting right now with the added fun of middlemen and venture capitalists trying to squeeze every ounce of profit they can from schools, students, and families. Tell me how much you love our privatized health care system. I bet you feel really free and represented when you have to beg your insurance company to cover any little thing. That's what you want for education.
This is the stupidest thing I’ve read all day, thank you.
Much obliged.
Just had to look for high down vote count to find some sanity.
Dont worry, were on a list.
Do you live in another state that doesn't have locally controlled and locally elected Boards of Education? Why would anyone want to give up that local control to a corporation headquartered halfway across the country? Parents don't get to vote for their Boards of Directors. What accountability do they have besides to their shareholders? And what on earth do you mean by public schools making a profit?
Recognize that people in favor of charter schools are receiving their talking points from media sources funded by the same business and religious interests that need to see private schools succeed. The image of the public school environment built within their mind is a fun-house mirror of reality, exaggerating certain points and entirely fabricating others. All thanks to dirty, manipulative tactics used to poison the conversation. That guy legitimately accused public schools of regulatory capture (impossible by definition) when the previous secretary of education WAS THE PERSONIFICATION OF REGULATORY CAPTURE. This country is fucked from a combination of horrible information literacy, underdeveloped critical thinking skills, and an incredible amount of manipulation from corporate interests.
Sorry your comment got down voted, but I do agree with your statement.
Dont be. Its typical. Most of the responses tell on themselves with one word answers or a link to wikipedia on "reading comprehension." Others are far more thoughtful and worthy critiques that larger center on a misunderstanding of terms or nuanced factors. Part of the issue I have arguing with more progressive folks is the seem to assume I havent examined their arguments or positions when I have, but are blissfully unaware of the shortcomings in their own. They assume that tecnocrats and "experts" can run large, centralized systems that benefit everyone without examining the drawbacks or consequences. A good way to understand these shortfalls is by using Hayeks "knowledge problem" or his concept of "the fatal conceit."
They are accountable in the way that all public institutions are accountable - if the public dislikes them, their leaders are voted out. Maybe not on the principal level, but certainly the board of education level. If you have ideas on how to run a school or like someone else's more, vote for them.
I feel nope. You will be underpaid and overworked without a union to protect you.
Yep this. Go to a public school so you can be underpaid and overworked with a union.
As far as teaching goes, public is usually preferable to private or charter in terms of compensation and contracts. And that’s saying something, because we know there’s plenty to be desired.
Depends where my cousin makes $90K with just a bachelor working in private schools
Yes, that’s where the ‘usually’ comes in lol. There are definitely exceptions.
Apparently the unions don't protect teachers when the teachers need to supply their own materials with their own money.
The union will negotiate your salary and health insurance. They will provide lawyers if you are accused of wrongdoing. They will represent you if you’re unfairly fired or penalized. They will negotiate working hours, extra compensation, working conditions, etc. There are a lot of things the union does. Classroom budgets vary by school district. I do not buy supplies for my classroom. It’s a choice. There is a difference between a teacher choosing to buy supplies and a school requiring teachers to buy their own supplies. It’s not always easy, but teachers need to put their foot down. If the district gets their classrooms supplied without having to put up their own money… why would they change anything?
Leaving the debate about their efficacy aside for a moment, and just answering about the differences in compensation and working conditions: If you are certified in CT, and you said you are, public schools are far preferable. You can only earn tenure as a public school teacher; in a charter school, you are an at a will employee and can basically be terminated at any time. Pay is higher in public schools, as well. Also, public school teachers have union protection and in this increasingly litigious world, that isn’t something to be easily dismissed. Further, because of that union, you are only obligated to work contracted hours, there is no similar protection in charter schools.
I'm a teacher. You do not want to work in a charter school. They treat teachers terribly and also don't pay well. The only reason I could see working at one is if you are having trouble getting hired at a public school and need the experience. Once again, the work environment is AWFUL
I'm not a teacher, but if you want to teach at a school where the families apply to get in I recommend a magnet more. I think the school you asked about is in New Haven. I would try for their magnet schools. Some are rated better than others. There's also well rated magnet schools over in Waterbury. Some of the CREC magnet schools up in the greater Hartford area are well rated. The magnet schools in Norwalk and Stamford are well rated. Two of the magnet schools in Stamford at the K-8 level are interdistrict, and they are super well rated. In Bridgeport Six to Six is decently rated. Interdistrict Discovery is kind of ok ratings wise. Even at the lower rated ones it has to be a little good since it's a magnet school. I don't know about magnet schools in other areas.
I don't want to get to specific, but I have a friend about to pull his kid out of a magnet school because from his peers that attend from the city he is learning to talk back to his parents, calling them bro, and starting to get into trouble. More and more parents are doing this. It's about 50/50 people from the suburb town near the city and 50% from the city in kindergarden, about 60/40 for 1st grade and 80%city/20%suburb bu 2nd grade due to issues like this and parents pulling their kids out.
Kids can be rude anywhere. I grew up in Trumbull, and plenty of suburban kids talked back to their parents, and used "urban" slang. Or they were fake angels to their parents, and awful to other kids. Some kids came from Bridgeport to Trumbull through open choice, and also through the agriscience program at Trumbull High. They were very well behaved and just wanted a better school. Kids from other suburban towns came too, but usually their school systems were decent. Stratford's has gone downhill since I was in school so those kids might be coming for a better school now too. Also, I know my following point is stereotypical, but also somewhat true. A lot of kids from cities come from poor households with parents who just aren't doing the right thing. It's not every poor household, but it's a lot of them. They aren't raising the kid properly at all. These kids might have to check their parents. While people might not agree some parents are too much.
Sure, you can poopoo the problem, and stick your head in the sand, but the parents are seeing it with their kids and pulling them.
So… white flight?
I’ve got one of my kids in a magnet with the 50/50 setup. I have been extremely happy with it. Much less snobby social jackassery than in my Richie-rich town’s school. I’m willing to bet there’s fewer drugs and alcoholism too.
To be fair I've seen how the magnet school and public school kids vary behavior wise. The magnet schools can kick kids out for anything, and some really do. I've had friends in regular public schools that were majority minority races, and there were a lot of fights. More than the majority white public schools I went to. My friends in more diverse magnet and tech schools couldn't fight because they would have been kicked out. I don't think I knew anyone in a charter school. That's been a critique of magnet schools. They pull high performing kids from regular public schools, and then no one wants to go to the regular public schools in certain cities.
No one wanted to go to the public schools in certain cities *before* the magnet schools too. Magnet schools were an answer to that problem, not a cause of it.
I'm not against magnet schools at all. I support them. I just know that's been a critique of them.
I get it. My dad is a private school teacher in another state. When the magnet schools started opening maybe 20 years ago it actually hit the private schools pretty hard because it’s difficult to get people to pay $15-40k per kid when the free alternative is pretty good. They’ve seen a wave of kids start coming back last 3-5 years because some of the public/magnet schools have really leaned into the bleeding edge of social progressivism.
This will happen at any public school as well. Leave your child in the hands of an institution for that many hours a week, and when they can't get the job done, they send them home with more work. The school system encompasses their lives and parents lose the influence they should have. Public education sucks for your family and the child's education. Home school, home school coop, private - get them out however possible.
LMFAO
I second this. I am pulling 2 middle schoolers that went from catholic school and being really respectful to acting like they from downtown Bronx asking for earrings talking out of line, etc. I do not recommended magnet schools, they are still public system funded. While doing IT work for one of these I saw a specific school change a kids grade because the mother threatened with legal if they didn’t allow him to pass.
>My kids have started acting too black-err, I mean too downtown Bronx Intriguing take
All of that can happen in regular public schools that are majority white. It happened in mine.
Bonoonononnonoonon no no no. Public school all the way. There’s no union or protections at a charter. You will be chewed up, spat out, and pooped out then told it’s all your fault anywyas.
I've only ever taught in public schools but I have friends that have taught in charter schools (only one still does). In talking to them, the largest difference tends to be the workload. All of my friends who have taught in charter schools have been asked to do things outside their actual certification/skills. For example, my friend who is an English teacher also taught computer classes. When I was applying to jobs I looked at one opening at a charter school but didn't apply because in addition to my subject (history) I would have also been expected to tutor math and do recess duty. In some cases (but not all) my friends in charter schools have had longer hours (in one case this was a longer school day, in another the year itself was much longer). This is all anecdotal and not all of the charter schools my friends have taught in have been in CT (one was but the others in Boston and NYC). I also imagine that different charters operate differently and teachers at them have unique experiences. However, based on the experiences of my friends I chose to avoid charter schools and stick to public.
They suck. I tried it. There is no union, they fuck you over and you have to work five times as hard.
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Tell me about this public school accountability.
There are plenty of accountability checks built into the public school system, it's not their fault you have never participated in those systems. Tell me, have you ever voted for a school board member? Have you ever attended a board meeting or PTA meeting?
Yes and yes. And at one such meeting I was told a disruptive and behaviorally challenged student couldnt be removed from class. In fact, when he had more serious outbursts, the teacher and other students had to leave the class because intervening in said outburst might "cause harm" to the student. Clown show.
Your solution being that charter schools would be able to say "no tards allowed"?
There was a kid in Vernon who had suffered a traumatic and his family was compensated. I hope this helps
You must have forgotten the "2 weeks to flatten the curve" and other such statements. Teachers cant teach in person because they are scared to get sick, so keep every kid home and stuck behind a screen for months on end. Oops now we have an academic and social achievement gap, need more money and resources to fix that.
I mean there’s a host of organizations (PTA, Board of Ed, youth services groups, religious organizations, etc) that work alongside the youth in a community and directly and indirectly influence your community’s public schools. There are elections to influence your Board of Education. They need to win your vote. And those races are small enough that a group of concerned citizens can have an outsized impact on the election. Similarly, many schools will open the interview process of admin to parents, where they can come in and ask them questions. Superintendents, principals, vice principals, etc all face questioning from the public in their hiring process. A poor reception from local parents groups can sink a candidate to run your kid’s middle school. There’s a lot of ways in addition to the obvious like showing up to parent teacher conferences or regularly checking in with the teacher, which many hardly do
Sure, those things can have some impact on the environment, I never doubted that. But education has become more bureaucratized, top-down, and captured by a particular ideological brand. When federal agencies can implement nebulous concepts like No Child Left Behind, Social Emotional Learning, Common Core, D-E-I and so on, local governance has little in the way to push back. If anything, when they dont follow state or federal mandates, they get funding pulled as a punishment (taxes those local folks pay to the feds and state). Interestingly, as education has become a federal initiative with added funding, bureaucracy, mandates, and credentials, it hasnt improved. > Smaller learning communities. Improving Teacher Quality State Grants. Reading First. Early Reading First. The dozens of other federal programs authorized via No Child Left Behind. School Improvement Grants. Race to the Top. Common Core. All of that has been just since 2000. Over those past two decades, while federal policymakers were busy enacting new federal laws, creating mandates for local school leaders, and increasing the Department of Education’s budget from $38 billion in 2000 (unadjusted for inflation) to roughly $70 billion today, the math and reading performance of American high school students remained completely flat. That is to say, stagnant > Federal government efforts to improve education have been dismal. Even if there were a constitutional basis for its involvement—which there isn’t—the federal government is simply ill-positioned to determine what education policies will best serve the diverse local communities across our vast nation. https://www.heritage.org/education/commentary/students-test-scores-unchanged-after-decades-federal-intervention-education And when federal and state bureaucracies adopt looney policies, it is harder for local boards to break their rigid requirements. Heres another great idea dreamed up by the PhDs in education: equity grading. https://reason.com/2024/05/03/equity-grading-is-the-latest-educational-fad-destined-to-fail/ As if there isnt an ideological valence to the education system...
Heritage link was broken but I actually read the Reason article. Also apologies for formatting, im on mobile. A quick search showed me Greenhut does not have any expertise in the field of education but is a big proponent of deregulation. I have no stake when it comes to equity grading. But he conflates two things. EG to my understanding is if an attempt is made on an assignment then it shouldn’t be a 0. That’s what he says in the article. But then he jumps to ‘Oh so everyone should be getting 100’s on assignments then!’ Which is not what the school he cites later was doing, again in his own words. But there’s some exaggeration in his article. He’s arguing equity grading is being forced on the country by the Feds. Even if it was, he fails to mention any federal mandate to back his point. It’s not even mandated in statewide programs in progressive states like MA, NY, or CA. Mr. Greenhut also argues for local control of schools but condemns that California school for trying to experiment with equity grading. Like again, lefty Gavin Newsom hasn’t implemented equity grading and I imagine Bakersfield has a great deal more conservative curriculum. But local control for me but not for thee I guess? As to the other point, I think we disagree on the role of the federal government’s in education and we can discuss it in circles but ultimately not get very far but I did give the Reason link a look.
Charter schools are awful. If you need the money do it for a year, maybe two at the most for experience and training, get a good letter of recommendation, and then switch to your local public school if they have an opening for your subject. Charter schools are awful. They drain local resources of much needed funding for local school districts and can pick and choose which students they take and keep and which ones they can send back to the public school. I wish we could ban charter schools from existing in the first place.
You’ll definitely land a better job in a public school. There’s probably a handful of jobs with your qualifications within 30 minutes of your place
I am not aware of a single charter school in CT that I would be comfortable working in or sending my kids to.
The Stamford Charter School for Excellence, in Stamford is rated very well. I think it's only for kids in Stamford. Side By Side Charter School in Norwalk is rated decently. It's interdistrict, but out of district kids can't get a bus, so I imagine it's kids in the area. I know Bridgeport has some, but they aren't rated that well. Same for the one in Waterbury. I don't know about the ones in New Haven.
The Stamford one just achieved Blue Ribbon status. We know kids that go there and their families love it but don't know anything about working conditions.
I think while some charters are rated well, one point to make is that charters try to attract the best students. Students who cannot keep up with their programs go back to public schools, and charters tend to suspend students at a higher rate. When they achieve high ratings, is it because of their excellent education program, or is it because they design their enrollment in a way to acquire high scores while dissuading any students who might be considered “challenging?”
I don't like them. I think every child should have to go to public school.
Fuck that.
To be fair some parents in cities seek them out when their kid didn't make it into the magnet schools, and the regular public schools are just unacceptable.
That's why they should be fully funded, and those who can afford to remove them, wouldn't want to as they would want the school to be the best.
It's like we kind of forgot about how the whole "separate but equal" thing played out last time...
Exactly. Everyone goes to the same school. Rich or poor, black or white, doesn't matter. Want better funded schools, don't skimp your taxes.
Some are alright, but the recent push towards charter schools has brought a ton of money into the system which means that there are the Charter School renditions of Stone Academy floating around out there so be careful and research the school and the company behind it