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Common Dreams reports
The Seattle Times reports that
The ruling--believed to be one of the first of its kind in the country--overturns the law [I-1240] voters narrowly approved in 2012 allowing publicly funded, but privately operated, schools.
Teacher and author Mercedes Schneider offers more on the Act:
As is true of charter schools nationwide, the charters in Washington State (up to the current ruling) were eligible for public funding diverted from traditional public schools. Charter schools were approved via a November 2012 ballot initiative (I-1240, the Charter Schools Act) in which charters were declared to be "common schools" despite their not being subject to local control and local accountability. And also like America's charters in general, Washington's charters are not under the authority of elected school boards.
Thus, Washington voters had approved to give public money to private entities--a one-way street that provided no means for such funds to overseen by the public.
[...] The new ruling (pdf)[1] states that charters, "devoid of local control from their inception to their daily operation", cannot be classified as "common schools," nor have "access to restricted common school funding."
[...] "The Supreme Court has affirmed what we've said all along--charter schools steal money from our existing classrooms, and voters have no say in how these charter schools spend taxpayer funding," said Kim Mead, president of the [Washington Education Association], in a statement.
"Instead of diverting taxpayer dollars to unaccountable charter schools, it's time for the Legislature to fully fund K-12 public schools so that all of Washington's children get the quality education the Constitution guarantees them," Mead continued.
The Associated Press reports that the state had one charter school last year, and eight more have opened in the past few weeks.
I pity Ms. Schneider's students if she routinely starts sentences with conjunctions--especially consecutive, redundant conjunctions.
[1] I had trouble with the connection.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 07 2015, @07:37AM
If this is the case, wouldn't that money be better spent at turning public schools into a non-failure?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Monday September 07 2015, @08:39AM
Sorry, but no. Within TFS and TFA, they are arguing for "local control". THAT is a very good idea. LOCAL control. But, see, they people who want to outlaw the charter schools don't really want "local control" at all. What they really want, is that they have control. Not the locals, but the state capital.
Crap. I had two paragraphs typed out explaining my opposition to a monoculture. I deleted them - suffice to say that when everyone is thinking alike, then no one is actually thinking. Control of your education systems from the capital is a curse that you can live without. Monoculture. It's a curse word, far worse than fuck, shit, piss, queer, ass, or any of the other "forbidden" words you've ever heard. Worse than (gasp!) THE "N" WORD! A monoculture is worse than the old Chinese curse, "May you live in interesting times."
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Francis on Monday September 07 2015, @01:28PM
That's ridiculous. What we have in WA is too much control over education locally. Every freaking time we elect new school board members they waste a lot of money trying to completely reinvent the wheel. We'll spend huge amounts of money on a new training one session and then when new school board members come in they'll claim the district is a disaster and spend money on a different training to address the same problem.
We can't close schools because there's so many freaking advocates for each school that the ones that need to be closed are usually not the ones that do get closed. The ones that do get closed are usually the ones that serve minority communities and the minority communities are usually where the largest part of the poor education shows up. So we bus them all over the place to go to the schools and wonder why they don't have any time for studying or rest.
Also, right now the state legislature is being held in contempt of court after failing to provide the funds that the State Supreme court mandated by paid due to education being the highest priority for funding in the sate. Literally, education is the first thing we're supposed to fund, even before things like the national guard and state patrol.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Monday September 07 2015, @02:50PM
I think that you've helped my argument, more than anything. So, minority neighborhoods have their schools closed, and their children bussed miles away, just to sit in class with kids who are not minorities? WTF made you think that anyone had "local" control to start with? Quite obviously, the "local" people didn't decide to close their own neighborhood schools. Instead, someone at the city/county/regional levels bludgeoned the locals into closing their schools, so that the city/county/regional dictators could exercise CONTROL over those little minority children.
WTF weren't those local schools permitted to be improved? Why weren't LOCAL PEOPLE given the authority necessary to improve those schools?
Oh - careful now, Francis. Don't you DARE to make some policitally incorrect statement that might imply that the minority people aren't smart enough to run a school. One slip up here, and the collectivists are going to be screaming for your head!
Since I'm not a socialist/collectivist/liberal, I can state quite bluntly that the goal is to exercise control over those minorities, thus proving the superiority of the ruling class. Keep hammering those little minority kids into square boxes, despite the fact that all those little minority kids are kinda round, or oval, in cross section. Keep hammering though. And, any little oval body that cannot be forced into a square box can be discarded into the prison system, after all.
THAT is what fascism is all about. Control, control, control.
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Monday September 07 2015, @06:28PM
I think that you've helped my argument, more than anything. So, minority neighborhoods have their schools closed, and their children bussed miles away, just to sit in class with kids who are not minorities?
I think you are missing his point, either by misunderstanding or otherwise. The schools getting closed are in poorer districts, most likely urban areas higher in minority students, and those schools are getting closed because they have the least political advocacy and when funding gets cut they as a result are the losers. It has nothing to do with an attempt to integrate minorities with others. He further points out that the students are hurt by the fact their day, as a result of busings, is longer and they lose sleep and study time as a result. The goal should be to fund their local schools and keep them open.
Charter schools are not a part of this goal, they are simply part of the overall attempt made to privatize public services, not because the privatized versions are better, they rarely if ever are, but because it funnels public money into private pockets. The goal of charter schools is profit, and once profit is counted as the primary goal of an essential public service, the service part is sure to suffer.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Monday September 07 2015, @06:39PM
What makes me think that there's local control over that is that we have a freaking school board that's voted on by the voters of the city. They also have meetings whenever there's a round of closures planned and for things like that. Just watching the proposed closures change when they actual closures are announced makes it pretty clear that it's not just the school boards decision.
Since when do minorities run schools in minority neighborhoods? Even in non-minority majority neighborhoods the administrative staff may or may not live locally. The principals and administrators rarely live in the area the school serves. Same goes for the teachers. What the minority communities don't have is time and money to influence how the closures are handled.
Since you chose to emphasize that you're not a socialist/collectivist/liberal, I have to assume that you're an idiot. You're making assertions about the local situation that are outright untrue because the truth doesn't fit your agenda.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Monday September 07 2015, @07:11PM
Why does the administration live far away from the schools they are administering? Call me an idiot - why are peole hiring principals who have no stake in the school's success?
All of my principals and school administration people lived nearby when I was in school. In 5th & 6th grade, my principal lived exactly three blocks from me. I was buddies with his son for a few months, before I FINALLY realized that they shared the same last name. "Is Mr. Gibbons your dad?" "Well, yeah, everyone knows that." "I didn't, I'm the new kid in town, remember?" "Oh."
Put local people in charge - that's the only way you get "local" control.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Monday September 07 2015, @07:25PM
You must live in a tiny town if you don't see the problem with that.
The principals don't get to stay at one school for their entire career around here. They get to be there for as long as 8 years, but usually only a few years. And even if they did get to stay at the same school for the entire career, that's hardly an incentive to improve things. It just means that the school will tend to stagnate with the principal. The principal might have children there for a few years, but it's a pretty weak incentive if you're not already motivated to do your best.
I doubt that Seattle is the only city that's like that either.
Also, if the incentive is merely a matter of location based connection, how do you motivate principals to keep trying? Plus, what qualified principal is going to want to move into a neighborhood that has gang problems? Requiring that principals live near the school is just going to chase the qualified ones to better schools in better neighborhoods or out of the city completely. Seattle isn't too bad violence wise, but I can only imagine how bad it would be in cities where there is a violence problem.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday September 07 2015, @07:38PM
I disagree. People should have some attachment to their work. Their own kids and their neighbor's kids going to the school they work at is a far greater attachment than living miles away, in an unrelated district.
Most cities have residency requirements for elected officials, as well as employees. Schools should have similar requirements. I don't want three Okies, and four Texans motoring in every day to teach my kids here in Arkansas. Louisiana would be a bit of a stretch, since our school is almost 100 miles from that state line.
We have local teachers here, most of whom graduated from one school or another, right here in the county. The county encompasses four different school districts, and almost all of the county's teachers live within the disctrict they teach in. The exceptions are pretty close, and that can partly be blamed on redistricting over the years.
Locals. Local control. My position is that local people should control their schools, and they should be able to require that the staff are local people as well. Education should not be state controlled.
(Score: 2) by BK on Monday September 07 2015, @05:18PM
Whoever pays for a thing usually controls that thing. It appears that the Washington state constitution assigns the responsibility to fund, and therefore the authority to control, to the state legislature. What is this local control you speak of?
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Monday September 07 2015, @06:35PM
The school board. Each school district has it's own board. And they make most of the district's decisions. We have a statewide Office of Public Instruction, but they don't micromanage the districts. They do make some decisions and regulations, but there's the OPI, school board, Principal and ultimately teacher that all have various responsibilities here. But, with charter schools as enacted, the OPI and school board had no say in how things were run. Which meant that the voters had no control or say in how things were run.
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by BK on Tuesday September 08 2015, @05:16AM
That's just deck chairs on the Titanic -- a metaphor that works on many levels. The truth is that the state controls everything that really matters. They control the what and constrain the how and present the locals with the illusion of choice.
The board can hire teachers, so long as they have the state's certification.
The board can buy books or curriculum, so long as they meet state guidelines.
The board MUST have books and curriculum meeting those guidelines... or else!
The board can select the sports team logo, so long as nobody anywhere might be offended.
etc.
The choices are illusions. Failure is by design. Apparently the WA constitution mandates failure. And I once thought that constitutions weren't suicide pacts...
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by curunir_wolf on Monday September 07 2015, @12:53PM
If this is the case, wouldn't that money be better spent at turning public schools into a non-failure?
Been there, done that, did not work. Public education in the US simply cannot be fixed with increased funding. It has been tried, and failed.
American spending on public K-12 education is at an all-time high and is still rising. Approximately $9,300 is spent per pupil.
There is a lack of a correlation between long-term Education spending and performance - that does not suggest that resources are not a factor in academic performance, but it does suggest that simply increasing spending is unlikely to improve educational performance. Instead, resource allocation needs to be addressed, and that's what charter schools tried to address, by cutting out the bureaucrats that were causing the problem. Unfortunately, it doesn't always work, because you will sometimes get other incompetent / corrupt leaders in charge of the charter schools too.
I am a crackpot
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday September 07 2015, @08:27PM
If this is the case, wouldn't that money be better spent at turning public schools into a non-failure?
Good money after bad. Maybe Bernie Maddox's next investment opportunity won't be a total fraud. Let's find out.