School Leader

A visit to two charter schools

Earlier this week I had the pleasure of touring two charter schools in Nashville and visiting with their principals. As Kentucky looks forward to its first charter school law, it was helpful to see first hand two different charter schools pursuing different strategies and serving different needs, each with its own measure of success. I came away with several observations.

The visits to East End Prep and Explore! Community School were arranged by fellow Kentucky Board of Education member Ben Cundiff, who serves on the boards of directors for the two schools. We were joined by another board member and staff members from the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence. We arrived near the end of the school day and so could only visit a few classrooms in action, but we had a chance to interact with some students and to chat with their principals.

In Tennessee charter schools are required to have a sponsoring organization. The sponsor for these two schools is the Martha O'Bryan Center, a well-respected community organization that focuses on addressing issues of poverty, education, and economic mobility.  Both schools serve the East End community of Nashville, with East End Prep focused primarily on neighborhoods in the northeast portion of the East End and Explore! concentrating on the southeast region. Despite the rapid gentrification of the East End, these schools serve mostly impoverished families. Eighty-seven percent of students at East End Prep qualify for free and reduced price lunch, compared with 63% at Explore.

Most of the district schools in the area are persistently low-achieving, except for one high-performing elementary school that serves the most affluent students in that region of the city, and which is virtually closed to low-income students because of school zoning policies (belying the reality that many public schools don't really "serve all comers"). These two charter schools are filling a great need.

East End Prep is in its sixth year of operation. It serves 650 students in grades K-5, the overwhelming majority of whom are African American and Hispanic. Like many charter schools, East End Prep began with only kindergarten classes and has added a grade each year. Principal Jim Leckrone, who is a veteran administrator from traditional public schools, has led East End Prep since its inception. The school, which is located in a building that once housed a Metro Nashville middle school, plans to continue its expansion until it serves grades K-8.

While perhaps not a "No Excuses" style charter school, East End Prep nevertheless emphasizes high academic expectations and strong character. Mr. Leckrone described an instructional program focused on state standards and regular formative assessment of student progress. Rather than use a single "out of the box" curricular program, teachers select from a variety of sources to create learning experiences based on standards. The ratio of student poverty level to academic achievement makes East End Prep one of the highest-performing high-poverty schools in the Metro area.

Explore! Community School is only in its second year of operation. It is following the growth model of East End Prep by adding a single grade level each year, so currently only serves kindergarten and first graders. Principal Jon Driskell, a former Metro special educator and coach for new teachers, described the school's mission as serving a demographically diverse student body using project-based learning as its main instructional focus. Explore! is currently housed in an incubator space owned by the Tennessee Charter School Center, a privately-funded initiative designed to support high-quality charter school implementation. A permanent space is being designed and renovated and will be available in 2018.

Both principals used the word "nimble" to describe how their schools could easily make decisions about curriculum, instruction, and day-to-day governance. Their autonomy as charter schools, freed from the bureaucratic structures (and mindsets) of district schools, allows them to move quickly and deftly in meeting student needs. They are free to hire and develop teachers as they see fit. Above all, East End Prep's Jim Leckrone said that the school's primary innovation is its mission-driven culture. Teachers choose to work at East End Prep because they feel called too work with high-risk students and they share the school's vision. The school's parents share in that mission. "When we enroll a new student, we make it clear to the parents that we are enrolling the whole family," Mr. Leckrone explained.

Here are some key insights I took from my visit to East End Prep and Explore!:

• Charter school autonomy is critical. While I have no objection to district-operated charters (and Metro Nashville has some now), part of the explanation for these schools' success lies in their freedom from district control. In exchange they face higher accountability than their district counterparts, and the ultimate accountability that comes from knowing that if they fail to meet their client families' expectations, they could be closed. Kentucky should reject any charter school bill that doesn't include the option of schools not run by local districts.
• Equitable funding matters. In Tennessee, state and local funds follow students to their charter school, but no transportation or facilities monies are provided. This means the schools have to raise approximately one-third of their operating budgets from private sources, which poses a substantial burden for schools that may not charge tuition. I'm pleased that in the charter school principles endorsed by the Kentucky Board of Education, we included provisions for transportation and facilities funding.
• Charter schools are often accused of selecting or retaining only the easiest-to-educate students. There is no evidence of this at East End Prep and Explore!. These schools serve higher percentages of poor and minority students and have made an extra effort to welcome students with disabilities. Ben Cundiff described how East End Prep nearly broke its budget during the school's first year of operation in order to hire a special education teacher to assist a single, high-need student. According to Principal Jon Driskell, 15 percent of students at Explore! Community School have disabilities, a higher percentage than the overall Metro average.
• The schools are learning lessons about sustainability. Like many charter schools, East End Prep and Explore! employ large percentages of early-career teachers who devote higher than normal hours of service to their students. But all teachers participate in the Tennessee teacher retirement system and are paid 10 percent higher salaries than the Metro salary schedule calls for in order to award their extra hours. In both schools, a teacher and teacher's assistant are employed for every class. Many aides are also fully certified, so this system builds a growing pool of experienced teachers to fill any gaps when turnover occurs. Nevertheless, East End Prep's Jim Leckrone acknowledged that the school is taking extra steps to retain high-quality teachers, especially as they become older, start families, and strive for a better work-life balance. This involves carefully trying to manage the expectations for teachers, parents, and students without compromising the mission-driven focus of the school, but will be key to the school's continued success.
• Support makes a difference. For both principals, involvement of the schools' sponsor, the Marth O'Bryan Center, was seen as crucial to their effectiveness. And in the case of Explore! in particular, the Tennessee Charter Schools Center has been essential in providing a start-up location and additional supports. It would behoove Kentuckians to think about similar structures that can give charter schools a better chance for success.

But perhaps one of the most interesting insights of the visit came near the end of our time at Explore!. Mr. Driskell acknowledged that, even though many of his students were from low-income families, parents at the school were highly involved and eager to make good decisions about their child's education. Some students are not so blessed, however, and many educators worry about district schools that might be populated by high numbers of such children in a choice-based environment.

I offered some thoughts on this problem in a recent post, but was also intrigued by Mr. Driskell's response. He expressed his own concerns about the rapid growth of the Nashville charter school sector, with four different charters in the immediate vicinity all competing for the same students. Jon sees an opportunity for better coordination from charter schools and the Metro district to maximize their individual and collective effectiveness in meeting student needs. "We all want to educate these students, but we each have slightly different missions and could actually help each other," he observed. And there are small signs that such collaboration is possible. Jon noted that he'd recently received invitations to attend principals' meetings with other school principals from the Metro district. He hopes this is also an invitation to share ideas and provide mutual support.

My basic inclination is to let consumer choices shape the education landscape, but some level of oversight, planning, and direction is also called for. And there's nothing better than educators from different schools and sectors coming together for the benefit of students. Just as no one policy strategy will be sufficient to meet our education challenges, no one school or district is sufficient either. If district, charter, and even parochial and independent school leaders can stop viewing each other as enemies (even while they remain friendly competitors) and see how their work can complement and support one another, students and families may begin to reap maximum benefit from school choice.

Image: Students at East End Prep, from the school's website, www.eastendprep.org

Usual disclaimer: Views expressed on this blog are mine alone and do not reflect the opinions of Western Kentucky University (where I serve as associate professor of education administration, leadership, and research) or the Kentucky Board of Education (where I serve as a member).

Related posts:

• Breaking the government monopoly on education
• Baby steps for school choice
• What makes a school "public?"
• Closing achievement gaps requires new thinking in education policy
• Education in the Fractured Republic

 

Breaking the government monopoly on education

The struggle to make Kentucky one of the last states to embrace school choice is going to be an ugly one. The first charter school bill of the upcoming General Assembly has been introduced, but it is a charade of a law filed by a long-time charter school opponent and meant to head off a more meaningful bill. Now the state's attorney general is intimating he may try to hold up charter legislation as unconstitutional. 

These are not just the lengths people will take to deny low- and middle-income families a choice in who educates their own children. This is the sign of an educational system that seeks adult interests and the preservation of its power over all other considerations. As I wrote last week, those who advocate school choice must be clear with themselves, with their opponents, and with the public about what is at stake.

Many Kentuckians, and especially those who work in schools, have come to take for granted a system of educational delivery that functions as a government-run monopoly for most families. And while many parents are happy with their local district schools, and while we have a collective obligation to ensure that all schools are high-quality and well-funded, the time has long passed to end school districts' monopolistic control of K-12 education. But the defenders of the monopoly will have to be confronted directly.

Senator Gerald Neal (D-Louisville) has repeatedly voted against charter school legislation, until last year when he supported an amended proposal that would only allow district-run charter schools. This year, knowing that with a Republican majority General Assembly a charter law will finally prevail, Sen. Neal has preemptively filed a bill that will allow only four charter schools, two each for Jefferson and Fayette Counties,  all of which would be under district-control. 

I have no objections to district-run charters. But what Sen. Neal's bill lacks is a mechanism whereby families could choose a school that is not run by the district. Autonomy is one of the hallmarks of charter schools, increasing their capacity for innovation and heightening accountability. But of course, autonomy also provides a source of competition. Sen. Neal and his supporters know that if families choose an autonomous charter school, the district will no longer have control of the education dollars allotted for that student. And they want to maintain control of that money above all else.

This focus on funding is at the heart of Democrat Attorney General Andy Beshear's warning to lawmakers about potential charter school legislation (is it the norm for AG's to opine about laws they haven't even formally reviewed?). Beshear points to provisions in the Kentucky Constitution requiring an "efficient" system of "common schools." He cautions: "I think that the legislature needs to be careful that money they're going to siphon out of the public school system they are replacing." He questions whether charter schools would be "common schools" under the law.

For the record: charter schools are public schools. They must be open to all applicants and cannot charge tuition. They are governed by a performance contract outlined under state law and monitored and approved by their authorizing body. When a family selects to send their child to a charter school, the education dollars allocated for that student follow to the new school.

But it is true that school choice policies, including charter schools, stretch our thinking about what makes a school public (what we usually mean by the word "common"). The idea that education dollars are for the benefit of children, and not institutions, and should follow children to the school of their families' choice puts a major crack in the monopoly of local school districts to deliver and control education.

I've previously written about why this monopolistic system is insufficient. It's not because teachers and administrators in district schools aren't dedicated and hard-working. It's because, despite the real education progress we've made in Kentucky, the rate of improvement is too sluggish and the size of our achievement gaps are too great. The system itself cannot, by its very design, meet the challenges of educating all students to proficiency.

What are the public purposes of education? To ensure a learned, virtuous citizenry, capable of taking care of themselves and others economically, contributing to the good of their communities, and participating fully in (and helping to preserve) our democratically-governed republic? I think most Kentuckians would agree to that. But a monopoly of government-run schools is not required for that purpose. In fact, I would argue that our system isn't delivering well on that vision, and that other kinds of education providers can ably serve this public purpose (see my recent blog post on this topic).

There is a kernel of legitimate concern in those who worry about a choice-based education system. What happens to students whose families lack the resources to take full advantage of their options? What happens in schools that may be largely populated by such students? First, I would say that as a public good, education needs to be more generously funded so that schools of all types have more resources to meet their missions. Strong funding in a choice based system promotes even more educational options. New schools may open, offering even greater diversity in the learning options and types of students served, and be more responsive to students' individual needs, especially for those at highest risk for failure. Choice programs are designed specifically for the benefit of low-income students, since affluent families already have a greater measure of options available to them.

Secondly, the research suggests that choice programs do no measurable harm to students who remain in their assigned schools and in most cases actually lead to higher levels of student achievement for all students, regardless of the school they attend. When all schools must think of their students' families as clients who may choose to dispense with their services, a heightened focus on service and excellence appears to emerge.

 

Third, I don't know anyone who believes choice is the answer to all of our education challenges. For a number of reasons, district schools will continue to be the choice for most families. Collectively we must continue our efforts to ensure high-quality learning experiences through continual improvements in curriculum, teaching, and assessment of student learning for all schools.

 

No public policy can completely make up the differences in opportunity between the affluent and the desperately poor. Under the best of circumstances, low-income families will still struggle to take full advantage of their education options under a choice-based system, just as they need help to navigate their choices in health care or in the use of other public services. We need to take this challenge seriously, but shouldn't use it as an excuse to deny these families (and lots of other low-income families who are equipped and eager to use their options) a choice altogether. In fact, we should embrace school choice as one of many policy mechanisms for promoting greater social mobility and equity of opportunity.

 

Some skeptics of choice also worry about how we will ensure quality and accountability under such a model. We will do so the same way we handle health care and other sectors of the economy, with a regulatory framework that is never perfect, but better than the alternatives associated with a monopoly. Our current system of school accountability struggles mightily to ensure quality in our district schools, and regularly fails to do so. There will be much to debate and work through in adding choice to our education accountability framework. But why use that as an excuse to defend a system we know cannot meet its mission as designed and deny families an opportunity for a better education now?

 

Let me stress again: our district school teachers and administrators are not to blame for the weaknesses of our education system, which I now have also served for over 20 years. I believe the vast majority of educators want to do what is best for students. But I don't know anyone who decided to become a teacher because they were eager to work for a government monopoly. It's time to separate the mission of serving children from the institutions we've created to do so, give families more choices, and give all schools more flexibility in meeting their needs.

 

Usual disclaimer: Views expressed on this blog are mine alone and do not reflect the opinions of Western Kentucky University (where I serve as associate professor of education administration, leadership, and research) or the Kentucky Board of Education (where I serve as a member).

 

Related posts:

• Baby steps for school choice.
• What makes a school "public?"
• Closing achievement gaps requires new thinking in education policy.
• Education in The Fractured Republic.
• Does school choice "drain money" from traditional public schools?
• Poll: Kentuckians strongly favor school choice.

Why Knowledge Matters: The Most Important Education Book of 2016

Update, 1/22/17: A version of this review has been published in the Bowling Green Daily News.

E. D. Hirsch is well known in education circles as a long-time advocate for "cultural literacy," the notion that there is a body of knowledge all educated people should master to be effective and virtuous citizens. Despite the immense popularity of Hirsch's books (I use his What your First Grader [etc.] Needs to Know series with my own children) and the advent of the supposedly more rigorous Common Core State Standards, curriculum has continued to erode in American schools, especially in the early grades.

Hirsch's latest book, Why Knowledge Matters: Rescuing our Children from Failed Educational Theories, is a blistering indictment of this trend away from rigorous content and its effects on the most disadvantaged students. Hirsch vividly describes how the over-emphasis on skills to the exclusion of knowledge coupled with vapid state standards and problems with standardized reading tests have exacerbated achievement gaps. His call for a renewal of rich content in the early grades based on social justice concerns as well as research on student achievement and learning theory is extraordinarily timely and makes Why Knowledge Matters, in my estimation, the most important education book of the year. Parents, educators, and policymakers should read it closely.

The basic problem, as Hirsch describes it, is that elementary schools have shifted toward an overwhelming emphasis on reading as a skill. Students spend hours each day learning reading techniques like how to sound out words, how to find the main idea of a passage, or how to do "close reading" of a text. In turn, time spent on social studies, science, the arts - essentially everything except reading and math - has been drastically reduced in the early elementary grades. The effect on reading tests in the short-term is positive: general trends in student achievement show elementary reading skills have improved. But achievement levels are stagnant or even declining at the middle and high school level, and Hirsch argues that's because students have been denied access to the kinds of rich content knowledge they need to read widely across a variety of subject areas.

This effect has relatively little harm on students from affluent families who absorb knowledge by osmosis through their lives outside of school. But for students of poverty whose parents can't take them to museums or on vacations or expose them to the wider world through reading and cultural opportunities, the impact is to make them fall further behind and deny them the information they need for economic and academic success.

The system is unfair to children, but also to teachers, who are often given the blame for lackluster student achievement. Hirsch argues that reading tests are invariably tests of content knowledge. But because elementary schools lack a rich, carefully-designed content framework, reading tests aren't actually measuring the impact that teachers have made on students, but rather what students have learned (or have not learned) at home. 

Hirsch cites a wealth of data from U.S. schools in his argument, but also devotes an entire chapter to education in France, which provides a helpful case study since that country has a single, unified education system. According to Hirsch, France has an excellent and well-organized preschool curriculum which helps narrow achievement gaps early, but like the U.S., France went through a shift toward skills-centrism in the early grades with well-documented negative effects on student learning. French educators are now calling for the return to a clear and common curriculum that will give all students the content knowledge they need for long-term academic success.

Why Knowledge Matters lays part of the blame for these trends on educators themselves who have become enamored with the idea that, in our age of instant information access, specific content learning is no longer necessary. Instead, students should learn critical thinking and problem-solving skills and can "look up" anything else they need to know. In some of the most compelling passages of the book Hirsch dismantles the idea that content knowledge can ever be separated from skills in this way. All skills are domain specific, including the ability to read (and thus, there is actually no discrete "main idea finding" skill; if students know what a passage is talking about, they automatically know the main idea):

Two texts that are rated at the same difficulty level are rarely of the same difficulty for an individual student... A student can be an excellent reader about dinosaurs and a terrible reader about mushrooms... No matter how widely-skilled people may be, as soon as they confront unfamiliar content their skill degenerates.

Hirsch is generally supportive of the Common Core Standards as an improvement over what preceded them in most states, but believes they reinforce this over-emphasis on skills to the exclusion of knowledge and must be supplemented accordingly (including with specific literary texts that all students should study). And he rejects as a false dichotomy the tension between informational and literary texts that characterizes some of the debate over Common Core: "Good works of fiction can be informative. And good informational texts can be literature."

Why Knowledge Matters acknowledges that rebuilding curriculum will not be easy given the enormous focus on testing and accountability that makes educators so risk averse. And Hirsch concedes the political difficulty of getting school stakeholders to agree on a common curricular canon that all students should master. But he believes such a transformation can happen at the local level, and he cites the efforts of many hundreds of schools that have adopted his Core Knowledge curriculum as examples, though emphasizing that Core Knowledge is but one approach to a well-crafted body of content knowledge that can guide instruction. Furthermore, Hirsch argues that reducing time on reading skills and bolstering time on domain specific knowledge will increase student achievement scores, so schools have everything to gain and little to lose by doing so.

In future posts I'll react to some of Hirsch's arguments in greater depth (including what should be included in such a curriculum), but his core thesis seems exactly right to me. I've long been a proponent of more personalized learning approaches. Learning tasks should meet students closer to their actual readiness levels and give them more opportunities to work through standards at their own pace. But I'm increasingly wary of the tendency to take this a step farther and individualize the content that students learn. There are certain things that students do actually need to know, and Why Knowledge Matters shows why you can't simply look things up when you don't know them: we need existing mental maps of knowledge for new information to make sense, or to even know what information is relevant to the questions we are posing.

I am discovering from my own experience as a parent that I can personally supplement a lot of what my children learn at school through learning experiences at home and in the community. But what about those children whose parents lack the knowledge, time, or resources to do this for them? As I've argued before, closing achievement gaps will require a much more comprehensive approach, involving more drastic changes in what students learn, and how, and where, than we are currently offering.

 The learning Hirsch describes in Why Knowledge Matters, with its emphasis on more whole-class instruction, will strike some educators as very traditional. But, using many examples from Core Knowledge schools, Hirsch stresses that a rigorous curriculum does not have to mean boring learning experiences. I am hopeful about this, and have been greatly encouraged by schools that are attempting to blend a rich and detailed curriculum with various student-centered approaches to pedagogy. Libertas School of Memphis is one example. This charter school, now in its second year, serves extremely at-risk students and offers a Core Knowledge curriculum delivered through Montessori methods. I correspond regularly with the director at Libertas and hope to visit there soon and write about their experiences.

But I am eager for Why Knowledge Matters to be widely read and thoughtfully discussed in the education community for this same reason. I have enormous respect for pioneer educators who are successfully implementing project-based learning and other innovative strategies. I want them to read this book with an open mind and weigh in from the standpoint of logistics: how far can we go in delivering a rigorous and specific curriculum and still respect students' innate need to have a greater role in the learning process? I have been regularly arguing that good curriculum and good pedagogy are not mutually exclusive, but there may be a dynamic tension here - or we may need to have deeper discussion about what really constitutes "good pedagogy" in light of what we want students to really know and be able to do as a result of their schooling.

At any rate, Why Knowledge Matters, if read with the care it deserves, should have parents, educators, and policymakers engaged in a whole new level of discussion about the direction of our schools.

Usual disclaimer: Opinions expressed on this blog are mine alone and do not reflect the views of Western Kentucky University (my employer) or the Kentucky Board of Education (where I serve as a member).

Related posts:

• Why Knowledge Matters, Part II: Strengthening Standards with a Content-Rich Curriculum
• If caring is king, content is queen.
• Yes, kids need to know about the American Revolution.
• The New Era of education has arrived.
• A classical education reading list.
• Classical education, Montessori, and the tension between the "what" and "how" of learning.

Baby steps for school choice

UPDATE, 12/10/2016: A version of this post was published as an op-ed by Kentucky Today.

The GOP's takeover of the Kentucky legislature last month means that charter school legislation is finally coming to Kentucky. After a day-long study session on the topic last week, yesterday the Kentucky Board of Education, where I serve as a member, offered recommendations to lawmakers for provisions a charter law might include. I was disappointed the Board was not ready to endorse the concept of charters outright, and I have some personal disagreements with the set of principles the Board adopted, but overall I see yesterday's decision as a tiny victory for school choice. The education establishment has finally accepted the fact that charter schools are going to be a reality here. But the debate around charters and choice is really just beginning, and the Board's discussion suggests the dividing lines are not just over the technical dimensions of policy, but also philosophical perspectives over what education is for and how schooling is delivered.

The Board  is made up of six members appointed by previous Democrat Governor Steve Beshear and five appointed by current Republican Governor Matt Bevin and sworn in last June (including me). As late as September I assumed any Board discussion about charters would probably be a long way off, but at our October meeting one of the Beshear appointees suggested that the Board has a responsibility to be informed about the topic and possibly weigh in on the issue and so a study session was planned for late November. The election, in which Republicans won control of the state House of Representatives, created additional momentum. Last week's work session included an overview of the complex research on charter schools. That research makes it clear that, while it's difficult to detect large overall differences in student achievement between charter and district schools, the most disadvantaged students do seem to benefit academically from attending charter schools, sometimes dramatically. I came away cautiously hopeful that the Board might be willing to support charter schools with certain conditions. The Commissioner's office drafted a set of potential charter school practices that the Board might endorse for consideration at yesterday's regular meeting.

It became immediately clear when our discussion started, however, that some Board members were not prepared to support charter schools. Several voiced criticisms or concerns about the concept, while others seemed eager to debate the specifics in the Commissioner's proposed recommendations. I was disappointed, but not surprised, and I saw no value in trying to argue with Board members and persuade them to change their minds. As I said in the meeting, I have written and spoken enough words on this topic to fill a book and if anyone wants to know why I support charters they can easily find my reasons. There is a time to fight, and a time to seek common ground, and my goal was to identify those areas where Board members could collectively establish consensus. If we accept that charter schools are going to be in Kentucky, can we agree to some principles of practice that we are willing to support?

After lengthy discussion and debate over multiple amendments, the Board accepted the draft document provided by the Commissioner's office, which covers a broad array of technical components in charter school legislation, including who may authorize, who may apply to start a charter school, how they will be financed, and how they will be held accountable. The vast majority of these principles would be recognized as best practices by charter school advocates, though there were a few items I personally disagree with. Some examples:

• Authorizers. I believe that allowing several different entities to authorize charter schools encourages a wide variety of innovative charter school models serving a more diverse array of students. Some Board members were concerned, however, that too many authorizers would create problems with accountability and oversight, and felt strongly that the Board itself should have over-arching authority over all schools in the state, district or charter.
• Applicants. The statement of principles stipulates that charter school operators should be non-profit. I don't have a problem with for-profit school operators per se. My family's pediatrician makes a profit every time we see her, and I'm happy for her to do so as long as she keeps my children healthy and makes them well. When she doesn't, we'll find another pediatrician. But I do respect the concern that for-profit entities might not always operate with the best interests of children in mind (for the record, only about 13 percent of charter school operators nationwide are for-profit entities anyway; and government and non-profit entities routinely make decisions that aren't always in the best interest of children).
• Teacher certification. Charter schools should not be made to hire fully certified teachers. Freeing them from the burdens of the certification regime will allow charters to take better advantage of community members who may have content expertise, but not the requisite state credentials. And I'd like to see a greater flexibility in teacher certification requirements for all schools. But if one believes there is a strong link between certification and teacher quality, then I can see how one might be concerned about this topic.

I chose not to dig in and fight my fellow Board members over any of these issues. I believe we would have deadlocked and failed to arrive at anything we could have collectively agreed on. Even had my position prevailed on a split vote (a long shot at best), it seemed more prudent to emphasize our areas of agreement, especially given that these are purely recommendations for lawmakers to consider. The final judgment about what will be law is not the Board's. In the end, I was genuinely proud that Board members had a civil and productive discussion and exercised their responsibility to speak on the topic. I don't doubt the sincerity of any of these fine people, include those with whom I disagree. Our differences, I think, are in terms means, not ends.

And yet, there is a serious philosophical divide beneath the surface of the debate around school choice. The language of those who oppose choice reflects a strongly-held assumption that our current system of delivering education is the only or best way to do so. It's not that charter school opponents are fixated on denying parents a choice of who educates their own children. It's that we've created a system that, by its design, is supposed to meet the needs of every single family delivered by one provider: the local district schools. And those who are emphatically devoted to this system will, by definition, have to oppose parental choice.

There may have been legitimate reasons for creating this system in the past, but I would argue it cannot meet its mission. No school, no matter how good, can meet the needs of every single child. It functions as a government-run monopoly, which will inevitably be characterized by inefficiencies and a tendency toward one-size-fits-all solutions that will never satisfy the multitude of individual learning needs presented by our diverse student populations. It leads to inevitable battles for control and power in which there must be education winners and losers. And it requires byzantine systems of oversight and accountability to ensure a modicum of quality and which has no realistic chance of reaching the levels of student learning our new economy and culture demands. Above all, it is unjust: low-income students suffer the most from its weaknesses, while affluent families can use their resources to game the system to get access to the best schools or bypass it altogether for tuition-based education.

It doesn't have to be this way. Education is a public good and should be generously funded according to the value it brings our society both economically and culturally. But that funding should be primarily understood as a benefit for students, and only secondarily for the institutions that serve them. Those who support choice need to be clear about this: in arguing that education dollars should follow the students to the schools of their family's choice, we are directly challenging the one-size-fits-all system that is taken for granted by so many, especially those whose livelihoods and identities are bound up in the current structures of education delivery. We should respect the fear and concern that such a challenge evokes in those who have never conceived of delivering education differently, but we should not shy away from acknowledging the principles and values that under gird our belief in choice: that parents know best what is in the interest of their children, that multiple institutions can effectively provide a truly "public" education, and that a lightly-regulated system of accountability can ensure quality and equity for all.

It's not a radical idea. We have similar structures of consumer choice when it comes to other public goods like higher education (think Pell grants, the GI Bill, and federally subsidized student loans), health care, and food security. We don't say that we are "draining money" from WKU because a student chooses to uses her Pell grant at Brescia University, nor do we assume that funding public universities precludes us from offering supports to financially-needy students to attend the post-secondary institution of their choice. But Americans don't tend to think about P-12 education in this way. They should, and it's our job to make those connections and to gently but boldly challenge the system that isn't accomplishing its goals.

Even in a choice environment, I believe for a variety of reasons the vast majority of parents are going to continue to choose their local district schools. Choice doesn't fix everything about education, and I don't know anyone who thinks it will. And so I remain absolutely committed to pursuing whatever strategies are needed to promote high-quality schools, whether public, charter, parochial, or independent and giving all students full access to these options. I welcome the chance to continue working with my fellow Board members, even when we disagree about strategy, to advance those goals.

Usual disclaimer: Views expressed on this blog are mine alone and do not reflect the opinions of Western Kentucky University or the Kentucky Board of Education.

Related posts:

• What makes a school "public?"
• Does school choice "drain money" from public schools?
• Closing achievement gaps requires new thinking about education 
• Education in the Fractured Republic
• Poll: Kentuckians strongly favor school choice