Posted on 07/10/2015 8:06:32 AM PDT by Academiadotorg
Something is actually growing in Detroit, a city that mostly has been in the news for the its losses—charter schools, 66 of them.
Their growth tracks with a statewide trend, and has the Detroit public schools worried.
“With more than 260,000 Michigan students relying on educational choice, critics have likely realized that they must act now to limit it, before its growing popularity makes the task impossible,” Audrey Spalding writes in Impact, a magazine published by the conservative Mackinac Center for Public Policy. Specifically, “This year, more than 150,000 Michigan schoolchildren attend public charter schools. Another 110,000 students use ‘Schools of Choice,’ a state program that allows them to attend public schools outside of their home districts,” Spalding wrote. “Overall, close to one out of every five Michigan schoolchildren rely on some form of educational choice to attend a public school.”
Meanwhile, in the Motor City, “At the end of March, a collection of Detroit-based nonprofits and interest groups called for spending $53 million in state taxpayer money each year to pay off some of DPS’ [Detroit public schools] debt. The coalition also proposed creating a bureaucratic commission to oversee all schools in Detroit, including the Detroit Public Schools district, and the city’s 66 charter schools. This new commission would have the power to unilaterally close schools, and could forbid new schools from opening.” Michigan’s Republican Governor, Rick Snyder, has made a similar proposal.
As it happens, one of my in-laws retired just a few years ago from the DPS, in which he taught math. We asked him what we should look for in a public school. He gave us a one-word answer: “Homeschool.”
That’s why the teachers unions here in PA have declared war on them. They almost single handedly elected Gov. Wolf because he will be able to use the state Dept. of Education to shut them down. Certainly no new ones will be approved with him in office.
Look for them to try and replicate this in Michigan.
I always think it’s interesting that the liberals are “pro-choice” when it comes to abortion. They are in favor of people having the choice of what they will do in that area of life.
But in the area of public schools, and most other areas of life, liberals are anti-choice. They are against us having choices in life of how to live our lives. They are in fact totalitarian in their approach to other areas of life.
Regarding schools, they want us to sit down, shut up, and send our kids to whatever inferior public school they choose to assign our kids to. And want us to sit down and shut up.
Why is abortion so special, that this is the area liberals want us to exercise choice, and say they are pro-choice, when they are anti-choice in just about any other area of life you can think of???
>>something actually works in Detroit: charter schools—<<
Not to be argumentative, but the article said nothing about charter schools doing a better job.
Many parents, however, seem more than willing to give them a chance to prove that they can, and that speaks volumes about the state of the public schools.
Incidentally, the Wisconsin biennial budget will extend the Milwaukee voucher program to all schools statewide. I’m curious whether Walker will be able to make inroads on the black vote with that issue, given his strong support for vouchers in comparison to the Democrats’ strong opposition to them.
I was at a meeting where a bunch of public school teachers behaved literally like Teamster picket line thugs in the 1930’s. Taking even one dollar of funding from them to give to a charter school was like cutting off their right arm. They made it clear they were willing to fight to the death over this. Quite disturbing.
Its one reason I say Detroit will be in better shape than many cities in 15 or 20 years.
we’ve seen cities come out of the abyss before, usually when the progressives leave.
CC, you and I are not hired cheerleaders for Detwaa, but can you remember all the $h!+ you and I took sticking up for Detwaa?
It's not perfect, but it is working better I don't mean to be mean to all the naysayers but can I shipped them some mustard to go with their Crow?
I noticed that Detroit was missing from the list in a story about the rising murder rates in large cities nationwide.
Detroit is far from perfect and has a long way to go but there are victories there that the republicans should claim. The pro 2nd amendment black community should be capitalized on.
FReepers should be careful in which programs they support; here in NJ they are targeted to non-white areas (they get private educations, while taxpayers can’t afford them).
My parish wants money to subsidize their school that I can’t even afford; needless to say, I don’t give anything.
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