Good day, CharterFolk.
I start out offering another thanks to Patrick and Clarence for their great Contributor Column last week.
We’ve had so many great ones over the past year.
Now we’re taking time to thank them all with our Brian’s Voice Awards. Please take 30 seconds to choose your favorites. We have a week left before we announce our finalists.
Railroading
Trying to stay on top of the times, I find myself including in nearly every post updates about how AI is having a massive impact on education.
In terms of my own writing here at CharterFolk, I certainly use ChatGPT as a copy editor to catch typos and grammatical errors. But beyond that, I keep it limited.
I fear letting my voice get railroaded.
In the realm of image generation, though, I have no such compunction. Over the weekend I fed in some prompts about dynamics at play in the national charter school movement as we approach what could be a monumental decision coming out of the Supreme Court.
This is what it gave me back:
A rendering of a movement serving nearly four million kids finding itself at risk of being railroaded.
As my conversation with Starlee last week revealed …
… we certainly have reason to be deeply concerned about the consequences – intended or otherwise – that could result from what the court decides.
The very most threatening, from my standpoint?
A ruling saying that all states must allow religious entities to operate charter schools unless they change the governance of charter schools to mirror the governance structure of our national railroad.
It hardly needs mentioning the last thing we need in public education these days is something else that keeps on breaking down.
For the record, CharterFolk, I’m not a lawyer. I just play one on TV. So I claim a little latitude to speak with something less than perfect legalese.
It’s the standpoint from which one can see how irony abounds right now.
According to those arguing in support of St. Isadore, charter schools aren’t “state actors” because they don’t have the same governance structure as Amtrak – an entity created by statute with a board majority appointed by the government. That’s the definition for a “state actor” as was laid out in the Lebron case.
Of course, I recognize what the meaning of “state” is in this context: anything that is considered an extension of the government.
But an argument can be made that, using the common sense definition of “state,” Amtrak is no “state” actor at all.
It’s a federal actor.
It’s controlled by the federal government.
And yes, I suppose you can argue that it was created in statute, another requirement that religious liberty advocates want applied to charter schools. But who are we kidding that Amtrak is a statute-created thing?
They announce the opening of new routes on an ongoing basis.
Where’s the “statutory creation” in that?
And to say that charter school boards should be majority controlled by government appointment is a ludicrous standard as well.
I asked ChatGPT to come back with any aspect of modern American life where the government is managing the appointment of a majority of board members. It couldn’t come up with examples where the government is doing so with just dozens of entities, never mind the thousands that exist in the charter school landscape.
It points to what we know to be the case, which is that a rigid application of the Lebron/Amtrak state actor test would be nonsensical on its face.
It would be the fuel in the engine taking us back to one-size fits all education …
Before the court offers up a decision that could derail the most successful reform effort of public education in generations …
…it really ought to ask itself:
Is this where we want public education headed?
Railroading More Broadly
The fact is, the charter school movement has grown accustomed to people trying to railroad us.
Last week’s congressional hearing about charter schools …
… provided another example.
Subcommittee Chair Kevin Kiley …
… got things off to a great start.
Over the past 25 years, charter schools have emerged as the single most impactful reform in public education.
Invited guests – David Griffith, of Fordham, Eva Moskowitz of Success Academy, and Darryl Cobb of the Charter School Growth Fund – offered compelling testimony.
Then came the railroading part.
Questions and comments from the Dems on the committee.
It was essentially the same sad circumstance we have seen in Congress many times in recent years:
Views shared by “representatives” that aren’t in the least bit representative of broader sentiment about charter schools.
Not representative of the general public.
Certainly not parents.
Not even representative of the Democratic Party, whose members hold a range of opinion about charter schools.
But in legislative bodies where charter school opponents have their greatest level of influence, we hear the most inane tropes.
One thing I found particularly indicative of the times, though, was how the guest invited by Dems to provide “expert testimony” squirmed under questioning. Don’t get me wrong, Professor Genevieve Siegel-Hawley of Virginia Commonwealth University, was predictably awful in her description of charter schools on many issues. But at a few moments she clearly balked at the setup that was offered to her by charter detractors and sought to slightly reframe the question in order to provide at least a modicum of nuance in her response.
Generally, charter opponents have learned to avoid placing people with any independence whatsoever into settings like we saw last week. In prior hearings, they have invited expert testimony from the likes of Julian Vasquez Heilig, who is literally a board member of the NPE, the national teacher union attack dog against charter schools.
Because, charter opponents know – given how extreme their views have become on charter schools and other matters related to public education in recent years – the only way they can trust people in public seats to do exactly what they want is to occupy those seats themselves.
Mayor CTU
It’s a trend we’re seeing play out across the United States right now.
Chicago is case in point.
Not just a city where the schools are run by allies highly aligned with the teacher union. But a place where the schools – and indeed the entire city – are run by the union itself.
It’s because what the union wants done these days is so extreme …
… that even the usually reliable balk …
… making it necessary to replace them.
Just like the mayor has now replaced the superintendent.
Never mind that the new interim doesn’t have the credentials to do the job.
She has from the union’s perspective the most important qualification.
She was literally the mayor’s Chief of Staff.
Proving that the only way the teacher union is able to ensure that its playbook is followed …
… is to put themselves in position to run the playbook themselves.
Political Engineering
It’s a recognition that is dawning amongst teacher unions more broadly.
In New Jersey the teachers association is ready to put $35 million behind an effort to elect their president governor.
The Colorado president is making plans to run for Congress.
The newly chosen President of the State Senate in Rhode Island is also, literally, the state’s currently seated AFT President.
Not to mention a broader trend of teacher unions electing their own into a variety of offices …
… including, of course, local school board seats.
It’s what happens when you want to take the train where no one else wants to go.
You’ve got to become the engineer.
New Modes of Getting Students Where They Want to Go
None of this is to suggest that the charter school movement has anything to feel glum about.
New efforts to derail us surface every day, like the nonsense CaliforniaFolk are having to fend off right now.
Starlee is right that our movement has real momentum right now.
Charter schools are continuing to grow.
Even where conditions are politically difficult, charter schools keep right on growing.
And projections show charter schools continuing to grow for the foreseeable future.
Meanwhile, charter schools are generating stunning policy breakthroughs right now.
And our advocacy organizations are stronger than they’ve ever been, led by a renaissance happening among many of our state associations.
People trying to railroad the charter school movement will remain a part of the landscape indefinitely.
We just have to keep building the advocacy strength we will need to contend with it all, while recognizing that modes of transportation …
… are changing …
… faster than ever before.
Efforts to railroad the charter school movement, or indeed all of public education, are destined to fail.
And those set to usher in the next era of getting kids and families where they want to go …
… should recognize the bright future that awaits.