Dayton schools could have been Detroit-Dayton (OH) Daily News opinion piece

[pampango]

http://www.daytondailynews.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/dayton/opinion/entries/2009/10/24/editorial_dayton_schools_could.html?cxtype=feedbot

"The 11 years since the advent of charter schools in Dayton has, at times, felt wrenching. The first charter school opened here in 1998 and, within two years, a flood of students left the district, choosing from an array of new charter schools. The district was hit with a severe financial loss. That’s because, as the kids left, they took a big chunk of the district’s state aid with them. Dayton responded well to the economic and competitive pressure of charter schools. In 2001, the city elected a reform school board led by Gail Littlejohn, who was motivated to run, in part, by the sense of crisis that was being exacerbated by charters."

"The board started by shutting down a lot of low-enrollment schools. Before charters, board members didn’t have the political courage to close even one school for a decade and a half, despite a precipitous decline in enrollment. In response to charter schools, the board closed more than 15 schools, most of them longtime low-scorers. But the district also responded by opening new schools and creating new, high-quality options. Among them were an early college high school, a boys-only school, a girls-only school and an academic magnet program. These schools looked a lot like the charter schools."

"Suppose it hadn’t worked out that way. What if good people hadn’t been motivated to run for the school board? What if they didn’t make tough, unpopular choices or weren’t bold enough to experiment with their own charter-like options? You need only look three hours north to Detroit to see just how wrong things might have gone. Had it gone the other way, Dayton might be where Detroit is today. No matter how you look at it, Detroit is a mess. U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan called the district “New Orleans without Katrina.” Ouch."

"To be fair, at its worst, Dayton schools were never as corrupt nor as suffocatingly bureaucratic as Detroit’s. Even so, the things that Dayton did right, Detroit did wrong. When Dayton was recognizing the need to compete, Detroit was burying its head in the sand, hoping charters would somehow go away. While Dayton was trying out its own academic experiments, Detroit mostly just kept doing what it always did. Dayton certainly hasn’t done everything right. ... But, by comparison, it’s clear Dayton did a lot of things right."
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I taught in the Dayton schools at the elementary level until 1997, so I haven't been a part of the changes that have taken place since 2001. When I left it was still very bureaucratic and inefficient, but it was still the "only game in town" except for the Catholic schools of which there were quite a few. The school system has gone from about 45% minority in the early 1990's to 85% now and has stabilized at that level for the last 5 years or so. The district went back to neighborhood schools a couple of years ago and got rid of busing, since there was not much "diversity" left to bus.

Dayton is big enough to have "typical" problems that urban school districts have, but obviously not on the scale that Detroit, Chicago or the really big cities have. It has a lot of good kids and good teachers (and some of the other kind too) and still has plenty of problems (mostly linked to society's problems, if you ask me). I know nothing other than what I read about Detroit and its school system, so I don't know how "fair" the comparison is. Dayton is now ringed by mostly white suburbs with growing school districts that largely perform well academically. I imagine that Detroit is much the same.

Urban education has always been challenging. The waves of immigrants in the late 19th and early 20th century presented a unique challenge for urban educators. Now it is more focused on overcoming the societal effects of poverty in the cities.

[annabanana]

1. So, over all. . has the switch to the charters

done much more than starve the remaining Public School system?

[pampango]

2. It has "starved" it and "lit a fire" under it. The public school system in Dayton

is smaller today and at least modestly better than it was when I left in 1997 - the year before charter schools came to Dayton. Would it have shrunk anyway without charter schools by people leaving for the suburbs or to the existing private (mostly Catholic) schools? I don't know, though my guess is that most urban districts have gotten smaller in the last 10 years in any case.

Are there better solutions for the problems of urban education than charter schools? I hope so, but I know pouring money, alone, into the 1997 Dayton public schools would have done little for the students. When it was "the only game in town" it did little to respond to the problems in their system. There were plenty of cushy, well-paid administrator jobs and little in the way of supplies and new school buildings as there are today.