The main characteristic of the charter school managers is being controlling. Geoffrey Canada, Michelle Rhee, Eva Moskowitz feel themselves above the everyday classroom teachers. Their method is pushing, steam rolling, taking over.
And teachers have to sit and take it as the charter schools move into their schools and control the space.
Moskowitz Charter Plan Draws FireEva Moskowitz is planning to open a charter school on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, a move that is causing an uproar in a neighborhood that is concerned about tight classroom space. The founder of the Success Charter Network, a group of seven charter schools with a nearly all black and Hispanic demographic, Ms. Moskowitz said she is bringing her model to a neighborhood that she said may be more affluent but is just as desperate as Harlem and the Bronx for good, new schools like the ones she runs.
"Even if you're a person of some means, finding a great school for your kid is not easy," Ms. Moskowitz said.
..."We just don't have the room," said Noah Gotbaum, president of Community Education Council of District 3. Mr. Gotbaum noted that the 300 seats available at the school can't accommodate the 700 children Ms. Moskowitz K-5 school will ultimately house.
"If she chose to buy a building or buy land" on the Upper West Side to open a new school, "then you wouldn't hear a peep out of me," said Assemblyman Danny O'Donnell, who is opposing Ms. Moskowitz's plan. He said he is worried that the city's Department of Education has agreed to give Ms. Moskowitz's school space at P.S. 145 without listening to how the community and parents at the school might be affected.
She has already been expanding into the Bronx schools, often pushing public school classes into spare rooms and basements.
Eva Moskowitz moves charter school into another public school's space, boots them from classrooms.The "Eva" Empire has expanded to the Bronx, bringing a Harlem turf war for school space into the borough. Eva Moskowitz, the City Council member-turned-charter school CEO, has opened two new academies from her charter school franchise, Success Charter Network, inside Public School 30 in Mott Haven, and PS 146 in Morrisania. And Bronx Success Academies 1 and 2 are already ruffling feathers with district school staffers.
..."Staffers at the district schools say their new neighbors have booted them from classrooms and stairwells, while sharing the libraries, cafeterias and playgrounds.
...."Staffers at PS 30 say Bronx Success 1 sealed off the third floor to its staff and students - even taking over a stairwell - so Success students don't mingle with their district school neighbors.
"We are not allowed there," said one PS 30 teacher, noting the classrooms taken over by Success were formerly used for tutoring children with special needs. Now we have to do therapy sessions in the hallway."
And from the Uptowner, another public schools is very angry at being shoved around.
P.S. 123 Parents Feel Bullied by Harlem Success AcademyThe tensions began when the charter school first moved into the building, but increased this year when P.S. 123 lost its computer room to the charter school, as well as part of its teachers’ lounge and half its library, now devoted to Harlem Success Academy office space, said Hargraves.
P.S. 123 was offered basement rooms to replace some of the space Harlem Success Academy has commandeered, but “there’s no way a kid can learn in that environment,” Hargraves said, describing the basement as “no more than a storage area.” The school squeezed in classes elsewhere in the building.
Teachers against charter school managers, parents getting angrier, this is the result of the new education policy of this DOE.
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