School suspends student over hair grown for donation

This is absolutely moronic:

The board of a Flint-area charter school refused Wednesday evening to relent on its insistence that a high school student cut or restyle his long hair before allowing him to return to classes.

Instead, the board of Madison Academy offered four options to 17-year-old J.T. Gaskins and his mother, Christa Plante, during a meeting with the pair.

The options: Gaskins could trim his hair as originally requested; he could braid it, get a perm or any other styling to help him comply with the rules; he could transfer to another school; or organize a fundraiser for the charity.

"We would like to have J.T. return tomorrow," board president Nicholas Mihailoff said. "We feel like we're presenting four very reasonable options."

Plante said after the meeting she was exhausted and needed time to evaluate her options to "make the best decision for everybody."

She told board she would let them know if Gaskins will be attending class Thursday, Mihailoff said.

Gaskins, a senior at the school, has been suspended for more than a week for violating the school's dress code. He has been growing his hair out since the holidays to donate it to Locks of Love, a charity that helps make wigs for cancer patients.

The academy's policy requires male students to keep their hair clean, neat and off the collar.

Read the whole thing.

If he was a girl, of course, there would be no issue. Apparently, this charter school wants to be excused from exercising charity, compassion, good judgment and empathy.

And England flirts with the charter school idea, as well

..but they're called "free schools" across the pond, and they already have started them in Sweden. From the BBC:

The creation of Swedish-style free schools in England could increase social segregation but net limited improvements, a leading academic claims.

Dr Susanne Wiborg, of the Institute of Education, also says it could lead to many private providers running schools.

Plans to allow parents and others to set up schools are in the Academies Bill, going through Parliament.

The government says such schools will drive up standards.

Dr Wiborg, an expert in comparative education, is looking at the impact these independently run but state-funded schools have had in Sweden, and what effect they might have here.

She said the impact on results within Sweden's independent schools themselves were limited and short-term.

Moderate improvements at the GCSE-equivalent level did not persist at age 18 or 19, she said.

She also found that children from "highly educated" families were the ones who mostly gained from education in these schools.

"But the impact on families and immigrants who had received a low level of education is close to zero," she added.

Several studies say that school choice in Sweden has "augmented social and ethnic segregation, particularly in relation to schools in deprived areas", she said.

But she added: "If the neo-liberal reforms increased inequality of achievement as well as social segregation in Sweden, a country with a universal welfare state and a relatively high level of social equality, then other countries could risk an even greater increase in inequality from implementing similar kinds of independent schools."

She said that the policy would "exacerbate the existing divisions further, because there are much more inequalities between schools here in England than in Sweden".

She also pointed out that the reforms that were currently being proposed by Education Secretary Michael Gove went further than those introduced in Sweden in the 1990s.

"It was expected that the free schools would through competition help all schools to improve, but we can only see a moderate effect.

"So to put so much effort into creating free schools for such a limited result - the question is whether it is really worth it."

Dr Wiborg also questioned whether parents were really interested in running schools.

She said: "Sweden has a tradition of this, but we do not, so why would be expect the results to be lots of locally run schools when this is not even the typical outcome in Sweden.

"It seems more likely that private education providers will run schools on a non-for-profit basis."

In Sweden the biggest provider of free schools is a dog food manufacturer called John Bauer, which runs 27 schools.

There were a number of private firms who were already interested in setting up free schools in England including a Dubai-based company called Gems, she added.

She said that what was lacking was the "fundamental discussion" of who should be allowed to educate children and potentially boost their business interests with public money.

A Department for Education spokesman said: "In this country, too often the poorest children are left with the worst education while richer families can buy their way to quality education via private schools or expensive houses.

"By allowing teachers to set up new schools we will give all children access to the kind of education only the rich can afford - small schools with small class sizes, great teaching and strong discipline.

"The coalition's commitment to the pupil premium will mean free schools will be incentivised to cater for the poorest children."

Well, it seems it's the same all over.

Charter results: I wonder what this means?

Are charter schoolsall that they cracked up to be?

On average, charter schools are not performing as well as their traditional public-school peers, according to a new study that is being called the first national assessment of these school-choice options. The study, conducted by the Center for Research on Education Outcomes at Stanford University, compared the reading and math state achievement test scores of students in charter schools in 15 states and the District of Columbia--amounting to 70 percent of U.S. charter school students--to those of their virtual "twins" in regular schools who shared with them certain characteristics. The research found that 37 percent of charter schools posted math gains that were significantly below what students would have seen if they had enrolled in local traditional public schools. And 46 percent of charter schools posted math gains that were statistically indistinguishable from the average growth among their traditional public-school companions. That means that only 17 percent of charter schools have growth in math scores that exceeds that of their traditional public-school equivalents by a significant amount.

In reading, charter students on average realized a growth that was less than their public-school counterparts but was not as statistically significant as differences in math achievement, researchers said.

"We are worried by these results," Margaret Raymond, director of CREDO and lead author of the report, Multiple Choice: Charter School Performance in 16 States, said at a news conference. "This study shows that we've got a 2-to-1 margin of bad charters to good charters."

Charter schools, free public schools that operate under their own mandate ("charter") rather than the overall district policies, are a staple of education reform agendas across the United States. Supporters say they improve public education by giving parents options and forcing schools to compete for students. The Stanford report already is riling up these schools' most ardent advocates.

The Washington-based Center for Education Reform disputed the findings, saying that they're based on uncorrelated variables, contradictory demographics, and a virtual methodology. The organization said that comparing the test scores of charter-school students to their "virtual" peers in regular public schools--students who match the charter students' demographics, English language proficiency, and participation in special education or subsidized lunch programs--is simplistic and is a fundamental flaw in the research because no two students are the same.

"More than 16 years of charter school research and analysis from CER shows that charter schools are outpacing their conventional public school peers with fewer resources and tremendous obstacles," the nonprofit group said in a news release.
The CREDO report identified five states--Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Louisiana, and Missouri--where charter schools had significantly higher learning gains than traditional schools. But the report contended that if charter schools are to flourish, their supporters must be willing to establish accountability in exchange for flexibility. The reluctance to close underperforming charters because of powerful community supporters hurts students and reflects poorly on charter schools as a whole, the report said.

The research comes on the heels of a recent pledge by President Barack Obama's education secretary, Arne Duncan, to use $5 billion of the $100 billion in federal stimulus funds for education to press states on charter schools. "States that don't have charter school laws, or put artificial caps on the growth of charter schools, will jeopardize their application" for federal grant money, Duncan said in a call with reporters last week. Currently, 10 states lack laws that allow charter schools, and 26 others cap their enrollment.

The Stanford report may offer some encouraging news for charter schools: Students in poverty and English-language learners outperformed their public-school peers in both reading and math. However, learning gains for black and Hispanic charter-school students were significantly lower than those of their traditional-school twins. But critics said those results demonstrated the flaws in the Stanford research: The overlap between low-income/English-learner students and black/Hispanic students is so great, CER said, that it should be impossible to get such contradictory results.

One thing that has always seemed illogical about charter schools is this: If allowing some public schools to opt out of some regulations is good for some, why isn't it good for all? But apparently that's not exactly the right question, according to this story. Perhaps the right question is this: Do those regulations that charter schools get to evade actually serve a purpose?

I will tell you that in MY neck of the woods, there have been some spectacular charter school flame-outs. And that's very distressing. Any school that fails represents failure for hundreds of people.

Ultimately, there is of course no magic bullet. It would be nice if we realized that, in no particular order, schools PLUS educators PLUS students PLUS parents all have their parts to play in improving the education provided.

Charter schools for inmates

Oh, heck, why not?

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – Albert Aragon dreams of working in real estate one day, but the 29-year-old jail inmate is a high school dropout who believes employers don't hire people with general equivalency diplomas.

Now he has a chance to get his high school diploma, thanks to a new Albuquerque charter school, one of a handful of charter schools nationwide serving current and former jail inmates.

"When they see a high school diploma, they see that you stuck in through the thick and thin, through the tough times, and when you're out getting jobs, they don't want GEDs, they want diplomas," he said during a break in his language arts class.

The Gordon Bernell Charter School at the Bernalillo County Metropolitan Detention Center in Albuquerque and the Five Keys Charter School in San Francisco have turned their state laws on charter schools into opportunities to grant high school diplomas — rather than GEDs — to jail inmates regardless of their age.

Wearing orange jumpsuits, students at the Albuquerque jail attend high school math and language classes and science labs in secure rooms next to their pod, which is segregated from the rest of the inmate population. Students are given homework to complete in their cells at night.

San Francisco County Sheriff Michael Hennessey, who helped start Five Keys Charter School in 2003, said it wasn't easy to get the school board to approve a charter school for inmates.

"After they got over the kind of shock of sanctioning a high school inside of a jail, they said they would be happy to support it," he said.

The school board eventually gave Five Keys unanimous support when its charter was approved in 2002.

"A lot of public school advocates believe that the charter schools are taking away the students from wealthier families, are creaming off the better students, and as a result it is diminishing the effectiveness of the public school movement," Hennessey said. "I'm certainly not taking the better advantaged students."

In Albuquerque, classes are fast-paced and allow students to earn high school credit as quickly as they can master each curriculum standard. But they must score 80 percent or better to get credit.

Language arts teacher Kimberlee Hanson wrapped up a recent class with a head-spinning list of upcoming tasks.

"Tomorrow we're typing stories. Write your stories. Your literary analysis is sticking with you. Monday's our final that ends this unit and then it's off to superheroes for persuasive essays," she told her students.

In addition to a basic high school curriculum, both charter schools teach their inmate-students life skills designed to help them be better citizens.

Psychologist Ron Gallegos works with inmates on how to make better choices by teaching them about morality.

In one assignment, the students had to document 10 hours of doing things for other people while not expecting anything in return, which is the antithesis of prison society, he said.

Gallegos said the school helps give inmates a sense of achievement.

"I think they are stunned to discover that they have some ability to be successful in the academic world," he said. "You see a pretty overwhelming sense of joy and pride in them when they accomplish writing an essay or solving a math problem or getting a science project."

Teachers at Gordon Bernell agree that student discipline is the least of their problems. The school has a zero-tolerance policy about drugs, violence and gangs.

When inmates are released, they can continue at the school's downtown campus, said Gordon Bernell's director, Greta Roskom.

Though charter school laws differ by state, Hennessey said the California education secretary and several communities around the state have expressed interest in replicating Five Keys Charter School. Roskom said New Mexico's charter school has attracted the attention of national correctional educators.

First, this gives the inmates another reason to behave, since it seems that they are not allowed to attend if they are behavior problems.

Second, it gives them something intellectual to do while they are in jail-- like seriously addressing what got them in jail in the first place. That's a great idea.

Third, education gives people opportunities and choices. Hopefully, this will reinforce to the inmates that they have choices-- and they had them before they got into jail, too.

It would be interesting to see what the long-term record of inmates who successfully complete this program, if this cuts the recidivism rates versus a control group.

Lake Wobegon schools and US News and World Report

Just how "public" are the schools that US News has crowned as "Gold Medal Schools" in its annual "America's Best High Schools" issue?

As I was looking at the list, I was struck by a few things right off the bat:
1. Most of these schools are not "open enrollment" schools. The majority select their students by application only, or are magnet schools, or charter schools. They are from the fairy tale land of public schools in America. Only NINE of the top 50 schools are open enrollment schools, in fact.

2. Eight of the top ten schools have twenty percent or less of their students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Number three on the list, Pacific College Charter in Santa Cruz, CA, has 0.0% disadvantaged children, and its minority enrollment in a whopping 5.3 percent. Only 20 of the top fifty schools have an economically disadvantaged population above 25%.

3. And speaking of minorities, in a country in which white, non-Hispanics are approximately fifty percent of the population, seven of the top ten have 12.6% minority enrollment, or less. Only 18 of the top fifty schools has a minority enrollment above 25%. As stated below, the average school has 44% minority enrollment, and only one of the top ten and seven of the top fifty meet that standard.

4. Kudos go out to Preuss School UCSD in La Jolla, CA (number 8 on the list), which serves a population that is 99.6% economically disadvantaged and 71.3% minority. The 752 students who go there (and by the way, my own alma mater had nearly three times that number in grades 10-12) are lucky indeed.

5. Only one of the top ten schools has an enrollment as large as the high school at which I teach (over 1500 students). Number 6, International Academy in Bloomfield Hills, MI, has 148 students, and number 4, High Technology High (ha!) in Lincroft, NJ, has 262. Number 7, International Baccalaureate in Bartow, FL, has 278 students. Only eight of the top 50 have enrollments over 1500 students.

And how many of them are in large school districts, I wonder? That information is not included.

I wonder how many students have IEPs or 504s? I wonder how many students have juvenile records? That information is also not included.

What is the student/teacher ratio, flawed though that indicator is when counselors and administrators are allowed to be included in determining the average?

And we're not even considering the fact that the ranking is based on how many Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate tests the students can take-- which is a real problem when so many schools cannot find the staff or afford the training to offer these kinds of classes. And yes, I am an Advanced Placement and College Credit teacher in the discipline of history.

But it is obvious that, in more ways than excellence, these schools are hardly representative of public schools across the country.

Well, let's just consider this from the National Center for Education Statistics to help frame our discussion:

The 100 largest public school districts, representing less than 1 percent (0.6 percent) of all school districts in the United States and jurisdictions, were responsible for the education of 23 percent of all public school students.

The 100 largest public school districts employed 22 percent of the United States and jurisdictions' public school full-time-equivalent (FTE) teachers and contained 17 percent of all public schools and 20 percent of public high school completers.

The 100 largest public school districts had larger average school enrollments compared to the average for all school districts (695 vs. 518) as well as a higher median pupil/teacher ratio (15.9 vs. 15.4).

The percentage of students in the 100 largest public school districts who were other than White, non-Hispanic was 71 percent, compared to 44 percent of students in all school districts.

In FY 2005, current expenditures per pupil in the 100 largest public school districts ranged from lows of $5,104 in the Puerto Rico Department of Education and $5,503 in the Alpine District, Utah to a high of $18,878 in the District of Columbia Public Schools and $17,988 in Boston, Massachusetts).

Three states-California, Florida, and Texas-accounted for 45 percent of the 100 largest public school districts.

So all that I see here is a reminder that schools that have to deal with disadvantaged populations, schools that have to take everyone (as the law requires of most public schools), are not ideal schools, and never will be. They just can't compete. Allow public schools to exclude "troublesome" or disadvantaged populations, I guess, and you're on the rocket ship to success. Even if that would place real public schools in violation of federal and state law.

Any school that gets to exclude populations, that only has students who WANT to be there, is going to have an advantage. In any other facet of modern American life, the people who partake in any activity-- even the military-- are there because they choose to be there, except in public schools-- oh wait, except for most of the schools that US News considers to be the "best."

It's ironic.

Almost as much as the fact that those who espouse charter schools-- schools which are exempt from many regulations and bureaucracies that other public schools have to endure-- decided to "improve" public schools by-- drumroll, please-- adding MORE regulations and MORE bureaucracy onto the backs of public schools, complements of the No Child Left Behind Act, et alia. And of course testing requirements don't apply to private schools, either-- but some would like to see my tax dollars going to pay tuition for students to go to private schools (completely ignoring the fact that once an institution takes public funding, it ceases to have the right to behave as a private institution, but that's a post for another day....).

Religious charter schools: just another way to draw students?

Can a charter school about Judaism not teach Judaism?

A school opening this month is named for a Jewish high priest, is directed by a rabbi, will have kosher food and will teach Hebrew. It's also a public school, funded by public tax dollars and following state curriculum guidelines.

Ben Gamla Charter School, billed as the nation's first publicly funded Hebrew-English school, has prompted fears of religion creeping into public schools and has even drawn criticism from groups that defend Jewish causes. Similar criticisms have been raised against Arabic-language charter schools elsewhere, with some saying those schools teach Islam.

Organizers insist that while Ben Gamla will teach Hebrew language and culture, it won't cross the divide between church and state.

"To me, it's very obvious that we're not teaching religion," said Rabbi Adam Siegel, the school's director. He previously directed two private Jewish day schools in Miami Beach. "Religion is prayer, it's God, it's Bible. And so if you stay away from there, you're not teaching religion."

Ben Gamla is the brainchild of former U.S. Rep. Peter Deutsch, who said he was as surprised by the controversy surrounding the school as he was by the interest in it.

Its new building, set to open Aug. 20, will replace earlier quarters leased from a synagogue that had only enough room for 100 children in kindergarten through third grade. Within weeks of publicizing its opening, Deutsch said, the school received more than 800 applications. The three-story building the school is moving into has space for more than 400 students, through eighth grade.

"If we had 50 kids I would have been happy," said Deutsch, who hopes to open other schools in Miami, New York and Los Angeles.

Charter schools are publicly financed and run independently, sometimes by private entities. Some specialize in a language, a trade or some other subject.

Ben Gamla students will follow state curriculum, but also will take a Hebrew language course, and one of their core subjects — math or physical education, for example — will be taught bilingually.

The Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said the school sets a dangerous precedent.

"Whenever you have a public school, a public charter school, that focuses on a particular culture that has an intense religious connection, there is the risk that you will end up teaching that religion," he said. "It could happen because some people believe culture and religion are inseparable, or it could happen because many of the teachers and administrators are of one religion and don't recognize the problem."

Even the Anti-Defamation League and the Jewish Federation of Broward County have expressed concerns.

"There are unanswered questions as to how the subject matter of Jewish culture can be taught without also teaching the Jewish religion," said federation head Eric Stillman.

Maybe someone needs to explain to me why charter schools need to pursue some sort of exotic niche in order to succeed? We've got charter schools that focus on weightlifting. We've got charter schools that have a military theme, charter schools that have a Greek theme (the language kind, not the Delta House kind, hopefully), charter schools that have a weightlifting theme, even. Maybe it might be more effective if, instead of being boutique schools, they might actually concentrate on, oh, I don't know, excelling at teaching their students the subject matter necessary for literacy in core subjects, the arts, and the like? I guess they're trying to mimic magnet schools. But I imagine that they couldn't beat off the students with a stick if they simply excelled at providing their students with an education.... instead of some appearing to be stalking horses for eroding the wall (currently composed of jello, apparently, in some places) between church and state? (Please see my previous post for the history of the meaning of the 1st Amendment's Establishment clause.)

The story goes on to discuss Arabic language charters being accused of being Islamic schools in disguise. Recently there was some controversy over the principal at New York's Khalil Gibran International Academy over her affiliation with a group selling T-shirts with the legend "Intifada NYC." I understand the principal resigned over the controversy, but I do not know enough about it to have an opinion. Anyone from NYC want to take a stab at it?

For a while there in my junior high years, my school seemed like a Baptist themed school when I was growing up, but no money officially went into the local preacher's pockets, at least. If there are Jewish day schools in Hollywood, Florida, why does there need to be a publicly funded one? Does it get back to the idea of subsidizing people's religious education, as I talked about previously? I wonder how a Catholic-themed charter school would go over?

It would be one thing if we were talking about a language with future economic or foreign policy import, such as, say, Mandarin or Spanish, or yes, Arabic, if it is done right. I know there's a difference between a language and a culture or religion. I wonder if the people running this school are as clear on that point as some of the rest of us are, though. I just question the need for this type of niche marketing.