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New year
Apropos of the start of a new year, the Buckeye Institute just released its wish list for the General Assembly in regard to education policymaking in 2025. Research fellow Greg Lawson writes that “students should come first, whether they learn at their local district school, a charter school, or one of Ohio’s many alternative education providers.” In the charter school space, the Buckeye Institute singled out easing access to unused buildings and reforming transportation services to get all students to and from school on time. Solid resolutions for a new year.
New administration
Also looking ahead is Fordham Institute vice president Chad Aldis, who was one of the commentators in a recent piece pondering the question “what will federal education policy look like in the new Trump administration?”. Among his prognostications, Chad says, “There will probably be less federal involvement in local school districts. So that means local decisions and state decisions related to education policy become all the more important and relevant.”
Pump up the volume
50CAN president Derrell Bradford shares his thoughts for the new year in an essay titled “Say It Loud …”. He lays out four principles of the charter movement that he feels have stagnated or been avoided in recent years and urges supporters to take them to heart once again and to make sure to speak them (and to act on them) loudly and proudly.
The view from Indiana
Earlier this month, House Bill 1136 was introduced in the Indiana legislature. It proposes a plan whereby any school district in which more than 50 percent of resident students attend a school other than one controlled by the district would be dissolved and its building converted into charter schools. If enacted today, it would apply to five districts in the state: three very small ones, which might not even need to be “charterized” since the tiny number of students in each one could easily be absorbed into existing options, and the more sizeable districts serving the cities of Gary and Indianapolis. Questions and concerns arose among some charter advocates about the practicality of creating up to 50 new charter schools in those cities overnight, while a predictable furor arose among charter school opponents. Late this week, several legislators suggested that a compromise might be possible which would see school districts share more of their local revenue with charter schools.
The state(s) of education reform
Fordham Institute president Mike Petrilli contemplates the state of education reform from the perspective of the two major political parties, going state by state to check his hypotheses in the areas of accountability, charter schools, and the science of reading. He concludes that Democrats have largely eschewed the education reform goals they previously championed (especially higher standards and quality curriculum) while Republicans have taken up the strongest reform positions across the board. He wishes it were not so—since our country and its students “would be better off with two ed-reform parties instead of one”, but is not as hopeful as he once was.
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