Does anyone know why more charters aren't propsed in PGCPS?

[Anonymous]

I know the county is known for not approving them as quickly as DC, but I would have thought there would have been more proposals by now for charter schools in this county. I could easily see a BASIS, LAMB, Inspired Teaching, Yu Ying or KIPP doing very well here, especially anything with an established track record in DC. Does anyone know what else is being considered and if there are some in the works. Years ago, when the county approved the boy only charter, the school board was on record as saying that they'd love to approve a charter school for girls and really a boys only charter shouldn't be approved unless there is a comparable program for girls.

What gives?

[Anonymous]

Yes, open wide the charter schools!! Seriously, I am dying for them to open Creative Minds, LAMB, YuYing, Basis, and Stokes here. What gives? I am willing to pony up and help open a charter but don't even know how to begin.

[Anonymous]

I feel like PG is about 5 years behind DC education-wise. So maybe we'll see an explosion of charters soon...

[Anonymous]

No, PG is about 20 years behind DC. The charter school movement started over 20 years ago in DC. DC changed their laws and welcomed innovative educational solutions.

There are a few articles on the charter school movement in DC.

Kiki

[Anonymous]

There were several charters opened in PG and they were very poorly managed and run. At Least one closed. Nearly 10 years ago one was proposed but didn't distinguish what it offered from anything the county already had. The school organizations you are mentioning may not have submitted proposals... Why should they? Why would they want to be in PG? That's not a swipe at PG. that's a question. Where will the teachers come from? I know a teacher who left one of the DC charters that has improved test scores. The teacher thought the kids were miserable in the school and all they did was drill for tests, not foster learning. Not saying that's the case with Latin, KIPP or Basis, just saying charters aren't the be all end all.

[Anonymous]

Hey, here's an idea: maybe we could improve our regular schools instead of making more schools that underpay and overwork their novice teachers until they quit, then hire new inexperienced teachers to do it again.

Just sayin'.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hey, here's an idea: maybe we could improve our regular schools instead of making more schools that underpay and overwork their novice teachers until they quit, then hire new inexperienced teachers to do it again.

Just sayin'.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hey, here's an idea: maybe we could improve our regular schools instead of making more schools that underpay and overwork their novice teachers until they quit, then hire new inexperienced teachers to do it again.

Just sayin'.

Yep.

As to the original question, Maryland's laws governing charter schools make the state less desirable for the for-profit groups that operate many charters. In particular, charter school employees are employees of the public school system and are covered by the same collective bargaining rights as other public school employees. Outside of Baltimore City there are only one or two charter schools in each county; Prince George's County has the second-highest number of charter schools in the state.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hey, here's an idea: maybe we could improve our regular schools instead of making more schools that underpay and overwork their novice teachers until they quit, then hire new inexperienced teachers to do it again.

Just sayin'.

Yep.

As to the original question, Maryland's laws governing charter schools make the state less desirable for the for-profit groups that operate many charters. In particular, charter school employees are employees of the public school system and are covered by the same collective bargaining rights as other public school employees. Outside of Baltimore City there are only one or two charter schools in each county; Prince George's County has the second-highest number of charter schools in the state.

Interesting. I didn't know that.

I second the notion of improving all schools. Reading all of the back and forth about people fighting to get into certain schools in DC stresses me out.

I firmly believe that equality begins with education. People should have equal opportunity to get a good education at their neighborhood school. It shouldn't be a battle or a lottery or anything else to get into a school that is strong.

I don't think moving to charters will solve the problems in PG.

I do think that PG should try to model all of their schools off of the schools that do well. And there are some in the county that do well.

I also think they should strengthen the TAG program, because all kids who score at the right level should have the opportunity to be in that program. But I think that the TAG programs should be done in the neighborhood schools. There shouldn't be a separate TAG school, because I think that kids of all levels should interact with each other at recess, lunch, art, et cetera.

But I do think that in each school, the kids should be divided into levels. I think that helps for the teachers to teach the appropriate level to the students, as opposed to having to teach to three different groups simultaneously.

think that in schools where there are a lot of behavioral problems, smaller classrooms would help. Again, set the teachers up for success. If there are a lot of kids misbehaving, give them smaller groups of those kids.

I think the things I mention above would go a long way to improve things in PG without having to open new charter schools. Perhaps, though, it would require opening new regular schools to alleviate overcrowding.

[Anonymous]

You know what, I really don't care if charters hire new teachers if the schools have good results and produce students that are college ready. My initial post was about the high performing charters with interesting curriculum and strong results. PGCPS has been losing students over the last thirty years. In the last ten years, there has been a turnaround in DC property values esp. in the NE quadrant that has access to charter schools. Like it or not, PGCPS is also competing with DC. Where is used to be that families from DC left to go to PGCPS, that is happening less and families from PGCPS are faking enrollment to get into DC charters.

As for some of the above comments, as far as equality beginning with education, I'd recommend that you read some Jonathan Kozol. I'd rather there be a lottery to get into a school because at least that would be more democratic than the current system which is determined by the size of your bank account and value of your house.

As for modeling schools on the ones that do well. The best predictor of whether or not a school does well is this county is probably due to neighborhood and the number of middle class kids in a particular school. That's not something that can be easily duplicated across the board because of historical housing patterns.

As for strengthening the TAG program by separating students in TAG from the general population at every school. Tracking at early ages shows horrible results almost across the board statistically. You'd also end up with classes segregated by class and language ability within each grade level, which would be cause for a class action suit.