From the Orlando Sentinel's school zone
by Leslie Postal
The so-called, parent-trigger bill has some of Florida’s parent advocacy groups worried.
The groups say the bill, which gives parents at a struggling campus the right to dictate an “improvement plan”, is misleading and misnamed.
The “parent empowerment in education” bill, as it’s called, “cynically uses parents and their love for their children as a tool to pull the “trigger” and hand their neighborhood school over to a private entity with no true guarantee of gaining anything better for their children,” the groups said. “The net result is that schools are taken away from the jurisdiction of duly elected district officials and the physical property of the school is seized and handed over to a for-profit management company.”
The bill doesn’t exactly say that but it does allow parents, if more than half agree, to decide on one of four improvement options — and to override the district’s wishes. The options include turning the school into a charter school or turning it over to a private management company.
Those issuing the statement against the bill include Fund Education Now (founded by three Orlando Moms) and the Florida PTA as well as five other parent groups from around the state.
http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/news_education_edblog/2012/01/parent-trigger-bill-doesnt-make-parent-advocacy-groups-happy.html
If a “parent advocacy” group is against the parent trigger, it either doesn’t understand the law, or it is a union/district front group masquerading as a parent advocacy group.
ReplyDeleteSchool district are notorious for crying poor, getting more money, and slathering the district with more bloated bureaucracy and rich union contracts – none of which benefits children or parents at all.
That is why a trigger is so important. If the district is failing, it does NOT deserve a 2, 3, or 5 year plan to rearrange the deck chairs on its failing titanic bureaucracy.
Flip it into an aggressive improvement option – preferably a new charter – and see if it succeeds. If it doesn’t show improvement in 3 years, flip it again.
It is long past time for coddling failing districts, their rubber stamp boards, and their powerful and entrenched unions and bureaucracies.
If a school isn’t performing, change it. No excuses.
Can you tell me which county has the rich union contract because I want to move there and I am not sure if the PTA is a front for anti-kid groups.
ReplyDeleteBruno is a paid hack. He has to spend his days commenting in blogs for clients. He lives in Chicago, was a talk radio host and is now being paid by the usual suspects to stir up issues in Florida. He's a paid destabilizer. Wake up everyone. Tear yourselves away from the emotional rhetoric. This is about BIG PROFITS. If Bruno seems excited, it's because he aims to get his mitts on some of that ed industry cash (read taxpayer dollars). Pack it up, Bruno. We're wise to you.
ReplyDelete