particular charter schools, react as organizations within a
policy, what’s happening in New Orleans challenges us to
more competitive climate,” he says. “Instead of innovating,
think about what we mean by community engagement
we tend to see them doing things such as finding new ways
and the way charter school policies are written,” Dixson
of serving ‘better students’ rather than educating students
says. She adds that many charters “buy and use curricula
to be better.”
out of hand, as test markets for companies who want
Need for charter schools to serve minority and disadvantaged students
EDUCATION AT ILLINOIS 28
to try out instructional software and programming or premade curricula, so there’s not a lot of room for teachers to create their own curriculum or units. The
Lubienski would like to push for policy changes to address
jury is still out on charters. The quality of education for
the resegregation seen in charter schools. “Some of the
students varies significantly. We can’t say the impact on
states that authorized charter schools required that
education by charter schools has been positive. Maybe
charter schools serve a certain portion of minority students
it’s not entirely negative, but issues such as quality of
or disadvantaged students that would be approximate to
education and safety and travel make many charters a
the schools in the surrounding dis-
mixed bag at best. Additionally most charters are not
trict or community,” he says. “And
equally accessible to all students and are not very diverse,
that’s largely been ignored.”
she says, and that makes matters worse.”
Studying charter schools in New Orleans Associate Professor Adrienne Dixson has conducted considerable research on post-Katrina charter schools in New Orleans, which is a pivotal point in the city’s history of school policy. All schools in the city are now chartered, to the dismay of most of the community and the school board. “In terms of
“
The jury is still out on charters. The quality of education for students varies significantly. We can’t say the impact on education by charter schools has been positive. Maybe it’s not entirely negative, but issues such as quality of education and safety and travel make many charters a mixed bag at best. —Adrienne Dixson