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As New Orleans restarts its schools, most are now charter schools
Since hurricane Katrina, the city has been determined to reform one of the nation's worst school districts.
from the September 4, 2007 edition
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The charter schools in New Orleans are draws because for teachers they offer self-direction, responsibility, and flexibility to oftentimes 20-something whites with lots of academic, but not so much practical, experience, new principals say.
But several new reports out of the city paint a darker picture. One put out in June by the United Teachers of New Orleans union points to an Atlantic Monthly article that described a situation from the spring of 2006: overworked rookie teachers unable to cope with the hardened kids dispersed from their neighborhood schools. In one school, more students were expelled last year than graduated.
Several in the teachers' union report that some students have yet to find room even in public schools, and that district schools are overburdened with students.
Less than a third of displaced students passed crucial tests in math and reading last year, according to the Southern Education Foundation (SEF). And with less than half of teachers being veterans, the new system faces daunting prospects a few years down the road, some warn. Two in 5 schools last year reported an increase in Katrina-related discipline problems, according to the RAND Corp.
"We are concerned about how well these [new] teachers are going to be able to handle working in this district and we're also concerned about how long they're going to stay," says Christian Roselund, a spokesman for United Teachers of New Orleans, the major teacher association in the city.
Jackie Cockerham, a 32-year veteran of New Orleans schools, is one of thousands "still hurting" from the mass pink-slipping of teachers after the storm. They argue that their schools were, in fact, not the worst in the state, and were held to different and often arbitrary standards. After the storm, says Ms. Cockerham, New Orleans' black teachers were the victims of an ideological drive by elitist – and mostly white – pro-charter advocates who now control the central office.
"The threat was that [existing] teachers were too influential," she says. "They're not going to get any qualms from the new people."
Another endemic issue: funding. A study released last week by the SEF says that the total federal aid to schools equals about 2 percent of total US aid for Katrina recovery – far short, they argue, of an appropriate federal response.
Many charters are now using school buildings and equipment free of charge. But with post-Katrina tax revenues off by 15 percent, tensions over funding are likely to rise in the next few years – especially in a district that had a $250 million debt when Katrina hit.
For now, incoming superintendent Paul Vallas, formerly of Chicago and Philadelphia schools, is forging ahead with a daunting mandate to find a good classroom for every child in New Orleans. Mr. Vallas will hear new ideas, but doesn't like complainers, insiders say.
"This is creating a new school system from the ground up," Vallas recently told an audience at Martin Luther King Jr. Science and Technical School in the Lower Ninth Ward.
Cora Pugh, a grandmother in the Lower Ninth Ward, says many black parents are cautiously optimistic about the schools' direction. "They're trying to do new programs to get the kids the learning they need," says Ms. Pugh. "It's really working well." But at the same time, she says, many of the more successful charter schools have replaced what were already high-performing public schools before Katrina.
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