The weather started getting rough....

The tiny ship was tossed....

If not for the courage of the crew...

They Minnow would be lost....

Good to know Colitis is at the helm....

BLESS...

Pros

According to proponents:

Charter schools present students and parents with an increasingly diverse array of education options.

The competition provided by charter schools forces school districts to improve the performance of their schools in order to attract and retain students and dollars.

If managed properly, charter schools serve as laboratories for education experimentation and innovation. The easing of certain regulations can free teachers and administrators to develop and implement new learning strategies.

Increased accountability for charter schools means that schools have to perform or risk closure. This extra incentive demands results.

Cons

According to opponents:

Because charter schools operate as a business, as well as a learning institution, they are subject to market forces that may eventually force them to close, depriving students of a continuous education.

Charter schools sometimes segregate students along racial and class lines and fail to adequately serve students with disabilities or limited English proficiency.

Accountability for student performance is difficult to measure and enforce in the burgeoning charter school movement. The usual complications of accurate student measurement are compounded by the often-conflicting demands of the state government’s need for accountability and the marketplace’s desire for opportunity.

The emergence of education management organizations as proprietors of charter schools creates “pseudo-school districts” in which decisions are made far removed from the school.

The FCBOE talking about "greater flexibility" is the greatest use of "code words" since the Dixiecrats used the phrase "states rights" in the 1940s.

Turning Fayette county into a "charter school system" would benefit exactly three people in Fayette county: Janet Smola, Terri Smith, and Lee Wright.

Going "Charter" would remove what little accountability these three commissioners face. It would essentially give legal foregiveness to some of their more questionable practices (i.e. saving Smola's son's job). They'd be given free reign to implement purchasing department kickbacks, unencumbered by policies prohibiting self-dealing and conflict of interest. Janet Smola could continue her practice of renting out school busses to organizations she has a business interest in.

The "more accountability" claim is a canard. INDIVIDUAL SCHOOLS might face more accountability, but we the public don't vote on principals and other school leaders. The "more accountability" for individual schools would be offset by LESS accountability for the school board.

The Gang of Three has essentially life tenure. A lack of district voting allows these three to cater to a small but politically potent base of voters in the Brooks/Woolsey area. When you add in the votes of the school system employees themselves, it virtually guarantees a near-insurmountable edge in votes for the incumbents.

A greater lack of accountability on the part of the school board (one can almost picture Terri Smith whining she did nothing LEGALLY wrong the next time she's caught with her hand in the cookie jar) will only reward the Gang of Three and their continuing record of mismanagement.

The charter school concept might be worth re-visiting once a new BOE is in place, however, seeing what the BOE has done with their current level of powers, I am not sure they're responsible enough to handle additional responsibilities in a professional manner. Heaven knows where new school buildings would wind up, not to mention the total decimation of any technical schools. The current board refuses to admit that not every Fayette County kid wants, needs to, or should go to college immediately upon graduation, which is why our drop-out rate keeps going up.

While we're on the subject of FCBOE I have to ask this question. When did the FCBOE remove all of the hot water faucets and piping from the student bathrooms? In all of the student bathrooms in both JC Booth & McIntosh these were removed and to top if off they have nether paper towels or hot air hand drier's. While the bathrooms that the Teachers use have both hot water and towels. In restaurants they have signs prompting employees to wash hands after going to the bathroom for sanitary reasons, our board of education does not believe that our children should do the same by supplying them with proper means to accomplish this. With the Swine Flu scare we are told to wash our hands frequently, but I have to wonder just what cold water and wiping your wet hands on your pants does to help prevent spend of the Disease. I will bet you anything that they have hot water and paper towels at the BOE home office, but why should they be made to provide these for "those people's kids".

Obama's weapon of Choice!

It's about time we get charter schools here.

Giving the FCBOE charter school status is the moral equivalent of giving the Taliban a high yield nuclear device.