OK, I've never been waterboarded but it can't be any worse that sitting through the FWCS public hearing on closing Elmhurst and Pleasant Center at the Grile Center last night. Admittedly the board had to listen to some inane questions and comments but the pontification they gave in their responses was almost unbearable. Like GiaQuinta and Corona explaining why they sent their kids to private school. Hey guys, I would have done the same thing if I were in your shoes but I wouldn't sit up there and bullshit my way around it like you did.
After Elmhurst closes there will be three failing public high schools south of Coliseum Boulevard. Academically they are in the bottom 5% of the high schools in the state. Wayne is ranked close to the high school in the Marion County jail (Corona's former Gary high school is worse that that.) Their teachers and administrators are being forced through a ritual of reapplying for their jobs and musical chairs to keep the state off their backs for another year or two. That won't improve anything. Those teachers are no different than the ones in the the other schools in the district.
Wendy's strategy for turning this around is to first remove the stigma of losers by calling them "LEAD" schools. Then to fix them with Freshmen Academies, "High School Reinvent" and best of all the "Balanced Scorecard". That's not going to fix them for the reason Wendy inadvertently gave last night. The middle class parents have deserted the south side of town. They will eventually desert the area north of Coliseum.
Hopefully the State will come in and take the South half of the system away from Wendy and her clueless puppets and turn it into a charter system. They've cost us the right to local control.
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Now Code Blue...did you not read the the proclamation from the almighty queen of all education this morning in the JG? Ball State has to realize that no one in Ft Wayne wants more Charter schools? The story this morning says...Ideally, a charter school springs from a community need for an alternative to exhisting public schools...where has she been? I guess the JG doesn't care that a charter would be an alternative for the parents at Elmhurst and Pleasant Center...that the parents that like Imagine Schools would love the opportunity to keep there children there for K-12. Oh wait... there it is...it's been a couple of weeks, but right there at the end...
There's no community clamor for a third Imagine School, and it appears Ball State charter school officials have figured that out...Did they tell the Journal Gazette that??
If someone (are you reading this Don?) opened a charter high school South of Coliseum it would fill up overnight. That would effectively put Wendy's three failing (LEAD)high schools out of business.
The Ball State charter process is a farce. Wendy is blackballing Ball State teaching graduates in retaliation for Ball State's granting charters in Fort wayne. A new process has to be established for approving charter schools, perhaps at the state level like they have in South Carolina. There Governor Mark Sanford took a detour from his hike on the Appalachian trail (or was it Argentina) to go to Washington and schmooze Arne Duncan for RTT money and got it.
wow
thats crazy, i work near the journal gazette at Auto Shipping Network http://www.autoshippingnetwork.com/ and this affects some of our outher employees who have kids attending one of Wendy's high schools...sucks
Got some interesting information from the Director, Office of Education Innovation
Office of Mayor Greg Ballard – City of Indianapolis today concerning our charter schools in Ft Wayne...we "can" get the authorization for our Mayor to authorize charters...hmmmmmmm
But would he be bold enough to go against FWCS?? Probably not
As always Evert, I respect your right to your own opinion...but, please present all the data. While FWCS undoubtedly has schools that are low performers, I don't think we should continue to believe that Imagine is the answer to these problems.
In fact, if you go to the DOE website, you'll see that Imagine on Broadway is also in the state's list of lowest achieving schools list (as is Imagine's Life Science Academy in Indianapolis). Here's the link so you can verify: http://www.doe.in.gov/ayp/docs/2010/ExpandedPersistentlyLowest-AchievingList.pdf
In addition, if you read the entire list, you'll find at least 10 other charter schools on this list (sometimes it's difficult to tell by simply reading the names...KIPP schools, for examples, are charters).
I have nothing against Imagine schools or private/parochials---I have friends and family members who have kids enrolled in both, and I applaud them for making a choice that works best for their family. My kids attend FWCS and receive an excellent education (as is evidenced by their high ISTEP scores), but continuing to villify FWCS and tout Imagine as the savior for student achievement simply isn't based on factual information.
Furthermore, FWCS's population has remained constant for many years---here's the link: http://mustang.doe.state.in.us/TRENDS/corpenr.cfm?corp=0235&var=enr
While there may be a change in demographics, the enrollment remains steady (unlike Indianapolis). And yes, there are still many middle-income families, like ours, that choose to have our students educated in FWCS, even though we can afford to send them elsewhere.
Just my opinion. I thank you for the opportunity to host a format that allows divergent opinions and I respect your right to express your opinions as well.
I think we can agree that not all FWCS are terrible. Each school has their strengths and weaknesses. The way FWCS operates fiscally and the leadership seem to be the problems. Give the teachers more of a voice. Many of them are very experienced and knowledgeable. The school board should be looking to the teachers for the solutions. Let's face it. Some of the students here in Fort Wayne are incredibly difficult to teach.
FWCS does not have the option to turn away students (except in extreme cases obviously). They have to teach anyone who walks through the door. Each school needs the flexibilty to change and address the needs of students in a timely manner. In public schools, any changes or solutions take so long because it has to go up the latter for approval. That's when students fall through the cracks.
Hopefully, Imagine will see some major growth. Just remember that Imagine on Broadway is only in it's second year. They have not had a chance to "grow" their own students. Students are entering the school at all different levels. If both Imagine schools don't show enough student growth, parents will leave.
I'm not pushing Imagine or any other charter system per se. I've said before that if they can't attract and keep students they should go out of business. I do believe we need a viable publicly funded alternative to the government run schools we have now. The only thing that will motivate FWCS to change is competition and that's why they're fighting charter schools tooth and nail.
I know FWCS enrollment has remained steady. But if you'll click on the demographic pie chart on the DOE web site you'll see that it's due to an influx of hispanic and multiracial students who so far are compensating for the loss of about 450 white students per year. That tells me the middle class is deserting the system. Although we still have some good schools, they will eventually all succumb.
The same thing happened in Gary and Indianapolis. Gary started to deteriorate before the influx of hispanics. The white kids were not replaced and the system is 97% black, about half the size it was before. They have about 20 buildings standing empty. Indianapolis has about 24 empty or about to be closed.
Part of my frustration stems from knowing what the system was like 40years ago compared to what it is today. The other part is listening to the administration, FWEA and the board telling us how wonderful things are, the "magic" and "miracles" going on in our "LEAD" schools, yada,yada,yada...ad nauseatum.
Purdue Alum....
After the JG printed an article attacking the test scores of the Imagine Schools I checked the IDOE website. Using the same criteria as the JG used in previous reporting, the Imagine schools were still holding their own.
The Truth shall set you free.....
Mayor Tom Henry came to the Imagine on Broadway open house. He made the comment that he would probably be attacked by the local press for doing so. Also a member of the school board was also there walking around. What he was doing there was nobody's idea.
Thanks for that information Disgusted...I do not think that anyone thinks that Imagine is the total answer. I do believe that they offer "choice". I went to Catholic schools for 12 years, our child graduated from Elmhurst (which is a good school, NOT perfect, as we know none of them are) and I have friends and family that are at Imagine. I have been to Imagine and the only two things that are different from the parochial schools are No Tuition and No Church. The charters are a new way of teaching PERIOD. And this should all be about what is best for the children. And give the the parents a chance to offer their child a better public education.
The JG and all of the other Imagine and charter school bashers out there can say what they want...at least Don Willis has tried to make a difference and to bring Ft Wayne into the latest century and up to par with the rest of the country. He can at least hold his head high and say "I tried"...which is better than just sitting around and complaining about the public education in this city and blaming everyone in Indianapolis for Fort Wayne's problems....
The truth shall set you free,
I have to disagree with your last entry that charter schools are a new way to teach. Charter schools operate in the same manner that almost all public high schools had educated in the United States until very recently. Charter schools hold students accountable for their actions. If a student disturbs a class he or she is punished and if it continues they are forced to attend another school. This is the key point that is being ignored in the discussion about why public schools are failing. Today public schools allow students to get away with too much and this hurts the educational environment. If I got a nickel for the amount of times I heard Wendy Robinson state that FWCS was going to hold students accountable for their actions, I would not have enough money to buy a soda. We could fix schools, but we would have to leave some students behind and no educator is willing to openly state this truth. What makes it even worse is that the politically correct way is leaving a lot more students behind.
Spencer,
Leadership is the reason for the lack of student discipline/accountability. Principals feel obligated to reduce the number of referrals as they are used as a statistic by the administration to determine the school performance. This causes the principals to put pressure on teachers to handle problems directly and not to write referrals. This is a feedback loop that eventually leads to what we have now.
A real leader would step in, acknowledge the problem and give principals and teachers all the tools they needed to solve the problem without policies that led to "cooking the books".
But FWCS has turned into a district that is all about PR and not about performance...
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