Vitti
To appreciate the significance of what Nikolai Vitti is saying about parental choice, one must first read his resume. He’s a 36-year-old with a Harvard education doctorate who served as chief academic officer to nationally recognized Miami-Dade school superintendent Alberto Carvalho before being chosen in the fall to run the Duval County school district, the 22nd largest in the nation.
So Vitti is, by anyone’s definition, a comer on the national public education scene.
And he says this: “I support choice because I think parents need options, especially those that do not have the financial means to go to a private school.”
And this: “I just don’t believe that anyone should tell a parent where they should send their child to school. I’m vehemently opposed to limiting options, especially to parents whose children are in lower performing schools or parents who don’t have the financial means to have the same flexibility that a parent would have of means. And that’s historically what’s happened with our public education system.”
These statements, in an enlightening podcast posted to this blog on Monday, are all the more impressive given that the school district he now commands has an uneasy history with private school choice. The pressure on him to continue to wage high-profile war is certainly great. But Vitti comes from a place, and perhaps a generation, where choice is not a dirty word. He openly praises charter operators such as KIPP, even borrowing from some of their practices while in Miami, and asserts that competition is making school districts up their game. In one of his first meetings on the new job, he recommended, and the school board approved, 12 new charter schools.
Vitti, then, is owed more than a pat on the back. He is also trying to break through the political divide to encourage open-minded debate on how to make choice actually work. Toward that end, he brings legitimate concerns to the table and needs to be heard. (more…)
Vitti
The sprawling, 125,000-student school district in Duval County, Fla., has a reputation for being particularly cold territory for vouchers and charter schools. But last month, its new superintendent recommended the school board approve a dozen new charter schools and, in doing so, sounded this refrain: We have to compete.
In an interview with redefinED, Nikolai Vitti said the competition injected into public education through expanded choice will improve schools in Duval, which has struggled with low-income students more than other big districts in Florida. He said he “vehemently opposed” limiting options for low-income parents. He spoke admiringly of the mission and innovative practices of the KIPP charter schools.
“The reality is, the market – meaning the structure of choice – forces me to compete, even if I don’t want to. And if I don’t compete, parents will continue to leave the school district,” Vitti said. “And so my role as superintendent is to improve our product.”
But Vitti, who previously served as chief academic officer in the Broad-Prize-winning Miami-Dade district, also offered a number of caveats. State rules tilt the playing field towards charter schools, he said. And in his view, the debate over them has been driven by perceptions of quality, not data.
“There are charter schools that have a track record of success, and particular charter schools that have failed, and failed in multiple areas,” he said. “Let’s not have an ideological conversation. Let’s have one based on data where we look at individual charter schools, individual traditional public schools, and ask the question: Who’s successful? Who’s not? And what’s the best situation for parents based on how they’re looking at it, and how the district as informed educators are looking at it?”
Vitti also offered a surprising take on who should authorize charter schools. In Florida, only school boards can do so – a situation that charter school opponents prefer, and one that may be tough to change because of restrictive language in the state constitution. But Vitti said unless changes are made to the charter application process – something that forces better dialogue between charters and districts – he’d rather have the state do the authorizing.
“I do believe there’s a way to create a balance between simply approving charter schools at the district level based on a boilerplate application process … and instead allow and require the charter school to be more strategic with the district,” he said. But “if we’re not going to create some kind of balance between that, then simply place the onus of the application process on the state. Because essentially that’s what’s happening already.”
It’s rare to find strong school choice advocates on local school boards. But in Florida, another such advocate has emerged as a viable candidate in one of the state’s biggest school districts.
Jason Fischer, 29, is one of six candidates running for the District 7 seat in Duval County, which is the county that corresponds with the city of Jacksonville. As we’ve noted before, Duval has been particularly unfriendly territory when it comes to charter schools, vouchers and tax credit scholarships. So it’s worth noting that not only is Fischer openly supportive of expanded school choice, including private options, but he’s no ordinary contender by other measures. Last month, Gov. Jeb Bush endorsed him. And yesterday, with less than three weeks to go before the Aug. 14 primary, three speaker-designates for the Florida House of Representatives did the same.
Like Glen Gilzean, a school board member and candidate in Pinellas County, Fla. who we’ve also written about (and who also snagged an endorsement from Bush), Fischer defies the caricature of the school choice supporter who wants to tear down traditional public schools. His platform is by no means limited to school choice; it includes, among other things, more focus on teacher quality and performance pay. But Fischer doesn’t shy from the potential benefits that come when more learning options are available to more kids.
“If the government has a good functioning school in an area, and people want to send their kids there, that’s fine,” Fischer told redefinED in a phone interview this week. “My goal isn’t to undercut public education. It’s to make sure parents have the widest opportunities available.”
“I think the choices will improve the quality of education of their child primarily,” he continued. “But secondarily, it will force the public school education system to improve its service level … so everyone benefits.”
Duval has struggled even more than most Florida urban districts to improve test scores for low-income students, and the School Board and one of the county’s key education advocacy groups have resisted more learning options for these students. But Fischer suggests that expanded choice can be part of the solution. (more…)
