Sparking the evolution of education choice
The mom on stage described how she and other low-income parents rode a bus through the darkness – six hours, L.A. to Sacramento, kids still in pajamas – to plead their case to power. In the halls of the legislature, people opposed to the idea of a parent trigger accused[Read More…]
David Colburn is a respected former University of Florida provost and progressive academic who should have done more homework before he blithely characterized those who support private school options as salesmen and hucksters. His recent commentary in the state’s largest newspaper, the Tampa Bay Times, rather pointedly ignored important evidence[Read More…]
It does sound nefarious: The people who back accountability for Florida public schools, the argument goes, are really out to mine huge sums of money from their degradation and demise. In a weekend op-ed for the Orlando Sentinel, Florida teachers union president Andy Ford (pictured here) mashed the privatization button hard[Read More…]
The Florida Board of Education is expected this week to extend its search for a new education commissioner, marking the second time in as many years it has done so amidst mutterings that the initial pool is mediocre. Through Friday, the board had received 16 applications to replace former Commissioner Gerard[Read More…]
Florida is a national leader in expanding school choice. And the state’s new top education official doesn’t see the momentum slowing, especially with low-income children. “The train has left the station on school choice,” Gary Chartrand, 58, told redefinED by phone this week – his first media interview since being[Read More…]
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Florida: State education commissioner Gerard Robinson, a former president of the Black Alliance for Educational Options, resigns amidst tumult over the state’s accountability system (Tampa Bay Times). Robinson says the move was for family reasons (Tampa Bay Times). Critics of Florida’s education reforms see an opportunity to change direction (News[Read More…]
Education reform, for some of us, is full of tough calls. And for some of us, there can be particular agony in the gray area where race, poverty and both types of accountability – parental choice and regulatory – intersect. Last week, the school board in Pinellas County, Fla., voted[Read More…]
Florida education commissioner Gerard Robinson has made what appears to be an anguishing personal decision to return to his family in Virginia, because his wife, a law professor, has been unable to find a comparable position in Florida. And yet the announcement Tuesday was greeted with a level of vitriol[Read More…]
