Tuesday, September 9, 2014

What's Wrong With Minneapolis Schools

As someone who has followed events in Minneapolis Schools for some time, I am not surprised by this author's comments. Well financed School Reformers who see Charter Schools and Teach for America as the path to educational equity have dominated school planning in Minneapolis. But having revolving door teaching staffs largely drawn from outside the state have, almost everywhere they have been tried, weakened the communities high needs schools are located in., How about a different approach- one that emphasized public schools that are round the clock community centers, that hire neighborhood residents to work in them, and try as much as possible to recruit teachers either from these communities or willing to settle in the communities where their schools are located and work in them a long time. Imposing an educational model created outside neighborhoods and staffed by people with no long term connections to neighborhoods is not working. Time to go back to the drawing board in Minneapolis and around the nation.