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I went to a famous charter school for middle school. Far too militant style-wise. Have nothing great to say about them. They're horrible for intelligent students, OK for mediocre ones. And I do not understand why charter schools are placed in districts where students are generally OK - they just drain NJ of more money.
All the talk about charters offering a better education? Not true. I remember 5th & 6th grade math being wasted time. I learned 5th grade made in 4th grade. Sixth grade math could probably have been condensed to three months. Eighth grade math was a disaster - eight lecture hours a week with six of those geared solely towards GEPA prep - aka PASSING STANDARDIZED TESTS AND LEARNING NOTHING VALUABLE JUST SO CHARTERS STAY OPENED!
Ugh. Glad I got outta there and moved on to a renowned private high school. Charters schools compare not at all to the class of education at independent day schools (I'm not talking about parochial schools).
The math foundation given me by my charter middle school absolutely set me up for struggle. Went into high school mal-prepared. Could never catch up to keep up with the caliber of high school's math, so struggled in college.
Ann brought this up before. But what would stop Asian Indians and Chinese from setting up langauge charter schools in one town like East Brunswick - and trust me there are plenty of each in E.B. - and totally mucking up the fine public schools in town? You open "language" schools for Hebrew, then we're going to have 10 different other ones competing for students and basically ruining the diversity of the schools.
I find the whole charter school concept repugnant except perhaps for specialized charters like technology. Even then I'm not so sold on charters. They discipline kids better in inner cities, that to me is their major advantage. In the 'burbs they're essentially not worth it.
I was on the fence about charter schools.
Now I think all of these charter schools are just going to end up costing everyone more money, especially in towns that are funding their own schools via property taxes.
{Following the introduction of dual-language immersion programs in a growing number of public schools around the country, New Jersey is opening its first public school with dual-language immersion in Chinese and English in September, 2011. The Princeton International Academy Charter School (PIACS) was approved by the New Jersey Department of Education in January, 2010 and will be the third public school in New Jersey offering dual-language immersion. In September 2010, a Spanish/English immersion school opened in Hoboken and a Hebrew/English immersion school opened in East Brunswick.}
I'm a bit confused as to why a Hebrew language school would be different from a Chinese or Spanish language school, from a legal perspective. (Obviously, teaching religion would be banned.)
That being said - charter schools were designed to fix messed up public schools, but are being used to create trendy immersion programs. However, you can't approve of a Chinese immersion school that mainly supports Chinese-Americans but disapprove of a Hebrew immersion school that appeals to Jews. This is what we call "hypocrisy" and is generally considered to be bad.
The safest way to handle this is to ban language immersion charter schools which are perversions of the charter school movement to begin with. If we want to provide vouchers for parochial schools (which I personally approve of), then we should. Otherwise, lets keep charter schools focused on their mission.
I had heard of this school, but wasn't sure if it got approved or not.
Who said they approve of a Chinese public school? I don't. If there is a demand for Chinese language in a community, add it into the regular public school.
I had heard of this school, but wasn't sure if it got approved or not.
Who said they approve of a Chinese public school? I don't. If there is a demand for Chinese language in a community, add it into the regular public school.
wait a second. shouldn't this apply to anything then? if there is demand for any sort of improvement to a school in a community, add it into the regular public school. forget charter schools altogether.
wait a second. shouldn't this apply to anything then? if there is demand for any sort of improvement to a school in a community, add it into the regular public school. forget charter schools altogether.
Yes. Forget charter schools altogether. Either give everyone a voucher to do with as they please, or just keep the current system.
I think charter schools can still have a place in dangerous/low-performing districts though.
That's great. I'd expand it to give everyone a voucher who wants one though. If people stay in their local public schools, great.
Charters really are vouchers in disguise, but I don't agree with how limited they are, and who gets approved and all of that. Open the whole thing up, or leave it alone.
Yes. Forget charter schools altogether. Either give everyone a voucher to do with as they please, or just keep the current system.
I think charter schools can still have a place in dangerous/low-performing districts though.
ok with me...kinda. vouchers don't fix the bad schools though. but then you added charter schools in dangerous/low-performing. might be onto something here!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ann77
That's great. I'd expand it to give everyone a voucher who wants one though. If people stay in their local public schools, great.
Charters really are vouchers in disguise, but I don't agree with how limited they are, and who gets approved and all of that. Open the whole thing up, or leave it alone.
but they are saying in the article that people should get the voucher and be able to use it at religious schools....
ok with me...kinda. vouchers don't fix the bad schools though. but then you added charter schools in dangerous/low-performing. might be onto something here!
but they are saying in the article that people should get the voucher and be able to use it at religious schools....
Right, charters make some sense in low-performing districts.
Yeah, it's better just to leave the vouchers out of the religious schools. That's a lose-lose for everyone, including the religious schools, who will then be pressured not to be so religious anymore.
Blerg. Just leave everything alone. Any "solution" just ends up costing more money it seems.
Right, charters make some sense in low-performing districts.
Yeah, it's better just to leave the vouchers out of the religious schools. That's a lose-lose for everyone, including the religious schools, who will then be pressured not to be so religious anymore.
Blerg. Just leave everything alone. Any "solution" just ends up costing more money it seems.
i just think everything we do is either
a) throw more money at schools, with no clear direction on what to do with that money to actually improve them.
b) help people who are more actively involved remove their kids from "troubled" schools, via vouchers or "charter schools"
neither of these fix the problems in our education system though. i don't have the answer.
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