"Parent Trigger" Bill Gets an "F" in My Book
March 4th, 2012
For the past couple of weeks in the newspaper, the
never-ending articles about this new "parent trigger" bill has gotten
the best of me. I am sure it's not only on my mind but on the minds of
all Florida teachers and superintendents too.
I cannot imagine the constant headaches our Superintendent Kamela Patton and county teachers have to deal with as they try to stay afloat in our school system. Trying to educate our kids and yet have the constant worry about what new bill or what new rule is coming up at every corner. Are the Board of Education members and other representatives of the state bored? Do they not have other things to worry about other than making the lives of every student, teacher, superintendent, and us parents miserable? It seems they are in a constant move in the wrong direction.
To update you on this bill, it basically will allow us parents to take a failing "F" school and hand it over to a charter school through a petition. This bill has now cleared the Florida Senate this Saturday, and will continue to the house floor, who knows when. Probably tomorrow by the way this is going.
Let's go back here for a minute and refresh ourselves on that No Child Left Behind Act. This is where states require schools to set benchmarks toward achieving 100% proficiency in math and reading by 2014. Florida received a waiver from this in January. So instead, Florida will be using an annual grading system to see how the schools are doing. A new proposed grading system will give the schools a flat out "F" if less than 25% of students score as proficient in reading on the FCAT. With that, special education and ESE students will also be counted into each schools grades and none of the learning gains from each student will be factored in. This is completely unfair and downright wrong.
Now bring this all together and many parents see this as a very negative impact on our schools, giving us the likeliness of receiving an F. Especially those schools rated high in the economically needy equation. And if an F is received, this "parent trigger" bill could very easily take place, allowing parents to petition to bring a charter school into that establishment. (That's when you will be seeing me picketing in front of our schools).
And I will tell you straight out, I do not like charter schools and what they are all about. I want traditional schooling the way it is now, the way I was taught and the way I want my family to be taught. I may be completely wrong, but if charter schools start taking over our county schools, I foresee curriculum tanking, parents divided, and communities torn apart. No thank you.
And why this big push towards charters schools anyway? Every time I read about charter schools, they are the ones constantly receiving the F's, not the county run schools. So why is this all happening now?
Now this site you have to check out. It gives you all the schools statewide that have received an F. And I guarantee every time you pick any county, 99% of all F schools are charter. Below the link are the F schools here in Lee and Collier. Both charters.
http://schoolgrades.fldoe.org/default.asp
Collier: Immokalee Community School
Years: 2010-2011, 2009-2010, 2008-2009, 2007-2008, 2006-2007, 2005-2006, 2004-2005, 2003-2004, 2002-2003, 2001-2002, 2000-2001, 1999-2000, 1998-1999
Lee:Lee Charter Academy
Years: 2010-2011, 2009-2010, 2008-2009, 2007-2008, 2006-2007, 2005-2006, 2004-2005, 2003-2004, 2002-2003, 2001-2002, 2000-2001, 1999-2000, 1998-1999
School Grades: F
So am I missing something here? Please, someone enlighten me.
I cannot imagine the constant headaches our Superintendent Kamela Patton and county teachers have to deal with as they try to stay afloat in our school system. Trying to educate our kids and yet have the constant worry about what new bill or what new rule is coming up at every corner. Are the Board of Education members and other representatives of the state bored? Do they not have other things to worry about other than making the lives of every student, teacher, superintendent, and us parents miserable? It seems they are in a constant move in the wrong direction.
To update you on this bill, it basically will allow us parents to take a failing "F" school and hand it over to a charter school through a petition. This bill has now cleared the Florida Senate this Saturday, and will continue to the house floor, who knows when. Probably tomorrow by the way this is going.
Let's go back here for a minute and refresh ourselves on that No Child Left Behind Act. This is where states require schools to set benchmarks toward achieving 100% proficiency in math and reading by 2014. Florida received a waiver from this in January. So instead, Florida will be using an annual grading system to see how the schools are doing. A new proposed grading system will give the schools a flat out "F" if less than 25% of students score as proficient in reading on the FCAT. With that, special education and ESE students will also be counted into each schools grades and none of the learning gains from each student will be factored in. This is completely unfair and downright wrong.
Now bring this all together and many parents see this as a very negative impact on our schools, giving us the likeliness of receiving an F. Especially those schools rated high in the economically needy equation. And if an F is received, this "parent trigger" bill could very easily take place, allowing parents to petition to bring a charter school into that establishment. (That's when you will be seeing me picketing in front of our schools).
And I will tell you straight out, I do not like charter schools and what they are all about. I want traditional schooling the way it is now, the way I was taught and the way I want my family to be taught. I may be completely wrong, but if charter schools start taking over our county schools, I foresee curriculum tanking, parents divided, and communities torn apart. No thank you.
And why this big push towards charters schools anyway? Every time I read about charter schools, they are the ones constantly receiving the F's, not the county run schools. So why is this all happening now?
Now this site you have to check out. It gives you all the schools statewide that have received an F. And I guarantee every time you pick any county, 99% of all F schools are charter. Below the link are the F schools here in Lee and Collier. Both charters.
http://schoolgrades.fldoe.org/default.asp
Collier: Immokalee Community School
Years: 2010-2011, 2009-2010, 2008-2009, 2007-2008, 2006-2007, 2005-2006, 2004-2005, 2003-2004, 2002-2003, 2001-2002, 2000-2001, 1999-2000, 1998-1999
Lee:Lee Charter Academy
Years: 2010-2011, 2009-2010, 2008-2009, 2007-2008, 2006-2007, 2005-2006, 2004-2005, 2003-2004, 2002-2003, 2001-2002, 2000-2001, 1999-2000, 1998-1999
School Grades: F
So am I missing something here? Please, someone enlighten me.
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