Guest MINDSETTER ™ Berwick: The Charter School Problem

Guest MINDSETTER ™ Berwick: The Charter School Problem

Charter schools were designed to be educational laboratories where new teaching methods and new school policies are tested and improved. Charter schools are not governed by school committees, union regulations or elected public officials. Charter school administrators and teachers are in control and parents and students are grateful that they have been chosen to a part of each charter school. Everyone in each charter school is highly motivated, highly productive and well behaved. They make up a dedicated homogenous group.  

Charter schools are successful because they are small and administrators can monitor the daily lessons that are taught.  In addition, charter schools can innovate whenever necessary, can control curriculum content, can have a longer school day and a longer school year, can pay their teachers more and can provide better working conditions for administrators, teachers and students.  Parental and community involvement is high and charter school teachers and students are very motivated.

Charter schools were never meant to be an alternative competitive public school system within several local community public school systems. This competition has led to disunity and distrust among community leaders. The diverse populations in each neighborhood make it very difficult for neighborhood public schools to compete with the homogenous team efforts provided by charter schools. Charter school students are well behaved, highly motivated and extremely dedicated to the educational process.The presence of charter schools in local neighborhoods has led to the loss of cohesion and dedication among neighborhood community leaders. It is hard for these leaders to understand why the underprivileged children in these charter schools are achieving at such a high level.  

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To save neighborhood public schools and reunify community leaders in each neighborhood, the “School-Within-a-School-Concept” should be employed in each public school with more than 350 students.  If a school has 600 students, it would be divided up into two separate schools with 300 students in each school.  In each school, administrators, faculty members, parents, non-instructional staff members and students would have an opportunity to get to know and trust one another.  In a short period of time, almost everyone would begin acting like a family where most members care about and want to help each other. Early childhood students will feel secure knowing that their older brothers, sisters and neighborhood friends will always be nearby.  A social commitment would develop where everyone involved would begin working together to make each school a successful community.  Because these schools would be small, curriculums designed to meet the cultural diverse needs of at risk student populations could be developed.  Administrators, teachers and students, in these small schools, could use the team approach to implement curriculum goals and create group portfolios to represent their achievements.   In a team, every member works very hard to make sure the team achieves its goals.  These small schools would be the equivalent of well run charter schools. Administrators and teachers using the team approach in small school settings to achieve curriculum goals is the key to making every neighborhood public school the equivalent of a well run charter school. In a few years, neighborhood political leaders, union leaders, educational leaders and religious leaders would begin working together to make each neighborhood a better place to live, work and pray.   In today’s complex and troubled world, providing opportunities for interfaith relationships is becoming very important.

When the “School-Within-a-School-Concept” is fully established in each community, the need for innovative charter schools would be greatly reduced and most of the children served by these charter schools would return to their neighborhood public schools.   Many charter schools could become private schools and be treated the same way that secular private schools and religious private schools are treated. 

Kenneth Berwick of Smithfield, RI Served three years in the United States Marine Corps from 1954-1957. Berwick is a retired teacher with a BA from RIC in 1960 and a Masters from Syracuse in 1969.