Mosley: Charter schools would give parents options
This column was submitted by the campaign of Steven Mosley, the Republican-endorsed candidate for the Mount Vernon District School Board seat.
This past week I met an African American mom at Whitman Middle School’s Back to School Night who expressed concern because when her 8th grader graduates from Whitman she will be placed into one of the lowest-performing high schools in our district. This parent was looking for other options. She asked me if elected what I would do to give parents more options. I told her that as we work to improve Mount Vernon High School, we must also give school choice and open enrollment to all parents.
Secondly, we must bring charter schools to Fairfax County so that she and others throughout the Mount Vernon District can have more choices and not be trapped into a school based on their zip code.
This November’s ballot gives us another year to unleash our children’s potential, or keep them from opportunity. I’m Steven Mosley, and I’m running for Fairfax County School Board for the Mount Vernon District and I want to champion school choice for all our students and parents.
Recently, I participated in my first debate, where the issue of charter schools became the source of hot contention between me and my opponent. Though charter schools have a high success rate in bridging the achievement gap, my opponent, and current school board member Chair, Karen Corbett Sanders has stated “charter schools are not the right answer for Fairfax County and not the right answer for Mount Vernon.”
Did you know that school choice is the one policy proposal that has an astounding above 70 percent approval rating? It’s strong in its diversity as well, with 76 percent of Hispanics and 69 percent of African American support. This poll was released this year by The American Federation for Children and Beck Research, a Democratic polling firm.
So why do we continue to tell our children that they can “be anything they want to be” and “do anything they put their mind to” without providing the resources for them to achieve it? Too many children are forced into underperforming and overcrowded schools and thereby not efficiently set up for success.
As a result, I have released my non-partisan SMART pledge. The focus of the SMART plan is to focus on areas that have majority support. Each letter of SMART represents a campaign pledge. “M” in the pledge stands for “Make Minority Student Achievement a priority by using proven methods to bridge the achievement gap.” This should go without saying, but school choice won’t just help black and brown students; it will give more options to all families in the Mount Vernon District.
Charter schools give power back to the parent. Instead of dividing the community through redistricting, school choice gives parents options. The opportunity for parents to truly choose what school is best for their student, without negatively impacting home values which is a result of redistricting in a district with underperforming schools as we have here in the Mount Vernon District. Charter schools would also help alleviate school overcrowding that we see at West Potomac High School and other schools within our district.
As reported in The Washington Post, this current school board, led by Karen Corbett Sanders, has failed to bridge the achievement gap for the last three years. In fact, the needle hasn’t moved since 2005. This board continues to use failed methods instead of proven results. All the while, our students suffer.
This November 5, you have an opportunity to change that with your vote.
This November let’s change the Board, not the boundaries. If elected, I pledge to support and approve the creation of charter schools in Fairfax County, which will help bridge the achievement gap and alleviate the overcrowding of schools.
Charter schools are a win-win. A win for parents. A win for the community, and a win for bridging the achievement gap.
A study on Charter Schools by the National Education Association in 2017 issued a report card on such schools in all 50 states and D.C. The 63 Virginia based charter schools received a grade of D and a mediocre rating. Fairfax County has the distinction of having one of the best school systems and schools overall in Virginia. Please explain how bringing a caliber of schools with only a D grade and mediocre rating brings improvements to an already highly ranked school system?
Very good question. I had not seen that study, but study after study shows that the only thing charter schools do is steal tax dollars from the public school system, impacting their performance while producing at best mediocre performance by the charter schools that are hurting the public schools. Bad idea!
Charter Schools just pull funds from public schools which hurts the quality of education in general. Since charter schools can pick their students, they take public funds and leave the most expensive students to teach in the public schools.
On top of that, charter schools tend to have lower academic credentials than most public schools. Charter schools are a race to the bottom.
If public schools aren’t performing why force parents to send their kids there? Education is for children and parents should have options for education that best fit their kid’s needs.
Great schools exist in neighborhoods where parents are willingly engaged in the school through strong parent involvement and volunteering in the school community and its operations. The schools are community assets that will educate your children and reflect the values and educational goals you seek for your children if you actively advocate for those values and goals as an involved parent. Our public schools are adequately resourced with provisions and professionals capable of delivering a first rate education. Parental and community involvement in the school is perhaps the most significant critical factor with regards to whether the school is under-performing. It seems cynical and dishonest to this former educator to suggest that one is trapped in an under-performing school by their zip code. If you choose to live in a community then why not show your support for that community by supporting the educational assets in place and encourage your friends and neighbors to work with you to shape and mold the school environment and culture into the one that serves the needs of your children. The idea that you should be able to go about and shop for what will be a better school is a false notion. Schools are communities of children and adults not products on a store shelf. If the newly formed charter school doe not have a strong parental support base that is engaged in the school culture it will not perform any better than than the identified local under-performing schools. Numerous studies thus far show no significant improvement from these schools. Charter schools will divide communities when the opposite should be taking place. Communities should be coming together in the interest of their children by working cooperatively with our public schools shaping them to be the community resources they are meant to be.
The premise of your question is wrong. Public schools almost always perform better than charter schools.
Instead of putting a band aid on the problem why not fix the issue: school zoning. It’s modern day segregation. I don’t think charter schools are the answer. I commend him for trying to help bring options but who is to say the charter school will be better than the existing schools in the area? Charter schools do not provide teachers with the same benefits as public, they are profit driven and they don’t have the oversight public schools have. Be courageous and Solve the problem the right way no matter how controversial it may be. Charter schools are only band aids on a gushing wound.
This guy is just trying to sell a fancy idea and get your vote. It won’t work and here is why.
Imagine a school district with 10 schools each with 100 students. A new charter school opens in the district and attracts 100 students itself, 10 students from each existing school.
Each district school now has less money, since the schools receive money for each child enrolled, and each is serving just 90.
That leads to a budget crunch. Cutting some costs, like the number of teachers, may be relatively straightforward (though still often painful). Other costs, like the principal’s salary and building maintenance, stay the same whether the school is serving 90 or 100 students.
To close the gap, the schools might cut an art teacher, cancel an after school program, or increase class sizes.
I think choice should be paramount when it comes to schools. As a life time resident of the Mount Vernon district (60 years) and having attended and graduated from Mount Vernon High School (as did both of our daughters). My wife and I were very active in the public school lives of our children until graduation. I have seen a slow and steady increase in taxes for education and a slow and steady decline in the quality of the Fairfax County Schools over the years since I attended them. When the School Board and the Board of Supervisors worry more about nonsensical issues like wasting money renaming schools because someone might be offended by their historical name; debating allowing students to skip school to attend some politically based protest or worrying about and wasting money dealing with the mental conditions of a miniscule minority of students bathroom choice, this tells me that priorities have shifted from education to political correctness and the school system definitely has money to waste. Choice is always the word we hear about other hot button issues – why not school choice too? The county wastes millions installing turf athletic fields and then charges students for music materials that is used in academic music classes. If a good charter school had been available a dozen years ago, my wife and I might have given it a close look. Perhaps a little competition and school choice would be a good thing to get our public school officials back on course for reading, writing and arithmetic. Sounds good to me.