Have you noticed what is happening in New Orleans? In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, there is an excitement brewing about education, of all things. Most of the existing pre-Katrina school system was washed away by the hurricane, both literally and figuratively. Even before the hurricane, the system was failing miserably. Statewide, Louisiana ranked as low as 46th out of the fifty United States in student achievement rankings. Instead of rebuilding a broken system, New Orleans decided to become a laboratory for charter schools. More than half of New Orleans’s public-school students are now in charter schools. Early successes have caught the attention of educators nationwide, as well as local governments still unsure about the viability of the charter school concept.
Charter schools are publicly financed, but are run privately. The individual school has much more latitude about the students it accepts and the curriculum it chooses to follow. Paul Vallas, the former head of the school systems in both Chicago and Philadelphia is the superintendent behind this mass experiment. Thus far, the experiment is successful beyond most reasonable expectation. We hear about the failures of New Orleans all the time. It is truly uplifting to hear about the occasional phoenix that every now and then rises from (very wet) ashes.
Robert M. Hutchins has said “We have not had the three R’s in America, we have had the six R’s: remedial readin’, remedial ‘ritin’ and remedial ‘rithmetic.” Perhaps out of the misery of Katrina, something may actually change for the better. Before Katrina, New Orleans and education went together as well as McDonalds and good nutrition. Don’t look now, but the times, they are ‘a changin.
By Myron Gushlak
