Call To Action: Stop the Plan to Privatize our Public School System

From Parisa Norouzi, Empower DC:

Our schools are not for sale! Transparency Now!

No backroom meetings between DC Government and business interests regarding our schools! Support the grassroots initiatives for the modernization of our existing public schools!

WHAT: Build a levee around our public schools
WHEN: Monday November 14. Protest 6:00 to 7:00 pm. (Hearing starts at 6:30 pm)
WHERE: McKinley Tech High School, 151 T St., NE (Near NY Ave. Metro Stop )
WHY: Because we won't be washed away!

Our public school system has been neglected and under funded for decades, resulting in deplorable schools that are not safe or healthy for DC children to attend. Public school advocates have been organizing to ensure that the city uses its budget surpluses to address the disgraceful conditions that DC children face everyday.

But DC Public Schools (DCPS) and the Mayor's office have little interest in consulting the people of DC on this issue. They have been having backroom meetings with an increasingly aggressive charter school special interests lead by business leaders that want to privatize our schools.

When first introduced to DC in 1996, charter schools were envisioned as laboratories of innovation that would ultimately benefit traditional public schools. Instead, charter schools have become Trojan horses used by businesses and the far right to dismantle public school systems and privatize education. This is being done in a climate of unbridled privatization of all aspects of our social services.

DCPS is holding a series of meetings to form a Master Education Plan (MEP) for the public schools. The MEP will be the framework by which DCPS will implement change and allocate resources over the next several years. Don't allow these meetings to become a rubber stamp for privatization. This is a call for people of conscience to come out to the meeting on November 14th at McKinley Tech School at 6:00 pm .

The charter school movement in New Orleans is trying to take advantage of the Katrina catastrophe by displacing the public school system there. Yet even in the post- catastrophic conditions of New Orleans, a judge temporarily halted this hijacking effort because he felt that the people of New Orleans were not being consulted and that there was lack of transparency in this process. Here in DC the same hijacking attempt is happening uncontested and we call on you to change this state of affairs.

Developers and the business community are looking to capitalize on the poor conditions of DCPS to take over in the form of Charter Schools, school closures, and consolidation. Make your voice heard and tell public officials.
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Originally I favored charter schools, and I am still interested, some day, in trying to create a school devoted to the built and unbuilt urban environment in all aspects, from planning and design to preservation and media (not to mention my arts cluster schools idea), but now I am much more skeptical.

Why can't we rebuild a great public school system in the District of Columbia, a system great for everyone, and one that brings people together, rather than separating us? Charter schools aren't neighborhood schools. And for most neighborhoods, the elementary school is truly the center and heart of the community.

Not to mention that we aren't really engaging in a comprehensive look at the public assets present or lacking, in our neighborhoods. This is but one more example. And putting a charter school in a vacant or underutilized building isn't necessarily meeting any of the expressed needs of particular neighborhoods.

See this column, "Don't Tread on Me," from the City Paper for some discussion about private dealing on the schools.