Local coalition grades OPSB
8th June 2015 · 0 Comments
By Kari Dequine Harden
Contributing Writer
Applauding success in some areas and identifying other areas in need of “serious work,” a coalition of more than 20 business, civic, and community groups detailed their assessment of the Orleans Parish School Board (OPSB) in a recent report.
“Progress made by members of the Orleans Parish School Board to advance policy creating greater equity for students with the highest needs and ensuring adequate facility maintenance for years to come is truly commendable. I urge OPSB to remain steadfast in its commitment to create transparent and reliable mechanisms for strategic planning, district operations, and most importantly ensuring equal access for all students,” said Urban League of New Orleans President Erika McConduit-Diggs in a press release.
The Forward New Orleans for Public Schools’ (FNOPS) “Midterm Progress Report” was based on seven platforms outlined by the group during the 2012 school board elections: 1. High quality, high performing public schools; 2. Coordination to enable choice; 3. System-wide strategic planning; 4. Resource manager for facilities; 5. Resource manager for taxes and bonds; 6. Resource manager for the fund balance reserve; and 7. Fairness and equity for all public school students.
The recent hiring of new superintendent Henderson Lewis Jr. was an important step, in that “the OPSB now has executive leadership on which it can rely to execute the FNOPS platform objectives and achieve the vision of a school system that equitably serves all Orleans Parish Public School students,” the report states.
The report calls the approval of the Cooperative Endeavor Agreement (CEA) between the OPSB and the Recovery School District (RSD) a “watershed moment.” The CEA focuses on better serving students with special needs and students who are most at-risk.
Led by the Business Council of New Orleans and River Region, the FNOPS group also includes the New Orleans Chamber of Commerce, Greater New Orleans, Inc. Children’s Defense Fund, Urban League of Greater New Orleans, Tulane’s Cowen Institute for Public Education Initiatives, and Educate Now!
The report gives strong general support to the continued expansion of charter schools and the long-term role of the RSD in New Orleans, which now is transitioning into a role of facility manager, as they do not directly run any schools in the city. The OPSB oversees about one quarter of the city’s public schools, including charter schools and direct-run schools.
Nationwide and locally, the success of charter schools is hotly debated, and the RSD’s continued presence and involvement in the city faces significant opposition from critics.
FNOPS does not have a platform or a progress report for the RSD.
The report hails “the creation of a school maintenance fund that will provide a revenue source for maintaining and repairing buildings.”
However the way in which that fund was created was highly controversial.
Last year, voters passed a bill that gives a majority of the tax dollars designated for maintaining and repairing public school facilities to the RSD for the indefinite future, the RSD was not mentioned in the language of the bill.
The report states that the December passage of the bill represented “major progress,” but that the OPSB still must create a formal policy on facility maintenance and repair.
On areas identified for improvement, the FNOPS report requested more policies in writing from the OPSB dealing with the performance of schools: “The OPSB has not established a comprehensive, formal School Quality Policy, but significant progress has been made with the development of the Charter School Performance Network. Unfortunately, we have not seen similar progress on a policy for the OPSB’s direct-run schools.”
FNOPS stressed a need for more official and consistent policies on how charter schools are authorized, how the contracts are extended and renewed, and how they are monitored, intervened in and closed.
The report applauded significant progress with the OneApp universal enrollment system, saying that despite its “rocky start,” it continues to improve every year, now with 97 schools participating. But the eight schools that still refuse to participate need to do so, the report urges.
OneApp continues to be a much-debated feature of the reform, and a system that critics say is confusing and lacks transparency and equity.
Only 54 percent of families were assigned their top choice for a school in the last round of the OneApp (for the 2014-2015 school year).
The report also directs the OPSB and RSD to collaborate on establishing a “Strategic Planning Policy” that will determine the type and number of schools needed citywide, and for the OPSB to create formal policy on tax and bonds, and a fund balance reserve policy.
The report reminds of the importance of an engaged citizenry, stating that “we will not see transformational change without persistent public engagement support.”
“Forward New Orleans for Public Schools came together to call on the Orleans Parish School Board to use its authority and resources to enhance the likelihood of success for all public school students both now and in the future,” said Paul H. Flower, chairman of the Business Council of New Orleans and River Region.
This article originally published in the June 8, 2015 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
