Does the Opportunity School District ignore local control?
No, says attorney and former Atlanta lawmaker Edward Lindsey. A former five-term state legislator and three-term Georgia House Majority Whip, Lindsey chaired Families for Better Public Schools, Inc. which successfully campaigned for the passage of the state constitutional amendment creating a State Charter School Commission.
Writing in the AJC Get Schooled blog, Lindsey says the OSD amendment, which is on the Nov. 8 ballot, also deserves passage. He maintains the OSD is not an attack on local control of schools.
“The Georgia constitution rightly places general responsibility over education in the hands of local school boards but also mandates: an adequate public education for the citizens shall be a primary obligation of the State of Georgia,” writes Lindsey.
“First, it is difficult to see how assisting students trapped in the lowest performing public schools — capped at less than 6 percent of the total number of public schools in Georgia — ‘destroys’ local control. This proposal merely creates a safety valve to assist the most vulnerable students in Georgia,” he says. “Second, local control should never amount to exclusive control.”
To read more of Lindsey's defense of the OSD, go to the Get Schooled blog.
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