Do you trust state to take over failing schools and turn them around?

As explained on the Louisiana Department of Education website:

The Recovery School District is a special school district run by the Louisiana Department of Education that intervenes in the management of chronically low-performing schools. The Recovery School District has 80 schools, including direct-run schools and charter schools, and has agreements with school districts for managing schools that are eligible to be moved into the Recovery School District. The turnaround model is designed to support autonomy, flexibility and innovation. 

A school is eligible for RSD intervention after 4 consecutive years of failing to reach the academic standards set forth by the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE). Entering into the RSD is just a stepping stone, not a permanent solution. It is an opportunity to reimagine and reinvent the school by implementing a new approach that works best for the students.

Credit: Maureen Downey

Credit: Maureen Downey

The RSD works to identify the barriers to why the school did not reach its goals and creates a clear solution for transforming the school. No two schools or solutions are the same, so the RSD works to come up with the best way to run the school. Whether it is direct-run by the RSD, chartered by a high-quality charter organiza tion or if the school district enters into a shared success agreement, the RSD knows that schools are powered by the people. Everyone must work together in the best interest of the students, ensuring them a clear path to college and careers.

It’s not clear how Recovery School Districts would work in Georgia, where many of the lowest performing schools are in rural areas.

In a report on the effectiveness of Recovery School Districts, the Center on Reinventing Public Education said: "RSD actions are more credible and politically sustainable when focused on a large metropolitan area with large numbers of low-performing schools. This critical mass helps the state attract talented people to run the RSD and the schools, build independent organizations to run charter schools, recruit teachers and principals, and encourage development of a nonprofit support infrastructure for new schools. Taking over small numbers of schools in rural or small urban areas is difficult and risky unless highly talented people can be attracted to those areas. Compared to prominent metropolitan areas, more isolated localities do not offer the personnel networks or support infrastructures that can sustain and provide political cover for reformers. Acting in many areas of the state at once compounds the political risks, since opponents find it easier to form coalitions in the legislature."

According to Bluestein’s story:

Gov. Nathan Deal said Wednesday that he wants lawmakers to study a plan for a statewide school district that could significantly increase the number of charter schools in Georgia.

Deal said legislators should consider a system, known in Louisiana as a Recovery School District, that gives the state more powers to take over struggling schools and convert them to charters. The remarks came at an event with Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, whose state pioneered the program.

“We are faced with some of the similar situations that Louisiana is faced with,” Deal said. “We’re continuing to put money into school systems that continue to fail. That is not the end result that we want.”

The Republican is locked in a fierce re-election battle against Democrat Jason Carter, who relentlessly accuses the governor of failing to fully fund the state’s public education system. The governor has cast an expansion of charter schools as a more cost-effective way to improve schools.

Louisiana voters passed a constitutional amendment in 2003 that created the state-run Recovery School District, but the policy really took root after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast. Nine years later, Jindal said, more than 90 percent of students in New Orleans are now in charter schools.

“There are too many kids in America who are trapped in failing schools,” said Jindal, a Republican who was in town to boost Deal’s campaign. “And charter schools are simply one more way to give those parents and children another option.”

Under the Louisiana system, the state can intervene in schools deemed “academically unacceptable” for four consecutive years. Those that receive charters receive state funding without being tied to requirements of local school boards. Those that fail to improve or meet standards would lose their charter.

Deal spokesman Brian Robinson said the governor isn’t tied to any specific proposal, but that he wants legislators to study the Louisiana plan as a way to boost failing schools.