Q AND A WITH MORGAN, CRITICS
State Rep. Alisha T. Morgan, D-Austell, is contemplating a run for state schools superintendent. In an interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Morgan laid out her positions on a couple of important education topics.
On Common Core, the set of national education standards some have criticized as a federal intrusion into state control over k-12 education:
“I am a supporter of Common Core. I am a supporter of rigorous standards. I believe if we’re going to make sure all of our students are college or career ready, we have to have high standards. These standards were adopted by states.”
On whether Georgia should have a merit pay component to the new teacher evaluation system, as was promised in the state’s successful Race to the Top federal grant application (note: the U.S. Department of Education has threatened to withhold a $10 million portion of that $400 million grant because Georgia has not included a merit pay component to the teacher evaluation system it is developing):
“At the end of the day, this is about accountability. What you say you need to do in an application is what you need to do. It wasn’t just an application. It was a commitment to children. I would never want to be in the position of losing millions of dollars because we don’t do what we said we’d do.”
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Morgan’s possible candidacy has already drawn opposition from the Georgia Federation of Teachers, whose president, Verdaillia Turner, laid out her views on the state representative.
The AJC: Do you think Rep. Morgan would be an effective superintendent? Why or why not?
Turner: Georgia needs a state superintendent who serves children and parents, not special moneyed interests. Representative Morgan is not that person. She has used her position as an elected official to push legislation that serves special interests, rather than children and public schools. In doing so, she has been party to draining vital resources from our public schools — schools that serve every child who walks through their door.
The AJC: From what you've heard, would teachers support her candidacy? Why or why not?
Turner: Teachers cannot and will not support someone who works against the best interest of public schools. Those who work closest with children know what they need. They are not fooled by slick talk and misplaced priorities. They saw how the funding cuts that result from Representative Morgan's policies impact our most vulnerable students.
The AJC: Rep. Morgan supported the charter schools amendment, which was approved by voters. Why does that not suggest that voters agree with her support for school choice?
Turner: The charter school amendment did not sail through the General Assembly easily. In the end, the amendment passed because it was slick politics, not sound policy. It took a lot of arm-twisting and outside money to impose this bad policy on the people of Georgia. The language on the ballot was misleading — probably intentionally so. Poll after poll shows that parents and the general public support fixing and funding our neighborhood schools rather than closing them and replacing them with charter schools. Georgia is no exception.
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State Sen. Vincent Fort, D-Atlanta, also had strong views on Morgan, saying: “The concern that I have is that on issues of supporting teachers, supporting public schools, I don’t think she’s been supportive of either. She’s been involved with the right wing on charter schools. We don’t need ‘Republican light’ in a Democratic primary. I have spoken to other legislators who have the same point of view I have. But some legislators have a tough time speaking out against a colleague. I just think that on something that’s so important, I have to speak out.”
For her part, Morgan said she has demonstrated an ability to work with Republicans but, if she ran, she’d run as a Democrat. She said she has a long track record of support for public schools, including charter schools, and hopes education groups would be supportive if she ran for superintendent.
Georgia Rep. Alisha Thomas Morgan’s possible run for state schools superintendent is bringing to the surface the complicated relationship she has with fellow members of Georgia’s Legislative Black Caucus.
Morgan, a Democrat from Austell who hosted a teacher appreciation day at the Capitol on Thursday, said she has not made up her mind about a run for superintendent in November 2014.
But her possible candidacy has already brought out fiery opposition from state Sen. Vincent Fort, D-Atlanta, who said Morgan should not be elected to oversee the state’s public school system because she is an advocate of charter schools.
“On issues of supporting teachers, supporting public schools, I don’t think she’s been supportive of either,” Fort said. “She’s been involved with the right wing on charter schools. I find it surprising that someone with that kind of record would be having a teacher appreciation day.”
Among some black caucus members at the Capitol, eyes occasionally roll and heads sometimes shake when Morgan speaks up for charter schools as important alternatives for students trapped in struggling traditional public schools.
Morgan has argued that many of those students are black, making her advocacy of options for them something of a civil rights issue.
Some black legislators, however, say the push for charter schools is really about sapping funding from and publicly vilifying traditional public schools. They argue that Republicans are simply using black students in struggling schools — with Morgan’s willing or unwitting acquiescence — as props in their quest to put for-profit charter management companies in charge of public schools.
Morgan, first elected to the state House of Representatives in 2002, has a relatively high profile in the Legislature, a noteworthy fact given that her party is in the minority.
Her profile — and the ire of fellow Democrats like Fort — has been raised by her public support for charters.
Despite the deep rift between Morgan and many black legislators on school choice, most of her caucus colleagues are loath to speak out publicly against one of their own.
Fort, however, didn’t hold back when Morgan asked fellow lawmakers to join her in celebrating the sacrifices and successes of teachers.
“I can not in good conscious ‘help’ you to thank teachers when you have, through your support of charter school and voucher legislation, worked to diminish the rights of teachers,” Fort wrote in an e-mail to Morgan and fellow black caucus members last week. “I think as legislators we would do better by teachers if we did less symbolism and more of a concrete nature by voting … in the best interests of teachers. Your collaboration with right-wing groups that attack teachers rather than cooperate with them is not something I agree with.”
Fort’s opposition to Morgan’s possible candidacy was quickly joined by Verdaillia Turner, president of the Georgia Federation of Teachers.
“Teachers cannot and will not support someone who works against the best interest of public schools,” Turner said.
Last year, during the contentious debate over whether the state constitution should be amended to clarify the state’s authority to create charter schools, many Democrats in elected office campaigned against the change. They argued that passage of the amendment would open the door to a dual public school system, one of charters governed by unelected, for-profit management firms and one governed by elected school board members. They also said passage of the amendment — which they argued was written in a deliberately misleading way — would diminish the authority of local school board members.
Republicans took the opposite stand, saying charter schools provide an alternative to parents in struggling traditional public schools. In press conferences and in other comments, they had strong criticism of the state’s public school system as bloated, ineffective and resistant to change.
Morgan bucked her party and backed the amendment, offering up her own tough assessment of the state’s public schools.
The amendment was passed with 58 percent of the vote.
“My connection to the charter amendment speaks to my connection to parents,” Morgan said.
Turner, however, sees it differently.
“In the end, the amendment passed because it was slick politics, not sound policy,” she said. “It took a lot of arm-twisting and outside money to impose this bad policy on the people of Georgia.”
When told of Turner’s and Fort’s comments, Morgan said simply, “I don’t focus on negativity.”
As for questions about her motive in hosting Thursday’s teacher appreciation day, Morgan said she cares deeply about public education and sought the event not as a political gambit but as a thank you to teachers.
“I wanted to do something in May, but that was the end of the school year and it was a busy time for teachers,” Morgan said. “This all came about because teachers are under pressure in our state. We are pushing Common Core. We are putting together a new teacher evaluation system. We need to do something. We need to say thank you.”
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