Next week, the school board of the LA Unified School District will be voting on one of the most transformative proposals to ever come before it. The Public School Choice Resolution, authored by Yolie Flores-Aguilar, would allow outside operators- community non-profits, charter operators, and others- to submit proposals to run LAUSD schools. The competition between outside organizations and the District would ensure that every community got the best possible school, and incentivize the District to finally learn how to run great schools. Open for proposals would be the 50 new schools currently being built by the District, as well as existing schools which have already been designated by the Federal Government as failing.
This resolution has been endorsed by the LA Times, the Daily News, and LA Opinion, along with dozens of community leaders and organizations. It has the potential to harness proven and successful school models, and bring badly needed innovation to the 700,000 student LAUSD system. Unfortunately, many entrenched interests who benefit financially from the status quo have been fighting tooth and nail to stop this resolution.
The Parent Revolution has been working overtime to pass the Public Choice Resolution, because we believe in a simple but apparently revolutionary concept: Every decision about our schools should start and end with what is best for kids. Period. For too long, special interests and a huge bureaucracy have designed a school system that works for them. This resolution represents an historic opportunity to design a system that works for us, the parents of Los Angeles.
Unfortunately, our opponents have tried to devolve this crucial debate into a contest over who can scream loudest. We refuse to go down that path. Last Thursday, the LA Times criticized us for refusing to admit UTLA protestors into one of our events — who had the night before shut down another community meeting about the resolution. We firmly believe that we can win the debate over this resolution in the marketplace of ideas. What we will not allow, however, is for that marketplace to be shut down altogether by organized special interests shouting down opposing viewpoints. You can read our entire response to the editorial here .
It’s crucial that parents have the ability to participate in an open and honest debate about their children’s education. We appreciate the LA Times calling for a transparent and open dialogue. We also call on them to give an accurate reporting of how these protests and disruptions are being conducted, and hold both sides accountable for their actions. And we extend an open hand to UTLA and anyone else who opposes this change for our schools to meet us any place, any time for an open and honest debate. All who commit to civil and respectful dialogue are always welcome.
We are all living in a potentially revolutionary moment, where together we get to drag our government into the 21st Century and make it responsive to the people again. These are exciting, but also sometime frightening times. Change is not easy. Whether we’re talking about education reform, healthcare reform or some other type of revolutionary change – we owe it to each other to take a deep breath, turn down the volume, and just listen to each other.