Tuesday, April 12, 2005
6 ideas to save Blue Ridge Technical Academy
From the RoundTable blog
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When the besieged parents at Blue Ridge Technical Academy Charter School recently appealed for help to Gov. Mark Warner to stop the closing of that school, his secretary of education threw up her hands and basically said, "It's not my job."
Technically, that's true. Charter schools are the domain of local school boards.
But genuine leadership by the education secretary would have the state step in and offer some concrete suggestions and guidance to the Roanoke public schools. At least this might ensure future charter schools actually are able to operate the way charter schools were intended - as incubators of educational innovation, free from cumbersome educratic regulations that break the mold of the "one-size-fits-all" world of education.
Warner has made much of his support for charter schools, but nearly half of Virginia's charters will have collapsed on his watch - mostly after federal funding ran out. He needs to step up to the plate and take a leadership role in providing charter schools the support that is lacking today.
So herewith a six-pack of ideas - for Blue Ridge Technical Academy, the Roanoke public school system, parents and the governor. They may not ensure the survival of BRTA, but they may help prevent another successful school from being pulled out from under the kids it's supposed to serve:
• Offer truth in budgeting: The school system told the school board that the "instructional" cost of educating a student at their regular high schools was $4,000, compared to more than $8,000 at BRTA. But in 2003, the school system told the state that its "instructional costs" (just instruction - not busing, administration or maintenance) was about $6,200 per pupil.
It can't be both ways. Either the numbers given the school board are misleading, or the numbers given the state are misleading. The local school board can't be expected to make an informed decision without budget transparency.
• Compare apples and apples: In providing the school board with the cost of operating BRTA, school system staff lumped in $77,356 for building maintenance and operations and called it part of the instructional costs. But in calculating the "instructional costs" for regular high school kids, the school system ignored building maintenance and operations (a cost that exceeds $800 per pupil, according to what Roanoke reports to the state). It's tough to know how much the money gap really is when costs can't be compared accurately.
• Look for waivers: Charter schools have the right to negotiate waivers to certain regulations, even though no charter in Virginia has ever done so. When BRTA added ninth grade, it added physical education classes - even though a 1999 List of Waivable Regulations appears to list physical education as among the items that could be waived. Savings: $50,000.
One idea might be for the school board to direct the staff (and a committee of parents) to review additional waivers that could save BRTA money: Given the choice between losing gym class or losing their school, odds are that parents and students would choose to keep the school.
• Put parents in charge: Virginia law requires a charter school to be "administered and managed by a management committee, composed of parents of students enrolled in the school, teachers and administrators working in the school, and representatives of any community sponsors."
In reality, BRTA has been run like any other Roanoke city school. Until this year, there was not even a parent organization or student government - both important mechanisms encouraging a sense of ownership. Giving parents, teachers and community leaders greater influence in the school would build important social capital and likely lead to more students at the school (thus lowering per-pupil costs).
• Let the state board review: Legislation last year created the option of a State Board of Education review of new charter applications for feasibility, curriculum, financial soundness and other criteria the state board might establish.
With his appointment of nationally recognized charter school expert Andrew Rotherham to the state board, Warner should ask Rotherham to head a review of BRTA's original charter application and renewals, with an eye toward recommending changes that might enable to school to survive. It certainly couldn't hurt, and it might just save the school.
• Pick up the phone: It can sometimes be dangerous to create precedent, and this idea runs the risk of doing so: But with his reputation as an education innovator on the line, Mark Warner certainly has the capability of helping to raise private funds for the school, starting with the $7 million Collis/Warner Foundation on whose board he sits.
Businessman Warner might consider creating a matching grant fund to give struggling parents a chance to energize the local community.
Time is running out on the Blue Ridge Technical Academy. Aren't these six ideas worth a shot?
Chris Braunlich is a former member of the Fairfax County School Board and vice president of the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy, a nonpartisan public policy foundation in Virginia.
