Monday, September 24, 2012
The State Superintendent speaks about why the charter schools amendment is a bad idea for public education in Georgia. His full remarks are attached to this article.
- GOVERNMENT
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Monday, September 24, 2012
This was part of a press release issued last month. In it, Dr. Barge says: I fully support the continued creation of high quality charter schools for Georgia’s students, but after careful consideration of what is best for all of Georgia’s students, I have decided to take a position in opposition to the constitutional amendment that will be on the Nov. 6 ballot. Until all of our public school students are in school for a full 180-day school year, until essential services like student transportation and student support can return to effective levels, and until teachers regain jobs with full pay for a full school year, we should not redirect one more dollar away from Georgia’s local school districts – much less an additional $430 …
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
There are strong opinions on both sides of the Charter School debate. This is the opinion of seven former members of the Georgia Charter School Commission.
- OPINION
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Wednesday, September 19, 2012
What is best for Georgia students? That is the question that should always be front and center when discussing education reform. One-third of Georgia students do not graduate from high school, so our education system clearly needs to be improved—for the benefit of our children, our families, our communities, and our economic future. Too often debates about education reform are centered on money and power. We wish to re-focus the debate toward what is best for students. On November 6, Georgians will vote on a constitutional amendment that would allow parents and other community members to start public charter schools—and to have the decision whether to allow these schools to open made by an independent and neutral observer. Charter …
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
It "has major concerns with the ... impact it will have on Georgia’s 1.67 million public school students," according to a statement from the group.
- ELECTIONS
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Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Under pressure from its national organization to rescind its opposition to a controversial amendment that could restore the state's authority to approve and fund charter schools, the Georgia Parent Teacher Association reaffirmed its stance. "We cannot support this constitutional amendment which will create an inequity in funding, siphon funds from local public schools where the great majority of the students in Georgia receive their education and deny parents meaningful engagement," the group said in a statement released late Friday. "Georgia PTA strongly opposes this constitutional amendment." In July, the state chapter made its position clear: Vote no when you go to the polls in November. While the Georgia PTA supports charter schools …
Monday, August 13, 2012
Advocacy group is composed of educators, parents, students and community members focused on improving public education.
Matt Jones is a public school teacher from Vidalia, Georgia. He is a co-founder of EmpowerED Georgia. He spoke with Athens Patch recently about his organization and some of the challenges facing public education in Georgia today. What is EmpowerED Georgia? An education advocacy group. It’s made up of 3,500 students, parents, educators and concerned citizens across the state. What does it do? Three things. Inform—we saw there was a big gap in education coverage in the media. Education issues are complex. The public is given catch phrases, but no one is explaining or discussing the difficult issues. These are in-depth issues, and we didn’t see that coverage happening anywhere else. So we decided to do it. We want to give people as much …
Rebecca McCarthy
10:37 am on Monday, September 24, 2012
Thanks, Leon. After reading all the materials Dr. Barge supplied, I am puzzled as to why anyone would vote for this amendment. It won't help improve public education. more ›