There was a tone of realism at Monday's P12 Education Task Force of Northwest Alabama meeting.
Its 27 members, consisting of current and retired educators from Franklin, Colbert and Lauderdale counties, understand that charter schools are coming soon to Alabama.
Senate Bill 54, Alabama's School Choice & Student Opportunity Act, was expected to clear the Senate by today. Passage through the House, also likely, could come this week, meaning the legislation could find its way to Gov. Robert Bentley's desk by week's end.
With that realization in mind, task force members asked the three legislators in attendance Monday evening to do their part to keep integrity in the process of enacting what will likely be the year's most controversial legislation.
“We realize it's going to pass, but please be transparent and tell us what it's all about," task force co-facilitator Sherrie Perkins said. "Even today, changes were being made to the proposed bill, and that makes us feel like the charter school bill will be similarly handled to the way the Alabama Accountability Act was handled, and we really don't want that."
Perkins' reference was to the 2013 passage of the ACA, originally an eight-page bill that, after a closed-door conference committee meeting, swelled to a 24-page bill passed minutes later.
Task force members discussed and decided on the three most pressing educational issues facing Alabama this year. Charter schools topped the list, followed by repealing college- and career-ready standards and maintaining preschool funding. An outline of these issues and concerns was to be presented to the six-member legislative delegation representing the three counties. Rep. Johnny Mack Morrow (D-Red Bay), Rep. Marcel Black (D-Tuscumbia) and Sen. Tim Melson (R-Florence) attended Monday's meeting.
Melson became the first Republican to directly interact with the task force, which was formed in November as Morrow's idea.
“We're definitely encouraged about seeing Sen. Melson tonight," Perkins said. "He had some comments about what was being discussed. We had an open-floor discussion about what we believe to be our three most important issues, and we appreciated him and Reps. Morrow and Black attending."
With strong support from the Republican-controlled legislature, the School Choice & Student Opportunity Act seems only days away from becoming part of Alabama law.
Opposition has been vocal from several educational associations and Democratic leaders, who anticipate public backlash once Alabamians learn how the new law will work.
“This one piece of legislation may very well set Alabama education back 50 years,” Morrow said. “The harm and damage to our educational system will go well beyond what we ever anticipated with the Accountability Act.”
Alabama Democratic Party chairwoman Nancy Worley took her attack of charter schools a step further.
“Charter schools are hotbeds for corruption," she said in a press release last week. "In Pennsylvania alone, charter schools have defrauded the taxpayers of more than $30 million dollars, while researchers at the Center for Popular Democracy and Integrity in Education found more than $100 million in fraud, waste and abuse in the 15 states they analyzed.
“Charter schools are not the answer. And if they did work, why not just apply what works to existing public schools? Why create a whole new publicly funded school system when they don't even properly fund the existing system?"
The proposed legislation calls for creation of Alabama public charter schools, which must meet listed criteria including autonomy over finance, personnel, scheduling and curriculum; being operated by an independent 501(c)(3) governing board; being a school where parents choose to send their children; and being operated under a contract between the governing board and its authorizer.
Charter school teachers would not be subject to state certification requirements under the proposed law. Additionally, even if a local school board opposes creation of a charter school, a politically appointed committee may overrule that local decision.
“Essentially, a group could get together and purchase an old Walmart building and create a charter school with the benefit of public funding, with little or no oversight in place,” Morrow said. “That is absolutely wrong and something I will never support.”
