I say an appointed commission shouldn’t have the authority to reverse the decision of a democratically elected school board, and so do 10 of 13 Illinois state representatives on the House Elementary and Secondary Education Committee who voted today in favor of a bill that deletes every single occurrence of the Illinois State Charter School Commission from the Illinois School Code.
Linda Chapa LaVia
The commission is an appointed board that has the power to reverse the decision of local school boards when they deny a charter school, such as last year’s denial by 18 districts of a proposed virtual charter school, which was to be run by Virginia-based K12 Inc. The fact that an appointed commission could overturn a school board’s decision prompted state Rep Linda Chapa LaVia, Democrat of Aurora, to propose HB 3754 in November. Several sponsors have since signed on.
The bill, if it becomes law, would take a Pink Pearl to the Illinois School Code, completely erasing the commission from Illinois law.
Based on the list of people who testified in favor of the bill at the hearing this morning, school districts, teachers, and private citizens stand in favor of dissolving the commission, whereas charter school companies and entrepreneurs are more likely to oppose the legislation.
The Caucus of Rank-and-file Educators, based in Chicago, is asking people to sign a petition in support of HB 3754. The organization writes:
This arrangement (where the commission can reverse a decision by a board of education) tramples upon local control and the very democratic process that this country was founded on. It should alarm Illinois citizens and school board members that the current commission Chairman, Greg Richmond, is also president and CEO of the National Association of Charter School Authorizers and wrote the national-level model legislation for ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council. In his position paper, Richmond states clearly that a statewide commission is the best way to “overcome the roadblocks to greater school choice put up by school districts,” ignoring the possibility that a local school board may have very good reasons to reject a particular charter school, which may not be a good fit for that district or may be shown to be more interested in profit than educating children. Charter schools should not be forced on any district.
Next stop …
The next stop for the bill is a vote in the full House. No word yet on when that might happen.
The virtual charter school denial in 18 school districts in the Fox River Valley led Ms Chapa LaVia to draft legislation last year, which passed easily, putting a one-year moratorium on the creation of virtual charter schools in Illinois.
That law also directed the commission to report on virtual, or online-only, schools. Illinois law, however, strictly prohibits “home-based” charter schools. This makes virtual charter schools like the one K12 proposed, where caregivers stay home with students during the day, illegal. Last month, the commission asked that the moratorium be extended so it could have more time—until December 2016—to study the law.
“Some may call this a moratorium to prevent virtual schools from opening but they’d be wrong,” Mr Richmond was quoted as saying in a news release. “The purpose is to get the right policies in place, however complex they may be.”
One of those policies would have to be getting rid of that pesky “no home-based charter schools” rule that’s now a part of the Illinois Compiled Statutes.
But as we have also pointed out, virtual schools “provide an opportunity for some children to receive a quality education that they may not otherwise receive,” the preliminary report concluded. It also acknowledged the number of such students “may be relatively small.”
With a 10-3 vote in committee, HB 3754 seems destined to pass the House and send the message that local boards of education are the best people to decide whether a charter school, virtual or brick-and-mortar, will serve students in a district well.
Other challenges remain, however. Gov Pat Quinn might refuse to sign the bill into law, as he has named Paul Vallas as his running mate in November’s gubernatorial election. Current charter school law in Illinois, including the existence of an omnipotent commission like the ISCSC, is right up Mr Vallas’s alley.
