Description: education reform in the nation's capital
A few days ago Alex Koma of the Washington City Paper had a detailed article published regarding charter schools in the nation’s capital and their request for increased funding to match the newly ratified teachers’ union contract. The agreement, which the D.C. Council approved yesterday , provides a total of a 12 percent raise in teacher salaries that goes back retroactively three years to the start of contract negotiations. The D.C. Line’s Chris Kain pointed out that the new labor agreement ends on Septemb
“’To ask public charter school leaders and teachers to continue serving students well with significantly fewer resources than DCPS exacerbates the inequity between the sectors and our most under-resourced students and their peers,’ Ariel Johnson, executive director of the DC Charter School Alliance , writes in a Dec. 19 letter to Mayor Muriel Bowser and the Council. Sixty of D.C.’s 68 charter school operators signed onto the letter.”
However, there is a major problem with the tone of the letter sent to Ms. Bowser. The Charter Alliance, while pointing out that the traditional schools are receiving $38.7 million more than the charters in the 2023 budget, or $800 more per student, fails to stress that equivalent funding for both education sectors is the law under the 1995 School Reform Act .