蜜桃影视

Education in California has been one battle after another. While recent legislative maneuvers聽 to limit charter schools in the nation鈥檚 largest state, the legislative fight continues. This war scapegoats charter schools for districts鈥� budgetary issues and completely ignores charters鈥� proven ability to improve student outcomes. And it鈥檚 not the one policymakers should be fighting.

One Democrat-backed bill still active , giving school districts the ability to block new charter schools from opening in their backyard. And聽 about the impact charter schools have on school districts, like losing students from traditional district schools 鈥� and thus public funding 鈥� to charter schools.

Ensuring that school districts can adapt to the realities of enrollment loss is a worthy state concern, but these bills obscure the fundamental problems at the root of districts鈥� fiscal distress.

Public education in California and many other states is聽.听 补苍诲听 are spiraling. Students have more complex and expensive needs. This year鈥檚聽, as well as聽 for children of color, non-native English speakers 补苍诲听, are all symptoms of the same problem. Charter schools are not the reason district budgets are collapsing.

By focusing on charter schools, our political leaders, especially Democrats, have bought a line promoted by special interests 鈥� like teachers unions 鈥� that pits one set of public institutions responsible for educating students (charter schools) against another (school districts). This only reinforces long-standing local adult turf issues of 鈥渄istrict schools versus charter schools,鈥� even though charter schools are public schools. It also delays needed reckoning with what students 鈥� all students 鈥� need to get a high-quality education.

This same false-dichotomy logic has now entered the national presidential debate. Assuring high-quality education for every student is why public education exists, something Democrats have historically believed.

In a bizarre twist of logic, Bernie Sanders celebrated the anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education decision by promising to give black and brown students access to better public education, and the same day proposed a moratorium on聽 鈥� institutions that聽.

Clearly there are political reasons for this sudden rise in anti-charter rhetoric from the left. Democrats in state legislatures, presidential primaries and beyond are working to distance themselves from the polarizing policies of President Donald Trump and Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, both of whom have聽.

But their party remains split along racial and ethnic lines.听 that black and Hispanic Democrats tend to support charter schools. These are voters for whom public education as a shared goal has often come up short. It makes sense that they would welcome new institutions that do a better job advancing that goal.

White members of the party, however, remain more likely to oppose charter schools. Many do so for one of the reasons Sanders does: because, they claim, charter schools have 鈥渄rained funding鈥� from school districts.

, where, like Sanders, some educators and advocates blame charter schools for district financial problems. Tax money follows students into their public schools 鈥� district or charter 鈥� so a district loses money when a student leaves to go to a charter school. That鈥檚 because the district is no longer educating that child. The same thing happens when students move to a neighboring district.

Data do not support the next leap in logic that charter critics often take. Our researchers found no evidence that charter enrollment increases the likelihood school districts will enter financial distress. found that financial stress stems from mismanagement, rising pension and health care costs and unaffordable spending commitments.

颁补濒颈蹿辞谤苍颈补听 with more than 1 in 4 students attending charter schools than any other state in the country. Yet as charters have grown, the number of districts in financial distress hasn鈥檛 risen. Indeed, most of the districts with financial trouble are home to few charter schools. On average, charter schools enroll聽, according to California school officials.

While the financial health of school districts matters, this debate needs a new frame. Charter schools, like school districts, are public agencies that support the broader goal of ensuring that every student is educated. In Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area, they聽. Pitting these institutions against each other doesn鈥檛 just distract from these shared challenges. It lets elected officials off the hook for bigger questions about how public education is structured.

Confronting those problems will require transforming that system. This can include transformation from within. Across the country, district leaders are and give educators more control over their schools, as Los Angeles Superintendent Austin Beutner has proposed. But it will also require new institutions 鈥� charter or otherwise 鈥� that emerge outside the existing system and rethink education in a more fundamental way.

Our public education system needs a that gives educators more say in decision-making at their schools. It needs a new approach to high school that helps students gain college credits, explore career opportunities and gain job skills, without sorting them into tracks. It needs new approaches to special education and social-emotional learning that values all students as individuals and flexes to meet their needs. Public education needs to lower the barriers between schools and communities. And it needs funding and budgeting systems that support those aims without trapping schools under burdensome debt and retirement obligations they can鈥檛 afford.

The fight between school districts and charter schools is the wrong battle. Our students need political leaders willing to focus on the right one.

Robin Lake is director of the Center on Reinventing Public Education at the University of Washington Bothell. You can find her on Twitter .

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