[CharterSchools] Send Today to a Legislator You Know!

[charterschools at LACharter.org]

Charters work, so defend them

By Rolfe McCollister, Baton Rouge Business Report

Monday, April 19, 2010

Why do some resist what works? Why deny parents and children a choice in 
education? What are the teachers unions and other defenders of the status quo 
afraid of?

In Proverbs 26:11, it says, “As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool 
returneth to his folly.” That’s what I was reminded of when I read the 
Times-Picayune’s report of a BESE meeting held in New Orleans recently. Some of the 
comments quoted, which I’ve reproduced below, exhibit an opposition to 
charters—and to change—as well as an ignorance of the opportunity they provide 
children who were trapped in a failing and bankrupt New Orleans public 
system pre-Katrina.

• “Charters don’t want anything to do with our children. They’re sending 
them away,” said Brenda Valteau, who identified herself as a 1961 graduate 
of George Washington Carver High School. “We’re losing our young people to 
the streets. It sounds like a conspiracy to me.”

• “I urge you to hear the voice of the community. I’m saying to you, it’s 
time to bring our schools back home,” said Orleans Parish School Board 
member Ira Thomas.

Now consider an extended excerpt of a letter written to me by a former 
student at the Children’s Charter School in Baton Rouge, who is now at Harvard, 
on what the charter school meant to him:

Dear Mr. McCollister,

My family’s decision to put my brother and me in CCS was probably the best 
decision they have ever made regarding the two of us. CCS provided us the 
support, attention, and confidence to succeed academically, and the long hours 
we spent at school, the arts and crafts programs, partnerships with the 
Boys and Girls Club, the building of the basketball court, all contributed to 
my drive to do well in school. Not to toot my own horn, but when I left CCS 
in 3rd grade for Richmond, Virginia, I was the best student in my fourth 
grade class, student of the year in fifth grade, valedictorian of my middle 
school class [in New Jersey], and salutatorian in high school. I have always 
been one of one or two black students in a class, but the confidence I gained 
at CCS allowed me to blossom in what could have been an otherwise difficult, 
homogenously middle-class white environment.

Attached is one of my college essays that gained me admittance to Stanford, 
Yale, MIT and Harvard. In short, I am forever thankful to you, Jim, Mrs. 
West, Mrs. Bell, Mrs. Teepell and the rest of the board of directors, teachers 
and staff of CCS.

Luke [his brother] is still awaiting word from the Institute of Politics 
Internship Program in Washington, D.C. He is extremely excited about the 
prospect of working with Senator Landrieu, but also won a spot to study in Kyoto, 
Japan, this summer, as well as represent Harvard University as a delegate 
for a three-week workshop on global sustainability in Tokyo, Japan. In short, 
he’s going to have some tough choices to make. I do breast cancer research 
at Mass General Hospital, but I am very active in mentoring local inner city 
youth—just today, I spoke to a group of 9th and 10th graders about the 
importance of getting a college education, and dispelled notions that college is 
expensive and unattainable. I am also in talks with the Dana Farber Cancer 
Institute about doing more outreach in inner city Boston to get young high 
school students interested in doing cancer research at the Harvard Medical 
School-affiliated hospitals.

Keep fighting the good fight.

Best,

Paul Yarabe, Harvard College Class of 2013

Now, after reading this letter, would any sane individual follow the advice 
of the two New Orleans women given above—or any other status-quo lovin’, 
charter-hatin’ individual who doesn’t give a damn about children getting a 
choice or a chance? And that includes legislators and superintendents.

A potential irony here is that if Ms. Valteau or Ms. Thomas, or one of 
their daughters, is one day a victim of breast cancer, it could be the research 
of Paul Yarabe, a charter student, that saves her life. Thank God Paul had a 
choice.

Charters and school choice are under attack this legislative session at the 
Capitol and at the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education. Gov. Bobby 
Jindal, the Legislature and BESE must continue to defend and expand that 
option for all children in our state.






cheron brylski
the brylski company
3418 coliseum street
new orleans, louisiana 70115
(504) 897-6110
FX (504) 897-0778
cell (504) 460-1468
www.brylskicompany.com
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://nine.pairlist.net/pipermail/charterschools/attachments/20100422/b6b2c1a8/attachment.html>