Gov. Nathan Deal wants to give the state broad new powers to take over failing schools, embarking on a stark shift away from current policy that largely leaves the challenge of reviving Georgia’s worst schools to local districts.
Deal will urge lawmakers to pass a constitutional amendment during the legislative session that begins Monday to give the state the authority to shutter failing schools, run them directly or convert them to charters. The proposal would create an “opportunity school district” with its own superintendent and oversight authority.
“Money alone will not solve the problem, and more money won’t solve the problem either,” Deal told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in an exclusive interview. “Some of these schools will require drastic overhauls with new options afforded to those children and their families.”
The Republican will need bipartisan support for his proposal, which requires a two-thirds majority of votes in both chambers. That means Democrats, who already figure to play a key role in a debate over transportation funding, would play a pivotal role in another signature debate.
“We hope that we will have support across party lines because I can’t imagine any member of the General Assembly wanting to condemn any constituents and their children to failing schools,” Deal said. “We understand that this will require a lot of effort, and we’re prepared to devote that effort to this initiative.”
It also means putting another Deal campaign pledge on the back burner for a year. Deal said he will assign a committee, which he expects to name this week, to spend the next months reviewing changes to Georgia’s education funding formula. The governor campaigned with a vow to overhaul the 1985 law that established the formula, which he casts as outdated.
“Because of time constraints, I did not feel it was appropriate to rush into that and try to present something in this legislative session,” said Deal, who said he expects lawmakers to take up that debate in 2016.
Signs of improvement
Three other states — Louisiana, Michigan and Tennessee — have launched similar districts designed to revamp the most troubled schools. Experts say it’s too soonto tell whether the Michigan and Tennessee models are successful, but there are signs of improvement in Louisiana, which established its program in 2003.
Critics, however, say the benefits are overblown and fear it could bring a new layer of bureaucracy to school administration. Others say a host of changes adopted in the past decade are starting to pay dividends. Even incoming state Superintendent Richard Woods, a Republican, has cautioned that more time is needed to assess policies already in place.
The governor and his aides say they’ve waited long enough, and they sense the timing is right coming on the heels of a convincing re-election victory. Many of the specifics of Deal’s proposed constitutional amendment have yet to be hammered out, but the governor’s aides provided details of how they envision it working.
A school would be eligible for state takeover if it is labeled as “failing” for three years based on metrics that include test scores, improvement of lowest-performing students and graduation rates. The governor’s administration would hire a superintendent to oversee the newly created opportunity school district and decide the next step for each school.
Schools that have restabilized while under state supervision could exit the program after five years, though the details of that transition process have yet to be worked out.
Deal’s aides estimate that roughly 11 percent of Georgia’s schools are failing. Erin Hames, Deal’s chief policy deputy, said the state would only intervene in a small fraction of them.
“We would try to be very strategic and thoughtful about what schools we actually intervene in,” Hames said. “We’ll look for certain opportunities.”
Georgia’s worst schools
The state could have plenty to choose from.
An analysis of Georgia’s 40 worst schools released by the state late last year showed that despite spending more than $100 million to improve them, most were no better off and some performed even more poorly than when transformation efforts began.
Priscilla Davenport is the parent of a junior at DeKalb County’s McNair High School, which is on the worst schools list. She said she is tired of being frustrated with the school’s lagging performance and would support new state powers to shake up the school.
“The main focus is children’s education, and if they’re not getting a proper education where they are attending, then someone needs to come in and make adjustments,” she said. “I would like to see changes made at the school. (There’s a) need for a stronger leader to come in and re-evaluate what’s going on.”
But some opponents don’t think it’s the state’s role to take over failing schools. Angela Palm with the Georgia School Boards Association said she’s not convinced a change in governance will solve the problems of struggling schools.
“How a student performs is a function of several things — not just what happens at school, but what happens at home,” she said. “I don’t think a change in governance will do it. It will take a lot of additional resources because somehow you have to change the culture surrounding the student, as well as what’s happening in the school. Changing what’s happening in the school … I don’t think it will get you there.”
And some lawmakers have indicated they would prefer the governor focus on different things.
“I look forward to reading the specifics of the plan, but my initial reaction is that I would have preferred to hear proposals to make pre-k universal and to recruit and retain outstanding teachers,” said state Rep. Scott Holcomb, D-Atlanta. “These measures are known to work and would raise standards across the state.”
A second-term pledge
The governor’s support for the opportunity school district comes months after he first floated the idea in September during a campaign visit by Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal. He quickly walked back those comments, though, saying then that he would only recommend initially studying the idea.
Now, though, Deal sees the constitutional amendment as a signature education policy goal for his second term, which begins Monday. He often told campaign crowds that a child’s ZIP code shouldn’t determine his or her quality of education, and he sees this effort as living up to that promise.
With the start of the legislative session, which also begins Monday, Deal and his allies plan to launch an aggressive campaign for the legislation. He will have his work cut out for him.
Some conservatives, including those who feared Common Core education guidelines were tantamount to a federal intrusion in school policy, would now be confronted with a new debate over the government’s role in local districts.
And key Democrats have often sided with teacher groups who fear such a move could give the state too much power in local school decisions.
Deal, though, said he has plotted out a range of arguments to win over critics.
He plans to remind skeptical lawmakers often of the overwhelming support that Georgia voters gave to a constitutional amendment in 2012 that gave the state new powers to approve charter schools. That effort passed with 58 percent of the vote and carried more resoundingly in majority-black counties such as Clayton.
He will try to appeal to conservatives by drawing a line between school dropouts and incarceration rates. He expects stiff opposition from the education establishment, but he said they will end up on the “hot seat to answer why they support a failing status quo.”
And to critics who want the business of reviving struggling schools to remain a local matter, Deal said he will offer a simple, if cursory, message.
“How’s that working out for you?”
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