The Democratic candidate for Governor of Washington State opposes charter schools. An exceedingly modest proposal for charters in WA was finally approved by the state legislature last spring. The bill is now threatened with reversal in a Nov. 2 ballot initiative backed by the Washington Education Association (WEA), one local leader of which has likened charter school supporters to Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels.

Christine Gregoire, seeking to hold onto the Guv's mansion in Olympia for WA Ds - as incumbent Gary Locke steps down after two terms - is nowhere near as rash as that on the subject, but does proffer up the usual union-endorsed crud that charters are a threat to public education. This despite Locke's own support of charters.

Just one more reason I'm marking my ballot for her GOP opponent, former State Sen. Dino Rossi, who favors charter schools.

Gregoire had this to say recently on charter schools and the state's key NCLB-tied assessment tests known as the WASL, in a debate with Rossi. (Third item down, in this partial debate transcript).

Question: What are your positions on charter schools and the WASL?

Rossi: "The WASL test, it's controversial, but we mustn't lower our standards. We must make sure our standards are high. Should we periodically review the WASL tests? Absolutely. ...

"When it comes to charter schools, it passed this legislative session.

"We've had our children in public school, we've had our children in Catholic school, we've home-schooled. ... One thing I do know is there isn't just one way to teach a child. So having more options as a parent, I think that's a good thing."

Gregoire: "I think we need to ensure every child has access to a great education. So I think we ought to take our money and creativity and innovation and invest every taxpaying dollar into our public schools. So I'm not going to support charter schools at this time in Washington state.

"With regard to the WASL, we've got to make sure our children are seeing that WASL is meaningful to them. I believe in the three Rs, a rigorous coursework for our children — relevant coursework so they feel that they are connected to what's going on in their future education, and a relationship with their teachers and adults in that school, so that they feel they are a part of their future education."

A career in state bureaucracy and several terms as a popular Democratic elected official (State Attorney General) have left Gregoire in the debt of public employee unions such as the WEA, and generally detached from reality. First, charter schools ARE public schools, under the state legislation passed last spring, and in fact, must be enabled by local school districts. Across the country, charters are (in a great many instances) warmly embraced, and an example of just the "creativity and vision" Gregoire claims she wants to see in public education.

Generally, charters can bring out the worst in Democratic Party advocates of minorities, who somehow believe that struggling Native American, Hispanic and Black students shouldn't have more K-12 schooling choices - like, say, the kids of white Ds who go to pricey private schools while their parents champion (their own blindered concept of ) "public education."

Groups advocating for minority students in Seattle favor charters as a feasible alternative (see my Jan. '04 Seattle Times column on the topic here - free reg. req.). So do other parents (count me as one) who want serious options in the public system for rigorous instruction and firm school discipline untethered to compromising bureaucratic stipulations.

Rossi has it right: charters are one more approach in the toolbox for students. And it is their interests, not that of the cash-hungry, failing public edcuation monopoly in WA, that should come first. The WEA and Gregoire, on the other hand, see public school students as cash cows: if some go to publicly-operated charters, free of union regulations, there will be less money for traditional (and I use the term flinchingly) public schools: and perhaps over time, a greater percentage of non-union-dues-paying teachers.

In Seattle, the school board has been irresponsibly delaying a decision on a closing 11 schools, due to declining enrollment. Such an uncomfortable step is necessary to consolidate facilities and reduce costs. Yet it would shoot to smithereens the arguement of the WEA and Gregoire that charters threaten funding for, and commitment to, public schools. The Seattle system's own inefficiencies in facilities management are presently a much greater threat, as hinted at by the overhead involved in keeping 11 schools open that ought to be closed. Never mind, for now, why enrollment is declining....

As far as Gregoire's comment that kids need to see that the WASL is "meaningful" to them: it's already plenty meaningful whether they and their parents are smart enough to see that, or not. As has been well-noted, starting in 2008, graduating seniors of public high schools here will have to have passed their 10th-grade WASLs (in 2006), in order to graduate. One important additional concern, which neither candidate mentions in the link above, is that there should be a 12th-grade WASL test (not just 4th, 7th and 10th).

Remember, Washington voters, if you support charter schools, vote for Dino Rossi. And vote "Yes" on R-55, to keep the new charter school law in WA from being overturned before it has even had a chance to work.

Posted by Matt Rosenberg at October 25, 2004 05:23 PM

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