Can't Fix Flint, Can't Fix the Roads, CERTAINLY Can't Fix Education

Rochelle Riley: Detroit must fix its own schools

Rochelle Riley, Detroit Free Press Columnist 7:31 a.m. EST January 17, 2016

Gov. Rick Snyder has enough to do to fix Flint. State management has not worked, so let the city fix its own schools.

http://www.freep.com/story/news/columnists/rochelle-riley/2016/01/16/detroit-must-fix-its-own-schools/78885506/

Our school district is failing our parents.
It is failing our children.
That means it is failing our future — and Detroit’s renaissance.
This is no time to debate that some schools work while others don't. This is no time to defend graduation rates that remain too low and dropout rates that remain too high.

Teachers, through sick-outs, have forced us to look at the conditions some of our children endure every school year. The mayor looked and immediately ordered city inspections of all 97 schools. We can no longer look away.

It is finally time to stop living with failure.

It has become clearer than ever that the fix for our failing district will likely not come from the state Legislature. It won’t be found in the bills introduced last week by State Sen. Goeff Hansen, R-Hart, whose hard work is notable more for what they lack than what they do:

• They would allow for the election of a city school board, but one that cannot choose its own district superintendent.
• They would authorize $250 million to open a new school district, but ignore the current district’s $515 million-and-rising debt.
• They ignore the troubles of a second Detroit-based state district run by the Education Achievement Authority, a district being investigated by federal authorities.

But the greatest failure of Hansen's well-intentioned bills is that they did not include what Mayor Mike Duggan, a diverse coalition of leaders and most parents want: educational accountability. The bills do not include the education commission that Duggan, in news reports, said would “establish a single standard of performance for all public schools in Detroit — district and charter.”

Hansen didn't offer the legislation that was needed. According to news reports, he said "we had to craft something that would get 20 votes in the Senate and get through the House. The charters were unhappy with the governance of it.”

The charters were unhappy about the governance of it. Sigh.

Detroit needs someone to monitor the landscape, to ensure that all schools serve students equally and valiantly — and that schools exist where children live. More importantly, the city needs an entity that holds for-profit schools as accountable as other public schools.

So, again, the fix for our failing district will not fall from the sky between Dan Gilbert building purchases and transportation ideas suggested by Michael Ford, CEO of the Regional Transit Authority of Southeast Michigan.

And the state Legislature cannot save it.

Detroit is going to have to stop waiting for Superman. That was Clark Kent, not Rick Snyder. And the governor, who can't fix roads and can’t fix Flint, certainly can’t fix education.

It’s time that Detroit stood up and fixed itself. It’s time that the governor stop holding the city district hostage, preventing it from declaring bankruptcy. It's time for Detroit to force the state to pay the state-guaranteed debt.

It's time for Detroit to shut down the old school district and create a new one on its own, one without crooks, without bad apples and with processes in place to stay financially healthy.

The governor's a little busy right now explaining how his staff allowed an entire city to drink toxic water. So let's tell him that Detroit no longer needs the state to run its schools. Or we can take a lesson from the teachers and just tell him we're sick.


Contact Rochelle Riley: rriley99@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @rochelleriley.