A valuable lesson: Newark shouldn't leave the public out of the school reform process
Jennifer Brown/The Star-LedgerCommunity activist Edward B. Johnson asks members of the Newark Public School Advisory Board to address the issues the crowd gathered to hear at a meeting at the Fifteenth Avenue School, as restless parents protest school changes.
Shavar Jeffries, president of Newark's School Advisory Board, keeps warning that if you don't involve the parents, educational reform will be much harder.
To see what he's talking about, look at Washington, D.C. Even though the reforms pushed by former chancellor Michelle Rhee raised student scores, the mayor was voted out last year and the future of the initiatives jeopardized because there wasn't enough local support.
Newark Mayor Cory Booker has said community involvement is key, and touted his resident surveys and town hall meetings. But meanwhile, no one told Jeffries about a detailed proposal by a consulting firm hired to restructure Newark's schools — stamped "strictly confidential" — until the draft was leaked to the media. It involves new initiatives in about 20 schools, roughly a third of the district.
Predictably, hundreds of angry parents turned out to his board meeting Tuesday to vent about what appeared to be a back-room process. "You need to engage people upfront," Jeffries said. "School reform should be pursued democratically."
Reform always meets with strong opposition from parents who don't want to change things, even though they have failed for a long time. But what hope do school advocates have of mobilizing the silent majority when parents feel they have zero say in the decision-making process?
Booker said this proposal is only days old, and neither he nor Christopher Cerf, the state's acting education commissioner, had even seen it yet. They had planned to present its recommendations to the school board, had the proposal not been leaked first, the mayor says. "This was an unfortunate leak that was 100 percent not the process we would follow," Booker said.
Newark schools need improvements, and the $100 million pledge from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg can help. But the way this proposal was drawn up only raises local suspicion that this vital reform process is about political agendas fueled by private money.
What was promised here was public engagement, and it should start with transparency in major decisions about the use of that funding. The public should be informed of every step in the process.