Charters and the Virginia Education Association: Round 2
In response to this post last Tuesday, I received the following through EIA’s Dead Drop page:
In a recent email to EIA, VEA’s GR Director Robley Jones claims the VEA union supports charter schools. That’s a complete fabrication. In the September 2009 issue of the VEA News here’s what President Kitty Boitnott said about them:
“I also worry that the current fascination with charter schools and tuition vouchers will continue to gain momentum here in Virginia, costing our children a quality education and resulting in the loss of jobs for teachers and other school employees. We are continually fighting to fully fund our public schools.”
Here’s a link to the article (on page 2):
http://www.veanea.org/vea-news/0909/images/VEANewsSept09.pdf
When the present charter school law was drafted many years ago, the VEA placed so many bureaucratic restrictions on charter schools as to make them almost impossible to organize. It’s no wonder Virginia has the fewest such institutions in the nation.
November 16th, 2009 at 18:53
I love teachers, but I have to say that I really resent disingenuous teacher union leaders. This last comment sets the record straight — not only is the VEA opposed to any charter that isn’t authorized by the district where the unions contracts dominate, but the Virginia Schools Boards Association also argues that its law is perfectly fine, and believe the Commonwealth’s law warrants an A, not the F that CER’s national ranking grades it yearly. These groups said they wanted control over who charters and how. They have that control, and they’ve demonstrated how little such concessions mean by not chartering but a handful over the years and when they do, only approving schools that take the kids with the biggest challenges off their hands. The public is tired of such adult games. Apparently so is Secretary Duncan.
When the Virginia charter law improves, you’re going to see great teachers coming forward to start schools. We are looking forward to that day.