"Examines the post-Hurricane Katrina transformation of New Orleans public schools to an all-charter system and the consequences of this change for local democracy"--
The author describes the transformation that occurred in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina to make all public schools charter schools. She focuses on how white reformers excluded black educators, community members, and parents to disrupt the system to create change and keep reforms in place and how the years leading up to Hurricane Katrina involved a slow dismantling of public schools, how the post-Katrina reform process left black parents and residents without a voice and left officials, who were mostly white, with little accountability, and how the reforms occurred by excluding the experiences and preferences of residents. She details the events in the aftermath of the hurricane, focusing on the activities of the small group of elite, mostly white and affluent residents to pass a law that redefined failing schools; laws passed between 1997 and 2005 that impacted the school reforms and allowed the state legislature to take control of New Orleans public schools after the hurricane; how reformers maintained the reforms and the all-charter system in 2006 and 2007; the effects of the reforms on governance, including governing boards, the opinion of public school parents, and political efficacy and trust; and policy recommendations to increase participation among parents of public school children, improve trust in the system, and make it more representative, responsive, and easier to navigate. Annotation ©2022 Ringgold, Inc., Portland, OR (protoview.com)
Two months after Hurricane Katrina, Louisiana took control of nearly all the public schools in New Orleans. Today, all of the city’s public schools are charter schools. Although many analyses mark the beginning of education reform in New Orleans with Katrina, in Public Schools, Private Governance, J. Celeste Layargues that the storm merely accelerated the timeline for reforms that had inched along incrementally over the previous decade. Both before and after Katrina, white reformers purposely excluded Black educators, community members, and parents.
Public Schools, Private Governance traces the slow, deliberate dismantling of New Orleans’ public schools, and the processes that have maintained the reforms made in Katrina’s immediate aftermath, showing how Black parents and residents were left without a voice and the officials charged with school governance, most of whom are white, with little accountability. Lay cogently explains how political minorities disrupted systems to create change and keep reforms in place, and the predictable political effects—exclusion, frustration, and resignation—on the part of those most directly affected.
Lisainfo e-raamatute kohta