One of the most fascinating things, for me anyways, is reading about New Orleans and how after the 2005 tragedy, the city has become a potential beacon for educational reform. Recently, the New York Times published an article highlighting some of the reforms that have taken place thus far and where Vallas and Pastorek (two main school district leaders) plan to go from here.
You can look at the article here (It is fairly extensive):
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/17/magazine/17NewOrleans-t.html?pagewanted=4&_r=1&hp
This article highlights some of the successes and challenges that the city currently faces in reforming the school district. One of the main things that stands out for me is the constant struggle between the centralization or decentralization of power among school districts. As a former teacher in both a public and charter school, I can definitely attest to the power structure of public schools (centralized) hindering our ability to maximize our instructional time. I am definitely in favor of their approach to "graduating" successful schools into decentralized players who can manage their budgets, hire and fire employees, set salaries, and do all the other things normal businesses can do while still being held accountable to the highest performance standards. Once you equip schools with professional leadership and an excellent staff, it can become a self sustaining force that does not require district intervention. What do you think?
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