Encourage community input by advancing charter school

Educators consistently identify parental and community involvement as indispensable assets in the critical mission of improving public schools. That makes the turnout of approximately 250 people for Tuesday night's public forum at Burke High School highly encouraging.

The Charleston County School District held that forum to solicit public input on how to best use the building that formerly housed Rivers Middle School. District officials should further encourage such parental and community involvement by following the public's lead in recommending that the school board approve a well-crafted proposal for a math and science charter school on that site.

District officials randomly assigned attendees of the forum into five groups that each considered five options for the Rivers building, then voted on their top two choices. "Option C," allowing the proposed Charleston Charter School for Math and Science to use the entire facility so it has room to grow, was the first choice for three groups, the second for another. "Option A," which would have the school share the facility with the district's planned High Tech High program, drew one first-choice and three second-choice votes.

Thus, a solid majority favored, as the best use of the Rivers building, the Charleston Charter School for Math and Science, which aims to open for sixth through ninth graders in the 2008-09 school year and gradually expand through 12th grade by 2012-13. Some who opposed it expressed concerns that it would detract needed focus from Burke, considered for a state takeover last year because of persistently low standardized test scores. Some downtown residents also worry that the new charter school wouldn't fully serve downtown families because it would be open to students countywide.

But district officials, including outgoing Superintendent Maria Goodloe-Johnson and incoming Superintendent Nancy McGinley, repeatedly stressed at the forum that regardless of what happens in the Rivers building, the long-term push for raising Burke's academic performance will remain a top priority.

Indeed, after the five groups returned from their separate meetings, these words from Dr. Goodloe-Johnson, shown in large type on the screen at the front of the Burke auditorium, hammered that message home: "All options will be considered with a focus on improving the quality and quantity of programs for students at all ability levels at Burke."

As for the question of which students would benefit from the new school, its comprehensive charter application assures "equity of access to all students." Park Dougherty, the school's planning committee chair, has emphasized that the school will welcome students of all academic backgrounds, and that no entrance exam will be given.

If applications surpass the enrollment limit, a lottery will determine admissions. The school's application also asserts the goal of its student body's ethnic composition roughly matching that of the overall district.

Shortly before the forum ended, Dr. McGinley reminded the attendees: "Charter schools are public schools." But charter schools, unlike other public schools, answer to a governance board of citizens and school staff, not the district. The state law mandating such schools recognizes that their creation inevitably fosters parental and community involvement in public education.

The district should recognize that, too, by giving the Charleston Charter School for Math and Science the home it needs in the Rivers building.