Nearly one year after Mayor Adrian Fenty created the Office of the State Superintendent of Education, it released on Monday a first-of-its-kind, five-year plan for improving city schools and bolstering adult education.
The plan, which received public feedback Monday night at a forum moderated by State Education Superintendent Deborah Gist, lays out familiar aims: bring up test scores, improve teacher quality, widen access to quality prekindergarten and better serve students with special needs. Experts say the proof will be in the pudding.
“You’ve gotta start somewhere,” said Walter Smith, executive director of D.C. Appleseed, a nonprofit focused on Washington-specific policy issues. “This is a new undertaking.”
The newness comes as the Office of the State Superintendent continues to negotiate its role in cooperation with D.C. Public Schools, led by Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee. While the latter is focused on the day-to-day operations of schools, Gist’s “state” office is responsible for, in part, policies and standards of public schools, which serve about 37,000 students, and the city’s 56 independent charter schools.
And while D.C. public schools compete for students with charter schools, the state plan aims to clearly communicate the academic performance of all schools in the District and “hold events and provide information to parents regarding the variety of available school options.”
At Monday night’s meeting at Chesar Chavez Charter School in Northeast, Gist acknowledged “the trend has certainly been toward a growth in charters,” but added that “the expectations will be for all schools.”
Also included in the state plan — in a more substantive way than would be accomplished by the K-12 schools — is a focus on adult education, including increasing the percentage of D.C. residents with an education at least equal to a high school diploma.
Smith complained, however, that the plan made little mention of the creation of a community college in order to achieve that goal.
City officials “recognize that one of the key building blocks in this city is to increase the community college capacity,” Smith said, adding that D.C. Appleseed has been working with the D.C. Council to establish a community college in the city.
