The Notebook

Stories tagged: Promise Academies

Year 4 of Renaissance involves 6 Promise Academies, 3 charters

by Charlotte Pope Posted in April 2013 Edition | Permalink

Nine schools will be remade as Renaissance Schools next fall, with three of them facing conversion to charters.

This is Year Four of the initiative to transform the lowest-performing schools in the District. Now there are 17 Renaissance charters, along with nine District-run Promise Academies – but three of those are closing.

Slated to become Promise Academies next fall are Barry, Bryant, Cayuga, and McMichael elementaries, as well as two high schools, Edison and Strawberry Mansion.

Two charters to grow; seven more must wait to learn fate

Submitted by Katie McCabe on Fri, 07/20/2012 - 16:29 Posted in Latest news | Permalink

A divided School Reform Commission approved the expansion of two more charters on Friday, but delayed decisions on two others pending the result of the state’s ongoing investigation of possible cheating on state tests. Five other schools also have pending renewal or modification requests.

Creighton: Exception to the Renaissance rule?

by Bill Hangley, Jr. Posted in Summer 2012 Edition | Permalink

For three of this year's four Renaissance Schools, the selection process is over. The public meetings are complete, the School Reform Commission has voted, and barring any unforeseen complication, next September they'll open as neighborhood charter schools.

But at Creighton Elementary in the Lower Northeast, supporters of a unique plan for a teacher-led administration are holding out hope that their school can buck a very big trend.

With Renaissance vote approaching, SRC seeks to balance results and cost

Submitted by Benjamin Herold on Wed, 04/11/2012 - 17:41 Posted in Latest news | Permalink

by Benjamin Herold
for the Notebook and WHYY/NewsWorks

As the School Reform Commission prepares to vote on converting four more District schools to charters, it will weigh the hope of duplicating preliminary test score gains in its first cohort of Renaissance turnaround schools against the reality that expanding the initiative is likely to cost the District between $800 and $1,000 per student in the first year.

“That is the calculation,” said Commissioner Feather Houstoun.

“We have a pretty good sense of what the [new charter conversions] may mean in terms of budget impact. There’s a return because of the value of what happened to children that has not happened in decades.”

Working on a new blueprint for schools she grew up in

by Dale Mezzacappa Posted in April 2012 Edition | Permalink

Penny Nixon fondly remembers Ms. Newman, her 12th grade teacher at Martin Luther King High School nearly 30 years ago.

"We wrote about almost everything in Ms. Newman's class," said Nixon. "We wrote about issues that impacted our lives, just being a teenager – around peer pressure, around drugs and alcohol."

One Voice for teaching and learning and the next superintendent

Submitted by Samuel Reed III on Wed, 02/08/2012 - 19:24 | Permalink

One Voice, an alliance of parents, students, and teachers, is gathering a group to testify at the next School Reform Commission meeting on Monday. The next SRC meeting will be another strategy, policy, and priorities community discussion, and it will be focused on curriculum and career and college readiness. Wendell Pritchett, chair of the curriculum committee, will run the meeting with Chief Academic Officer Penny Nixon.

One Voice plans to testify about how the budget crisis may be causing the District to overlook the importance of teaching and learning.

Autonomy within the District

Posted in December 2011 Edition | Permalink

Amid all the debate about charters and vouchers, one glaring gap remains in the reform landscape: District turnaround schools that enjoy the same autonomy as Renaissance charters. The current options are highly autonomous charters and highly prescribed District Promise Academies.

There are great District principals who have turned around chronically low-performing schools. They should be encouraged to take on similar challenges today, provided that they can also prepare successors so their current schools continue to enjoy strong leadership.

District crafts plans to expand School Advisory Councils

by Paul Jablow Posted in December 2011 Edition | Permalink

The School District is finalizing plans to expand and improve School Advisory Councils, with the aim of introducing them into additional schools and training members and school principals about their roles.

Despite gains, Renaissance expansion uncertain

Submitted by Benjamin Herold on Thu, 11/17/2011 - 13:05 Posted in Latest news | Permalink

by Benjamin Herold
for the Notebook and WHYY/NewsWorks

Despite encouraging signs of progress in their first cohort of 13 Renaissance Schools, District officials are not yet sure if they will attempt to turn around more low-performing public schools next year.

Thomas Darden, the District's deputy chief of strategic programs, said that “no decision has been made yet” about whether to hand more struggling public schools over to outside managers for conversion to charters.