As statewide tensions continue, East Palo Alto school district eyes charter school moratorium

I understand the financial burden that Ravenswood is under due partly to the charter school options in the area. But in this resolution, all I see are ways that traditional school districts are attempting to squash the charter system, and if that fails, to have their fingers in all aspects of it. What I don't see is an attempt to address the reasons that parents in under-performing districts are taking their tax money and enrolling their students in charter schools. How about some school union reform? A revamping of the tenure system and ability to fire underperfoming teachers?

You can suppress the charter schools and have the short term gain of slowing the hemorrhage of money, but are you really improving the lives of the children in your area in a long term capacity?

I agree with Menlo Mom. What are these failing public schools doing to provide a better education to the underserved? Stop with the pleas for more money and address the issue of too many administrators and lack of the teachers union to support termination of underperforming teachers. Unions are more about dues than the effectiveness of their membership. For those who say "how do you measure what a teacher does"; you do it like you measure any other employee. Keep the Charter Schools going, it is the best hope for improvements in our school system. Competition is a good thing.

There is no greater and more implacable enemy of children than the Teacher's Union.

The prize-winning public schools in the Menlo Park, Las Lomitas, and Portola Valley school districts have strong unions and tenure.

A more likely cause of the difference between, say, the Las Lomitas schools' performance and that of the Ravenswood schools, is the greater wealth of the Las Lomitas district. It allows them to choose and hire and keep teachers with the best resumes - the best credentialed, the best educated, the most experienced.