Opinion

 Op Ed: There’s No Such Thing as a “Public Charter School”

Published

9 years ago

August 15, 2016

By Ann Berlak

This year, more than a quarter of Oakland’s 49,000 students are attending one of its nearly 40 charter schools, far more per capita than anywhere else in the state.

Is this something for Oaklanders to boast about?

Not long ago I visited a school in Oakland to read to third graders on “Literacy Day.” On  the way to the classroom I asked my guide if this was a charter or a public school. The  immediate and decisive response: “We’re a public charter school.”

On June 14^th the LA Times informed the public: “Charters are independently operated, free public schools.”

The California Department of Education makes no bones about it: “A charter school is a public school.”

However, the term “public charter school” was developed by a PR firm to reframe the way we understand schooling in relationship to “public” and to democracy.

The campaign has been wildly successful. However, though the term “public charter school” is increasingly ubiquitous, charters are not public schools.

Public institutions—schools, libraries, zoos—are, at least in theory, funded by  taxes from all the people in its jurisdiction—local, state and national—and are held accountable to and by those people through that fundamental process we in a democracy call voting.

Most public schools are accountable to an elected school board made up of community  members. Residents of that community have the right to be present at Board meetings, weigh in  on votes and debates, and access public financial documents.

Charter schools are run by executive boards, committees or corporations whose members often  live outside the community in which they are located and are not accountable to parents or  the taxpayers/community members who fund them.

If you don’t like what your traditional public school is doing, you can make your voice heard by  addressing administrators, voting for new leadership or taking a leadership role yourself. If  you don’t like what your child’s charter school is doing and you express yourself, you may be  asked to leave. There is no democratic mechanism for spearheading policy change.

Public institutions are the motors of democracy. Their purpose is to  promote and preserve the fundamental values of a democratic society: liberty, equality and  the public welfare or common good.

Public schools recognize that the welfare of everyone’s children and grandchildren is  intimately linked to the welfare of all. Through support and oversight by the community,  public schooling is intended to serve the common good and preserve fundamental qualities that sustain  democracy beyond getting students “college and career ready.” If public schools have not always lived up to their promise then it is necessary to redouble our efforts to have them do so, not to abandon them.

When students leave public schools for charter schools they take their per pupil expenditures –which in California averaged $9,794 last year–with them, leaving public schools with less revenue but the same overhead.

The federal government also spends millions on charters at the expense of public schools. Taxpayers paid one consulting firm nearly $10 million to the U.S. Department of Education Charter Schools. That’s $10 million fewer federal dollars for public schools.

The law forbids local districts, which in California are the main authorizers for new charters, from taking into account the potentially crippling impact of new charters on district financing when considering approving new schools.

So even if you find an excellent charter to send your own child to, you are reducing the chances of every student remaining in the public school having their own excellent education.

Charter schools’ claim they enhance democracy is disingenuous.

The highly touted freedom of individual parents to choose their child’s school comes at the heavy price of reducing two other essential functions of democracy: providing for the general welfare of a society that requires well funded public schools and insuring equal opportunity for all children.

Competing with traditional public schools for space and funding reduces the quality of the remaining public schools, and ignores patterns of clear advantage for the children of savvy parents, thus assuring that some children will be better schooled than others.

Being publicly funded, charters cannot be considered private. However, their private governance and their marginalization of fundamental democratic values disqualify them as public.

The most accurate label for charters is “Publicly–funded private schools.” Don’t let them abscond with our language. There is no such thing as a public charter school.

Ann Berlak is an author and has worked as a teacher and teacher educator. She lives in Oakland.

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Advice

COMMENTARY: If You Don’t Want Your ‘Black Card’ Revoked, Watch What You Bring to Holiday Dinners

From Thanksgiving to Christmas to New Year’s Day, whether it’s the dining room table or the bid whist (Spades? Uno, anyone?) table, your card may be in danger.

Published

5 days ago

December 14, 2025

Oakland Post

The ‘aunties’ playing cards. iStock photo by Andreswd.

By Wanda Ravernell
Post Staff

From the fourth week of November to the first week in January, if you are of African descent, but particularly African American, certain violations of cultural etiquette will get your ‘Black card’ revoked.

From Thanksgiving to Christmas to New Year’s Day, whether it’s the dining room table or the bid whist (Spades? Uno, anyone?) table, your card may be in danger.

It could take until Super Bowl Sunday for reinstatement.

I don’t know much about the card table, but for years I was on probation by the ‘Aunties,’ the givers and takers of Black cards.

How I Got into Trouble

It was 1970-something and I was influenced by the health food movement that emerged from the hippie era. A vegetarian (which was then considered sacrilegious by most Black people I knew) prepared me a simple meal: grated cheese over steamed broccoli, lentils, and brown rice.

I introduced the broccoli dish at the Friday night supper with my aunt and grandfather. She pronounced the bright green broccoli undone, but she ate it. (I did not, of course, try brown rice on them.)

I knew that I would be allowed back in the kitchen when she attempted the dish, but the broccoli had been cooked to death. (Y’all remember when ALL vegetables, not just greens, were cooked to mush?)

My Black card, which had been revoked was then reattained because they ate what I prepared and imitated it.

Over the decades, various transgressions have become normalized. I remember when having a smoked turkey neck instead of a ham hock in collard greens was greeted with mumblings and murmurings at both the dining room and card tables. Then came vegan versions with just olive oil (What? No Crisco? No bacon, at least?) and garlic. And now my husband stir fries his collards in a wok.

But No Matter How Things Have Changed…

At holiday meals, there are assigned tasks. Uncle Jack chopped raw onions when needed. Uncle Buddy made the fruit salad for Easter. My mother brought the greens in winter, macaroni salad in summer. Aunt Deanie did the macaroni and cheese, and the great aunts, my deceased grandmother’s sisters, oversaw the preparation of the roast beef, turkey, and ham. My father, if he were present, did the carving.

These designations/assignments were binding agreements that could stand up in a court of law. Do not violate the law of assignments by bringing some other version of a tried-and-true dish, even if you call it a new ‘cheese and noodle item’ to ‘try out.’ The auntie lawgivers know what you are trying to do. It’s called a menu coup d’état, and they are not having it.

The time for experiments is in your own home: your spouse and kids are the Guinea pigs.

My mother’s variation of a classic that I detested from that Sunday to the present was adding crushed pineapple to mashed sweet potatoes. A relative stops by, tries it, and then it can be introduced as an add-on to the standard holiday menu.

My Aunt Vivian’s concoctions from Good Housekeeping or Ladies’ Home Journal magazine also made it to the Black people’s tables all over the country in the form of a green bean casserole.

What Not to Do and How Did It Cross Your Mind?

People are, of all things holy, preparing mac ‘n’ cheese with so much sugar it tastes like custard with noodles in it.

Also showing up in the wrong places: raisins. Raisins have been reported in the stuffing (makes no sense unless it’s in a ‘sweet meats’ dish), in a pan of corn bread, and – heresy in the Black kitchen – the MAC ‘n’ CHEESE.

These are not mere allegations: There is photographic evidence of these Black card violations, but I don’t want to defame witnesses who remained present at the scene of the crimes.

The cook – bless his/her heart – was probably well-meaning, if ignorant. Maybe they got the idea from a social media influencer, much like Aunt Viv got recipes from magazines.

Thankfully, a long-winded blessing of the food at the table can give the wary attendee time to locate the oddity’s place on the table and plan accordingly.

But who knows? Innovation always prevails, for, as the old folks say, ‘waste makes want.’ What if the leftovers were cut up, dipped in breadcrumbs and deep fried? The next day, that dish might make it to the TV tray by the card table.

An older cousin – on her way to being an Auntie – in her bonnet, leggings, T-shirt, and bunny slippers and too tired to object, might try it and like it….

And if she ‘rubs your head’ after eating it, the new dish might be a winner and (Whew!) everybody, thanks God, keeps their Black cards.

Until the next time.