I have to admit that I was extremely skeptical when I first heard about Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg's donation of $100 million to Newark's public school system. I mean EXTREMELY skeptical. After all it certainly isn't lack of funding that makes our public schools so terrible since many of the worst schools are the best funded. However, after reading a bit more about whats going on I am starting to think that this is actually a step in the right direction. It does seem to move us away from the union death grip that exists now and towards local control with private sector involvement. Plus it's on a bipartisan basis which is always a plus. This plan certainly isn't what I want to see as the end goal for education in this country but it is better than what we have now and much more politically realistic than full on privatization. This plan also has the added benefit of Chris Christie's passion being fully behind it. He ain't holding back:
At the end of the day this reform won't be the final solution to our failed education system. It's still has government control at its core. Albeit better, more local, and responsive government control but government control none the less. In the end we've seen that the private sector does a better job running schools than the government and the government ought not run anything that can be run better otherwise.
However, this initiative is the most promising in the country to move us away from centralized government control. DC had a promising program but, realistically, it will probably die along with Major Fenty's political career. Newark is now the city to look to for education reform.
Good luck to those charged with making this initiative work. Kids lives depend on it.