By Thomas Phippen A years-long effort to bring local charter schools into a formal relationship with the Roaring Fork School District will continue, but what the final result will be is anyone’s guess.
With help from facilitators from the Gates Family Foundation, RFSD Superintendent Rob Stein began the process in fall 2016 to bring charter schools and the district together to work on important issues and improve education throughout the region.
After two years of conversations, the compact between charter schools and the district passed a milestone last week as the boards for Two Rivers Community School in Glenwood Springs and Ross Montessori School in Carbondale chose to continue working with the district toward a formal compact.
A compact might include anything from simply a shared enrollment schedule to an agreement to share mill levy revenue. Shared enrollment schedules would reduce paperwork and uncertainty like double enrollment. In addition to shared mill levy and bond funds, the district would consider sharing food services, bus systems and other infrastructure.
The larger goal for Stein is to improve equality across the district schools through shared enrollment priorities and benchmarks
The Gates Foundation has assisted 18 school districts across the country to develop compacts with the charters in their district. But the Roaring Fork Valley would be the first rural school, according to Ana Solar, the Gates senior program officer who is facilitating the discussions.
a matter of trust
For some leaders of the two independent charter schools, Ross Montessori and Two Rivers, which are authorized by the Charter School Institute (CSI), a compact that would relinquish charter school authority to the larger school district is cause for concern (Carbondale Community Charter School is part of RFSD).
Though there was no formal vote at a Thursday joint meeting of the school boards from Ross Montessori and Two Rivers Community School, which Stein and the executive director of CSI also attended, the boards agreed to four more facilitated sessions to consider a formal compact.
Some board members likened the upcoming process to diplomatic negotiations between nations.
The goal in seeking the compact has largely been accomplished, Stein said in an interview. The conversations have already resulted in “improved relations and increased communication among all the schools in the valley,” which has benefit because the schools are part of the same community and serve the same families, Stein said.
“The advantage of a compact would simply be to formalize agreements about how we could work together better, and work through shared goals,” Stein said.
A rocky past
The school district and the CSI charter schools are getting along amicably now, but that wasn’t always the case, according to several people who were involved in forming the charter schools.
Under previous superintendents, leaders of the current charter schools felt their voices went unheard, which is part of impetus behind forming independent schools.
The history of charter schools in the valley shows the importance of charter school autonomy and competition, according to Rebecca Ruland-Shanahan, co-founder and head of school at Two Rivers. Having good charter school alternatives in the …read more
Via:: Post Independent