House plan for Detroit schools excludes Education Commission, key to success

Sandy K. Baruah is president of the Detroit Regional Chamber and a member of the Coalition for the Future of Detroit Schoolchildren.

Choice has often been at the heart of the most heated education policy debates for several decades. It should come as no surprise that choice is at the eye of the controversy swirling around education in Detroit and its public schools.

Without a cap on charter schools, the city offers more school options than anywhere else, due in large part to the struggles of the public schools. Yet, too many Detroit parents and students must choose between two failing schools, which is no choice at all. For children who have no recourse but to trust adults to make the right decisions, the results are tragic. It is disheartening that a bill that would perpetuate that lack of choice passed the House of Representatives.

As a longtime advocate of education reform, the Detroit Regional Chamber fully supports the Senate plan sponsored by Sen. Goeff Hansen because it offers a more sustainable path forward for education in Detroit – both public and charter. It provides the reform needed to help address low school performance. It also offers the stability and support needed to try one of the most dramatic overhauls of an educational system this nation has ever seen.

One of the pillars of the Senate plan is the Detroit Education Commission, which is designed to provide oversight to hold poorly performing schools accountable. It is the best option to ensure that good schools are replicated where the city needs them, and authorities have the power to prevent poorly performing schools from proliferating. An entity like the Commission has proven to work best in other places – for both public and charter schools. It’s a best practice and the lack of any such governance model has prevented leading national charter school operators from setting up shop in Detroit.

And perhaps as importantly, the commission is unanimously supported by Detroit’s public, private and philanthropic leadership, a Republican governor and Democratic mayor, which is critical to developing the cohesion needed to tackle the monumental challenge ahead. The Chamber, which was on the forefront of advocating for school choice and charter schools – and remains committed – believes the best way to simultaneously provide access to quality education to all Detroit residents and preserve robust charter school options is to implement a governance structure like the Detroit Education Commission.

Despite efforts by lawmakers in the House of Representatives, their plan is not a viable solution. It fails to adequately address the debt, and falls short in other areas as well. It fails to provide the structure needed for a transition to local control to be successful.

Beyond the moral imperative, providing a good education is an essential part of revitalizing Detroit and continuing Michigan’s comeback. The momentum underway today will only be sustained if the city continues to grow. That’s not going to happen at the pace needed with chronically poor performing schools that negatively impact talent and investment attraction.

The Grand Bargain, which saved the Detroit Institute of Arts’ collection and helped settle the city’s historic bankruptcy, worked because the people and leadership of Michigan came together to put Detroit on the path of being a city the entire state, and nation, can be proud of. To fulfill the promise of what Detroit can be requires that its education system is worthy of supplying the talent needed by a world-class 21st century city.

Certainly, money is big part of the challenge facing the Detroit Public School system. But if we just solve the financial issues we will miss the more important task of ensuring access to quality education (public or charter) to all students in Detroit and better promoting strong academic achievement rates. The successful establishment of a Detroit Education Commission will not be a magic elixir to all of Detroit’s education ills. However, it would be a positive step in the right direction and an improvement of the current situation which after a decade of haphazard school opening and closing, is not working well enough for anyone.

There is no greater vehicle than education to ensure that opportunity is widespread. Education operates like an escalator to the middle class and beyond, and that escalator is broken in Detroit. The opportunity gap is widening. Businesses that have been committed to Detroit and this region and state remain so, and expect policy that reflects that commitment, such as the Senate plan.

In the days ahead, the Legislature is faced with a choice to pass the right plan. It may not be an easy or popular one. It follows decades of poor decisions by others. However, it is a choice that Detroit, Southeast Michigan and the entire state need, and one the philanthropic, business and community leaders nearly unanimously support.

But most importantly, it is a choice that tens of thousands of children across Detroit are counting on.