I know a student at LEP High (Leadership & Entrepreneurship Public Charter High School) in Portland. His name is Ned, and he loves his school. He’s facing the prospect of his school closing down, as are many of the students of LEP High, and some of them won’t go anywhere else. For some of them, LEP is their last chance, for some of them, their only real chance.
Not for Ned. He can go to a traditional school, and he would, if he had to. He’s bright, but traditional public schools have left him uninterested. He loves the diversity, the project learning, and dynamic staff. He’s even asked to test up to higher level math classes. He wants to not just succeed, but exceed.Check out LEP’s website: http://www.lephigh.org/.
Also check out this article: http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2009/03/portland_charter_school_faces.html
When I was in high school I would have loved to have an option to the traditional public high school, a place where I could try out a different path, since I wasn’t quite on the traditional one. Still, I was stuck there. It was all we had. It didn’t really matter what I intended to do after high school, the only thing that mattered was that I be passed through and spit out the other end. I left high school with no idea of what I was supposed to do next. Now there are options, and the Portland school board is thinking of closing down one of the best ones in town. LEP prepares its students, it works with them, it challenges them academically, and it offers them options.
Why should we lose such an effective school? It’s all about finances, or perceived finances. No one disputes the program, but on the other hand, the financial motivations don’t seem entirely clear. There was a deficit on June 30, 2008. This is because LEP did not receive the funds for serving LEP students in June until July. When the payment was received, the deficit was gone. This is a timing issue, not a shortage of funds issue.
As well, negotiations are currently ongoing with the landlord on restructuring the lease and the tenant improvement note, yet these issues are also being used as reasons to deny LEP’s application for charter school renewal. The landlord wants to make this work also, so why the rush to closure without knowing what can be worked out?
Also, LEP’s contract and the state provide an additional 25% of funding for children in foster care, but those funds are not being passed on to them from Portland Public Schools. There are several more instances of withholding of funds by the Portland Public Schools, and I’m really wondering why this is happening. Why isn’t there more cooperation to ensure all the students in Portland have the same opportunities, the same chance to be in a program that works for them? A program that works.
Just ask Ned. It works for him, and it works for many others, and for some of them, it may be the first time they’ve had options. Let’s not make it be the last time.
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Tom Pantera
Hollywood Assistant
Hells Bells
aging hippie chick
Pam Epstein
O'Really?
Salon.com
Comments
Why close down something that seems to be helping the next generation to succeed? I mean, that's the future right there, at the first step of what we hope will be a better life than the last generations. Crippling them before they even get to the door is a bad, bad thing to do. But they do it, and our proud of it, by saying such things as "We save $ by shutting down all these after school programs or alternative school programs. Aren't we smart?"
:(
Rated.
Thanks for using your voice to help us reach out!
The only reason most of the students care that LEP closes, is because they have nowhere else to go. NOT because they like it there. Give us an alternative school, and we wouldn't care if LEP closed down. I personally have nowhere else to go besides LEP, and even in the situation that I'm in I feel like LEP maybe should be shut down. Once during class, a student said raise your hand if you hate this school, and almost everyone in the class did if not everyone.
At the school lock-in/teach-in protest today, students who were late to school weren't allowed to participate. One girl brought all of her sleeping stuff, had a signed permission slip, waited after school for hours, had her dad call, talked to the principal, had no where else to go because her dad was planning on her being at the school, cried, and STILL she wasn't allowed to stay by one of the teachers, Mr. Brady. On top of that, the protest was organized by the students for the students and a teacher shouldn't have the right to say who can't protest... She was sick to the point where she couldn't walk but she still made the effort to come to the school so that it wouldn't close, but she was turned out.
I wanted to protest the closing of our school, but now...why should I? The school doesn't care about me, clearly. I understand that other students need the school, and I apologize to those students for my backstabbing.
But LEP discriminated against and disappointed me, so I have every right to disappoint it.
I get nothing out of LEP that I wouldn't get out of any other school. Almost all of my friends have transferred to night school or another school completely and are much happier and I hope to soon do the same. However, if LEP shuts down and I can't go to night school there, I'll just have to take online classes and to be honest, that's better than attending that excuse for a school.
What lesson will be learned in this situation? Will they have the chance to learn that positive change can happen, peacefully, in community, and through the structures we have? Or will they learn that if you work hard, build something worthwhile, and then have the courage to fight for it... well... it won't matter if you don't have money?