Opposed to Any School Takeover: DeKalb Superintendent

DECATUR, GA — One week after the DeKalb board of education issued a statement opposing a constitutional amendment that would allow the state to assume control of failing schools, Superindentent Dr. Stephen Green also says it's a bad idea.

"I am opposed to any state takeover of local schools no matter what it is called," Green said in a statement issued Monday morning. "When I became superintendent of the Kansas City, MO, public schools in 2011, my team and I found ourselves in a desperate fight for survival and for control of public education. An appointed Missouri state employee was attempting to take over the school system under a conspiratorial smokescreen by creating a special statewide district for low-performing schools.

"In Georgia, the state wants control of schools it has stigmatized as failing, based on standardized testing," Green said. "This takeover effort comes despite strong evidence that standardized tests can’t fairly take into account, or accurately measure, the extreme complexity of teaching and learning in a district like DeKalb, with 135 schools and 102,000 students from 180 nations and with 144 languages."

The amendment, which voters will decide in November, would allow the state to establish a special Opportunity School District (OSD). The amendment would authorize the state to temporarily step in to assist chronically failing public schools. In the governor’s proposal, persistently failing schools are defined as those scoring below 60 on the Georgia Department of Education’s accountability measure, the College and Career Performance Index, for three consecutive years.

"Local control of education is a bedrock American principle," according to the school board's statement issued last week. "We strongly believe citizens whose taxes pay for a majority of the cost of educating our children should exercise control over decisions relating to that education. We believe it is not only wrong but risky to give up local control to a new state bureaucracy.

"The board strongly believes that the answer to improved academic outcomes and achievement is in the classroom and the schoolhouse, with motivated, well-trained teachers; engaged, challenged students; and involved, supportive parents, caregivers, and communities."

DeKalb has 26 schools that are categorized as "failing," more than any other school system in the state.

"We fought and won the battle to keep schools in Kansas City under control of parents and professional educators and out of the hands of politicians," Green said. "I am probably the only school superintendent in the state of Georgia to lead a system through this unique experience. Key members of today’s DeKalb schools leadership team also worked beside me in Kansas City. These academic professionals are battle-tested in holding onto local control of schools.

"There are no quick fixes, no short cuts. Turning around schools takes deep, hard, intimate work. It means fighting poverty and all that it brings. It means helping new arrivals to our country anchor lives and hopes to our communities and country. It means giving special needs and pre-school students and others among our most vulnerable the schooling, security, and stability that allows them to be their best."

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