Christie presses for schools overhaul

Gov. Christie outlined a proposal to improve and expand school choice in New Jersey at a town hall meeting in Hoboken on Thursday, urging lawmakers to overhaul state law to allow charter schools to be created more easily.

The announcement followed a speech in Mercer County on Tuesday in which the governor called for changes in the way public school teachers are paid, retained and promoted.

Christie, who was joined Thursday by Harlem Children's Zone Founder and Chief Executive Officer Geoffrey Canada and Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer, said the need for expanded school choice in New Jersey is clear.

"We cannot continue to ask children and families stuck in chronically failing public schools to wait any longer," Christie said. "Quite simply, parents and children deserve a choice. We must be able to fulfill our obligation to provide parents and their children with educational alternative that include expanding high quality charter schools and providing interdistrict public school options."

Christie, whose own children attend private school, said the state's laws need to be revamped to encourage the growth of charter schools. He said he hopes to attract some of the most successful charter school operators nationwide to New Jersey.

The governor's ideas for expanding charter schools include removing hurdles for public schools to convert to charter status, approving new charter school authorizers, allowing single-sex charter schools, allowing charter schools focused on special education and encouraging cyber and virtual charter schools.

He also proposed allowing failing public schools to be closed and converted into charter schools and encouraging charter schools and local school districts to share physical facilities.

Christie also reiterated his support for the Opportunity Scholarship Act, a voucher-like program that would allow low-income students in underperforming school districts to receive scholarship, paid for through corporate tax credits, to attend non-public schools or out of district public schools. He also called for lawmakers to make permanent a pilot program that allows students to attend public schools outside of their local districts but in nearby neighborhoods.

New Jersey Education Association Barbara Keshishian pointed out that not all charter schools are successful. She referred to a Stanford University study of 2,400 charter schools nationwide that found less than one-fifth outperformed public schools while nearly two-fifths performed at lower levels than their public counterparts. And in New Jersey, she said, a Rutgers study found New Jersey's charter schools perform far below the average public school.

"Clearly, there are excellent charter schools – like the Robert Treat Academy in Newark – and excellent public schools," Keshishian said. "Charter schools were meant to be laboratories of innovation – not a replacement for all public schools. If we're really smart, we'll identify excellent schools of all types and replicate their successes wherever we can."

Keshishian added that regarding vouchers, the NJEA does not believe that public funds should be used for private and religious schools. The Opportunity Scholarship Act gets around that issue by having corporate sponsors pay for the scholarships, for which they receive tax deductions.

Richard Bozza, executive director of the New Jersey Association of School Administrators, said that while he agreed changes need to be made in the persistently low-achieving schools, most schools in the state are doing a good job of educating students.

"We've got great schools, let's start to find ways to support their achievement as well," Bozza said.

New Jersey currently has 73 charter schools serving 26,000 students, or 1.4 percent of the K-12 student population in the state, according to the state Department of Education. More than 11,000 students are on charter school waiting lists.

Christie, who has long been vocal about his support for school choice and charter schools, has not yet named a replacement for schools commissioner Bret Schundler, another longtime advocate of school choice. Christie fired Schundler amid a controversy over the state's failed Race to the Top federal grant application, which cost the state $400 million in federal funds.

Christie's first budget, totaling $29.4 billion, cut aid to schools by $819 million to help close a nearly $11 billion budget gap. He has frequently targeted teachers' unions, arguing that they have declined to be "part of the solution" to the state's budget problems.