Parents, students skeptical of ILEA proposals to change who oversees Indianapolis schools

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Parents and others have expressed skepticism about a task force’s proposals to change who oversees charters and Indianapolis Public Schools, arguing the plans would create additional bureaucracy without improving education.

Roughly 100 people attended a public input session at KIPP Indy Legacy High School on Wednesday, just one week before the Indianapolis Local Education Alliance votes on recommendations to make sweeping changes to IPS and charters. Their recommendations will go to state lawmakers.

The alliance will consider two proposals that would significantly dilute the power of the elected IPS school board. One gives oversight of both charter and IPS schools to a collaborative board consisting of IPS, mayoral, and charter school appointees. Another gives oversight to an independent Indianapolis Education Authority within the mayor’s office.

But both proposals encountered virtually universal criticism on Wednesday. In a breakout group during the session that focused on the best structure for governing schools, supporters of both IPS and charter schools said either option could result in more bureaucracy.

“One of the reasons that our school system is failing our students is because we keep on inventing new ways of creating structures that don’t really care about the learning inside the classroom,” said Bony Georges, an IPS teacher who is also an advocate with Stand for Children Indiana, which has supported expanding charter school models. “At the end of the day, I’m confident it will fail. Why? Because parents, students don’t care about school systems that we are creating, models that we are creating — they care about good education.”

Other parents questioned how these proposals would foster collaboration between IPS and the charter sector, or how they would close the opportunity gap between students of color and their white peers.

Groups supporting IPS have pushed the ILEA to consider giving the elected IPS school board expanded powers, including becoming the sole authorizer of charters in district boundaries.

Meanwhile, Stand for Children’s advocates have proposed that a new hybrid IPS school board, partly elected and partly appointed by the mayor’s Office of Education innovation, should serve as the charter authorizer.

Samantha Douglas, president of the Far Eastside Community Council, said her experience has shown that the city’s current boards with appointed members already consist of individuals who do not represent their residents well.

“What you’re proposing is that we have more boards with more appointees that will continue to not represent general residents well,” she said.

ILEA members at Wednesday’s meeting explained their support or opposition to the various models.

Former mayor Bart Peterson said he did not favor a model that would put an elected IPS school board in charge of boh district-run and charter schools. He pointed out that the district has never chosen to authorize a school — even though state law gives IPS that ability.

“I don’t think the charter school community would believe — I don’t believe — that that is the environment in which all of the decision-making ought to occur,” Peterson said.

Another ILEA member, Tobin McClamroch, said the two proposals that would reduce the current IPS board’s authority prioritized collaboration. By bringing charters and district schools together under one entity, he said, it would create an economy of scale that would make IPS sustainable as it faces serious long-term fiscal concerns.

Students from charter and district schools also voiced skepticism that the proposals would make a real impact in their classrooms or affect how they get to school. Instead, they cited the need for help with other problems students face: gun violence, mental health challenges, and getting to and from school safely.

KIPP Indy Legacy High School senior Dazlyn Delarosa said both options under consideration by the ILEA that would dilute the elected school board’s power are unpopular with the public and do not address the issues at hand.

But she also criticized the lack of input from students who, like her, have struggled with challenges like housing instability. In their own breakout group Wednesday, she said, students discussed the importance of safety.

“That is what they care about — that’s all they care about. They want to be safe when they go to school,” she said. “They want to know that there are adults with them. They want to know that security is available. They want to feel safe coming to school, being in a safe building.”

The task force is also considering two sets of proposals for how transportation and facilities could be shared by district and charter schools.

In one model, schools participate in and pay into a collaborative that handles transportation and building services. In another model, an independent authority collects property taxes and oversees those services.

The next public listening session is on Monday from 12-2 p.m. at the Madame Walker Legacy Center at 617 Indiana Ave. The ILEA’s final vote on which recommendations to adopt will be held on Dec. 17 at the City-County Building at 200 E. Washington St.

Amelia Pak-Harvey covers Indianapolis and Lawrence Township schools for Chalkbeat Indiana. Contact Amelia at apak-harvey@chalkbeat.org.

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.