Close the schools but have another bureau for "sustainability"????
Talk about crossing the Rubicon!

So according to these stupid jack asses we can never have too much planning,

at any and all costs,

no matter how bad they are at it.

oops wrong thread,

but since I'm back here, I wonder why the PPS won't try this before closing these schools.

http://reason.tv/video/show/60.html

more here
http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2006/11/08/11barr.h26.html

Mr. Barr, a Democratic political organizer turned charter school mogul
Mr. Barr opened five more charters this fall—all within Jefferson High’s attendance area—and enrolled about 140 freshmen at each site, most of whom would have gone to Jefferson. District officials agreed to house two of the charters at a new middle school.

The move expanded Green Dot’s portfolio to 10 schools, all in poor neighborhoods and serving mostly Latino and some African-American students. All operate on the same principles, or “six tenets”: student enrollments no larger than 525, a college-preparatory curriculum, mandatory parental involvement, school-based decisionmaking, more money in the classroom, and schools open for community use.

Closing Jefferson seems to make sense from every point of view except that of providing a neighborhood school for a neighborhood that is mostly black. Why would it not make sense to house the Green Dot charter schools in the Jefferson building which, after all, is pretty nice?

Recommend Diane Ravitch's book "The Death and Life of the Great American School System" to all concerned about Portland schools. She was bureaucrat in the Dept. of Ed under Bush I and her book is a huge rarity, a bright person saying "Boy was I wrong" -- on NCLB, etc. A very refreshing book and she has a lot to say about school closures.