Gates really getting serious about charter schools

I wrote yesterday about the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation awarding a $10 million grant to charter schools in Houston.

Now, a consortium of charter schools in the Los Angeles area is getting a whole lot more than that, $60 million to be exact, to develop data oriented teacher evaluation programs that will rely, in part, on test results for students.

This is the kind of forward-thinking “stuff” that you can do quickly with charter school flexibility. Gates knows that.

Meanwhile, Kentucky has nothing like this.

Why does a state that likes to pride itself on education innovation continue to opt out of one of the most promising developments in school reform ever? Are the best interests of Kentucky’s students really going to be forever subordinated to the self interests of a few teachers’ union people?

Let’s hope that gets changed when the legislature comes to Frankfort in January. Our kids deserve a better deal. And, Bill Gates and company apparently understand where that better deal may lie.