Christian Science Monitor on the miracle in New Orleans schools

Charter schools are playing a key part

The Christian Science Monitor recently ran a nice article about the recovery of New Orleans’ schools after Hurricane Katrina.

Charter schools played a big role in the turn-around.

Shannon Jones, executive director of the Cowen Institute for Public Education Initiatives at Tulane University in New Orleans, points out that schools are held accountable for results in a new way because parents can choose any school in the district. Schools that don’t perform lose enrollment.

The job isn’t done in New Orleans, but the city now boasts schools like the Benjamin Franklin Senior High School, a magnet charter school, with an ACT Composite Score of 27.1. That eclipses anything even the top magnet school in Kentucky, the DuPont Manual High School in Louisville can produce.