newjerseynewsroom.com

BY SHARON McCLOSKEY and JOE TYRRELL

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

SPECIAL REPORT: THIRD OF THREE PARTS

Newark schools have captured the nation's imagination.

After years of indifference, a buzz began locally in 2008, when wealthy foundations announced they had put up more than $20 million for the Newark Charter School Fund, backing public schools that are privately run.

Now, Newark schools have an even larger commitment, $100 million from billionaire Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. But the gift comes with strings.

As part of a deal negotiated among Zuckerberg, Mayor Cory Booker and Gov. Chris Christie, partial control of the city's school district will be handed to Booker, who convinced Zuckerberg to open his checkbook and is working to raise matching money.

Christie had already paved the way for the handover by announcing that he would not reappoint Superintendent Clifford Janey, who had just begun his third year on the job.

Richard Barth, president of the highly touted Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP), said it aims to double the number of children it serves in Newark, where it already has four charter schools.

SPECIAL REPORT:

New Jersey's charter school experiment: Inside Newark's Lady Liberty Academy

New Jersey's charter school experiment: Glen Pinder shakes up Lady Liberty Academy

"This partnership will create a team that knows that with will, hard work, and innovative ideas, we can do better," added Ted Mitchell, president of California's state board of education and president of the NewSchools Venture Fund, a strong backer of the "education entrepreneur" movement.

But not everyone has jumped on the bandwagon. Long-time Newark reformers like the Education Law Center's David Sciarra are leery of Booker control. For starters, Sciarra said, Gov. Christie had no authority to grant it.

At least in his public statements, Booker has acknowledged that cooperation and shared commitments will be as important as money and educational theories.

And money, no matter what the amount, does not guarantee success. If there is consensus among education gurus and entrepreneurs on any one point, it is this: the turnaround of problem schools is hard.

The experience Newark's Lady Liberty Academy Charter School, the beneficent of grant money from the Newark Charter School Fund, provides a cautionary tale about the problems faced by those working to improve Newark schools, and the danger of centralizing too many decisions among too few people.

New Beginnings

The winds of change blew open the doors of Lady Liberty last fall. With money provided by the Newark Charter School fund, Booker had lured a high-profile principal from New York's Harlem Children's Zone, Glen Pinder.

Over the preceding summer, with Fund partner De'Shawn Wright filling one of the nine-member board's many vacancies, Pinder installed a new administrative team, colleagues from New York. Wright and a handful of others set out to remake the school, hiring contractors to rewire and refit the building and enlisting new vendors for curriculum changes and testing preparation.

When parents walked through the school's doors in September, change was evident. But it would not be until November that they got their audience with the new executive director. Standing before them in a packed classroom, Pinder portrayed the school as failing.

True, Lady Liberty needed help, as student proficiency rates had dropped on state tests in 2008-2009. No matter that scores had gone up the previous year, or that Pinder overstated the decline. He was unafraid of setting a bold target, one tied to federal funding requirements.

"My main goal," he said, is to get to 80 percent proficiency by 2012," Pinder said.

He mentioned some of the consultants the school had brought in, noting they were needed the school ready for a charter renewal visit from state officials, then slated for December.

"The state's going to want to talk to parents," Pinder told them, "so we'll be reaching out to you for help."

As the new administrative team tried to transform the school, holdover staffers began to suspect that the makeover resembled more of a Potemkin Village. Some complained that the school was being staged for the visit from state education officials, with parents, teachers and students being selected and scripted to play roles in the process.

Some chafed at the administration's regimented approach. Others questioned Pinder's commitment to improvement beyond test scores.

"I'd correct students who misused words and grammar, after all that's part of our jobs," said Susan Gamba, a veteran teacher who had worked at several other districts.

"Of course, some of these kids complain that you're a racist, and Pinder would back them up," she said. "He'd say, 'Don't correct them, let them speak the way they do. You have to be sensitive to their culture.'"

The new year arrived with renewed internecine struggles at the school. They started in January with Pinder's continued effort to fire kindergarten teacher Kim Kurus, whose problems began following a union organizing discussion among some staffers.

Upstairs in the Dance Room, the few remaining members of the school board gathered for another early morning meeting, milling around the room and making small talk while they awaited the arrival of board President Ray Codey.

Then Kurus, whose status had been in limbo since December's meeting, walked in, clenching her folders to her chest, and the lightness disappeared.

"Shall we begin?" Codey asked, as he swept into the room, removed his overcoat and took his seat at the center of the tables.

To his right sat Glen Pinder, already wiping his brow with a folded handkerchief, and Kaylin Dines, once again reviewing her meeting folder. To his left, K. Anthony Thomas, dressed for court, De'Shawn Wright, checking his Blackberry, and Business Administrator Gil Barrios.