Detroit 'Emergency Manager' Closing School For Girls -- Help Save "Catherine Ferguson Academy"

PowerisKnowledge. Sometimes going to weed is the only true answer. I live in a small town that once had a very substantial group of industries, to include GE, that have since fled and our work base has long gone away. The size of the town and county has only slightly lowered. For such a small County we have tons of government works from all levels.

Now to get to the specifics. In my lifetime we have had three downtown renewals and yet nothing has changed except for the loss of jobs. We have an ever increasing number of government employees, so much for the efficiency of modern computers. IF, back in the first renewal, or even in the second or the third that I was a part of, if we had let the downtown properties lose in value then new life, new money and entreprenuers would have done the renewals on their own. As it is, we are talking about a new "downtown" renewal. Almost without exception the downtown business is still the same people, just a later generation and the building owners keep getting subsidized to make their businesses look better. That is no way to run a railroad and I am afraid your school problem is in the same category. A new broom sweeps clean. People who are concerned can pitch in with money, effort and whatever assets to help these children get an education. Put them back in mainstream.

PowerisKnowledge, don't ever think you are not appreciated. There have been demonstrations I didn't believe in that I could have support just because the demonstration itself proved a need for better foresight on the part of officialdom. There are activists who sit on the street, there are activists who come with wire cutters, or with dynamite or guns or bombs. Then there are activists who write letters, run for office, spend their money, their energy and their assets to try to make a difference. Yet never forget, there are activists on both sides of many issues. You must have had a wonderful Mom. Thanks for being here.

Goes to show you how phukked up priorities are.

I'm curious about how much is spent per student per school year in this school compared to the other schools in the district.

Is it possible that closing this school will allow several others to stay open?

kazutam,

If you are going to be closing schools to save money (allegedly that is the case here), would it not make more sense to close the ones that are failing? As in ones that have high dropout rates?

Not necessarily.

Look you can have wonderful graduation rates, yet be spending 3 or 4 times as much per student.

The person put in to manage this has to look at what is best for the MOST students.

So if they are(and I'll admit I don't know) spending a disproportionate amount per student compared to the spending on the rest of the students in the district to achieve these results, well as Spock would say "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few".

I am speaking from the perspective of outcomes, since I do that as part of my job. I perform audits and generate reports to ensure contract goals are being met. If we do not meet goals as outlined, we do not get funding. It's that simple. Now in this case I'm not sure if the school has that same setup or not. That being said, any program that boasts a high success rate such as Ferguson (in this case graduation and going on to college) should not be on the chopping block. If you are looking to close schools because of funding issues (allegedly), then why not target those who are not meeting the goals or achieving the desired outcomes? One poster put it quire accurately:

This is a prime example of cutting out the healthy heart when the problem lies in the cancerous toe.

Like I said the "emergency manager" has to look to the health of the ENTIRE school system.

IF times were good then fine support separate schools for each "special interest" group, but in Detroit and the surrounding areas times are NOT good.

So they spend the money to keep this school open, what do you say to the students of the schools that are closed? Sorry you aren't as important as the pregnant girls?

If you are looking to close schools because of funding issues (allegedly), then why not target those who are not meeting the goals or achieving the desired outcomes?

Because sometimes it's better to teach 200 kids with a 30% failure rate than 50 with a 10% failure rate. What would be harder, finding a place for 200 kids in an already overcrowded school system or 50?

When times are tough, it's all about the numbers.

Here is the DPS site for the school, btw. Their report says the grad rate is different than what you claim.

He may not even be qualified to be in the position and obtained it through someone he knows.

So now because you don't like the decisions being made it's time to attack the person who has the dirty job of cleaning up the messes left from 30 years of mismanagement?

Such a wonderful way to do things.

And people wonder why things are such a mess.

If I were this guy I'd be tempted to say to he11 with it, you all made the mess YOU clean it up.

Yep that will surely "fix" the problem.

Give control BACK to the folks that have embezzled the monies and run this system into the ground.

Oh wait, let me guess, the demand would then come out that monies should be taken from all of the other school districts in the state to support the mismanaged ones in the Detroit area, after all you've gotta have money to be able to embezzle it, right?

Here is the DPS site for the school, btw. Their report says the grad rate is different than what you claim

The report from 09-10, states that graduation rate was less than 80% and proficiency and they didn't proficiency test 95% of their students. Which doesn't mean that they haven't improved during the 10-11 school year to a 90% graduation rate. I don't know, with out those numbers I can't comment.

But I will say this, even though the school is providing services that should be provided anyway, that doesn't mean that studies should be neglected. It doesn't matter if the girls get accepted into college if they have to drop out because they can't keep up. That does more harm to them than good.

I feel bad for them. The Michigan system failed them long before they got to CFA.