New study explains exodus from Columbus schools

The Columbus Dispatch

10/22/2005

By Jennifer Smith Richards

Dear Gene,

Your people never listened to us. They never paid attention to our children. They let things get out of control at school. Our kids aren’t safe.

They wouldn’t help our needy kids or challenge our gifted ones. We don’t love you anymore.

So we’re leaving.

Goodbye,
The parents.

Superintendent Gene Harris and the Columbus Public Schools knew that students - more than 7,100 now - had ended their marriage with the district and found comfort in the arms of charter schools. Now they know why it’s over.

The main reasons are few but specific. They are passionate, and they are personal.

Most parents or guardians - more than 90 percent - who have left did so for more than one reason, according to a poll of 371 families analyzed by KidsOhio.org. The group released a study last spring explaining who had left. This time, it asked why.

School-climate issues - discipline, safety and dress - and a lack of individual attention pushed parents away most often, the analysis found. They also were in search of smaller classes, more academic challenges and better communication with teachers and principals.

Three-quarters of parents now give their new partners high grades - As and Bs - and half give their Columbus schools Ds or Fs.

And while this may come as a blow - even a shock - to the district, which has said it will win them back, parents made it clear that most don’t want to come back. Indeed, 58 percent of parents say their child’s performance has improved at a charter school.

“It’s a pretty strong endorsement of what’s going on in charter schools,” said Martin Saperstein, president of Saperstein Associates Inc., which conducted the poll for KidsOhio. “Even if you fix one thing (in Columbus schools) there’s still lots and lots of parents out there who will be unhappy.”

Charter schools have a spotty academic record but their popularity grows. Defections from Columbus Public Schools are projected to cost the district $50 million this school year, a major reason officials are looking to close buildings and reduce the number of employees.

And with state vouchers starting next year to help pay private-school tuition for families with children at failing public schools, the district is bracing for even more students to leave.

Comments about the district’s shortcomings were powerful, Harris said.

“This was not easy, but it was necessary,” Harris said. “It’s not about my comfort. It’s not about any of our staff’s comfort. It’s about serving our community and our client base.”

Comments received minor editing, Saperstein said.

“There’s nothing they could’ve done,” said the parent of a first-grader. “Columbus Public Schools are just a mess. The whole atmosphere is just chaos.”

Said the parent of a kindergartner: “Columbus Public Schools have lost their gift of love for their students.”

KidsOhio found that parents in the households polled are savvy about education. Three in 10 are college graduates. They are more likely to have higher incomes, own homes and be married than the average district resident.

The poll’s findings were a surprise to many district employees, said Mark Real, director of KidsOhio. Real and Saperstein presented the analysis to about 400 Columbus principals, teachers and other staff members yesterday.

“It was really sobering to actually see that in print,” said Rhonda Johnson, who heads the teachers union. “I don’t think that the average teacher in the school district knows exactly how many students we’ve lost and what that means in terms of jobs, buildings closed and the bottom line.”

The superintendent knows.

“The parents of the students we serve are very sophisticated and they look for options that will fit the needs of their children,” Harris said. “We started our alternative schools in the mid-’80s and we encouraged parents at that time to be discriminating. So we’re not surprised that our parents have continued to be more and more discriminating.”

Harris said district leaders are using the poll and analysis to mobilize an effort starting today to give parents what they need. Although the district already is planning specific programs and schools to mirror what some charters offer, there’s more to be done, she said.

“We won’t ignore the data we have and we will continue to remake our district so it is a district of choice,” Harris said.

KidsOhio has offered to do another study, this time of parents who stay in the district. It will ask what they like and dislike about Columbus schools.

The group pays for its studies through private donations and does not use district money.

“Listening to those parents is very, very important.” Harris said. “And I think they’ll be pleased they’re even being asked.”

Charter-school operators say they already knew what bothered parents and what they were seeking.

“We are successful because we listen to parents’ needs and parents’ wants and desires. All of the things parents said in this study are what we’ve responded to,” said Anita Nelam, who runs two single-sex charter schools in Columbus and is a board member of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools.

Real, of KidsOhio, said he encourages the district to compete with charters for students - and he thinks it can.

“If we’re going to have real competition, we cannot extinguish the traditional public schools. They have to stand and do battle with charters, private and voucher schools,” Real said. “It’s not just competition. It’s competition to improve.”

jsmithrichards@dispatch.com

Copyright © 2005, The Columbus Dispatch