The Maine State Charter School Commission has begun its work. The commission has invited public participation at meetings and has come up with ideas to fill “educational gaps” in the public school system or offer specific programming ideas like business education or science, technology, engineering and math education.
The charter school movement is based on the premise that our current school system is not meeting the needs of all our students.
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Many Maine students drop out of school. Many barely make it to graduation. Who are the students who are not successful in the public school system? Who are the students who are likely to drop out of school? Who are the students who can’t function within the current school structure?
As our state embarks on this new venture to establish 10 charter schools, I hope the commission will focus on who should be served rather than what these schools will offer.
The establishment of charter schools in Maine offers us the chance to develop school models that will meet the needs of students who have traditionally not been successful. If we create 10 charter schools with no commitment to those students who are least likely to succeed in our current school structure, then we are wasting an opportunity to make real progress in education reform.
I encourage the commission to support the creation of charter schools that are designed specifically to serve students who have not previously experienced success.
Craig King
Topsham
In a recent interview with a Press Herald reporter (“Deadline limits charter schools opening in fall,” March 6), Portland Mayor Michael Brennan said that he opposes charter schools and that he sees the proposed Baxter Academy for Technology and Science “as a threat to the economic well-being of Portland’s school system because it would take students and money from the system.”
Brennan also said that “parents should be skeptical of the proposed charter school because its backers don’t have a record of success.”
Mayor Brennan should take a look his own school system’s “record of success.” For example, published testing data for Portland High School indicate that it underperforms about 75 percent of the high schools in Maine and performs at the absolute bottom in Cumberland County. The status quo favored by the mayor already has a poor “record of success,” yet he opposes even trying any alternative.
Brennan also mentioned that the city is actually trying to increase enrollment. So he not only opposes charter schools but also advocates packing poorly performing public schools with even more students to do no more than increase revenue.
It would appear that the mayor is either ignorant of the performance of his school system or that he owes a favor to a certain special interest group connected to public education.
The thing the people of Portland really need to be skeptical of is their mayor’s motivation to limit their choice on education.
Dennis T. Caron
Cumberland Center
Driver’s parking-ban plight stirs decades-old memories
The Press Herald reported that the number of cars towed during the previous snowstorm was a far cry from the hundreds impounded in previous storms (“Clearing up a storm,” March 3).
The article mentioned one car owner who wasn’t so lucky, Ashley Lamar from Mississippi, who had never had to deal with a parking ban and wishes there was better notification for those who just moved here.
I’m with you, Ms. Lamar. Count me in the hundreds who have been impounded, and as a brand-new resident of Maine to boot.
It was New Year’s Day 1981, when my husband and I moved to Portland. We drove separate vehicles, my husband a U-Haul and I our van, both with out-of-state plates. We arrived that evening, and I was relieved to see all the available parking in front of our apartment on Grant Street.
How silly, in hindsight, but what did we know about “orange alerts”? I rented the apartment on an earlier trip and my husband hadn’t seen it yet, so we went in for a walk-through before unloading. Suddenly, we noticed the police out front with lights flashing in the dark, snowy sky and a tow truck with chains hooked to the U-Haul. Our van was missing.
We appealed to the police officer, but he told us to pay the surly tow truck guy a lot of cash to take the chains off the U-Haul so we could drive to the ferry terminal (“The what? Where’s that?”), pay a fine and get our van back.
You would think I’d be over it after 31 years, but my heart raced as I read about Ms. Lamar and Portland’s “no mercy” parking ban. Time will tell whether this letter to the editor will finally bring me closure. I think from the rueful smile on my face that it has.
Joyce Oreskovich
Brunswick
Snowe’s reasons for leaving bode ill for nation’s future
The recent announcement by our distinguished Sen. Olympia Snowe not to seek re-election is both sad and disturbing in its implications. Maine and the country will be losing the voice of a moderate senator who is dedicated, measured, deferential and experienced.
Maine and the country are losing out. Sad!
Her decision scares me and, when considering her reasons, it is most disturbing. Washington has devolved into a perverse culture of meanness, extremism and polarity. I’ve experienced it myself.
It is my understanding that Sen. Snowe’s decision is based on believing this will not change and that she can have more impact outside of the political realm. Sad and scary and disturbing!
Sen. Snowe has not fundamentally changed her personal philosophy, but politics have become so divisive and polarized that ideologies at the extremes permeate — if not rule — our political system.
Our country finds itself losing stature and its core strength eroded as out-of-control debt continues to damage our economic well-being and promises to burden generations to come.
If ever we needed a call to action, it is now. To see a great leader so discouraged that she made such a decision should scare us all. I hope we can all insist on electing principled leaders to represent us locally, regionally and nationally — and honor Sen. Snowe’s legacy. I respect Sen. Snowe’s decision and sincerely hope she can find a path to make changes outside the system that will bring civility back to national politics. I hope to support her efforts.
I write this as a citizen of Maine and the United States who is truly concerned by the implications of Sen. Snowe’s decision.
Michael Dubyak
Cape Elizabeth
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