Free Press columnist Rochelle Riley floats a bold notion for one of Detroit's most serious social problems -- "a district of failing schools."
To supplement Detroit Public Schools, charter schools and Educational Achievement Authority classrooms, she suggests something that "might improve education most, at least for some Detroit children: residential schools."
Let’s at least consider giving parents who need it the option of . . . sending [children] to public, tuition-free boarding schools away from the chaos. . . .
I find it heartbreaking that so many children in Detroit are in situations they didn’t make, while people yell for their parents to do better. What we should be thinking is how we can do better by those children.
Riley quotes supportive comments from Dan Varner, chief executive of a four-year-old coalition called Excellent Schools Detroit, though her 12-paragraph conversation starter doesn't address the giant green "elephant" in the room. A few readers do so in posted comments:
- Dan Jeffery: Perhaps you can tell where the money from this will come from? . . . I'd love to see your business model on how these funds would be found without government money!
- Rick Dziengowski: Oh look: A flying pig is throwing free money from the sky! What else can we give, you Ms. Riley? Maybe we could turn the Charles Wright [Museum] into that boarding school as a way to keep it open.
- Dennis Smith: "Tuition-free." What happens when the other person's money runs out?
-- Alan Stamm
