Judy's JournalDr. Judith S. Stein
NIEO has worked nationally on facilitating, developing and/or implementing school choice or educational options—magnets, charters, home schools, Opportunity Scholarships, virtual schools and career academies for parental involvement and student academic excellence. The VPSC grant has provided for many new initiatives and partnerships in Florida and nationally. This was the first grant to a non-profit university for school choice. Since then, the Walton Foundation has funded a large center at the University of Arkansas headed by the great Jay Greene. In addition, the first joint school district and university Parent Resource Centers (PRC’s) were developed by the FSCRC and outreach centers have been staffed in OpaLocka, Homestead and Little Havana with partner organizations such as the Resource Room, Children’s Psychiatric Services and the Cuban National American Council. These Centers provide community services for school choice to the many neighborhoods in Miami in addition to those centers in the university: North Miami Beach and Kendall Student Education Centers. New centers are soon-to-open Parent Resource Centers in Tallahassee, Jacksonville, and Orlando, Florida. On the secondary school reform front, our partnership with a state university in Pensacola, Florida has flourished. A national Career Academy Survey has been developed by our partner Dr. Wally Holmes-Bouchillon, of the University of West Florida (UWF), and all academies in the United States are submitting the survey on-line. A national conference for career academies was hosted by the National Career Academy Coalition (NCAC) in San Francisco in November. NCAC which is another of our partners, as is the Small School Workshop (SSW) under the leadership of Michael and Susan Klonsky who were instrumental in the development of the USDOE Smaller Learning Communities grant. We are working with SSW on a series of “webinars” on school violence and reform. We have been a major part of the Commissioner’s initiative for career academies and presented at the K-12 School Reform Conference as well as reviewing the Project SUCCEED grants for Florida’s funding for Career Academies. Our on-going work with the mentors and mentees of the VPSC grant have led to many workshops and meetings such as the second annual Florida Public School Choice Consortium (FPSCC) Conference in Tampa, this time with Magnet Schools of America (MSA) and their Summer Magnet and Related Training (SMART) conference where we honored MaryEllen Elia the Superintendent of Hillsborough County and Past President of MSA. Other meetings are scheduled for the 2006-2007 school year which include the joint meeting in October with the K-12 conference where almost all the mentors and mentees attended. |
The other meetings for the year are scheduled for January 2007 at the Small Schools Conference in Miami, March 2007 in Tallahassee for the Career Academy Showcase and May 2007 for the FPSCC Third Annual Meeting in Orlando. Our nationally reviewed peer-researched School Choice Journal was published in March of 2006 and was well received by all. The next edition will come out this month and hopefully there will be four journals each year. Florida is a “bell weather state” for School Choice which includes charter schools, private school choice including Opportunity Scholarships and McKay Scholarships for Special Education students, as well as public choice such as Magnet Schools, Career Academies, NCLB Choice (this is the choice which is provided for students in low performing school who are able to transfer to higher performing public schools) and SES Choice (which provides choice by way of tutoring by private and public supplemental service providers). We are proud to announce that Dr. Carlo Rodriguez, former Administrative Director of Miami-Dade Public Schools’ Charter School Operations Office has been appointed the new Executive Director of the Office of School Choice and Parental Options. We will be saying farewell to Virginia Gentles who will be leaving for Washington, DC and honoring her at the State of Florida Charter School Conference on November 29, 2006. School Choice has been enhanced in Florida through the many public and private choice programs available in this State. The choices include:
Finally, we are happy to announce that we have filled out our staff in South Florida with the hiring of a Professional Development Coordinator Dr. Patricia Grimsley, a 36 year veteran and former principal and district administrator in Miami. Our Katy Twist is now the Charter School Coordinator for the Center, and a new Parent Liaison Kathylynn Pierre is housed at Nova Southeastern University in North Miami Beach. We also have a new administrator in Tampa for Central/North Florida--Ms. Kathleen Harris, housed at the Student Education Center of Nova Southeastern University in Tampa, Florida. Kathy is a nationally known consultant for secondary school reform and parental involvement. We hope to assist you in learning more about how school choice helps educators, parents and students with school climate; security; student achievement and educational excellence in 2006 and 2007 and beyond. Visit us in Florida. Happy New Year 2007 Judith S. Stein Ed.D. |
Since this will be the first e-newsletter for the 2007 year, we wish you a Happy and Healthy New Year for 2007. As I write this, my last article for the Florida School Choice e-newsletter of the Florida School Choice Resource Center (FSCRC) for 2006, we are pleased to continue our work for school choice in Florida. This Center was developed under the Voluntary Public School Choice grant (VPSC) from the United States Department of Education which was provided to the State of Florida in the 2002-2003 school year to expand, reinstate or improve school choice in Florida. This grant provided a five-year sub-grant to Nova Southeastern University, Fischler School of Education and Human Services (FGSEHS) which provides for the increase of initiatives of the National Institute of Educational Options (NIEO) which has been part of the FGSEHS since 1998.