As a resident of the Commonwealth I'm pleased that the Massachusetts legislators did not give into the pressures from the teacher unions to water down the ed reform bill. You could say it was the lure of the big bucks from Race to the Top, and you're probably right, but so far that has not been enough to get the legislators in Albany to remove the cap on charters and allow for more leeway in their creation. Apparently Governor Paterson and Mayor Bloomberg are pulling out all stops to get the appropriate laws to qualify for the RTTT funding. The deadline is tomorrow afternoon and Paterson has called a special session of the legislator on MLK Day to see if he can get it to make the necessary changes. Hopefully the state senators and reps will see the significance of fulfilling Dr. King's Dream in which children of all colors get an opportunity for a quality education.

Here's all the info:
Paterson clashes with N.Y. lawmakers over charter schools
Associated Press / January 18, 2010
ALBANY, N.Y. - New York’s Legislature is proposing last-minute changes to charter schools law that Governor David Paterson and Mayor Michael Bloomberg warned yesterday will cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars in a federal grant due tomorrow.


By proposing to raise the cap of available charters to 400, the Democrat-led Senate and Assembly are following the lead of the state’s powerful teachers’ union and other school lobbyists, which have long opposed charter schools as now operated.

The current cap is 200, with just six charters left.

Paterson has said that in order to qualify for up to $700 million from the federal Race to the Top fund, the state must eliminate its cap or raise it to no fewer than 454. Paterson says the US education secretary told him so.

Yesterday Paterson ordered a special session to negotiate changes today, which is a holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr. The application must be in Washington by 4 p.m. tomorrow to be considered in the Obama administration program aimed at improving public education.

The bill in the Senate and Assembly would also give the Board of Regents, which is appointed by the Legislature, far more power in awarding any charters. It would limit the other entities with authority to approve charters: the State University of New York Board of Trustees, which is appointed by the governor, and the New York City Department of Education, under the mayor’s control.

The bill also contains accountability measures and reporting requirements that lobbyists for traditional schools long sought for charter schools operated by private companies. Such requirements are already in place for most public schools.

Charter schools were created more than a decade ago to take more innovative approaches to education, including longer school days and years, while reducing ties to bureaucracy and union hiring.

Thousands of families have turned to charter schools, often from waiting lists. Public schools have long said that has drained their resources.

© Copyright 2010 Globe Newspaper Company.