Charleston Post & Courier March 6, 2007

HEADLINE: DC School ideas pushed

BY DIETTE COURRÉGÉ

The Charleston Education Network put pressure Monday on the Charleston County School Board to adopt some of its ideas to enhance and accelerate the Charleston Plan for Excellence.

Members of the advocacy group announced seven policies that they believe will improve the district:

--Staff the lowest-performing schools first.

--Ensure that teachers at below-average and unsatisfactory rated schools have at least three years of experience.

--Assign only experienced principals to those schools.

--Ensure every child without a profound disability is a proficient reader by the end of third grade.

--Fully adopt student-based funding as the budgeting mechanism.

--Identify ineffective employees. Improve their performance quickly or remove them.

--Improve the use of technology in delivering instruction.

"There is nothing magic in these policies," said Johanna Martin- Carrington, cochair of the Charleston Education Network board. "They are all common sense and they all go to the heart of the school district's mission: teach every child successfully to high standards."

Jon Butzon, executive director of the network, said the proposed policies don't specify the way the district should operate but give guidance to the superintendent on the board's priorities.

School board Chairwoman Nancy Cook said the board is focused on the right areas, and she plans to incorporate the network's ideas in a workshop. "It's definitely the right time for it," she said. But the board needs to have conversations about the way those objectives could be accomplished without any extra cost to the district, Cook said.

Reach Diette Courrégé at 937-5546 or dcourrege@postandcourier.com