"The don't-look-back-and-don't-ask-questions rubber stamp process"

The Center for Education Reform

June 8, 2010

AS IT EVER WAS IN MONTGOMERY COUNTY. Rather than admit there are things even the vaunted Montgomery County, MD school system could improve upon, Superintendent Jerry Weast began the don't-look-back-and-don't-ask-questions rubber stamp process for denying the first two charter school applications for the county in a decade. At least 12 percent of high schoolers there don't graduate on time or at all and of those that do, barely a majority finish four-year colleges. Think their families would like an alternative option? Montgomery County Public Schools (and Jerry Weast in particular) seem to take the notion of charter schools as a personal attack. But when MCPS isn't working for all kids, real options could reach those lost into a system suffering from a self-perpetuated myth of perfection. Weast, a stickler for data, should be the first to recognize that the numbers don't lie.

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