Gazette Editorial: Following criticism, school board should examine impartiality of policies

Gazette: A fair shot for charter schools

With her pull-no-punches critique of the county Board of Education's second rejection of a charter school application, board member Laura Berthiaume has distinguished herself as an independent thinker who is willing to take a principled stand for fairness and proactive approaches to learning.
Last month, the school board rejected the applications of two charter schools, including Global Garden, a proposed 420-student kindergarten through eighth grade International Baccalaureate school in the Kensington area. The 6-2 vote against Global Garden (member Michael Durso was the other supporting vote) came in response to a ruling from the state Board of Education that required the county to reconsider its 2010 rejection of Global Garden.
In prepared comments presented to the board the night it turned away Global Garden for the second time, Berthiaume criticized not only this decision, but also what she sees as a pervasive problem with the county's inherent bias against charter schools...