I count three or four from among the five or six school buildings CMS intends to close and “hold in reserve” that would make great charter school locations.
First step, the new General Assembly needs to pop the cap on charter schools and allow supply to catch up with demand. You can easily imagine multiple charter schools sharing the operational cost of a single former CMS site. Best of all the meddlesome gnomes at DPI cannot possibly find fault with the physical plant. Can they?
More broadly, there is no need for neighborhoods to “lose” their schools just because CMS has pulled up stakes. I know this challenges the received wisdom and drama of the victimhood parade, but maybe it is a good thing CMS is leaving parts of Charlotte it has failed to educate. Perhaps CMS will be replaced by something better. But first we need to open up our minds to that possibility and make it easy for it to happen.
