Jalen and his Academy in the WSJ
By rights, this violates the no politics rule. Steve Moore, a regular Journal columnist does a column praising Jalen Rose's Detroit charter academy. It is mostly about school choice, but there's a full rundown on the highlights of Jalen's public life. I can think of few athletes anywhere who do a better job of owning up to their mistakes than Jalen.
One really weird thing is that Jalen insists that Chris Webber didn't get any booster money. I had thought that Jalen had already admitted to taking money, albeit inconsequential amounts. And the notion that Webber never got anything might be news to the Ed Martin estate and the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan.
Anyway, here's the link; you should not need a Journal subscription:
It can't be just me who is thinking that Jalen is starting to sound like a future mayor of the City of Detroit.
December 31st, 2011 at 12:13 AM ^
I believe there are some who argue that it was Mayce Edward Christopher Webber Jr., rather than Mayce Edward Christopher Webber III (aka C-Webb), who was getting cash from Ed Martin.
December 31st, 2011 at 9:16 AM ^
Nice to see Jalen Rose doing good things for youth.
I have a very negative view of charter schools because 90% of them are owned and run by greedy businessmen who don't actually care about education and are incompetent at running a school...
But the ones who have caring owners (like this one) can change the world. Hope he keeps up the good work.
December 31st, 2011 at 11:18 AM ^
And you base this broad sweeping generalization off of an n of...? I can't speak for other charters, but many in NYC produce fewer dropouts, fewer criminals, boast higher graduation rates and higher college matriculation rates than their standard public schhool counterparts. Not a controlled experiment by any means, but the correlation with better results is there.
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<br>As far as greedy businessmen: if someone can do a better job, produce better results, and make a profit in the process, then everybody wins. If the results were poor or not worth costs, kids wouldn't go out of their way to go there. The fact remains that most (if not all) charter schools operate on a smaller per child budget than standard public schools. Get rid of beurocracy, and costs go down and efficiency and productivity go up.
December 31st, 2011 at 12:01 PM ^
Increasing shool choice should be a positive. Period. If the school is run well, parents will choose to send their children there. If it is run poorly (by those evil "greedy businessmen"), then they won't.
It is extremely unfortunate that the entire issue of school choice has been politicized by teacher unions.
Regardless, it's nice to hear about Jalen's efforts to help children in Detroit get a better education. This need not be a political issue.
December 31st, 2011 at 10:53 AM ^