Speaker is Assemblywoman Mila M. Jasey
For residents of Maplewood, South Orange and West Orange, the news that their school districts might be getting a new charter school was not met with universal acceptance. In fact, many oppose not only the Hua Mei charter school, which would offer a Mandarin-immersion curriculum, but also the process by which new charter schools are approved (or rejected) in New Jersey.
On Friday, January 6, approximately 100 protesters, some with their children, joined with local officials at the Maplewood Community Center in DeHart Park to voice their opposition both to the proposed Hua Mei school, and to the charter school approval process in general. The rally had two objectives: to urge Acting Education Commissioner Chris Cerf to reject Hua Mei’s charter school application and to voice support for reform legislation that would give local control over the charter-school approval process.
Local officials who addressed the crowd included Former N.J. Gov. and (current) state Senator Richard Codey, Assemblywoman Mila Jasey and Assemblyman John McKeon.
Marian Raab
The rally’s organizer, Marian Raab, also spoke to the crowd urging them to work towards charter School reform and to prevent schools like Hua Mei from attempting to secure a “boutique” education for a privileged few via the public school system. Framing it as a larger issue of charter school reform, Raab stressed that the system by which approvals were granted needed to be overhauled because “I can’t do this every six months!”
Other speakers included Dr. Brian Osborne, Superintendent of the South Orange-Maplewood School District, and representatives from Save Our Schools (SOS) NJ, a nonpartisan, grassroots organization of parents and other concerned residents who “believe that all NJ children should have access to a high quality public education.” This group has been advocating for the passage of legislation that would reform New Jersey’s charter school law. SOS speakers included Alle Ries of Maplewood, Jill Kimelman of Millburn and Stan Karp of Montclair, who led a delegation of supporters at the rally from Montclair, who have been staging their own opposition to a charter school proposal for Quest Academy in their school district.
The Superintendents of both affected School Districts oppose Hua Mei; Dr. Anthony P. Cavanna (Superintendent of West Orange Public Schools) wrote an opposition letter that is available here and the letter from Dr. Brian Osborne, Superintendent of South Orange – Maplewood Schools, can be viewed as an Op-ed on Maplewood Patch.
On the other side of the debate were Adam Kraemer and Marc Meyerowitz, both of West Orange, who handed out informational sheets and advocated that charter schools are good for Essex County for a number of reasons, including that they provide additional educational options to students and that they provide relief to already crowded local public schools.Jutta Gassner-Snyder, one of the founders of Hua Mei, stressed the importance of providing the option for a Mandarin-English educational curriculum that “will not only enrich children’s lives, it will prepare them with a global vision and capacity to speak a strategic world language that they cannot currently get at any other public school in our district.”If the Hua Mei Charter School is approved, it will open in September, 2012, with two Kindergarten and two first grade classes, as well as one second grade class.
When Gassner-Snyder was asked if they would re-apply if the school is not approved this year, she responded “We haven’t reached a verdict on that yet. We hope our future will be electing a board and getting the wheels going for the school opening.”
