Thank you once again to everyone who helped battle HB 643 and HB 666 last week. Both of those bills posed a significant threat to the charter school movement. Your engagement, whether through contacting legislators or testifying before the legislature, is what made the difference.
With a little less than a month left, the legislative session is beginning to wind down. However, there are still plenty of bills being debated. Check out some potential bills of interest below. LAPCS does not yet have positions on all of these bills, but as a membership organization, we take your input very seriously. If there is consensus among membership that we should support or oppose a bill, we will certainly voice that to legislators on everyone's behalf. Of course, as the charter movement expands and diversifies across Louisiana, consensus becomes more difficult. Please note that you are always welcome and encouraged to reach out to your legislators and your authorizer, even if LAPCS remains neutral on an issue (or in times when you may not agree with our position). We will always be there to support you and provide as much information as we can. Thus, If you have questions about bills or how to get involved, please contact our Policy Director, Veronica Brooks, at vbrooks@lacharterschools.org.
On another note, as a quick reminder, all current charter board members and board members who served last year (2012-2013) must submit a Tier 3 financial disclosure form to the Board of Ethics by Wednesday, May 15 (for information regarding the 2012 calendar year). If you are required (for other reasons) to submit a higher ranking financial disclosure form, then you will need to locate the correct form and submit it instead. You can download the Tier 3 form here.
Also, this week, LAPCS celebrated Teacher Appreciation Week and National Charter Schools Week. This year's theme was 'Delivering on the Dream." The LAPCS staff delivered and shipped some 1,800 "Delivering on the Dream" bags and info kits to member schools to have distributed to their teachers. We followed that up with distributing a Legislative Report Card out to members of the Louisiana House of Representatives and Senate, while receiving an official proclamation from the Governor recognizing Teacher Appreciation Day and Charter School Week in Louisiana.
Last but not least, LAPCS would like to share a bit of fun news! Our Executive Director, Caroline Roemer Shirley, was invited to participate on a panel last week at Stanford University to discuss the successes and challenges of implementing a common enrollment system. While there, she got to rub elbows with Nobel prize winner, Al Roth. Through osmosis, she is now an expert in Economics, so feel free to send her your questions regarding game theory!
