Giving Compass' Take:

•  Earl Martin Phalen, writing for The 74, discusses how school reforms need to go further to change the education system. Some charter school networks have been successful at making meaningful change in education. 

• How can donors help elevate school reforms? What current improvements are not working?

• Read about the importance of teacher buy-in in education reform. 

Many believe that the historic Brown v. Board of Education case was only about integration. It wasn’t. It was truly a courageous effort to leverage the legal system to help ensure that through education and hard work, all children can fulfill their tremendous innate potential.

While this value was one of the fundamental pillars of our great nation, it was not the reality for many. For many American children, education — in addition to housing, health, safety and access to capital, to name a few — was both separate and unequal.

Although many initiatives and billions of dollars have been invested into reforming our schools over the past few decades, those efforts have produced only modest improvements. Other efforts to improve the quality of education for all American children have focused on offering low-income families choice, through charter schools and, for those who could afford it, vouchers.

Charters, when implemented well, have brought the vision and spirit of Brown to life: Institutions like the Kauffman School, Brooke Charter School, Success Academies, Rocketship, KIPP, IDEA Public Schools and many, many more have provided excellence and given children the opportunity to transform their futures — and their families’ futures — through a good education.

Unfortunately, modest reforms to traditional public schools, and the development and expansion of charter schools, cannot solve this problem alone. Today, charters make up only 5 percent of the schools in the United States, and while many have been exceptional, many more are mediocre at best and horrific at worst.

More and more, I believe that we must take bold action in transforming our nation’s failing public schools, where most of our children currently go. Organizations such as Green Dot, Democracy Prep and Friendship Charter Schools are demonstrating that not only is school turnaround possible, it can be done in authentic collaboration with our public school districts and educators.

Read the full article about modest school reforms are not enough by Earl Martin Phalen at The 74.