At a recent forum hosted by Families for Excellent Schools, NYC mayoral candidates Christine Quinn, Anthony Weiner, John Liu, and Sal Albanese discussed their views on charter schools. For many of the parents in the audience, the city charging charter schools rent seemed to be an important issue.
[Liu] said that because district schools shoulder some costs that charter schools do not, letting charter schools use public space rent-free puts them on an unequal playing field. He also said the tension that co-locations create between parents, teachers and communities is not worth it.
“It has distracted away from the learning environment that should be in each and one of those school buildings,” he said, in comments that prompted the only boos of the night. “If we want to have charter schools they should be community-grown charter schools with their own space.”
Each candidate spent about 25 minutes answering questions posed by charter school parents, whom Families for Excellent Schools is trying to mobilize in the mayoral election. Quinn and Weiner each said, as they have before, that they support continuing to allow charter schools to use public space. But each said tensions between district and charter schools could be reduced.
