EDITORIAL: School accountability

The public school system in Nevada, and particularly in Clark County, has many needs that will ultimately require funding, most notably capital funds to address the dire necessity for more campuses and to maintain and repair buildings on existing campuses. But with regard to poor-performing schools, it’s been shown time and time again that without accountability, throwing money at those schools doesn’t solve the problem.

That was demonstrated once more Monday in a report by the Review-Journal’s Trevon Milliard. Nevada education officials are rightly preparing to tighten the state’s grip on struggling schools that receive extra financial support, and take action if those schools fail to improve. The measures come in the wake of 51 public schools being labeled low performers, including 29 in Clark County.

Nine of the 51 schools — seven in Clark County, all high schools — were identified as “priority schools.” Mr. Milliard noted that eight of those schools shared in $34 million in federal School Improvement Grants over the past three years, yet none of those schools approved their standing in the state’s one-to-five-star accountability system ratings. That certainly demonstrates the need for the state to significantly up its accountability standards.

Mr. Milliard reported that the state is allowed to turn chronically underperforming schools over to management organizations, which usually run charter schools, or close those schools and send students elsewhere. With many Clark County schools already bursting at the seams, the latter option is an absolute nonstarter.

However, the former suggestion should be put to use more often. The Nevada Board of Education must have the power to create real accountability standards, with the very real consequence of removing more failing schools from the control and operation of school districts and placing those schools into the hands of private charter operators. And the 2015 Legislature should get on board, too, passing a parent trigger law that allows chronically low-performing public schools to be converted into charter campuses.

More funding may indeed be needed, but not without serious accountability and true reform measures.