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By Angel Figueroa
This holiday season, one family in Reading, Pa., has a lot to be thankful for.
Jaritza Rodriguez is set to graduate from high school, where she serves as student government president. By this time next year, she'll have become the first in her family to go to college. She wants to be a radiologist and is applying to Penn State.
Just a few years ago, such a bright future was anything but certain for Jaritza.
If the Reading School Board gets its way, hundreds of other students won't get the same chance she's had to get their education back on track at the public charter school called I-LEAD Charter School
For nearly three years, the school board has been trying to revoke I-LEAD's charter, in spite of having renewed it just five months before starting the revocation action.
School board officials have rejected offers of free mediation and instead are pursuing costly legal efforts to lock I-LEAD's doors to the many students who have no other options.
- READ MORE: Reading charter school says it's been 'bullied' by school district (Pa. Watchdog)
This kind of education isn't easy, but it's giving students like Jaritza a second chance.
And they're embracing it with great enthusiasm. To cite but one measure, I-LEAD students' truancy rate is barely half that of high school students in the city's other public schools.
In spite of having been labeled among the worst of the worst, and in many cases having given up and dropped out of the traditional public school system, students at I-LEAD see and seize the opportunity to get themselves back on track.
Like many cities across the United States, Reading has experienced major demographic shifts in recent decades that have overwhelmed leaders in various sectors, perhaps none more dramatically than education.
- READ MORE: I-LEAD Charter School skirted Pa. Sunshine Act, expert says (Reading Eagle)
High poverty, high migration, high illiteracy and high dropout rates create significant challenges for many cities such as Reading.
And local leaders have yet to come up with optimal solutions for how to better serve students who perhaps don't speak English, or who have been promoted to high school in the Reading School District but arrive at I-LEAD testing at an elementary level.
Instead of adapting to these changing demographics and creating innovative solutions, too many leaders focus instead on preserving the status quo and shutting down alternative options that work.
In Massachusetts, voters this year passed a measure to cap the number of charter school seats in the state in spite of extremely high performance.
Parents in Huntington Park, California, had to sue the city council over a moratorium on charter school growth.
This summer, the NAACP called for a moratorium on charter schools across the country even though many charter schools, like I-LEAD, serve the same disadvantaged minority youths that the NAACP claims to support.
To be clear, the Reading School District and other public school districts are working for many students.
But the students for whom traditional public schools are not working deserve another option. They deserve a welcoming, compassionate learning environment that meets their needs.
I-LEAD's holistic approach to education helps students like Jaritza Rodriguez discover and unlock potential they didn't even know they had.
In her three years at I-LEAD, "Jarry," as she's known around the school, has blossomed into a strong, outspoken leader.
She's building a base of knowledge that will serve her in college and her career along with leadership and other life skills that will make her a well-rounded person and set her up for success.
Since its first commencement in 2011--when it celebrated 23 students, 14 of whom had been high-school dropouts and two of whom were homeless--I-LEAD Charter School has served the neediest of Reading's young people.
Contrary to the national stereotype of charter schools, I-LEAD doesn't cherry-pick high-performing students from other schools so we can show amazing test scores. We serve high-risk students who were deemed too difficult or too far behind their peers to stay in the public schools.
They come to us because they have nowhere else to go. The system has failed them and we're their only hope.
Education is the strongest force in any community. It has the potential to level the playing field and erase class divisions. Unfortunately, rhetoric drives politics, and the powerful too often lose sight of the most valuable thing here: the students.
Every student in this country has the right to a good education.
We owe them a chance to learn in a safe environment, no matter their financial resources, their ethnic background or their past educational performance.
Together with Jaritza and her family, I'm thankful for the opportunity I-LEAD has given at-risk students in Reading, and I'm hopeful school boards across the country will decide to support rather than oppose efforts like ours.
Angel Figueroa is the chief executive officer of I-LEAD Charter School in Reading.