Educational Visit From Across the Pond

Charter schools are created to make a difference in education outside of the confines of traditional public school systems. Innovative philosophies and practices are embraced, and their success varies from school to school.

So it makes sense that leaders of these schools would benefit from learning from one another.

A group of school heads from academies - Great Britain's equivalent to American charter schools - recently traveled here to spend seven days with USC Rossier School of Education experts and tour key charter high schools in the Los Angeles area.

The delegation was the second in as many years to visit USC Rossier leaders to exchange knowledge and leadership strategies.

Guilbert Hentschke of USC Rossier and Brent Davies of the University of Hull initiated the professional development opportunity for academy heads after the two had collaborated for 15 years comparing trends in U.S. and U.K. schools.

"The academy movement arose as a form of social justice initiative and an effort to try something new because there was a lack of political will or ability to do anything," Davies said.

Charter schools and academies are publicly funded, privately operated schools and, despite being an ocean apart, share many of the same challenges and opportunities.

Both, for instance, have a lot more autonomy than traditional public schools, and both tend to mostly serve inner-city students.

"By coming to the U.S., we're given the opportunity for individual reflection, which is a luxury we don't give to the teaching community often," said Linda Marshall, vice principal of Bradford Academy in Bradford. "The visit was perfect timing in my professional career - a chance to reflect, share and absorb the practices and experiences from colleagues in the U.S. and U.K."

By Andrea Bennett on February 23, 2009
Full article. http://uscnews.usc.edu/global/educational_visit_from_across_the_pond.html?view=full