New KIPP School Model Questioned

Jay Mathews writes in a column for the Washington Post (1/24), "The Knowledge Is Power Program, the nation's and [DC's] most successful charter school network, has a new official name, KIPP, and a new approach to raising achievement for disadvantaged children. In its first decade, the network...focused on creating middle schools that started with fifth-graders two or three years below grade level and got them up to speed by eighth grade. Now it is opening elementary schools, including three here, so that it can start raising achievement in pre-kindergarten and kindergarten." According to Matthews, "The move makes sense and conforms to a movement in many city school systems and charter networks to create K-8 schools that will give urban and rural children the consistent support and high standards found in many suburban schools. But I see a problem. This clean progression from making pre-K the main intake point overlooks the messiness of life in the communities being served."