Big easy choice: schools in New Orleans.ONE UNEXPECTED by-product by·prod·uct or by-prod·uct n. 1. Something produced in the making of something else. 2. A secondary result; a side effect. by-product Noun 1. of Hurricane Katrina  Editing of this page by unregistered or newly registered users is currently disabled due to vandalism. : New Orleans New Orleans (ôr`lēənz –lənz, ôrlēnz`), city (2006 pop. 187,525), coextensive with Orleans parish, SE La., between the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain, 107 mi (172 km) by water from the river mouth; founded is now the only city in America offering unfettered public school choice. Schools have dropped residency requirements, so any student living anywhere in the city can register at any school on a first come, first served basis. (If individual schools are oversubscribed Refers to connecting more users to a system than can be fully supported if all of them were using it at the same time. Networks and servers are almost always designed with some amount of oversubscription, counting on the fact that everybody does not need the service simultaneously. , a lottery determines who gets to attend.) This year, students can choose from 31 charter schools, 17 state-run schools, and five schools run by the local district. Twenty-five different organizations, from nonprofits to national charter chains, are running schools, and the options run from comprehensive curricula to niche schools featuring early college, French immersion, Montessori, the arts, and architectural design. Schools fought to attract customers with radio and TV advertising, enrollment fairs, visits to local churches and community groups, and roadside signs pitching the benefits of their programs. The New Orleans Times-Picayune told parents, "Think of yourselves as consumers in a brand new marketplace." Critics predicted chaos all summer. In August, The New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of Times ran a negative piece headlined "Rough Start for State's Efforts to Remake Faltering Schools in New Orleans." Tulane University education professor Lance Hill told the Times, "We've created the most balkanized school system in North America. The average parent is mystified mys·ti·fy tr.v. mys·ti·fied, mys·ti·fy·ing, mys·ti·fies 1. To confuse or puzzle mentally. See Synonyms at puzzle. 2. To make obscure or mysterious. ." But as the Times-Picayune reported a month later, 53 schools with 34,000 students have opened with relative calm and few snafus. Parents somehow managed to navigate their choices without mass chaos, and now one of America's preeminent cities is getting a dose of educational liberty. All it took was a hurricane. |
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