Hundreds of lime green T-shirts created a pond of color on the north side of the Capitol Thursday afternoon as students and parents demonstrated in favor of further funding for charter schools in Bridgeport and Stamford. The money, proposed by Gov. Dannel P. Malloy, was taken out of the budget recently approved by the budget-writing Appropriations Committee. Malloy, in a two-minute speech, was non-confrontational. He did not demand that the funding be returned. “The cause of education, there’s really nothing more important in our society. All of our schools should be great schools and we should not be dividing ourselves by what type of schools or who runs the schools. What we have to do is make sure that we have great schools available to all of our students. And that’s exactly what I’ve been trying to do for four years and will try to do over the next four years as well, to make sure that we have models of schools that are working for the students that go to them; that we implement the things that we know will work. We know longer school days work. We know more concentration on reading and arithmetic, particularly early in the year, has an effect on outcomes. We know that holding students and parents responsible works. We should not be afraid of a model that does those things and does those things successfully… We also have to understand that we’re going to have charter schools in Connecticut, we’re going to have other schools in Connecticut, private schools and other publicly run schools…Let’s not be afraid to experiment…Yes and let’s make sure that we fund charter schools in the state of Connecticut.”
There was a similar, much-smaller rally in Bridgeport on Monday. Demonstrators are hoping that the money can be restored in the final budget compromise as the General Assembly heads toward its June 3 adjournment.