But a decade ago several trends in American
education, and in the Catholic Church, made a Catholic - operated
public school
seem increasingly possible: 1) the traditional, parish - based Catholic school system, especially in the inner cities, was crumbling; 2) equally troubled urban
public - school systems were failing to educate most of their students; and 3) a burgeoning charter school movement, born in the early 1990s, was beginning to turn heads among educators in both the private and
public sectors.
A month ago, the Republicans in charge of both houses of Minnesota's Legislature
seemed to be working their way systematically through a national party playbook full of moves designed to turn a bipartisan push for
education reform into a stealth attack on
public -
sector unions.