CT Supreme Court Hears Arguments In Bridgeport Schools Case

The Connecticut Supreme Court heard arguments on Thursday challenging the state’s takeover of Bridgeport’s troubled public schools.  Much of the debate centered on whether officials followed proper steps before replacing local school board members with state appointees.

Plaintiffs include 3 ousted school board members, parents and candidates who’d hoped to run for seats on Bridgeport’s board of ed. Their lawyers told the court that Connecticut education officials exceeded their authority when they removed Bridgeport’s elected school board. And they said under state statute, local members should have been given special training before being displaced. 

But State Assistant Attorney General Mark Kohler said the local board didn’t want it.  "The purpose of this training requirement was to give that local board the opportunity for additional training to improve its performance. And the local board by a 6 to 3 majority vote, told the state we don’t think that’s productive, we choose to forgo that training."

Lawyer for the plaintiffs Josephine Miller said Bridgeport’s no different from other failing urban school districts across the country.  She questioned how Connecticut chooses which one should be the focus of a state takeover.  "The citizens of Bridgeport are, at this present juncture, deprived of their opportunity to have local control over their school board unlike other towns and cities where there is an elected school board, where the schools are failing, where they have failed to maintain or attain adequate yearly progress and yet only Bridgeport has been singled out."

A law passed in Connecticut in 2007 gives the state the authority to takeover failing school districts.  Bridgeport has been deemed a “low achieving” school district for seven consecutive years.

For WNPR, I’m Diane Orson