Mapping the Takeover of Camden Public Schools: From Community Resistance to Corporate Consolidation of Power?

• In Event: “Slum Life Is Squalid”: Challenging Urban Renewal Through Critical Race Place-Based Research in Historic Schools/Communities

Abstract

This presentation synthesizes qualitative work examining the evolution of the Camden City School District from its takeover by the state of New Jersey in 2013 and the fifteen legislatively-imposed charter managed operated (CMO) schools or “renaissance schools,” which led to massive layoffs and schools closures (Author, 2018). The mechanisms that community members and the local teacher union employed to resist further assault on Camden’s public education system are likewise highlighted (Author, 2020), including the voices of students who attended Camden High School during rampant media attacks on the city’s “failing schools” (Author, 2023). Consistent throughout this struggle was the desire for residents, educators, and students to have greater power over their school system, their views heard and respected, and policymakers’ recognition that public schools offer more than curriculum to communities. In employing standpoint theory, the author provides a platform for the experiences and perceptions of those most likely to be marginalized, while working alongside those interviewed as a city resident and teacher.

After years of opposition from the Camden public in resistance to attacks on their public schools, the author explores how renaissance schools adjusted their operations in response to popular criticism. For instance, one CMO provider for K-8 schools made a point to trumpet its zero-tolerance discipline practices which included silent, movement-free lunches and strict student uniform enforcement policies, but after widespread outcry, rolled back many such measures and began touting their network schools as places of care. Additionally, renaissance school providers hired local residents in non-educator positions and opened facilities to community organizations that used to be housed in public schools.

Notably, the author explores how widespread resistance from the Camden community has tamped down over the past decade. Whether due to the initial shock of forced school closures having worn off, the aging out of students and families who were initially impacted and in their place an emergence of younger parents and students who have always been part of renaissance schools, an acquiescence that “they [the powerful] are gonna do what they wanna do anyway” on behalf of the broader Camden public has developed. In sum, despite the imperialist-like takeover of Camden’s schools in 2013, in 2024, acceptance seems to be the prevailing attitude among most.

What does this mean for defenders of urban public education in communities where schools are experiencing similar attacks? How can resistance in protecting urban public education be sustained when it appears a majority of community members have accepted the public schools’ takeover? What, if anything, can be done to mobilize younger parents and their children who have only known renaissance schools, but may or may not know the oppressive history that initiated their emergence?

Camden’s case poses critical questions about the sustainability of resistance efforts, and at which point activists are dictating to others what they should find offensive, what they should want to fight against? And lastly, what is to be done when it appears few others care anymore? In this presentation, the author explores some of these pressing questions.

Author

• Keith E. Benson, Camden City School District