Lack of funding, crumbling infrastructures, reduced faculties and administration, low salaries, corruption and poverty are all contributing factors to school failures. Now, the rise in the number of competing charter schools is either another causal factor for failures or the long sought solution. Just as it is not unusual for teachers to think of their sphere of influence as their classroom or school, we, as leaders, may limit our thinking to our local buildings or districts. But, policy makers and the media see public schools as one entity, and, to understand what has happened to us and what might happen, so should we.    Read more..