Last Bell: Breaking the gridlock in education reform - Tapa dura

In the mid-nineties, the Alfred Glickman School was just another failing school in one of America's most violent cities. Then SABIS®, a private, for-profit education provider, took over. Twenty years later, the school is a six-time silver medalist in U.S. News & World Report's annual "America's Best High Schools" listing, and every single graduate of the school has been offered a college place.
With success of this magnitude, you would think that for-profit managed charter schools like SABIS would be in high demand. On the contrary, they are fought at every turn. Why is the idea of employing for-profit companies to help rescue failing public schools treated with fear and hostility? Stranger still, why does a nation built on free enterprise refuse to embrace a free market strategy when so many students and schools would clearly benefit and with so much at stake?
Last Bell is a book about politics, money and power. It examines the charge that for-profits running charter schools are in it for the money, not the kids, and reveals the real motives of those spreading these ideas and why they fight private sector involvement in public schools. Last Bell is a reasonable voice in a polarized debate. It does not call for an end to public schools but rather imagines a future in which private companies help create a competitive market for public education to boost performance, turn derelict schools into centers of excellence and give parents even in the worst neighborhoods real choice and their children a future.

Carl Bistany is the president of the board of SABIS® Educational Systems, INC. and SABIS® Educational Services. These two independent corporations manage schools within the SABIS® Network, which currently serves 70,000 students. For 22 years, he has helped guide the family-owned education business that was set up in 1886 in a village in Lebanon. His efforts have led to the company's expansion, particularly through public-private-partnerships, so that today SABIS® Network schools operate in 16 countries on four continents; 15 SABIS® Network schools with more than 9,000 students are public charter schools in the U.S.
Stephanie Gruner Buckley is an American journalist who has worked on staff at publications including The Wall Street Journal, Inc. magazine and Atlantic Media's Quartz.