A Parent Trigger for New York: Empowering Parents to Reform Their Children’s Schools

This comprehensive Parent Trigger report from the New York Foundation for Education Reform's B. Jason Brooks discusses and clarifies the complexities of parent-driven school overhauls, summarizes the experiences and best-practices in other states, and offers guidance for a model parent trigger law that would allow significant school reform. It also includes a brief history of the parent-trigger movement, arguments made on both sides of the issue, and an analysis of the five key features that every piece of parent-trigger legislation should contain. In the end, the ideal parent trigger law combines true parental empowerment with responsible foresight and planning to ensure that it can deliver effective reforms for improving student achievement.