So-called Parent Trigger Laws, which under certain circumstances
allow parents to ‘take over’ a failing public school and determine its
new path, are about to get more attention due to the nationwide opening
of Won’t Back Down,
a story of a parent whose daughter is continuously failed by the school
system teaming with a teacher to bring change to their public school.
At the moment the story told in the movie is fiction in at least one important way. There hasn’t yet been a successful attempt by parents to take over a public school
— but there might be soon. There is an ongoing attempt by a group of
parents to make use of California’s parent trigger law to take control
of an elementary school, and just like in the movie, the full might of
the local education establishment has now arrayed against them.
