By JOHN NORTON
THE PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN

Cesar Chavez Academy will be featured next month in a U.S. Department of Education publication and a video promoting charter schools for low-income and minority students.

A crew from the department’s office of communications and outreach visited the school Wednesday to make what will be a five-minute video that will be available on the department’s Web site next month and part of a regular television program broadcast on public stations and some cable channels. The program is called “Education News Parents Can Use.”

David Terry, associate producer of the video, said that segments were being done on Cesar Chavez and Boston’s Match Charter High School as “models of excellence in charter school options.”

The aim of the article and videos is to show parents that there are alternatives to regular public schools where children from minority groups and low-income families can do well.

“Over the last seven years,” Terry said, “we’ve gone from 2,000 charter schools to 4,000 and growing.”

Todd May, senior director of the communications office, added, “they can be an effective model for closing the achievement gap.”

May said that Cesar Chavez was selected because of its record of registering higher test scores than the state and local school district.

Hernandez said that 1,100 children are enrolled at Cesar Chavez this year, up from 761 from last year, an almost 45 percent increase in enrollment.

ON THE NET

U.S. Department of Education videos: www.ed.gov/news/av/video/edtv/index.html