also with us is sarah carr of the "hechinger report," an online education news site.'s author of "hope against hope," a book about new orleans charter schools. john, help us understand all this. i think you refer to new orleans now as a system of schools rather than a school system explain. >> well, it's almost all charter schools. there are still a few traditional schools within what's the old orleans parish school board. but there are about 88 schools and i think all but five of them are charter schools. they're about 45,000 students. and all but maybe 2500 go to charter schools. so it is a system of schools. >> and sarah carr, has it been a smooth transition, remind us, has there been opposition along the way. where are we now with that? >> you know, you can find people who think what has happened is the greatest thing to occur in the history of urban education and people who think it's the worst thing. i think most people who are being honest will admit it's someplace in the middle. and i found in years reporting on it that it's really the families at the grass ro