The Arizona Daily Star reviewed the charter sector and came up with some amazing and disturbing findings.
The state has 500 plus charter schools, and provides next to no oversight.
A new charter may get a visit in the first year or two, but seldom after that.
They are on their own.
There are only 7 people in the state department of education to oversee the charters, but five of the positions are vacant.
Charter schools are now one-quarter of all schools in the state, and the federal government (thanks, Arne) is offering the state $53 million to open 100 more of them.
Some do excellent work, some don’t, as is true throughout this sector.
Some charter leaders pay themselves handsomely, some keep their finances obscure.
What a strange way to spend the public’s money.
By now, after 15 years of free-market education policy, Arizona ought to be the top scoring state in the nation.
But it’s not.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
So the reformers repeatedly state that they want teachers to be evaluated with student data so they can make sure the “bad teachers” are fired. Yet, they want no oversight at all for charter schools?
I’m confused. What if there are bad teachers in the charter schools? What if the kids in the charter schools don’t have the necessary resources they need because the charter management company takes so much of the money appropriated to the school? Are the teachers in the charters schools that accept kids with IEPs and 504 plans required to submit all the documentation that public school teachers are required to submit? Are the charter school teachers evaluated the same way the public school teachers are being evaluated? Is VAM used to evaluate any charter school teachers in the US? What federal and state laws and regulations are charter school required to follow, and what laws and regulations are they exempted from following?
Depends on state law, which is often responsive to charter lobbyists, who want maximum deregulation
Take a look at what Louisiana’s Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) will be discussing and voting on tomorrow. Not harder rules to set up charter schools in the state, but easier. Can you imagine that?
http://theadvocate.com/news/3633015-123/bese-oks-new-charter-rules
fits with Jindal and White’s desire to dismantle public education and replace it with a market based system.
Is it true that every State has the responsibility to determine regulations and accountability measures for charters?
Yes. Charters are created by state law, which defines the terms of their existence.
Just as Arizona was a center of the (often fraud-based) real estate bubble, so too is it fertile ground for charter privateers.
Let’s not forget that charters, whether they are invading public school facilities or using federal tax credits for new construction – just wait till Cory Booker/Cami Anderson’s TFA dormitory/real estate scam implodes in Newark – are among many other things a real estate play for edupreneurs. Look at the Boards of charter schools – Moskowitz’s HSA being a prime example – and you will usually find real estate interests present.
And then there’s the irony (I’ll be polite, and not say “hypocrisy”) of all these rugged individualist meritocrats, climbing over each other and slobbering at the public teat, while favorite quotations from Milton Friedman run through their heads, and civil rights/social justice cliches emanate from their press releases.
Along with investigative reporters – and you, of course, Diane – we need a Swift or Twain to satirize the off-the-charts venality of corporate education reform. Future readers will be amused/horrified at what was done to the public schools, and ask themselves, “What were they thinking, and how could they let that happen?”
Excellent analysis Michael! I think that you might be able to be that Swift or Twain fro what I’ve read of your various comments here!
Michael: “Cory Booker’s/Cami Anderson’s TFA dorm/real estate scam”–is that what Newark is doing with the money Zuckerberg pledged?
Could you explain a bit about how to look into the real estate deals of Chicago’s appointed School Board member Penny Pritzker?
I oppose government bribing of anyone, but what is your evidence and source that Charter schools are not working.
George,
Go back through this blog alone or the many others that are referenced herein and you will be able to find plenty of evidence of the frauds and fallacies that many if not most charter “successes” are.
Well, there’s so much of it I have to ask that you be more specific on what type of failure or mismanagement you want to learn about. Here’s a stab in the dark or 2 to get you started. http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/article/Wendy-Lecker-State-uses-double-standard-when-3741280.php#ixzz220uSbV5N
http://schoolfinance101.wordpress.com/2012/08/15/still-searching-for-miracle-schools-and-superguy-updates-on-houston-and-new-york-city/
What do you mean by “working”? If you mean, “are charter schools overall producing higher test scores,” the preponderance of studies say they are not. With only a small number of exceptions, produced by charter supporters, the studies show that charters on average get the same test scores as public schools serving the same kinds of students. Read chapter 7 of my latest book for studies, as well as updates in my last chapter. For example, the Detroit News reported that only 6 of 24 Detroit charters outperformed Detroit public schools.
Not acceptable for anybody to take public money and not be held accountable for spending it.
Charter schools need to be abolished. They’re nothing more than cash cows for crooks and unnecessary.
The situation in Arizona is distressing. A significant number of charter schools are underperforming and depriving students of a worthwhile education. Oversight by the state is nearly non-existent. This article points out that some charter schools are excelling. While that may be true of a handful of them, please do not underestimate the damage that these few schools are doing to the public school system in general. The excelling charter schools on Arizona are largely located in upper middle class areas. They “cherry pick” students from nearby high quality public schools. They do not offer things like free and reduced lunch, bus service, or help with the cost of uniforms or “consumable” textbooks and supplies. Their fundraising is relentless – both among families attending the schools and private sector (note the $1.5 million recently gifted by the Quayle family to a large charter school network in Arizona). Charter schools in Arizona are approved by the State. There is no district involvement, cooperation, or public accountability. Charter schools are not incubating new ideas and sharing that knowledge to improve the system at large. They are competing directly with public schools, but are allowed to play by another set of rules. They serve a small percentage of students and no one seriously argues that this model is “scalable.”. (The Daily Star article mentions that 24 percent of Arizona schools are charter schools, but I am almost positive that the percentage of students served by charter schools is far less than that.) The goal seems to be to have a network of strong charter schools that serves a small segment of the population while suffocating and destroying our public school system. Just how is this “competition” a good thing? Have we in Arizona just given up on a strong public school system?
The 25% number is misleading, because we have charters that have 17 students and public high schools that have 3,000. In 2008, Arizona had 1,480 ‘traditional’ K-12 and 477 charter schools. But according to the Arizona Dept of Ed and reports from each county’s superintendent’s office:
85% of Arizona students attend public schools, 9% attend charter schools, 4% attend private and less than 1% attend home schooled. If we want to fix education, we need to invest where the children are.
Our public school is contemplating ‘flipping’ to a public charter solely due to funding. In AZ, charters get about 800 dollars PER STUDENT funding. Our supt is already in the process of flipping one elementary, and now my school is considering it because we are not TItle I. I have a lot of other questions and concerns about this…
..
Vinnie,
$800?? Did you mean $8,000??
Thanks,
Duane
Actually about $880 more per student for charter…less regulations and holds on funding…so multiply that times about 600 students…?? Idk why charters get a’pass’ when it comes to funding and accountability in AZ…we are already 47th? I think in terms of per pupil funding….its just a matter of playing the system at this point! Pathetic! We already got our day extended by 1/2 hour with no compensation (hello Chicago!), pay frozen for 4 years… its a nightmare here…a total shift from where i began 17 years ago…home of whole language and bilingual education! What happened to innovation?? TESTING!!”
Sorry *800 dollars MORE PER STUDENT*
My research of charters versus districts in AZ I have found that…
In Arizona charters serve about 12% of the student population.
In 2011, charter public school students in grades 3-8 outperformed their district
counterparts on state proficiency test (called AIMS). Charter students outperformed district students in percent passing and in average scale scores at every 3-8 grade level and in every category except 8th grade math.
A charter group was named by the AZ dept of Ed the best ‘district’ in the state for 2012. Charter groups had to have at least 3 schools and 750 students to be compared to districts.
22 AZ charters in 2010 had their charter non-renewed (how many distrct schools were closed in 2010 for failing finacially or academically?)
2 AZ Charters placed in the Top 5 of high schools in the country for 2012 beating out selective magnet schools (See WaPo Challenge and Newsweek).
In addition to charters, AZ has open enrollment which allows for students to attend any public school that has room, and the state money follows the student.
If AZ is the Wild West, than every state should bring on the wild. Otherwise we see situations like the one in Ohio where the woman was jailed for sending her child to a better school but she did not live in that district.
If you will also look at demographics in your study of charter schools of AZ, you will see that charter schools typically do not serve the students who most need the help. They serve students who already perform well in an academic setting. The AZ charter schools do not have the same demographics of special needs, ESOL, students from economically disadvantage homes, or any other challenges that face the public school system. If you compare the same students with the same type of demographics from a public school as the charter schools in AZ, you will find that the public schools still outperform the charter schools. It has been proven, even in Arne Duncan’s beloved Chicago school district, that taking a student who does not perform well and transferring them to a higher performing school or to a high performing charter school, does not guarantee success for that student. So, if the charter schools in AZ had to make their schools match the demographics of the public schools they would do no better, and probably worse. Please read the book Freakanomics. It is very enlightening.