Bill Phillis, leader of the Ohio Equity and Adequacy Coalition, is a dedicated advocate for equitable funding of public schools. He reports here that charter schools–many of which are very low-performing–receive nearly $1 billion a year.
He writes:
Total payment to charter schools is $903,344,671.24 as of the January 2014 report. This is a one-year figure.
You may wish to examine the State Report Card at http://reportcard.education.ohio.gov/Pages/School-Search.aspx. You must enter a charter school name in the search box on the right hand side.
Ohio has spent $1.4 billion on charters that never received a C or higher on the report card and/or scores below the average performance index score for Big 8 Urban buildings.
Initial estimates show that Ohio has spent about $1 billion on charters that have closed for a variety of reasons since the 2002-2003 school year, only 25% of that can be attributed to charters that were forced shut by state law.
As of today on the ODE website, there are 392 charter schools.
As of today on the ODE website, 151 charter schools have closed.
Bill can be reached at ohioeanda@sbcglobal.net
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I am assuming that some of these charter schools replaced traditional neighborhood schools. When the charters close, how do the neighborhood schools come back? Where are the students being educated right now? Are parents in a panic using online education to fill the void?
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I think it’s a really good question in the charter-heavy cities. If a public school were shutting down, they’d have to use a planning process and re-locate the children. We saw this happen in Chicago, where they closed 49 at once. That was an elaborate plan. I don’t know what happens if a large number close at once, and the public schools in that area are gone. There doesn’t seem to be any planning at all. I guess the assumption is public schools will always be there as a “back up” to “choice” schools, but that seems incredibly reckless to me.
Public schools aren’t like the sun or the tides or something, unchanging and static and operating without support. They’re IN these choice systems. They’re affected by charters and vouchers.
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I haven’t been able to figure out the “authorizers” role in all this, in terms of incentives for rubber stamping these schools, etc.
In the Michigan EAA docs, The Broad Foundation “interviewed” several national charter chains to see if they would be interested in opening schools in Detroit. One of the issues mentioned is “skimming” by authorizers, I don’t think this meant in a nefarious way, but instead is referring to some sort of fee authorizers get for backing the schools.
What about an old-fashioned bond? They’d have to put up a bond to reimburse the district for costs related to an abrupt charter shut-down. That seems like a reasonable safeguard.
http://www.toledoblade.com/Education/2014/02/11/Nebraska-Ave-charter-school-that-opened-in-fall-shuts-doors-Copy.html
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Charter news in PA:
“Tuition payments to Pennsylvania charter schools rose from $960 million in 2010-11 to more than $1.15 billion in 2011-12.”
Report: Pennsylvania’s charters are costly to traditional public schools
NSBA School Board News Today by Lawrence Hardy February 12th, 2014
Pennsylvania’s growing number of charter and cyber-charter schools do not save school districts money and, in many cases, add to their expenses, says a new report from the Pennsylvania School Boards Association (PSBA). “Charter schools do not charge a standard rate for their educational services,” says the report by PSBA’s Education Research and Policy Center. “In fact, the amount paid to charter schools varies greatly by school district, and is often completely unrelated to the actual operational costs incurred by charter schools.” ”
http://schoolboardnews.nsba.org/2014/02/report-pennsylvanias-charters-are-costly-to-traditional-public-schools/
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Reblogged this on Crazy Normal – the Classroom Exposé.
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It’s long overdue to outlaw charter schools or cut off public funding for them so that they die on the vine. They serve no purpose other than to divide communities and segregate populations. They are de facto private schools. If any are any good, let them operate as the private schools that they are and charge tuition. NO taxpayer funds should support them.
We can’t pander to this charter school “movement” anymore. Diane Ravitch sort of did in her recent book, and that was her weakest chapter there. They are unfixable because they never should have been brought into existence in the first place. The institutions for democracy are too important to turn over to looters.
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Charter schools is the real issue, not CC which is atrocious but can be thrown out without destroying public education. Charter schools will end public education and our republic as we know it.
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It’s naked class warfare, and it’s a naked attempt to destroy our democracy and install a plutocracy in its place.
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More and more that is apparent to those wanting to save public schools, where they might have seemed nebulous at first glance. They were the foot in the door for privatizing and now I think it will get worse before it gets better.
If there was pork in education budgets over the last couple decades, where we are now will do more than atone for that. It will downright take us back decades. Already has.
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In 2000, Bill Clinton created the “New Markets Tax Credit” for anyone investing in charter schools in poor neighborhoods. That is the reason behind the big interest all of a sudden of hedge funds into the education reform business. They can get a 39% tax credit for the original investment, plus all kinds of other credits for job creation. So they are able to double their investment in just 7 years. They don’t worry about whether the kids are learning or suffering or whatever. They just have to keep the doors open for seven years and they can pay back their bondholders and walk away with the money.
Also, foreign investors who put up $500,000 or more can get immigration visas for themselves and their families for investing in American charter schools under regulation EB-5.
Charter schools is the issue of the day if you love your country and want to preserve public education.
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I agree with you. You state it well.
As my husband said about charters, “I’m not crazy about subsidizing an exclusive education experience for other people.” We use public schools.
Eliminate charters. Create a sliding scale for some kind of tax deduction for paying for private school. Everyone is happy and nobody is paying for any exclusive experiences for other people.
(But the tax deduction should be explored—you get to deduct day care, so it is a valid area to explore; there is a possibility for negotiating there).
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So this is the state auditor who will conduct a review.
I don’t have much hope anything will come of it, though.
The current Lt Governor supposedly conducted a review in 2006, and our former AG actually sued and got nowhere, but maybe this will be a real review.
“The Dispatch also found that some sponsors were not only acting as watchdogs but were also selling treasury and personnel services and special-education guidance to schools, among other services.
The plan is to “follow the money and try to figure out what had happened,” Yost said. “Under the Ohio setup, to the extent that anybody has line responsibility for oversight, it appears to be the sponsors.”
No one really has “line oversight”, as the auditor admits, and that was because there’s a difference between “authorization” and “regulation”. Charters were simply authorized in Ohio, which is a deregulatory mechanism, not a regulatory one.
“Authorization” is sort of like “agnostics” and “relinquishing” – it’s a market-based, laissez-faire approach to publicly-funded education 🙂
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Sorry, here’s the link about the auditor’s possible review:
http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2014/02/12/Yost_investigates_charter_sponsors.html
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“But some charters are really good.”
I get tired of that line. But usually the people who say it do not know all that is going on in this country to take money and propriety away from those who need it most with charters as a threshold.
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Certainly in many cases, changing entirely the faculty and leadership of a school is done poorly and for the wrong reasons. However, I have seen this approach be successful when the current faculty and leadership has lost its edge and knows not what to do to create a great learning environment. I witnessed a long term, highly successful turnaround . It requires bringing in an experienced, highly effective leader who brings with them a team of teachers who work collaboratively with the leader with unity, team work, and direction. It will not work with corporate charters, TFAs and such. They also must bring in the community and the parents to make it work. Some turnarounds are needed,, but careful selection of the best people does not always happen.
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Maybe a word other than turnaround.
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Sorry I MEANT post the above under the article about Boston turnarounds. Can’t get the hang of this blogging stuff!!
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