The blog known as “Better Living Through Mathematics” ponders the criteria of an ethical charter school.
That would be a school that doesn’t kick other kids out of their school. And a school that enrolled the same proportion of students with disabilities and English learners as neighborhood public schools.
That would be a school that has a fair discipline policy, suspending no more than neighborhood public schools.
If your charter meets those criteria, let the author of the post know.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
An ethical charter school is one that
– doesn’t invade and take over public school facilities.
– doesn’t cherry-pick students for admission.
– doesn’t “counsel out” students facing behavioral or academics challenges.
– replaces students who leave the school, rather than using high student attrition to manipulate their test, graduation and college-admittance statistics.
– Enrolls local children who have special needs, are English language Learners, or are homeless, at similar percentages to those found in the local community.
– negotiates wages, benefits and working conditions that reflect the prevailing standards in the public schools.
– makes efforts to retain faculty and staff, rather than churn and burn through them.
– Pays management salaries comparable to those in the public schools.
Yes, an ethical charter school does all these things.
That’s why, based on the above criteria, virtually none exist.
My posts below were actually a response to Michael’s list, not the original authors.
“According to a study by the National Center for the Study of Privatization in Education, charter schools spend a greater percentage of money on “administration” than their public school peers. Hey, Eva Moscowitz, how’s that $400,000+ yearly salary working for you?”
This is true in Ohio but the reason seems obvious to me so I’m not sure why we’re always raising it out of context.
They spend more on administration per student because they’re operating a group of separate, small school “systems”.
One can certainly argue that’s redundant and wasteful, because in Ohio we now have the public school administration (centralized) and we’re also paying for administration of each charter, or a chain of charters, but it was also inevitable. We will inevitably end up with more managers, total, if you add public system and charter system(s).
“The public school system is known for its maze-like bureaucracy,”
It’s may be known for that, but that’s because it has a central administration structure. It’s bigger. If the per pupil costs for public versus charters are correct then it’s also more efficient, PER PUPIL.
I have no idea why ed reformers thought there would be FEWER administrators when they set up a series of small charter school systems. Now we have the (large) public school administrators set and a whole series of smaller charter school administrator sets. How is this better?
I was thinking about the “two separate sets of administrators” issue in my state because there is regulatory legislation (which won’t get out of committee) on charter school record-keeping.
Records retention, document requests, all that. They’ll have to set up and administer some sort of centralized system at some point, and that will have to replicate the public system that is already in place in districts, unless they off-load that cost to the public system (which is entirely possible in this state!).
Sometimes I’m amazed at how poorly thought-through and reckless this decision to set up two separate systems was. In Ohio, we’ll actually have three systems, because we also publicly fund private schools.
Why did anyone imagine there would be FEWER administrators or less administrative costs? How was that possible, let alone likely? Was any of this discussed, or are we building another airplane in the air?
I think that’s a pretty good list.
Two thoughts…
– “enrolls local children who have…in similar percentages”
This is an admirable goal, but very hard in practice for a lot of reasons. Since charter schools are open enrollment, the numbers of these students (assuming no selectivity) is dependent on who opts in. In some states, there are limitations put on charter schools’ abilities to serve these children using the same tools as district schools. Finally, populations vary very widely between schools within a district. My district has a hugely popular (and deservedly so) ELL program at one school, and has a very high ELL % there. Individual charter schools (legally not allowed to cooperate in my state) can’t provide that service unless a charter specific to that opened, which I think will happen at some point. The same applies for part of the SE population. My district has an excellent program for autism spectrum kids who are not profoundly challenged. We were very supportive of our top student leaving our school for that program because it was a perfect fit.
– “replaces students who leave the school…”
This is a legitimate criticism of anybody who tries to compare a charter school’s performance directly with a district school’s. But, there are two issues here, attrition and accepting students at any time of year and any grade. Confounding this is that the latter can hide the former (many district schools have high attrition, but also high incoming rates of new students). There are also lots of different reasons for attrition, which may include nefarious reasons, but also include geographic mobility, or just plain not liking a school if there are other charter or district choices. Also, keep in mind that many charter students are essentially “attrition” from district schools, but never looked at that way. Regarding being open in all grades, that certainly “raises” achievement measures for charters without any actual achievement, and again, this has to be considered when comparing performance. That’s why cohort performance is the best tool, but there is still a remaining effect since the classrooms look different as a result. The only “defense” I’ll offer here is that a huge part of the problem is incoming kids in upper grades that are so far behind due to social promotion. In many cases, transfers in and out of District schools are of comparable average achievement levels. But, transfers in to a charter that is making a lot of growth are more likely to be behind where the charter kids are (based on a lot of things, but one example is longer school day and school year). My understanding is that in New Orleans, with it’s large percentage of charter students, charters are required to admit at any time and any grade. Of course, even there, it’s only if they have seats, which is another responsibility of district schools that charters don’t have and are not in a position to solve because they are single schools.
So, these are legitimate criticisms of anyone comparing charter scores with district scores without a *lot* more detail, but IMO, these two in particular aren’t quite the black and white moral issues that I agree the other ones are.
I’m sorry, but I forgot one that I also think is a bit of a gray area, the “number of suspensions”. First of all, I’ll say that I think expulsions have to be looked at and should be comparable.
But, suspensions are a tool, and most charters use that tool differently than many district schools. It is certainly a failure if a student leaves the school because of suspensions, but a progressive discipline system works well for many (in my limited experience most) low SES kids. So, one has to look at the net result, which may include students who leave school because of suspensions, but may include students who stay for the same reason.
So again, I don’t think number of suspensions (especially without knowing reasons) is a comparable number. We’ve (knock on wood) never had a knife or a gun found in our school. Should that count as a negative because our suspensions aren’t “up to par”?
The question probably should be for both public and charter schools what actions are considered to be cause for suspension? Suspension is seldom used as a disciplinary tool in higher SES communities. If we look at similar offenses is there a difference in response? How does suspension benefit the already at risk student? My experience is that isolation from school did not benefit their performance. It’s very hard to help a child “catch up” in these circumstances. When suspension is absolutely necessary, I would favor an in-house model.
2old2teach,
I’m actually not so sure that you can equate specific policies between schools with different populations.
One would hope that the consequences for something like cheating wouldn’t differ much between the communities, because that seems more punative than constructive. I would also hope that the consequences for any safety-related issues are similar.
But where suspensions are meant to be constructive, it seems more important to look at the results of the discipline system than to compare specific details. Some of the questions that I think are important are:
-What percentage of students have had suspensions, for how long, and for what,
-Are there internal inconsistencies in suspensions within the school?
-Do students who get suspended generally change the behavior and avoid future suspensions?
-How many students with multiple suspensions eventually decrease that number vs. how many eventually drop out or spend an inordinate amount of time on suspension.
-What are the academic implications of the suspension policy?
You’re right that suspension is seldom used in higher SES schools. But, I think most higher-SES schools don’t experience a lot of the behavioral issues that low-SES schools do. I also think that low-SES students may benefit from a more structured discipline system, but that needs to be monitored to ensure that it is having the desired effect.
And definitely agree on in-school vs. out for anything other than safety issues when at all possible.
Equate policies? No. Compare? Yes. I know that some African-American adults (perhaps with a southern or church going background?) can be quite strict about polite behavior with their children and grandchildren especially in public. I forget where I heard this explanation, but I was told that during our most racist past, a black child (particularly a boy) did not want to draw attention to himself for fear of racist attacks. Exemplary manners were a survival tactic in a white world. A “no excuses” approach to discipline might appeal to someone raised with a similar standard even though the reasoning is no longer as likely to be connected to survival. I am an advocate of natural consequences for behavior. Even safety issues can be addressed under this rationale, which certainly would probably lead to some isolation/separation from regular school society. I am also an advocate of restorative justice practices. I taught in a school where all students entered through scanners and had their backpacks x-rayed. It was a major nuisance but the community agreed that because of the gang culture, everyone felt safer. Safety officers patrolled the hallways and cameras were present through out (not in classrooms). In my own community, we are lucky not to have to respond to the threat of violence in as aggressive a manner.
I have been composing this post for so long that I have forgotten all I wanted to address and why. This response is probably enough anyway.
I am actually responding to Michael’s list (first post), not the article.
Without reading the post, my first thought was “an oxymoron”, you know like free gift and civil war.
The difficulty with this criteria is that it would likely label qualified admission magnet schools like Stuyvesant High School and Thomas Jefferson High School as being unethical because they have too few English learners and students with disabilities. I am also a bit puzzled about how this would apply to charter schools that are specifically set up to educate students with disabilities as they are likely to have a much higher proportion than neighborhood schools. The schools I have in mind here are both old established charters, like the Pennsylvania School for the Deaf, and newer charter schools like the New York Center for Autism Charter School. It would seem especially silly to say these schools are unethical, so perhaps the criteria could be changed to say “at least” the same proportion to allow for these specialized charter schools. It would appear that the New York Center for Autism Charter School would fail on poster Michael Florillo’s criteria as it is located in East Harlem’s P.S/IS. 50.
How about nominating the rural charter school I posted about earlier: the Walton Rural Life Center? Located in a town of 235 it might be hard to define what is meant by a neighborhood school (i don’t now if there is a public elementary school within five or more likely 15 miles), but it seems like a good school.
Those are good points. I think we do need public schools that are designed for the high achievers and some for students with disabilities that affect their learning. I think that is a good for everyone.
I would hope schools such as Stuyvesant do not brag about how much better they perform on standardized tests, graduation rates, college admissions, etc. when compared to other schools. I would hope these schools acknowledge that their student population affects their outcomes.
My main issue with charters is when they compare themselves to traditional public schools, they do not acknowledge that their are some major differences between their school and a neighborhood school. I also have an issue with a “public” school that does not offer buses or free lunch.
I think that there are too many charter schools and too many approaches to charter schools to be able to make broad claims about the schools as a group.
The Walton Rural Center Charter School in Walton, Kansas and the Success Academy in New York City are very different schools in very different places with very different local conditions, yet both are charter schools.
I agree that global claims should be suspect. There are certainly good charters out there. We can, however, look at “most” and “few” or percentages when we make claims. This will give us a more balanced perspective when we make comparisons.
For instance, most magnet schools do NOT have admission criteria. Only a few magnets have these criteria. Most charters, on the other hand, do practice selective admissions.
Most TPS do not engage in questionable accounting practices or engage in outright malfeasance. There are cases where they exist, though. Charters, on the other hand, are more likely to attract these shady individuals. And they are more likely to engage in shady deals.
Charters are perfect gardens to specifically help students with disabilities, English learners, and borderline/dropout students. However, there are fewer than 50 of these types of charters all across the US. Less than 1% dedicate themselves to helping these populations. TPS do the majority of the grunt work here.
I agree with most of what you said, but can you support the statement “Most charters, on the other hand, do practice selective admissions”?
It’s certainly illegal in my state, and I haven’t seen lawsuits, etc. that indicate that charters are breaking that law. Are charters in some states allowed to pick and choose students, or you implying that they do this illegally? Is there evidence to support this?
Personally, I haven’t seen any data that remotely supports saying “most charters” do this. Lots of opinions, few or no examples.
“Charters are perfect gardens to specifically help students with disabilities, English learners, and borderline/dropout students. However, there are fewer than 50 of these types of charters all across the US. Less than 1% dedicate themselves to helping these populations. TPS do the majority of the grunt work here.”
I think there would be a lot more, but there are sometimes barriers to doing this. For example, in New York, charters are prohibited from contracting with each other or cooperatives for services.
I know someone was working on turning a highly respected private program for SE students into a charter, but I haven’t heard about it lately. I know they were getting no slack from charter opponents regardless of the population they planned to serve.
I agree that there are too many different charters to make claims about charters as a group. However, there is a population of pro-charters advocates who do make blanket claims that charters are better. Blanket claims are not unique to one side of this debate.
However, I stand behind my blanket claim that all charters should offer buses and free lunch if they want to claim the school is available to all.
concerned mom,
Just curious about which charters don’t offer these things. Is it that the charters aren’t offering FRL? Or that they just don’t offer lunch and kids have to bring it?
My charter actually busses all students, even those that are within the distance from the school that the district doesn’t bus. Since we have a longer school day, we don’t think it’s safe for our kids to be going to and from school on their own, especially in winter when it can be dark coming and going.
We also give lunch to all kids without pay because almost all of our kids qualify for FRL. Paying for other students eliminates any stigma of FRL, removes the need for paying someone to collect money, and removes the need for students to bring money to school for any reason.
We pay for these things out of our regular operating budget. Transportation is our 3rd biggest cost behind people and building.
Lots of variation between charter laws in states and between schools.
jpr,
There are several high performing charters in my town that don’t offer free/reduced lunch or buses.
..and I will add these charters w/o free/reduced lunch and buses have a much different demographic than the traditional neighborhood schools near-by.
JPR,
It is illegal in my state as well. However, they get around this by filling out an application. Here’s the basic difference for the application process: TPS do not screen prior history data but charters do.
In a TPS, for example, a student can be and is usually enrolled even if the data from the previous years never ended up at the current TPS. Charters, though, make no excuses about that data history up front. That data contains grades and test scores. If the data history is not present, charters call that an incomplete application. Other factors can result in an incomplete application as well.
In addition to interviews and essays as a means to screen out the undesirable, another way to screen the applicants while still following the law is through aggressive advertising and limited windows for filling out an application. This is why some charters pay for a PR person/s. Small windows for filling out the application process are given.
The data on this is fairly consistent: When charters in CA were examined, particularly the ones in LA, they found that 84% (202 of the 241) had admission policies that potentially screened applicants. Or in Philadelphia, a team of researchers found that close to 72% of the sampled charters screened applicants by enforcing significant barriers to the application process. Boston had more than 50% of its charters engaging in admission practices that screened students.
TheMorrigan,
Thanks for that and for the specific details. I know a lot about charters in NY, but little about the rest of the country. I’ll read up on the studies you referenced.
We’re not permitted (appropriately in my opinion) to look at anything like that, nor in any way deny a student entry if there is an open spot.
You repeat a commonly repeated fallacy: that the existence of specialized public high schools like Stuyvesant refutes criticisms of charter schools.
While one can argue about whether it’s right for these schools to exist – and there is a great deal of argument over the admission criteria, which in the case of Stuyvesant is a single exam – it is inarguable that they make no effort to hide the difficulty of getting in, are transparent about their admission and retention standards, and make no claims to serve the same population as other public high schools.
One of the Big Lies about charter schools, however, is that they perform “miracles” with the same students who are stuck in “failing” public schools. That canard, which you and a few others on this site refuse to let go of, has been conclusively shown to be false, irregardless of the outliers you use as examples.
My comment was concerning the ethical test provided in the original post. If part of the test requires the same population of students as neighborhood schools it seems obvious to me that qualified admission magnet schools fail this test. They may well pass other tests that might be proposed.
One of the strangest government efforts I have ever observed has been watching the Obama Administration struggle so mightily to “reform” our broken, fragmented wildly inequitable and expensive private health care system WHILE they privatize the k-12 public school system.
They’re attempting to fix the broken healthcare system WHILE turning public schools into a replica of the broken healthcare system.
You could just weep and bang your head on the table watching it happen.
“Why, why why?!” 🙂
“Turn back, before it’s too late!”
Ultimately, the reason I’m “in” this is because I believe people will deeply, deeply regret turning over our public K-12 system to private entities.
I think it’s a colossal and tragic mistake, epic, one for the history books, and will be recognized as such once the public system is gone.
So my question on ethics is this: is it ethical to claim you’re doing better than public schools, an apples to apples comparison, when you’re spending more?
I could live with this if the claims weren’t so damaging to public schools, in other words, if the claims ONLY acted to pump up charter schools, but they don’t! They’re used to slam public schools. How is THAT ethical?
“Schools in the Houston-based KIPP network top their spending rankings in Texas. KIPP is one of the best regarded networks of charter schools in the country, with its “no excuses” philosophy built on high expectations and extra time in the classroom.
It also runs some of the most expensive programs, according to these researchers, propped up by big donors and foundations. In the 2008-2009 school year, KIPP Aspire Academy in San Antonio reported raking in donations of $11,000 per student—nearly twice what the average public school spent in the study.
KIPP schools in Austin, San Antonio and Dallas spent between $750 and $1,700 more per student than traditional schools, according to their reports to the Texas Education Agency—that’s between 11 and 25 percent more. Based on their IRS filings, though—a more comprehensive measure of their costs—KIPP spent almost $6,500 more per student. (Throughout the study, one of the researchers’ greatest frustrations seems to be the huge difference between what Texas charters reported to the state and what they reported to the IRS.)”
I mean, good lord. Twice the funding per pupil? How is that a fair comparison? I have no idea what public schools would do with twice the funding, but that hardly seems like a fair competition.
http://www.texasobserver.org/is-a-charter-school-a-cheaper-school-maybe-not/
Chiara Duggin,
I agree that cost per student has to be factored in when comparing outcomes. Our district schools get thousands more than our charters. I think the charters that spend more per student are the exception, but I haven’t seen national data in awhile.
An ETHICAL school/district, charter, private or public would not use the results of a standardized tests as anything other than a description of the interaction of the student and the testing device at a particular time. And even that due to the myriad errors involved in the process of making standardized tests the results are invalid. In other words almost all schools do UNETHICAL practices that harm students.
Until those involved understand that UNETHICALNESS and quit doing it we will continue to harm the most innocent of society, the children.
So if you’re a public school in NYC and you want “the charter deal” (don’t pay operating costs, choose your facility) can you opt out of the public system and go under a charter?
You’d get more funding per pupil, I’ve read (variously) between 1300 and 2000, and that’s a substantial incentive.
I know this is probably impossible, public schools can’t opt out, but I have wondered about public schools converting to charters, doing so in pursuit of preferential treatment adds a whole new wrinkle.
What if everyone did that? Who gets stuck with operating costs? Would it be like musical chairs? 🙂
Chiara,
NYC charters do pay all of their operating costs, and until the recent law change, frequently had to pay rent for their public school students to use public schools.
Also, charter opponents like to point out data that purports to show that charters spend more money, but it is cherry picked data.
Excuse me JPR,
NYC charters receive taxpayer funds for operating expenses. Please don’t claim otherwise. Thank you
Yes, their primary source of income is per-student funding if that wasn’t clear.
Per-student funding from tax revenue. Please include all information.
An ethical charter is NO charter. They drain funds from publics and make tons of money for their backers, and thats the only reason they exist, and to break unions and destroy the middle class as well. They have no better outcomes than the publics so why even play this game of “lets figure out a way to have good charters” when, adjusting for poverty, we have one of the best education systems in the nation.
I think you could also make that same argument about magnet schools draining funds from local neighborhood schools. I don’t think it makes magnet schools unethical.
I also doubt that the Walton Rural Center Charter School is a cash cow, but it is possible that they have actual cows on school grounds. More likely just chickens and goats though.
Jeff,
Can I call you on your “make tons of money for their backers” comment? Who is making the money and how? And since you made a blanket statement,I don’t mean one or two exceptional cases.
Lots of people like to say that billionaires are “invested” in charters, but they’re actually supporting them philanthropically, not as an investment. BTW, if any billionaires reading want to support my school, please send us a check.
I know there are for-profit charters (though my understanding is they are pretty poor investments), as well as not-for-profit charters that could be accused of benefiting individuals. There are also plenty of third parties that make money on education, but I haven’t seen anything that supports charters sending more money this way than districts.
Here in Chicago there is a charter school that includes a large number of English language learners, and it is an alternative high school that doesn’t kick anyone out. It is Rudy Lozano Leadership Academy. I know this because my daughter did volunteer work there and was very impressed with what they did. They have a social justice/restorative justice focus. Lozano staff are highly qualified and I was amazed at the requirements for their staff. However, it is ironic that a teacher from Lozano was fired for trying to unionize, because Lozano was a well known community activist.
So Lozano Leadership Academy kicks out its teachers for suspected union activities while honoring a policy to keep its students?
Yes, that is what happened at Lozano. It is really troubling to see this part of the “reform” movement, the aspect of conveying to students that they are “first”, while no one else matters.
That’s not any type of social justice/restorative justice I can support.
An ethical charter school would not close their doors before the end of the school year and an ethical pro-charter government would figure out how to keep that school open for another 8 weeks. A charter school in NC is closing on 04/15. Where will these students go? At least for the remainder of the year, they will go to a traditional neighborhood school. That is not fair to any students.
I have heard more than a few pro-charter advocates give the solution if a charter is “failing” is to close the school. but what they don’t mention is the students from the failing school are not reassigned to a charter. These students will most likely return to the neighborhood schools.
An oxymoron.
First, if you are going to have selective schools with public money, you can’t have people making obscene amounts of money on the public dole. There has to be financial transparencey, and salary maximums for positions or categories or something.
Second, if you run a selective system, the non select population must be adequately funded, and the struggling population must get extra funding.
Not a charter school, but a magnet school, in what I would consider a good philanthropic contribution, by Microsoft founder Paul Allen.
http://aviationhscareers.org/about
We can’t generalize about charter schools any more than about public schools, especially in California where parents are so unhappy that the Parent Trigger Law was pulled for the first time and where several charter schools I know accept students with existing IEP’s and have a 3,000 student waiting list. Teachers from surrounding public schools are flocking to charters, hoping for a better teaching experience and some appreciation and support.
True, but that doesn’t mean we can’t utter the phrase, “charter school reform” haha.
They accept students with existing IEP’s. Do they also admit students who may be on the way to an IEP? And, if so, do they accept them without discrimination, as do public schools?
Yes, they do, or they would be answerable to the community who began the parent trigger school in which everyone who wanted to attend was admitted. In the public school I was in it took two years to get a kid into special ed. Two years! The proper “forms” had to be completed, then they’d get lost, then the psychologist didn’t show up. There are areas where our public schools are not doing their job and are getting what they asked for.
Joe Nathan, where are you? I would think this discussion would be just up your alley!
(I’m not being sarcastic, just wondering what comments you might have.)