Geoff Decker, writing in Chalkbeat New York City, says the state is asking charter schools to do their best to recruit more students with disabilities and students who are English language learners. The state has set very low targets. For example, New York City charters are supposed to meet a target of 7 percent English language learners, which is only half of the city’s proportion of 14.3 percent.
Why should they have a target of 7 percent when the citywide average is 14 percent?
The state says it will crack down, but not very hard. It will act like a cotton hand in a velvet glove.
Such disparities have been flash points in debates about New York City’s charter schools for years. Lawmakers stepped in five years ago, requiring schools to have targets for enrolling students with disabilities, English language learners, and students from low-income families. The idea was that not making efforts to hit those targets would jeopardize a school’s ability to stay open.
This year, for the first time, schools’ progress toward those goals are being scrutinized. But it appears that state regulators plan to treat the targets as guidelines, not requirements.
“We’re not exactly sure how rigidly we’re going to interpret the targets because there may be some challenges that the schools face,” Joseph Belluck, who chairs the committee that governs SUNY’s Charter Schools Institute, said last week. If a school can’t show it has tried to meet its targets, SUNY will be stricter, he added.
“We hope that they will not say that they’ve done nothing to meet them,” Belluck said. “That would be a problem.”
So here is the scenario. The SUNY Charter Schools Institute will ask charters that enroll only 2 or 3 percent English language learners, have you really truly tried to increase the enrollment of ELLs? The charter operator will say, “Oh, yes, we have certainly tried. We printed flyers in Spanish. We have done our best.” And the case will be closed. No sanctions for non-compliance. And charters will continue to under-enroll the students with the greatest needs without penalty.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Despite the support of the Obama Administration for charter schools, the Office for Civil Rights has demonstrated its independence of Administration policy on numerous occasions. Shouldn’t a title VI (of the Civil Rights Act of 1964) complaint be filed with OCR to take on this systematic practice of under-representation? Fortunately, the Office for Civil Rights has taken the position of every occasion that admissions policies or practices that have the “effect” of discriminating constitutes a violation of title VI.
What happened to the Charter Schools proponents big argument about charter schools have MORE accountability to the public? I mean, they have the ULTIMATE accountability if they fail to perform as promised… and that includes accepting all students.
Here’s the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools’ April 2014 statement bragging about how accountable charter schools are:
Click to access Charter-Schools-are-Accountable.pdf
The first page has a checklist
This includes:
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“___ Charter schools must meet the (same) federal & state standards and laws (as the traditional public schools.)
“___ Charter schools must meet charter agreement requirements.
“___ Charter schools can be closed; 11 states automatically closed low-performing charter schools.”
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First of all, what about the other states?
Secondly, the phrase “low performing” also encompasses the failure to perform in the acceptance of all students, regardless of the challenges those students bring — special ed., homeless, foster care, English Language Learners, kids with disruptive behavior, etc.
When charters so fail — as the ones in New York state described here did —- is there any actual real crackdown where “charters must be closed”?
No.
In Los Angeles, charter renewals are almost never turned down.
Compare that with the opening “overview” in the April 2014 National Alliance for Public Charter Schools’ accountability statement:
Click to access Charter-Schools-are-Accountable.pdf
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“Charter School Accountability
“Overview
“Charters are public schools, so they must meet the same accountability requirements as all other public schools. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), most recently reauthorized in 2001 as No Child Left Behind (NCLB) required all charter schools to follow the same content standards and take the same assessments as all other public schools in their
state.
“They are also responsible for making “adequate yearly progress” (AYP) in math and reading. Even in states that have received ESEA flexibility waivers, charter schools are still held accountable to the state’s accountability system. ESEA defers to state charter school laws, however, on exactly how these provisions are implemented for charter schools.
“Charter schools also have an extra layer of accountability from their authorizer. Public charter schools enter into an explicit agreement—or charter—that lays out expectations for performance. The entities that award charters and are responsible for monitoring charter schools’ performance against their charter agreements are called charter authorizers. The specific types of entities that can authorize charters vary from state to state, but may include local education agencies, state education agencies, higher education institutions, mayors or
other municipal authorities, and independent charter boards. Nationally more than 90 percent of charter school authorizers are school districts.
“If schools do not meet the expectations set out within the charter, the authorizer may close them.”
————-
But they don’t accept or keep all students, and they never do get closed for this failure. This is all just talk.
There’s more. This statement is loaded with such statements:
“In some cases, these performance expectations are tougher than the expectations set by the state accountability system (for the traditional public schools. ”
Yeah, right!
Oh, here’s more…
“Ultimately, ESEA applies the same standards, assessment, and accountability requirements to charter schools as it does to other public schools but defers to each state’s charter school law regarding the application of these requirements to charter schools.
“Persistently low-achieving charter schools—unlike traditional public schools—can be closed for failure to meet the expectations in their performance contracts.”
One more thing that they brag about:
“Charter schools are required to undergo financial audits.”
Tell that to New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli in New York State. Every time that DiNapoli attempts to audit Eva’s schools or the KIPP schools, he’s met with legal Terminator-type lawyers who fight tooth and nail any inspection of their finances.
(Google “DiNapoli” “charter schools” to read about this in detail.)
Check out this court ruling from March 2014. That’s one month prior to the release of the phony “charter schools are more accountable than public schools” press release ABOVE.
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/state-comptroller-audit-charter-schools-judge-article-1.1721265
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N.Y. DAILY NEWS:
“New York charter schools won a big victory Thursday when a judge ruled the state’s top fiscal officer can’t follow the money and look at their books.
“Charter school crusader Eva Moskowitz filed suit to bar state Controller Thomas DiNapoli from auditing her 22 schools, all of which are publicly funded but also receive private donations. On Thursday, Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Thomas Breslin ruled DiNapoli did not have the authority to audit any New York charter because the schools are not technically ‘units of the state.’
“We are disappointed that the court struck down the law authorizing the Comptroller’s office to audit charter schools,” said DiNapoli spokesman Matt Sweeney. He added an appeal is under consideration.
“Other cities, such as Los Angeles and Chicago, have rules allowing charters to be audited. In New York, the schools are required to hire independent auditors.
“Mayor de Blasio recently set off a firestorm when he refused to allow three of Moskowitz’s charters to co-locate in public schools. She and her well-financed supporters have launched a campaign to reverse his decision.”
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Do you get that wording? Charter schools are technically not “units of the state”. In other words, they’re “private” corporations, shielded from any inspection by any government agency, and from the same oversight that traditional public schools are. Charter schools and charter school chains are as protected as Walmart or Best Buy, or any private business. Public schools and entire public school districts can and are be audited by the state, but not charters.
Remember that the next time someone says, “Charter schools are public schools.”
Do you want to know why the charter leaders like Eva Moskowitz fight these audits?
Why are audits—like the one N.Y. State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli attempts—so gosh-darn important?
Check out NYC Educator’s article on the scandal where KIPP charter chain leaders used public money to fund a week-long “retreat” to the Bahamas for themselves and some select teachers. KIPP defended this by claiming the whole trip was “professional development” at a location that was “off campus.”
I’ll say it was “off campus”… A THOUSAND MILES off campus.
How did that happen? NY State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli wanted to know.
Back in 2007 when this story broke, it provoked a furor at the time. Initially, KIPP stuck by their claim that spending money on the trip was an appropriate use of public money. Eventually, they bowed to public pressure, and stepped this back, then promised to institute “internal controls” to prevent this from happening again.
Here’s NYC EDUCATOR’s take on the Bahamas’ fiasco:
http://nyceducator.com/2007/12/what-do-we-do-with-all-that-extra-money.html
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NYC EDUCATOR:
“Whopee! Let’s spend five days in the Bahamas on the taxpayers’ dime! That’s what they do over at KIPP! Forget about vacationing with your family. First, you don’t have time, and second, you can’t afford it. It’s go with your slavedrivers or don’t go at all.
– – – – – –
” ‘KIPP founder Dave Levin, who as superintendent of the academy attended the Bahamas retreat, called the trips essential to motivating teachers to work the extra Saturdays and extended hours demanded by the school.’
– – – – – –
“Yeah, Dave, when you treat teachers and kids like dogs all year, they need a break. What–the kids didn’t get one? Too bad for them. Well, if they’re gonna grow up to work 200 hours a week with few benefits and no job protection, you can’t train them too early, can you?
“Loyal KIPP teachers rationalize the trips by explaining they don’t actually have any fun while on them:
– – – – – –
” ‘Math teacher Frank Corcoran, who attended a foray this year to the Dominican Republic, said formal meetings made up about 40 percent of the trip, but informal school-related chats dominated the spare time.’
” ‘So it feels like work even though people are walking around in swim trunks,’ he said. ‘Everyone comes out feeling motivated and pumped up, whereas at the end of the school year you’re just burned out.’ ”
– – – – – –
“I can certainly understand being burned out after those six=day weeks and being on call round the clock with the KIPP cell phone that allows parents to call you all night (precluding any sort of social or family life).
“And while workaholic executives may choose this very same lifestyle, KIPP teachers don’t remotely earn executive-style money or perks.
“Of course, KIPP denies using public money anyway, as they are beyond reproach:
– – – – – –
“Although officials at the charter school told auditors the trips in 2005 and 2006 were funded by surplus funds from private and not public sources, state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said DOCUMENTATION WAS LACKING TO SUPPORT THOSE CLAIMS. (CAPITALS are mine, JACK)
” ‘Having surplus funds is no excuse to spend taxpayer dollars on trips to the Caribbean,’ DiNapoli said. ‘Money intended for education should be spent on education.’ ”
– – – – – – –
“I’ll pay for my own vacation, thank you, and I’ll go with my family rather than my assistant principal (who appreciates this arrangement just as much as I do). My kid goes to a public school where they don’t need to work her or her teachers to death.
“You can kipp KIPP, thank you very much.”
As always, accountability is only for public school teachers and public schools, while charter privateers are allowed to go their merry way.
If I may add to your statement:
“As always, accountability is only for public school teachers and public schools, while charter privateers AND PROFITEERS are allowed to go their merry way.”
Why hasn’t any journalist asked Joseph Belluck straight out whether SUNY Charter Institute is endorsing the frequent suspensions of 5 year old children? Given that the feds are criticizing suspensions even for high school age students, will SUNY overlook high suspension rates for 5 year olds? Here is the question reporters should ask Mr. Belluck: If a charter school can get good test results, is it fine to suspend 5 year olds they deem “violent”? And if it turns out lots of 5 year olds at a charter school are violent, does SUNY think that might reflect a problem in the school itself?
I’m sure Mr.Belluck plans to convene a committee soon so they can start to talk about forming another committee to talk about what kind of committee can be formed to address the problems of frequent suspensions. But at least he would have to go on record explaining his view of Kindergarten suspensions and why the schools with the most suspensions are given the most charters by SUNY.
By allowing charters to work with guidelines rather than mandates, they are being allowed fudge the reporting of their demographics. As an ESL teacher, I would question the reporting of ELLs accurately. If they are not required to hire a certified teacher and use the same screening tools as the state, I would question the validity of their judgment. Are they required to do a home language survey which is used to signal a required screening in New York? You can’t just find students with Hispanic surnames and call them ELLs for purposes of reporting data. I frankly would not trust their reporting because they often seems to report whatever is to their advantage. To be fair, they should be required to have the roughly the same number of beginner, intermediate and advanced ELLs as public schools. Beginners from poor countries require much more intensive instruction in English and academics than advanced students that are close to reaching proficiency so they shouldn’t just serve the most advanced ELLs. Learning a new language is a process, and ELLs should not remain as ELLs just because the school needs to report a student as such to the city as was implied in the post. Students should be moving through the program at a rate that is similar to the rate of the public schools.
“By allowing charters to work with guidelines rather than mandates, they are being allowed fudge the reporting of their demographics.”
I would think it operates the other way around. Targets, goals, or guidelines remove the incentive to fudge the reporting, because you don’t have to meet the targets. With a mandate, the incentive to cook the books should increase.
What I mean is that without any oversight and control of the measuring of the data, how do we know that what they are reporting is the truth? I was talking mostly about problem of the misidentification of ELLs, particularly if those doing the identification are untrained individuals, rather than ESL professionals.
True, there is absolutely no reason to cook the books if your oversight agency doesn’t care if you meet targets and you know that as long as you say “we tried” they will say “carry on”. In fact, if your oversight agency has perverse incentives in which good test scores are heavily rewarded and educating at-risk kids who might bring down your test scores is not, why would anyone bother to fudge the reporting? And why would anyone try very hard to educate the kids who are unlikely to achieve the high test scores for which you are most rewarded by the oversight agency?
It’s pretty simple when you put it like that – much better to eliminate the incentive to fudge the reporting by eliminating the obligation to educate those kids! If you didn’t, SUNY might have to do some real oversight and what would that do? They might actually find a charter school cooking the books! And what’s more important? Taking away incentives to cook the books by charter operators who have no ethical standards? Or educating at-risk kids? I think we all know the answer to that! But thank you for expressing it so well.
If you want to ensure that targets get reached, you make them mandatory. You make them quotas, and you penalize schools that don’t meet them.
Yes, my apologies as I replied to you above. If you don’t really care about targets being reached, you only punish the schools who say “nah, nah, we aren’t even trying to meet them and you can’t make us.” But as the chair of SUNY makes clear, as long as the charter school says “sure, we’ll try” that’s all the oversight you need.
This is what’s known as the “pretty please?” method of accountability for charter schools. As opposed to the “off with their heads!” method of accountability for public schools.
Public Schools: Comply or else (no matter how our calculations or expectations vary year over year)
Charter Schools: Please indicate you heard us and that you are trying your very best to meet our very low expectations.
Note that ELLs in charters apparently aren’t even expected to show progress – the state is just hoping they show up in charters at all – and they don’t have to try very hard to even meet that low standard.
Autonomy/Flexibility apparently means ability to discriminate which should NOT be ok.
As a parent, I think I would object to the newest “accountability” measure they’re pushing in ed reform:
“Beyond narrow measures of academic achievement, measurement of social and emotional well-being offers schools another way to assess their efforts to help students. Measurement of indicators such as student attitudes toward personal growth and effectiveness may offer schools important clues about classroom instruction, classroom environment, and school climate and culture that can inform and guide efforts to improve them.”
“During the past 30 days, how often did you come to class prepared? (Self Management)
How true is this statement?: My intelligence is something that I can’t change very much. (Growth Mindset)
How true is this statement?: I can do well on all my tests, even when they’re difficult. (Self-Efficacy)
During the past 30 days, when others disagreed with you, how respectful were you of their views? (Social Awareness)”
They survey the kids on their thoughts to get this data. I don’t have any problem with schools requiring kids to complete and turn in assignments or come prepared to class or be respectful of others.
I do have a problem with schools requiring certain attitudes or thoughts that have to accompany those actions. I would opt my son out of this experiment. I don’t think they can or should require him to adopt “a growth mindset” and I’m not clear why he must report what he’s thinking or adopt these beliefs anyway. I don’t think it’s their job to monitor his thoughts.
http://edsource.org/2015/incorporating-social-emotional-learning-into-school-accountability-bookman-commentary/88989
It would seem reform movement doesn’t have a lot of room for diversity. You’re either an able bodied participant working with the system or you’re not.
Special Ed and ELL are expensive. Both require specialized skills from the teachers and paraprofessionals that stray from the norm.
I’ve thought from the beginning that one of the goals of the reform movement is to circumvent the federal mandate for Special Ed.