The first law authorizing charter schools was authorized by Minnesota in 1991, and the first charter school opened in St. Paul in 1992. The original idea of charters was that they would enroll students with high-needs, would try new approaches, and would share what they learned with the public schools. They were not intended to be competitors with public schools, but to be akin to research and development centers, abetting the work of the public schools.
Now, 25 years later, the charter sector has burgeoned into nearly 7,000 schools enrolling some three million students. Some charters are corporate chains. Some are religious in character. Some operate for profit. Some are owned and run by non-educators.
Instead of collaborating with public schools, most compete for students and resources. Instead of serving the neediest students, many choose the students who are likeliest to succeed.
It is time for a thorough inquiry into the status and condition of charter schools today, and that is what Carol Burris, executive director of the Network for Public Education, has done in this report.
An experienced high school principal, Burris has traveled the country, visiting charter schools and talking to parents, teachers, students, and administrators.
Not only has she examined many charters, she reviews the marketing of charters and their fiscal impact on traditional public schools. Policy makers have not expanded the funding at the state or local level to pay for new charters. Instead, they have cut funding for the public schools that typically enroll 85-90% of students. Thus, most students will have larger classes and fewer curriculum choices because of the funding taken away for charter schools. Burris also analyzes the report on charters by the NAACP and the response to it by charter advocates.
This is neither fair nor just nor wise.
This is the only post you will see today, except for a graphic that will pop up in an hour or so.
Take the time to read the entire report.
Let me know what you think.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Nothing recent about Gülen charters or Harmony?
See pages 21-24 – Gulan is right there.
So glad to see a light being shined on the charter management organizations and the insanely high costs they put on taxpayers. Kipp is losing millions because of these fees. These organizations need serious regulation — in fact, what are they really doing? Revising scripts? Doubtful.
Kipp is losing millions??
Do you mean that KIPP is stealing millions?
I don’t think KIPP is losing money. It’s top three leaders are each paid about half a million. No belt tightening there.
Every page drops the jaw lower and lower. The report should be required reading for governors and legislators.
“State Superintendent Paolo DeMaria offered a mixed review of the Cleveland school district’s progress under its 2012 improvement plan this week, avoiding any endorsement or judgment of the plan.
While the district has improved some things under the plan, DeMaria wrote in an update to the legislature on the plan required by state law, it still struggles to earn better than F grades on state report cards.”
Go back and read the cheerleading for the Cleveland Plan from 2012. They wildly over-sold another ed reform initiative.
They’re sticking with it because of course they are- it expands charters- which was the one and only goal. The plan wasn’t designed to support or improve public schools, it was designed to eradicate public schools.
They stopped promoting the Cleveland Plan and are now promoting the Indianapolis Plan, because there is no history in ed reform. The schools and cities they promote just fall off the radar if they aren’t the huge successes they’re promised to be.
We’ll never hear about Cleveland again because they don’t revisit failures. They just bury them and move on to the next city they’re “reinventing”. If Indianapolis doesn’t show progress as a result of privatization that’s okay- that city will drop of the list and they’ll replace it with their newest city.
http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2017/11/cleveland_plan_for_schools_gets_mixed_review_from_state_superintendent_paolo_demaria.html
Someone was just asking me yesterday, “What’s a charter school”. And, here’s the answer. Top-notch work. Hats off to the Network for Public Education.
It is reassuring to know that NPE has decided to chronicle the exploits of the charter industry. As this report shows, the government has neither the will nor the interest in keeping tabs on privatization. In this regard the government is complicit and negligent. Many government representatives have been incompetent stewards of the public trust.
This report is one of few records that reveals the impact of privatization on local public schools. What started out as an opportunity to provide so-called choice for students has morphed into a gigantic, flawed pay to play scheme with rampant waste, fraud, nepotism, mismanagement, enhanced segregation and government collusion. In many cases the mechanism for charter takeovers has deliberately been designed to exclude the democratic participation of the citizenry, a concerted effort to suppress democracy.
NPE’s recommendations moving forward are both doable and reasonable. Charters should be accountable to the community that they serve. Otherwise, the process of shifting public funds to private entities without taxpayers’ input becomes an example of taxation without representation. I would also suggest that charters should not be permitted to accept classified students unless they are required to comply with IDEA. Profiteers and complicit politicians are eager to move classified students into separate and unequal schools in order to circumvent IDEA’s costly requirements. This practice is not in the best interests of vulnerable students and their families.
Instead of considering the needs of students, privatization has become the main priority for many government leaders despite the dismal results and rampant corruption. Elected representatives should be working to improve education for students and provide fair funding solutions to all public schools. They should not be engaged in trying to advance privatization in collusion with corporate interests without regard to student and community welfare.
Is this the “embrace” to which you refer?
“Until charter schools become true public schools, the
Network for Public Education will continue to consider
them to be private schools that take public funding.”
Duane, you will have to have that exchange in another setting, not here. Jim H. regularly insults me, and the first rule of this blog is you can’t insult your host. Do it elsewhere.
Didn’t realize the background info. Thanks.
This is great research with some contributions from Valerie Strauss as well. I hope that Huff Post and large circulation media will get some keys ideas into circulation. I hope NEP has done, or will muster, a full court press-release PR program with vendors also known for doing PR for the charter industry. You can be sure that Bellwether and Brookings and the Fordham Institute are raving up their publicity machines in an effort to discredit the source and the content.
raving up–not intended. I know that I get notices from privateers in education from this service.
http://prnewswire.mediaroom.com/index.php
Thank you for this link to this comprehensive report.
I like that the Network for Public Education also took up Eva Moskowitz’ challenge that no one could ever prove that Success Academy Bronx 2 does not have the same demographics as PS 55 in the Bronx. And yet on page 38 of this report the stark difference in demographics gives proof to Eva Moskowitz’ false claims.
(Cue to pro-charter Tim and others claiming that Success Academy should have no obligation to have their Bronx charter teach kids similar to those in the neighboring public schools anymore because the pro-charter folks were just joking when they claimed they cared about the kids in failing public schools in the Bronx! They were kidding! What they REALLY meant is that as long is there is a zoned public school in a wealthy neighborhood in far away Manhattan or Brooklyn with lots of affluent students, then why should a Success Academy charter school in the Bronx have any obligation to teach the same number of at-risk kids as in the public schools in their Bronx district!)
At least New York has some statistics on charter schools which is more than we can say for many states. In too many states taxpayers are pouring public money down the drain, and nobody is held accountable.
It is interesting to note that the report cites millions wasted due to lack of governmental oversight. There is a corresponding rise in expenditure in the public schools to oversee what teachers are doing and try to find ways to suggest that what they are doing is wrong due to test scores. This too is money wasted. Since, as the report points out, 90% of American high school students are going to public facilities, imagine how much is being wasted in this futility. Most of it is being used to prove that schools are bad and we should have privatization. So it is much worse than you report here.
I think you are terrific. I saw you years ago when Art Johnson, Supt was just leaving his post . You spoke at Lynn Univetsity in PBC, Fl. This year the Republicans many of whom have financial interests in Charter schools passed 7069 which gives all monies allocated to Charter schools and zero to Public ones. Some school districts are challenging it in court. I belong to the Democratic Ed.Co. and we are studying the cause and intend to educate the public and other elected officials about the dire situation. I worked with Randy Weingarten, Sandy Feldman and Albert Shanker as well teaching for 40 years in the South Bronx.
Carole, keep up the fight,