Governor Gavin Newsom acted to tighten enrollment rules for charter schools, which have been credibly accused of excluding or pushing out students with disabilities and students who get low scores.

Three years ago, the ACLU of Southern California and the public interest law firm Public Advocates identified charter schools that advertised their exclusionary policies on their websites, but have since changed their websites. Their report found that more than one in five charters acknowledged keeping out certain classes of students.

EdSource summarized:

These practices, the report alleges, “violate the California Education Code, the California and U.S. Constitution, and state and federal civil rights laws.”

The report, titled, “Unequal Access: How Some California Charter Schools Illegally Restrict Enrollment,” says that according to the California Charter Schools Act of 1992, charter schools are required to “admit all pupils who wish to attend,” except for space limitations.

Newsom proposed a statute to ban such practices:

Newsom’s proposed statute would specify that charter schools cannot request or require parents to submit student records before enrolling. And it would require that charter schools post parental rights on their websites and make parents aware of them during enrollment and when students are expelled or leave during the year….The proposed statute implies there should be no allowances “for any reason” that might discourage any pupil from enrolling in a charter school.

A charter school advocate complained that district magnet schools for the arts or science or other specialties are not required to accept every applicant.

Many of those impose “selective (sometimes elite), complex and burdensome admissions requirements” that charter schools would not be allowed to adopt, said Eric Premack, executive director and founder of the Sacramento-based Charter Schools Development Center, which advises founders of charter schools. “It would be very interesting to see how districts would respond if the governor had proposed to subject districts to the same restrictions.”

The powerhouse California Charter School Association, the lobbying group, was noncommittal, not wanting to alienate the governor:

The California Charter Schools Association, which represents most of the state’s charter schools, has not commented on the specifics of Newsom’s proposal. In a statement last week on his education budget, it said, “We applaud Governor Newsom’s commitment to increasing funding for special education, and we share his vision in ensuring that all of California’s kids – especially our most vulnerable students – have access to public schools that meet their individual needs.”

Parents at the Catskill Avenue Elementary School in Carson, a suburb of Los Angeles, are fighting to prevent a charter school from crowding into their fully utilized school. 

State law requires districts to provide free space for charters, even in schools and communities that don’t want them.

“On a sunny afternoon in early April, in the working-class Los Angeles suburb of Carson, well over a hundred students, parents, teachers and community members gathered with a mission: to extol the virtues of Catskill Avenue Elementary School. But it wasn’t entirely a feel-good gathering. They were sounding an alarm that the Catskill campus was slated to share its space with GANAS Academy Charter School in the fall of 2019.

“Days after the rally, teachers and parents, backed by the United Teachers Los Angeles union, petitioned the Carson City Council to keep GANAS out of Catskill. Last Friday the council voted 3-0, with the mayor and one member absent, to support Catskill. The council’s resolution, which is symbolic and non-binding, will be sent to representatives of the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), which had approved GANAS’ charter.

“The founder and CEO of GANAS Academy, Sakshi Jain, has until Wednesday, May 1, to decide whether to accept the LAUSD offer to co-locate at Catskill. A LAUSD spokesperson said, in an email, that final offers of co-location sites are legally binding, suggesting the district would not offer GANAS another site if Catskill is rejected.

“Critics say GANAS is an example of the problems of charter schools in California: lack of oversight and transparency, and the tendency for districts and the state to greenlight charter schools whether or not there’s a clear need for them. In effect they say GANAS is a solution in search of a problem. And in search of a community. Before Carson’s Catskill Elementary was chosen, GANAS had plans to locate in nearby Wilmington, and used Wilmington’s demographic data in its petition to LAUSD.

“Phylis Hoffman, who teaches second grade at Harry Bridges Span School in Wilmington, called into question why Jain picked Wilmington for her school.

“The [GANAS] petition didn’t say where in Wilmington the school would be located, and the academic mission statement seemed very boilerplate and vague. And Jain has no California teaching credential. She appears to be a carpetbagger….”

”Elizabeth Untalan, who teaches fifth grade at Catskill, said that every room in the school is being used, including three computer labs, a counseling room, a science lab and a parent center. However, California’s Proposition 39, passed by voters in 2000, requires school districts to offer equitable and adequate unused public space to area charter schools. The key word is “unused,” and if a space is empty for part of the day, it is potentially eligible for a charter school to take it over.”

If the charter decides to move into the school, it will lose its computer labs, its counseling room, its science lab, and its parent center.

Someone, please remind me why stuffing a charter into a public school is a good idea.

Almost everyone in California seems to acknowledge that the state charter law is broken and needs reform. Governor Gavin Newsom created a Task Force, under the leadership of Tony Thurmond, State Superintendent of Public Instruction, charged with coming up with ways to fix the law. Since the majority of the Governor’s Task Force has ties to the charter industry (including two members of the state’s charter lobbying organization), it bears watching to see whether the proposals are effective or cosmetic.

Now the California School Boards Association has released its recommendations. Its report mentions in passing that only one of every three charter schools outperforms the public schools in the district where it is located.

“After more than 25 years of continued charter school growth, California now finds itself far removed from the original mission and vision of the Act, which was, in part, meant to improve student learning with an emphasis on those who are academically low achieving, and to help generate innovation to benefit students in all schools. California is now a state where only one in three charter schools produces student outcomes that are significantly better than those of the traditional public schools that those students would have otherwise attended.5 Moreover, rapid expansion has brought about examples of inequitable access to schools of choice, financial misconduct, and governance challenges.”

Frankly, after reading this brief document, I found myself wondering yet again, why is the government supporting two different systems? Charters are not more innovative than public schools, are not more successful in educating students, are less accountable, and do not cost less. Remind me, what’s the point?