Are charter schools worth it? Voters will decide

October 10, 2012 @ 10:38 am

Associated Press

SEATTLE (AP) - Washington's voters will in November again decide whether to allow charter schools in Washington, after having rejected similar proposals in 1995, 2000 and 2004.

The debate over this year's charter schools initiative mostly comes down to speculation.

The writers of the ballot measure that would allow the independent public schools to get a foothold in Washington state say they designed their proposal to create the best charter school system in the nation. The proposal would open as many as 40 charter schools over five years, they say, and would offer hope for struggling kids and their families.

Opponents say there are loopholes that should scare voters. They note that charter schools have a mixed track record in other states and there are no guarantees that the ones that open here would be successful. They also worry that charters will take money away from regular public schools, which are already suffering from years of state budget cuts.

Mike Bernard, an accountant and business owner from Bellevue, says his analysis led him to change his mind about charter schools since his days on the Issaquah School Board in the 1990s.

"If you spend any time at all working in schools, you realize how little changes, and how any opportunity to shake the system is probably a good thing," Bernard said.

He doesn't expect that charter schools would offer answers to all the problems in Washington public schools, but he thinks it would be silly not to give them a chance.

"I see very little downside and some good will certainly come of it," he said.

Others find a very big downside to the charter schools proposal: the possibility that it could take money away from a struggling school district if students migrate to the new schools, said Kathleen Smith, a registered nurse who is taking a break from hospital work to raise her two kids who are students in Seattle Public Schools.

Her daughter's eighth-grade teacher told her there were no science textbooks available for her students. She has seen kids who need extra help to keep them from falling through the cracks. And when the school had to choose between a nurse and a math specialist, they were forced to choose a nurse because health problems could put all students at risk.

"I see such great need and they're putting money into reform efforts," Smith said.

Proponents of the initiative say charter schools offer options for people who are frustrated with regular public schools. Unfortunately, research on the effectiveness of charter schools is not clear.

The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools says there have been as many as 200 studies of charter school effectiveness, but only a handful used high-quality, scientific methods. Some of those studies, however, showed charter schools were effective at helping low-income students do better.

Researchers at the University of Washington's Center on Reinventing Public Education distrust any study that does not compare charter students with their counterparts in a nearby district school.

UW researchers say that a review of the studies like this show ample evidence that charter elementary schools on average modestly outperform traditional public schools in both reading and math, and that charter middle schools do slightly better in math. Urban charters have better success rates than suburban or rural schools, they reported in a research brief on charter school achievement. Research has found no improvement in high school.

But when research focuses on just one charter school or just one charter management organization, the results can be more dramatic for a much smaller group of children.

Students at California-based KIPP Public Charter Schools, for example, have shown statistically significant improvement in reading and math over a one-year period.

Smaller, targeted studies don't always offer good news for charters. Researchers have documented poor results in Ohio and North Carolina and good results in Idaho, Massachusetts, New York and Delaware, the University of Washington researchers said.

Discussion of this initiative has wandered down a few unexpected alleyways. The following questions cannot really be answered until the initiative is put to the test in the real world:

Is there a parent trigger in the initiative that would allow parents to replace a successful public school with an independent charter school? It depends on how you interpret one section of the proposal, which was not designed to be a parent trigger. It would take some legal maneuvering and a little bit of nefarious intent to make this happen.

Could charter organizations bring in outside for-profit companies to run their schools and make money off Washington's school children? Lots of corporations already make money off public schools, including book publishers, computer makers and educational software developers. The initiative says only nonprofit organizations could run charter schools in Washington state. Opponents fear for-profit subcontractors.

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Contact Donna Blankinship on Twitter at https://twitter.com/dgblankinship

____

Online:

No on 1240: https://www.facebook.com/NoChartersWA

Yes on 1240: http://yeson1240.com/

People for Our Public Schools: http://peopleforourpublicschools.org/

National Alliance for Public Charter Schools: http://www.publiccharters.org/

UW Center on Reinventing Public Education: http://www.crpe.org/


(Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
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Comments (20)


  • Add A Comment

  • Kosh wrote...
    Anything
    June 17, 2012 1:53 pm
    That takes jobs away from evil unions is good with me, I'll sign and vote for it.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • wsualumn wrote...
    Charter Schools
    June 17, 2012 4:11 pm
    Weaken public schools by taking away money from district budgets, draw away high performing students and exclude students who have disabilities. Those that are hardest to educate are left to the public schools. Charter schools tend to divide communities and create an atmosphere where people fight over space and resources. Unlike charter schools that tend to be elitist, democratic public schools must educate all children.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • ron prevost wrote...
    WAZZU - What part of PUBLIC charter school system do you not understand ???????
    June 17, 2012 6:38 pm
    A knee-jerk reaction. But these charter schools will be PART of the public school system. MYNW really should present a clearer story, but that would be asking too much.

    But you've got good(?) company. The WEA knee-jerks exactly the same way you do.

    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • ron prevost wrote...
    @ Wsualumn
    June 17, 2012 6:42 pm
    Uh - THESE charter schools are to be PUBLIC. It would be nice if you actually read the story before knee-jerk reacting.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • wsualumn wrote...
    Of Course They are Public
    June 17, 2012 6:49 pm
    They get public funds. They still weaken the system. Charter schools pull certain kids. Maybe you should do more research as to how they operate.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • mihalyim wrote...
    Once again try to read
    July 6, 2012 6:31 am
    The motion "prioritizes proposals to serve economically and academically disadvantaged students." Those who typically score the lowest who you say will be left in the current system. All of the schools will also be non-profit and thus no one will be getting rich off the public dollar in this case. So what other arguments do you have?
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Troll Hunter wrote...
    mihalyim
    July 26, 2012 8:52 pm
    Public schools from K through college are not for profit, but that really means nothing in today's America. Let's take UW as an example. They are a 'not for profit' institution, yet they have well over a billion dollars hidden away. How did they get all that capital? "Donations" from wealthy alumni. The very real fear for these charter schools is that they will take those donations from wealthy parents who want a top notch education for their kiddies, at a public funded school. The rest of the public schools will of course be left behind due to the disparity in money, making an even greater divide in publicly funded education. The sad part of this initiative is that these wealthy want public funding yet want their charter schools to provide private school quality education. It is sad the state our education system is in today, but it really is all our fault. year after year voters would vote against education funding, then sit there and scratch their heads wondering what went wrong.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Kosh wrote...
    Nice Try
    June 17, 2012 5:30 pm
    But everyone knows about the failed school system that only prepares kids to exceed at being a liberal that has proven to NEVER work no matter how much money is thrown at it. Please show us were your radical liberal idea's have EVER worked?
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • wsualumn wrote...
    Kosh
    June 17, 2012 7:46 pm
    What school did you go to that made you become such a liberal? What did they include in their lessons that were of the liberal agenda? Please be specific and don't sound like a typical Fox News ditto head that just regurgitates what Rush and Hannity tells you and doesn't have the facts to back it up.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Moondoggie wrote...
    Those "evil" paid campaign workers
    July 6, 2012 9:37 am
    How come it only the paid signature gatherers that are evil? Craigslist is full of left wing orgs. that hire people to pass out leaflets. Why that isn’t considered evil?
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Bucket Dad wrote...
    wsualumn ...
    July 6, 2012 10:38 am
    "They get public funds. They still weaken the system. Charter schools pull certain kids." So do public universities such as, let me think, WSU and UW. So are you proposing that we pull funding from those elitist institution and fund the local community colleges only?
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • wsualumn wrote...
    Bucket
    July 6, 2012 7:55 pm
    The money universities receive doesn't compare to K-12 schools. When you go to college the individual pays tuition. Universities do get public dollars, but not to the extent the combined amount local schools collect. You can't compare the universities to public K-12 schools. You are comparing apples to oranges.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • kata wrote...
    !!!
    July 6, 2012 4:42 pm
    http://sos.wa.gov/_assets/elections/initiatives/FinalText_274.pdf

    It's 38 pages. Compared to 2700 pages, it's not even a cup of coffee's worth of reading.

    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }