CER Education Reform Newswire September 3, 2002: Triumphs and tribulations charter schools are facing in the new school year.

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Back-to-School Bulletin #2
Vol. 4, No. 36
September 3, 2002

American children have begun going back to school, and with the advent of this important ritual, CER is taking a close look at key issues facing education. This week: Triumphs and tribulations charter schools are facing in the new school year.

BRIGHTER CHOICES in NY: As is the case for countless public school children across the country, today is the first day of school for students at the new Brighter Choice Charter School in Albany, New York. What makes the Brighter Choice kids different from all but a handful of their public school peers is that they'll be going to two separate academies within the same school; the Brighter Choice School for Boys and the Brighter Choice School for Girls. These schools raise to fifteen the number of single-sex public schools in the country. Clearly the demand for such schools is high - more than 250 students applied for Brighter Choice's 90 slots. Fortunately, with easing of federal Title IX regulations that had once inhibited single-sex education, and with the ever-growing popularity of charters, more schools like Brighter Choice can be expected to open in the near future.

REFORMERS IN BUFFALO: Straying from the normal attitude of school boards in New York State, Buffalo's school board last week became the first district to approve a charter school (minus NYC, which authorizes its Chancellor to do so). By a vote of 8-1, the reformist board approved the establishment of the Enterprise charter school, despite an earlier, intense campaign of disinformation waged by the head of the city's teachers union against the original proposal by a Buffalo public school principal to convert his school. That principal, Gary Stillman, did not give up, and instead sought the school board's help in approving a new school, one that did not need the consent of the teachers who were led down a primrose path by their union. About their decision, school board member Darius Pridgen said that the new charter will provide "a quality education [for] many of the children who are the last and the least."

CHARTER STUDY SAYS DATA IS INCONCLUSIVE: Despite "inconclusive data" and a call for more thorough research on charters, the Brookings Institution's education unit issued a study which had newspapers around the country Tuesday proclaiming that charter school students fail to achieve on par with their traditional public school peers. Headlines notwithstanding, however, even a not-so-thorough reading of the report's charter section shows that although achievement scores for charters in some states lag behind those of traditional public schools, this hardly shows that charters aren't living up to their promise. In fact, the authors take pains to note that lower scores for charters could easily reflect the fact that disproportionately "charter students may have struggled academically before parents placed them at the school," a conclusion that has actually been found in dozens of other studies done on charters over the past few years. In fact, the authors all but ignored other research, although the report's ultimate conclusion is this: "With the data at hand, it is impossible to tell whether charter schools test scores reflect the quality of education at the schools." And, of course, the fundamental benefit of charters is prominent in the report, which notes that charters' main characteristic is that they are "serving students whose families have chosen for them to be there." Other research shortcomings include the fact that the researchers averaged the scores of all the students at each school, and then averaged all schools together to get their conclusion. Such statistical methods paint a misleading picture when a school does not have more than a few years of data available to assess whether students are really achieving. For more information about the study go to NEW STUDY INCONCLUSIVE AT BEST -- Previous Research Counters Brookings Findings, September 3, 2002 and Detailed Analysis. See also CER Monthly Letter Back to School 2002.

CALIFORNIA LAWSUIT A WIN FOR CHARTERS: A long-standing dispute in California pitting charter schools - and the law - against the status quo has ended, with charters coming out on top. According to California's Proposition 39, passed in 2000, school districts are required to help charter schools within their boundaries acquire facilities. The law notwithstanding, districts have routinely dragged their feet while charter students have been forced to go to school in sub-standard buildings and trailers. Perhaps nowhere has the issue been more contentious than in San Mateo County, where the Sequoia Union High School District has refused to pay for facilities for the Aurora Charter High School which operates in the district. At the request of Sequoia officials who hoped to save their district money, an elementary school district whose high school age children attend Sequoia schools chartered Aurora. The school's unsuccessful quest for classroom space was taken on in a suit against the district, and the last week San Mateo Superior Court Judge Quentin Kopp put an end to Sequoia's shenanigans, ordering the district to comply with its obligation to provide classrooms for the charter school. Sequoia can appeal the decision if it chooses, but can't muffle the message in Judge Kopp's ruling: School districts have no right either to flout the law or ignore their obligations to charter schools. For more, go to: http://www.canec.org/.

VISTA CHARTER STRUGGLES: Another charter in California has not only experienced district-mischief regarding its facility, but an ongoing attempt by district officials to put it out of business, despite increasing success with the mainly Latino children it serves. The Vista Literacy Academy was approved in March 2001, and had procured a school building in plenty of time to start the 2001-2002 school year. However, before the building could be utilized, the city fire marshal declared it unsafe, citing problems that would require nearly $500,000 to fix. Unable to use their facility, the school rented and set up trailers around their building, conducting classes in them for the bulk of the 2001-2002 school year. According to Proposition 39, of course, the district is required to help the school procure classroom space. Vista Unified has steadfastly refused to do so. Vista Academy, desperate for a permanent home for its 325 mainly low-income, Hispanic students, having exhausted all gentler means to get the district to live up to its obligations, filed suit against the district in mid-August, at which time anti-charter board members called for a "compliance investigation" of the school. The district cited no evidence of mismanagement by the school, and appeared to launch its investigation purely out of spite. In fact, a cabal of three board members - a majority on the five person board - seemed so intent on subverting both the law and the democratic process that they held to just one minute the public comment section of the emergency meeting called to launch the investigation. Even recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance was dispensed with, so desperate were these members to start their meeting before charter supporters could get on the agenda to speak. And the reason for all this? A school tried to make the district live up its obligations to it and the 300-some district students who attend it. Link here for previous woes and more recent challenges to Vista Academy.

SUCCESS AT DC's FRIENDSHIP-EDISON: In the Nation's Capital Friendship Edison charter schools continue to post scores far exceeding not just other public schools in DC, but across the country. Most notably, two elementary schools run by Friendship House together with Edison Schools posted math and reading achievement scores higher than between 53% and 62% of children nationally. They also raised scores at a rate exceeded by only one other DC public school, beating out 105 others. And all this was accomplished in spite of the fact that 70% of Friendship-Edison students receive free or reduced-price lunches.

OHIO EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: Meanwhile in the Midwest, the education establishment has gone off the deep end about charter schools, launching a massive disinformation campaign that they hope will yield thousands of pieces of correspondence to legislators and stir up the media. At issue is their concern over a bill that the legislature is considering to help create a more rational oversight structure for approved charters. Since the State Board of Education has not had the capacity to follow and properly steward the state's charters, the legislature correctly wants to vest that power in a state authority whose only job would be to create and monitor charters. Instead, the "Empire" would rather see all charters dismantled. Stay tuned for a fun election season! See also: WHAT OHIO'S COALITION FOR PUBLIC EDUCATION ISN'T TELLING YOU ABOUT CHARTER SCHOOLS, by Jeanne Allen, president, Center for Education Reform; Chester E. Finn Jr., president, Thomas B. Fordham Foundation; and Lisa Graham Keegan, CEO, Education Leaders Council.

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