Charter Schools and Their Enemies

Charter Schools and Their Enemies PDF Author: Thomas Sowell
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 9781541675131
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
In dozens of places in New York City where a charter school and a traditional public school hold classes in the same building, charter school students in those buildings have achieved "proficiency" on statewide tests several times more often than traditional public school students taking the same tests. In 2013, a fifth-grade class in a Harlem charter school scored higher on a mathematics test than any other fifth-grade class in the entire state of New York. That included, as the New York Times put it, "even their counterparts in the whitest and richest suburbs, Scarsdale and Briarcliff Manor." Nationwide, charter schools have only a fraction of the number of students who attend traditional public schools. But charter schools enrollment is growing faster, especially in low-income minority communities. From 2001 to 2016, enrollment in traditional public schools rose 1 percent, while charter school enrollment rose 571 percent. In cities across the country, with many students on waiting lists to transfer into charter schools, public school officials are blocking charter schools from using school buildings that have been vacant for years, in order to prevent those transfers from taking place. Even in states where blocking charter schools from using vacant school buildings is illegal, the laws have been evaded. In some places, vacant school buildings have been demolished, making sure no charter schools can use them. Book jacket.

Charter Schools and Their Enemies

Charter Schools and Their Enemies PDF Author: Thomas Sowell
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 9781541675131
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
In dozens of places in New York City where a charter school and a traditional public school hold classes in the same building, charter school students in those buildings have achieved "proficiency" on statewide tests several times more often than traditional public school students taking the same tests. In 2013, a fifth-grade class in a Harlem charter school scored higher on a mathematics test than any other fifth-grade class in the entire state of New York. That included, as the New York Times put it, "even their counterparts in the whitest and richest suburbs, Scarsdale and Briarcliff Manor." Nationwide, charter schools have only a fraction of the number of students who attend traditional public schools. But charter schools enrollment is growing faster, especially in low-income minority communities. From 2001 to 2016, enrollment in traditional public schools rose 1 percent, while charter school enrollment rose 571 percent. In cities across the country, with many students on waiting lists to transfer into charter schools, public school officials are blocking charter schools from using school buildings that have been vacant for years, in order to prevent those transfers from taking place. Even in states where blocking charter schools from using vacant school buildings is illegal, the laws have been evaded. In some places, vacant school buildings have been demolished, making sure no charter schools can use them. Book jacket.

Charter Schools and the Corporate Makeover of Public Education

Charter Schools and the Corporate Makeover of Public Education PDF Author: Michael Fabricant
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 0807771260
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 285

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Book Description
This book will reset the discourse on charter schooling by systematically exploring the gap between the promise and the performance of charter schools. The authors do not defend the public school system, which for decades has failed primarily poor children of color. Instead, they use empirical evidence to determine whether charter schooling offers an authentic alternative for these children. In concise chapters, they address a series of important questions related to the recent ascent of charter schools and the radical restructuring of public education. This essential introduction includes a detailed history of the charter movement, an analysis of the politics and economics driving the movement, documentation of actual student outcomes, and alternative images of transforming public education to serve all children.

School’s Choice

School’s Choice PDF Author: Wagma Mommandi
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 0807779806
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 233

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Book Description
Access issues are pivotal to almost all charter school tensions and debates. How well are these schools performing? Are they segregating and stratifying? Are they public and democratic? Are they fairly funded? Can apparent successes be scaled up? Answers to all these core questions hinge on how access to charter schools is shaped. This book describes the incentives and pressures on charter schools to restrict access and examines how charters navigate those pressures, explaining access-restricting practices in relation to the ecosystem within which charter schools are created. It also explains how charters have sometimes responded by resisting the pressures and sometimes by surrendering to them. The text presents analyses of 13 different types of practices around access, each of which shapes the school’s enrollment. The authors conclude by offering recommendations for how states and authorizers can address access-related inequities that arise in the charter sector. School’s Choice provides timely information on critical academic and policy issues that will come into play as charter school policy continues to evolve. Book Features: Examines how charter schools control who gains and retains access.Explores policies and practices that undermine equitable admission and encourage opportunity hoarding.Offers a set of policy recommendations at the state and federal level to address access-related issues.

A Smarter Charter

A Smarter Charter PDF Author: Richard D. Kahlenberg
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 0807755796
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
Moving beyond the debate over whether or not charter schools should exist, A Smarter Charter wrestles with the question of what kind of charter schools we should encourage. The authors begin by tracing the evolution of charter schools from Albert Shanker's original vision of giving teachers room to innovate while educating a diverse population of students, to today's charter schools where student segregation levels are even higher than in traditional public schools. In the second half of the book, the authors examine two key reforms currently seen in a small but growing number of charter schools, socioeconomic integration and teacher voice, that have the potential to improve performance and reshape the stereotypical image of what it means to be a charter school.

Charter School Funding Considerations

Charter School Funding Considerations PDF Author: Christine Rienstra Kiracofe
Publisher: IAP
ISBN: 1648028357
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 223

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Book Description
Much has been written about how public schools in the United States are funded. However, missing in the current literature landscape is a nuanced discussion of funding as it relates to public charter schools. This text, authored by researchers and professionals working in the charter school world, provides readers with a comprehensive overview of issues related to the funding and operation of charter schools. The book opens with an introduction to charter schools and how they are funded. The financial management and oversight of charter schools and issues related to funding equity, including how charter schools impact district school finances, are addressed. Special considerations for charter schools related to serving special education students and transportation issues are also addressed. After reading this book, readers will have a thorough understanding of how charter schools are funded and managed financially.

Charter Schools in Action

Charter Schools in Action PDF Author: Chester E. Finn, Jr.
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400823412
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 301

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Book Description
Can charter schools save public education? This radical question has unleashed a flood of opinions from Americans struggling with the contentious challenges of education reform. There has been plenty of heat over charter schools and their implications, but, until now, not much light. This important new book supplies plenty of illumination. Charter schools--independently operated public schools of choice--have existed in the United States only since 1992, yet there are already over 1,500 of them. How are they doing? Here prominent education analysts Chester Finn, Bruno Manno, and Gregg Vanourek offer the richest data available on the successes and failures of this exciting but controversial approach to education reform. After studying one hundred schools, interviewing hundreds of participants, surveying thousands more, and analyzing the most current data, they have compiled today's most authoritative, comprehensive explanation and appraisal of the charter phenomenon. Fact-filled, clear-eyed, and hard-hitting, this is the book for anyone concerned about public education and interested in the role of charter schools in its renewal. Can charter schools boost student achievement, drive educational innovation, and develop a new model of accountability for public schools? Where did the idea of charter schools come from? What would the future hold if this phenomenon spreads? These are some of the questions that this book answers. It addresses pupil performance, enrollment patterns, school start-up problems, charges of inequity, and smoldering political battles. It features close-up looks at five real--and very different--charter schools and two school districts that have been deeply affected by the charter movement, including their setbacks and triumphs. After outlining a new model of education accountability and describing how charter schools often lead to community renewal, the authors take the reader on an imaginary tour of a charter-based school system. Charter schools are the most vibrant force in education today. This book suggests that their legacy will consist not only of helping millions of families obtain a better education for their children but also in renewing American public education itself.

Charter Schools

Charter Schools PDF Author: Jack Buckley
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 9781400831852
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 376

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Book Description
Over the past several years, privately run, publicly funded charter schools have been sold to the American public as an education alternative promising better student achievement, greater parent satisfaction, and more vibrant school communities. But are charter schools delivering on their promise? Or are they just hype as critics contend, a costly experiment that is bleeding tax dollars from public schools? In this book, Jack Buckley and Mark Schneider tackle these questions about one of the thorniest policy reforms in the nation today. Using an exceptionally rigorous research approach, the authors investigate charter schools in Washington, D.C., carefully examining school data going back more than a decade, interpreting scores of interviews with parents, students, and teachers, and meticulously measuring how charter schools perform compared to traditional public schools. Their conclusions are sobering. Buckley and Schneider show that charter-school students are not outperforming students in traditional public schools, that the quality of charter-school education varies widely from school to school, and that parent enthusiasm for charter schools starts out strong but fades over time. And they argue that while charter schools may meet the most basic test of sound public policy--they do no harm--the evidence suggests they all too often fall short of advocates' claims. With the future of charter schools--and perhaps public education as a whole--hanging in the balance, this book supports the case for holding charter schools more accountable and brings us considerably nearer to resolving this contentious debate.

On the Rocketship

On the Rocketship PDF Author: Richard Whitmire
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1118611330
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 374

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Book Description
The face of American education is evolving—and the roadmap is clear On the Rocketship: How Top Charter Schools are Pushing the Envelope examines the rise and expansion of leading charter school network Rocketship, revealing the "secret sauce" that makes a successful program. A strong narrative with a timely message, the book explores how Rocketship started and the difficulties encountered as it expands. Designing schools for children who have been failed by traditional schools is extremely challenging work. Setbacks are inevitable. Later in the book the narrative shifts to the national picture, exploring how high performing charter schools are changing the education landscape in cities such as Denver, Memphis, and Houston. The book emerges just as charter schools are running into stiff political opposition in New York City and elsewhere. Even in San Jose, Rocketship's home base, the pushback against charter schools is gaining speed. On the Rocketship becomes a valuable resource for explaining what's at stake in this battle. Lose these schools, in New York, San Jose and other cities, and low-income and minority students lose their best shot at a quality education. Written by a veteran journalist who followed Rocketship through a school year, the book explores some of the factors that make Rocketship and other charters successful, including the blended learning that was pioneered at charter schools, especially Rocketship. Many schools around the country are looking to Rocketship as a model for implementing blended learning. The interplay between charter schools and blended learning is setting a change in motion, and the American education system is ready to evolve. On the Rocketship details this phenomenon, providing insights for educators across the nation.

Serving Our Children

Serving Our Children PDF Author: Kevin P. Chavous
Publisher: Capital Books
ISBN: 9781931868693
Category : Charter schools
Languages : en
Pages : 202

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Book Description
Washington, D.C., council member Chavous has long been an outspoken advocate for educational reform that serves the needs of all of the nation's children. Having been at the forefront of the charter school movement, Chavous now explores what his city has learned from the charter school experience and what it means to American public education as a whole.

Charter School City

Charter School City PDF Author: Douglas N. Harris
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022669478X
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
In the wake of the tragedy and destruction that came with Hurricane Katrina in 2005, public schools in New Orleans became part of an almost unthinkable experiment—eliminating the traditional public education system and completely replacing it with charter schools and school choice. Fifteen years later, the results have been remarkable, and the complex lessons learned should alter the way we think about American education. New Orleans became the first US city ever to adopt a school system based on the principles of markets and economics. When the state took over all of the city’s public schools, it turned them over to non-profit charter school managers accountable under performance-based contracts. Students were no longer obligated to attend a specific school based upon their address, allowing families to act like consumers and choose schools in any neighborhood. The teacher union contract, tenure, and certification rules were eliminated, giving schools autonomy and control to hire and fire as they pleased. In Charter School City, Douglas N. Harris provides an inside look at how and why these reform decisions were made and offers many surprising findings from one of the most extensive and rigorous evaluations of a district school reform ever conducted. Through close examination of the results, Harris finds that this unprecedented experiment was a noteworthy success on almost every measurable student outcome. But, as Harris shows, New Orleans was uniquely situated for these reforms to work well and that this market-based reform still required some specific and active roles for government. Letting free markets rule on their own without government involvement will not generate the kinds of changes their advocates suggest. Combining the evidence from New Orleans with that from other cities, Harris draws out the broader lessons of this unprecedented reform effort. At a time when charter school debates are more based on ideology than data, this book is a powerful, evidence-based, and in-depth look at how we can rethink the roles for governments, markets, and nonprofit organizations in education to ensure that America’s schools fulfill their potential for all students.