    
Issue Brief #5: Public Charter Schools
Regardless of who gets the credit, the idea spread quickly. Minnesota passed the first state law authorizing charter schools in 1991, with California following soon after. In 1993, City Academy opened its doors in St. Paul, Minnesota, becoming the first charter school in the country.3 By 1995, 19 states passed laws authorizing charter schools, and a year later Connecticut joined their ranks. Today, there are almost 3,500 public charter schools in 40 states and the District of Columbia enrolling more than one million students nationwide.4 What Makes Charter Schools Different? Public charter schools are staggeringly diverse, and include schools at all grade levels, with many different curricular and pedagogical approaches. There are arts and science schools, Montessori charter schools, schools that specialize in educating returned dropouts, schools with a voctech focus, schools that are operated by for-profit companies, neighborhood-based parents’ groups, and national non-profit organizations that have a specific approach to educating underserved populations.5 To speak of a “charter school” is simply to speak of a governance arrangement, not of any specific approach to teaching and learning.6 However, all public charter schools do share three characteristics that make them different from traditional public schools: Autonomy. At the heart of the charter school concept is the freedom to innovate. Charter schools are freed from much traditional regulatory oversight, on the theory that these bureaucratic burdens restrict teachers and administrators from developing and implementing new approaches to boosting academic achievement. Accountability. Charter schools are held accountable for how well they educate children, as measured by student achievement goals set in their charter, and for meeting the fiscal and operational responsibilities. If they don’t deliver, they can be closed—as 7 percent of charter schools were from 1993-2002.7 Choice. Charter schools are schools of choice, meaning that the groups that start them, the students who attend them, and the teachers who teach in them, are all involved by choice. As public schools, charter schools are universally required to accept students on a first-come, first-served or lottery basis. Charter Schools and Student Achievement So, does this mixture of autonomy, accountability, and choice actually work? Do public charter schools increase student achievement? The data are mixed, but there are encouraging signs. An analysis of the 2003 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) results released in August 2005 found that charter students had lower scores on the test than their peers in traditional public schools.8 However, this analysis did not take into account racial, ethnic and income differences in the student body of charter schools and did not examine how student achievement progressed over time. This is particularly important given that charter schools are more likely to take in students who are behind grade level.9 Later reports concluded that charter school students were more likely than students in neighboring public schools to be “proficient” in reading and math as measured by state tests.10 A 2003 report that compared public charter school students with students in traditional public schools in 10 states found that although students in charter schools did not score as high as those in public schools, they had made greater progress than their peers in traditional public schools, narrowing the gap between them by 40 percent over three years.11 A meta-analysis of charter school research found that most studies have concluded that gains among charter school students outpace those of students in traditional public schools, and that charter schools tend to improve with time.12 However, while charter schools are improving, there is mixed evidence on whether the competition created by their presence in a state has helped raise the performance of traditional public schools.13 Among the most promising charter schools has been the KIPP, or Knowledge is Power Program, schools. The 45 KIPP charter schools serve underprivileged children in grades 5 through 8 in 15 states and the District of Columbia. Founded by two young college graduates in 1994, the KIPP schools stress rigorous academic preparation, longer school days, accessible teachers (teachers are available to their students through school-issued cell phones for homework assistance), and continuous teacher training. Research suggests that this intensive program works: KIPP students consistently outperform their counterparts in traditional public schools on standardized tests.14 KIPP is probably the most well-known approach to raising student achievement that has been spawned by the rise of charter schools, but it is hardly the only such model. Other prominent charter school organizations that have received national acclaim for their pioneering approaches to closing the achievement gap include Aspire, Green Dot, MATCH, Uncommon Schools and Achievement First, created by the founders of New Haven’s Amistad Academy. Connecticut’s Charter Schools Connecticut’s overall public school system is home to the largest achievement gap between rich and poor students in the nation, its public charter schools are among the most effective in the country in terms of closing the achievement gap. State testing results demonstrate that Connecticut’s charter schools have delivered not only a higher percentage of students at goal or proficiency than local districts, but also outpace local districts in year-to-year growth in student achievement. The longer students stay in these schools the better they do on state tests. In fact, according to a 2005 study commissioned by ConnCAN and conducted by Gary Miron of Western Michigan University’s Evaluation Center, of the six states studied by the Evaluation Center the results from Connecticut are “the most positive and promising for charter schools” to date.15 Connecticut has also received national attention for a less celebratory reason: it is home to one of the most restrictive charter school enrollment caps in the nation and offers relatively few resources to support the operations of these innovative schools. In a 2006 report by the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, Connecticut was singled out as one of only four states that restricts the number or percentage of students in charter schools (with a limit of 250 students per school or, with an exemption from the State Board of Education, 85 students per grade), and the only state to set an enrollment cap on each of its charter schools.16 Currently Connecticut’s 14 charter schools serve just one-half of one percent of all public school students in the state—well below the two percent of students nationwide enrolled in charter schools and the eight percent served by charter schools in Arizona. This limitation means that two of every three Connecticut students who apply for a spot in a charter school are turned away. In their 2004 study of the legislation supporting charters schools, the Center for Education Reform ranked Connecticut’s charter law 29th out of the 41 states and the District of Columbia and gave the state an overall grade of “C.” Connecticut was marked down for “its numerous restrictions and impediments to growth,” the slow pace with which new charters are authorized, and a system of funding that does not allow money to follow students when they enroll in charter schools.17 Finally, while a 2005 report by the Fordham Foundation found that charter schools nationally receive, on average, about $1,800 less in per pupil funding than the district schools that surround them, charter schools in Connecticut receive about $2,300 less per pupil than their traditional public school counterparts.18 The Bottom Line In the decade since Connecticut passed legislation authorizing public charter schools, these innovative schools have emerged as a real bright spot on the state’s education landscape. As a group they are performing at a level that not only exceeds the traditional schools in their district, but places them at the top of charter schools nationwide. Home-grown charter schools organizations like New Haven’s Achievement First have emerged as national models of educational innovation and are now actively courted with generous financial packages to open new schools in neighboring states like New York. Despite this homegrown success, Connecticut’s public charter schools continue to struggle against a number of legislative barriers including enrollment caps, slow authorization of new schools, and limited funding. In the effort to close Connecticut’s achievement gap, removing the restrictions placed on these high-performing models of achievement is a good place to start.
Endnotes 1 Education by Charter: Restructuring School Districts, by Ray Budde, The Regional Laboratory for Educational Improvement of the Northeast Islands, 1988. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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