Public Charter Schools Comprise 60 Percent of Newsweek’s Top 25 Transformative High Schools, Including the Top Three Slots

Newsweek recently released its list of the Top 25 Transformative High Schools, and public charter schools represented exactly 60 percent of the list, including the top three highest ranked schools. Within the Top 25, the charter schools hold the rankings of: #1, 2, 3, 8, 9, 10, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, and 23.

In terms of its methodology, Newsweek notes:
    “It’s no secret that schools in poor neighborhoods often struggle. But some achieve a remarkable amount in relation to the poverty of their communities. Newsweek calls these Transformative Schools, and for the second year in a row, we have created a list of the top 25.

    “To compile the Transformative list, we took the scores from Newsweek’s top 1,000 schools and factored in the percentage of students who qualified for free- or reduced-price lunches—the most reliable measure of socio-economic status in American high schools. Schools that restrict admissions based on academics were ineligible; the purpose of the list is to highlight schools where enthusiasm is the only defining metric.”

NAPCS commends the tremendous impact these public charter schools are making in the lives of its students. This is another proof point for what can happen when great leaders are given the flexibility to be innovative. You can more about the #1 ranked Preuss School UCSD in our newest issue brief.

NAPCS Encourages the Charter Sector to Comment on the New Race to the Top District Proposed Requirements

The US Department of Education has posted a draft executive summary of the draft requirements, priorities, selection criteria, and definitions for the Race to the Top District (RTT-D) competition. According to the Department, the RTT-D competition “will build on the lessons learned from the State-level competitions and support bold, locally directed improvements in teaching and learning that will directly improve student achievement and teacher effectiveness. More specifically, Race to the Top District will reward those LEAs that have the leadership and vision to implement the strategies, structures and systems of support to move beyond one-size–fits-all models of schooling, which have struggled to produce excellence and equity for all children, to personalized, student-focused approaches to teaching and learning that will use collaborative, data-based strategies and 21st century tools to deliver instruction and supports tailored to the needs and goals of each student, with the goal of enabling all students to graduate college- and career-ready.”

Applicants must be LEAs (including charter LEAs) serving at least 2,500 students. Local Education Agencies may apply as a consortium which may include LEAs across one or more states. Additionally, at least 40% of participating students across all participating schools must be from low income families (using free and reduced lunch criteria). 

Applications must meet Absolute Priority 1 and one of Absolute Priorities 2:
Absolute Priority 1, Personalized Learning Environment(s)
Absolute Priority 2, LEAs in Race to the Top States
Absolute Priority 3, Rural LEAs in Race to the Top States
Absolute Priority 4, LEAs in non-Race to the Top States
Absolute Priority 5, Rural LEAs in non-Race to the Top States

You can read more and submit your comments here: http://www.ed.gov/race-top/district-competition. And stay tuned for further NAPCS analysis.

Systemic impact: E.L. Haynes, (Washington, D.C.)

The Race-Ethnicity Demographics of Public Charter Schools

Over the last several years, public charter schools have faced steady criticism that there are a larger percentage of charter schools with majority race/ethnicity groups than traditional public schools. The critics will point to national, state, or peculiar comparisons at metropolitan statistical areas to show that charter schools enroll more students of color.

Regrettably, racial isolation has been growing in our public school systems, largely as a result of the lifting of court order busing mandates, limitations on the use of race/ethnicity as an assignment mechanism, residential segregation, school district boundaries, attendance zones, and limited transportation. The fact is that, more often than not, charter schools mirror the demographic trends of the surrounding school district (read more here).

Today NAPCS is releasing a Details from the Dashboard report that presents race/ethnicity breakouts for public charter schools and traditional public schools at the state and school district levels. We present the data at these two levels to show that when comparisons are made solely at the state level, the differences between charter schools and traditional public schools in the demographics of students enrolled are exaggerated. District level comparisons provide a much better assessment of student demographics. The table below shows a couple of examples of states where charter schools appear to enroll a much different student population than the state average, but in reality the charter schools are on par with traditional public schools in the surrounding district. 

The Details from the Dashboard report serves as a complement to our recently released issue brief on the different ways in which public charter schools serve the diverse needs of communities. The state and district statistics provide context to the case studies presented in the report.

Race/Ethnicity Percentages by Public Charter Schools and Traditional Public Schools, 2010-2011

Source: Compiled by NAPCS using the Public Charter Schools Dashboard.

Guest Blog: A Researcher’s Take on Claims of Charter Schools and Segregation

Earlier this week, NAPCS published a report on public charter schools meeting the diverse demands of their communities. This question of diversity (particularly, racial and socioeconomic diversity) is important to all public schools, including public charter schools.  Groups such as UCLA’s Civil Rights Project pay close attention to racial segregation in all public schools and continue to find, for example, that “the children in United States schools are much poorer than they were decades ago and more separated in highly unequal schools.”

Unfortunately, many charter school opponents have seized this very real issue and misused it as an opportunity to bash charter schools. Just do a simple Google search on “segregation and charter schools” and you will find numerous hits in which news outlets or websites uncritically repeat the allegations of fervent charter bashers.

These claims reappear every so often and the problems are many. Let me name a few.

1. Shotgun reports. “Analyses” that take this shotgun approach present tables upon tables of data aiming to show (somehow) that charter schools are simultaneously schools of white flight that “cream” only the best students and miserable places in which poor children are trapped each day. Each of these conflicting claims is then backed up with an isolated example or two of a heavily white or heavily minority charter school. Of course, such reports make no mention of the numerous heavily white or heavily minority traditional schools surrounding the charter schools in question.

2. Data-free studies. Some reports make almost no attempt to gather data. These reports often include phrases like, “charter schools are among the most segregated in the district.” For example, the NEA Today website points to a March newspaper article and claims that “Some of the nation’s most segregated schools are charter schools, where students are often isolated by race, income, language and special education status”. While this blanket claim may be true (depending upon how segregation is defined), it is also true that the other segregated schools, indeed most of the segregated schools, are traditional schools. This is often the case in districts that are heavily segregated by neighborhoods where the traditional schools are also segregated. 

3. Compared to perfection. Charter opponents sometimes conduct studies asking whether the racial and economic composition of charter schools is perfectly reflective of the sending traditional school district (see Miron et. al., February 2010). The unsurprising result is, no, most charters do not look exactly like the nearby school districts and the authors then draw conclusions suggesting problematic racial segregation in charters. The obvious flaw here, however, is the comparison between a charter school and a traditional district; if we want to criticize charters for not being perfectly reflective of a broader area, we should also ask the same question of traditional schools.  That is, how well do the traditional school campuses reflect the broader district’s racial composition? When we ask this question, we generally find that neither charters nor traditional schools are reflective of the broader district or community. Check out the graph below showing data for a large southern district; the Y-axis represents the number of schools within the bands represented on the X-axis. For example, two of the schools in the district had minority student percentages between 20.0 percent and 24.9 percent while 13 schools had minority student percentages between 95 percent and 100 percent and so on. The take-away point here is that most of the traditional public schools do not reflect the overall district.  In a district with 78 percent minority students, half of the schools are heavily minority schools (90 percent or more minority students) and one-quarter of the schools are disproportionately white.

 
Consequently, the relevant question is not whether charter schools reflect the broader district; the question is whether charter schools are more or less reflective of the district than the traditional public schools in the broader community.

4. Studies at the state or national level. A perfect example of this type of analysis is a February 2010 study by the aforementioned Civil Rights Project (CRP) titled “Choice without Equity: Charter School Segregation and the Need for Civil Rights Standards.” The key flaw in this oft-referenced study is that the CRP authors focus on the fraction of students in highly segregated minority schools, and compare the figure for all charter schools to that of all traditional public schools. This is clearly an inappropriate analytic strategy because the geographic placement of public charter schools practically ensures that they will enroll higher percentages of minorities than will the average traditional school. As we show in our 2010 Education Next article (with the data attached so that anyone can choose to review or re-analyze it), our more appropriate analytic strategy clearly demonstrates how the CRP authors overstated their findings.

These are simply examples of the numerous ways to unfairly attack charter schools based on the demographic characteristics of the students that they serve. There are many others; indeed, some reports use no data at all but simply make reference to other flawed studies and yet the conclusions drawn by these reports are treated as new by those eager to bash charter schools. See, for example, the recent report called Chartering Equity that was used by charter critics to “show” that segregation is fostered by public charter schools.

* * * *

We have worked on this a great deal and have tried to figure out the best way to assess the relative racial integration and segregation at charter schools. It is complicated and requires that the researchers make several decisions (which can be debated) about how to define integration or segregation. Nevertheless, in recent years, some studies have done a good job of attacking this question. See, for example, the thorough analysis by the RAND Corporation in 2009. Good studies such as this generally compare the relative integration or the racial compositions of charter schools to that of nearby traditional public schools.

Thoughtful analyses find that students who move into charter schools mostly choose schools with racial compositions similar to those of the traditional public schools they exited. These results are not uniform; they vary state by state (for example, we find in Florida that charter schools and traditional public schools are similar in their “reflectiveness” of the broader community; in Delaware, however, charters are not as reflective of the community as are traditional public schools.) Results also vary by metropolitan area (in Philadelphia, 65 percent of the students in both charters and traditional schools attend highly segregated schools; in Atlanta, only 25 percent of charter students attend highly segregated schools while 70 percent of traditional public schools students attend such segregated schools).

Of course, schools (charters or traditional) that are the most "segregated" sit in geographic areas with high concentrations of poor and minority students. These families have the fewest choices; when they are dissatisfied with the schooling options they have, charters often open to serve these disadvantaged students. These are issues related to poverty and residential segregation — these are not charter problems!

In short, the claims that charter schools enhance segregation across the board are most certainly false and more than likely a thinly-veiled attempt of charter opponents to slow the charter movement and limit choice options. And, to cast these attacks as a defense of racial integration is simply disingenuous. For example, the majority of students in center cities, in both the public charter sector and in the traditional public sector, attend intensely segregated minority schools. We know this, any casual observer of urban schools knows this, and the critics of charter schools know this.

Thus, anyone truly interested in racial integration for students (and not simply interested in attacking charter schools) is looking in the wrong direction by focusing on the failings of charter schools. Charters serve fewer than three percent of US public school children; the remaining 97 percent are compelled to attend traditional public schools. Anyone genuinely concerned with enhancing racial integration should be channeling their energy toward reducing segregation in the traditional sector.

Finally, when critics use the term segregation to malign charter schools, it might be viewed as disrespectful to those who have suffered from formalized segregation in the past or to those who currently suffer from residential segregation. It does not seem to be the right term to use when referring to the results of active choices made by families of minority students. Segregation connotes a lack of freedom; this situation feels like the opposite. The fact that some poor students are free to flee segregated traditional public schools for similarly segregated charters cannot be viewed as an indictment of charters. Indeed, leaders of charter organizations are quick to state that they are honored to serve minority families who choose the charter schools after a search for attractive schooling options. It is simply wrong to compare these active parental choices to the forced segregation of our nation’s past.

Gary W. Ritter, Professor of Education and Public Policy, University of Arkansas

Expanding the school model: Citizens of the World Charter Schools (Los Angeles metro area)

Incubating a diversity-focused charter school: Bricolage Academy (New Orleans)

How Public Charter Schools Are Designed to Meet the Diverse Demands of Our Communities

Today, NAPCS is proud to release our newest issue brief, A Mission to Serve: How Public Charter Schools Are Designed to Meet the Diverse Demands of Our Communities. By looking at high performing public charter schools that are consciously designed to serve their students–whether in homogenous or diverse environments–this issue brief underscores that public charter schools can accommodate both models and, in the process, provide more high quality public school options to our nation’s students.

One of the most exceptional developments within the first two decades of the movement has been the rise of high performing public charter schools with missions intently focused on educating students from traditionally underserved communities. While much media attention rightly has been given to these schools, the past decade or so also has seen a noteworthy rise in high-performing public charter schools with missions intentionally designed to serve economically integrated student populations.  These schools are utilizing their autonomy to achieve a diverse student population through location-based strategies, recruitment efforts and enrollment processes.

Perhaps most notably, a growing number of cities – and the parents and educators in them – are welcoming both types of public charter school models for their respective (and in some cases unprecedented) contributions to raising student achievement, particularly for students who have previously struggled in school.  Our issue brief showcases this development in three such cities:  Denver, Washington, D.C., and San Diego.

The Challenge of Filling Charter School Governing Board Positions

This is my third year serving on a public charter school governing board. The school, Pioneer Charter School, is a PreK-7 school in Denver serving a large proportion of students who are at-risk for academic failure. Over 90 percent of Pioneer's students are Latino, 70 percent are English Language Learners, and 90 percent receive free or reduced lunch. Pioneer opened in 1997, making it one of the first Denver Public Schools (DPS) charter schools.

For the first decade of operation, it would have been difficult to distinguish Pioneer from one of the neighborhood district schools (the district maintained control over the school’s budget, hiring of the school leader, and other duties that the school’s governing board should have had responsibility for). One consequence of this ‘charter school in name only’ management was that most parents believed that the school was their neighborhood school. About five years ago, during Pioneer’s charter renewal, DPS made the Pioneer board decide between becoming a district school or firmly establishing itself as a charter school. The governing board decided to become a full-fledged charter school, taking on fiduciary responsibility for Pioneer.

Pioneer has struggled academically, which has been quite a challenge for me as a board member. During my first year on the board, we contemplated recommending closure. Instead, we made a change in school leadership, hiring a dynamic leader who had previous success as the founder of a KIPP school in Colorado. We are in the second year of our self-imposed turnaround, a process that has included: a nearly 50 percent turnover in teachers; a complete overhaul of the curriculum (from inconsistent use of Success for All and Everyday Math to a customized, in-house standards-based curriculum based on the Common Core); the implementation of regular benchmark assessments and data-driven decision-making; and changes in school policies to ensure that we have a culture of high expectations. As a board, we are cautiously optimistic that we will see academic gains on this year’s state assessments. But we are also realistic in understanding that it may take another year or two to see real improvements (fingers crossed that it will happen before we come up for renewal again).

Serving on a charter school governing board has been incredibly demanding and amazingly rewarding. I truly love the work. However, it is a yearly challenge for our board to find new board members. We work with local organizations, like the Colorado League of Charter Schools and Get Smart Schools, to find new board members. But we have had to balance seeking out individuals who have the expertise we need with simply finding individuals who are willing to volunteer their time to the school (and twisting their arms to do so…). And this is not a unique problem for our charter school (the National Charter School Resource Center examines recruiting board members in D.C. and Maine here).

For many new charter school board members, this is the first time they have served on a board (that was my experience). Fortunately, there are some great resources for governing board professional development in Colorado through the CO League and the CO Department of Education. Other states have similar resources for governing boards. There are also national organizations that provide assistance and quality guidelines.

As a researcher, I am interested in the role that charter governing boards play in the charter sector. However, there is very little research on charter boards and many unanswered questions: Who serves on charter boards and for how long? What are the most common decisions that charter boards undertake? What types of board decisions have the most impact on school performance? How do founding boards differ from boards of charter schools that have been around for many years? How involved are boards in the strategic vision of their charters? This is certainly an untapped area for potential charter school research. I hope future studies can shed light and provide solutions for the questions, so that schools like mine can effectively propel themselves to a higher level of board operation and student academic achievement.


Photo: Older students read to the younger students on Reading Day at Pioneer Charter School (PCS).

What is a public charter school?

During National Charter Schools Week, we celebrate achievements in the school house and the state house. These achievements could not have been possible without the commitment of teachers, leaders, parents and advocates from all parts of the country. We asked some of these individuals to tell us why they are a part of the charter schools movement.

As executive director of the Public Charter Schools Alliance of South Carolina, Mary Carmichael gets asked all the time about charter schools.  Here’s her answer to the most basic, but most important question: What is a public charter school? 

It is a community where teachers are empowered to foster a lifelong love of discovering and applying new knowledge.

It is a community where families have the opportunity to see their children flourish in a learning environment aligned to their needs.

It is a community where school leaders are educational entrepreneurs allocating resources and developing a faculty of instructional innovators to advance the mission of the school.

It is a community where boards are held accountable for being excellent stewards of public funds and improving students’ academic achievement.

What is a public charter school?
Public charter schools embody our American ideals of independent, innovative thinkers and doers.  They are public schools with the freedom to be more innovative while being held accountable for improving student achievement.

National Charter School Week is an exciting time to be joining charter school leaders from across the country in Washington, D.C. to celebrate 20 years of innovation in public charter schools and to share knowledge on how to transform public education for all children in all of our communities.

What is a public charter school?
It is a community where we all can make a difference in the life of a child and impact in our collective future.