Washington View: Charter schools: What a long, strange trip it’s been

2020 ◽  
Vol 101 (8) ◽  
pp. 62-63
Author(s):  
Maria Ferguson
Keyword(s):  
Public Education ◽  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Charter School ◽  
Presidential Candidates ◽  
Perfect Storm

The recent pushback against charter schools, which has taken many by surprise, stems from what Maria Ferguson describes as a perfect storm of circumstances. Because states approach charter school authorization and oversight in so many different ways, the landscape has become confusing. Betsy DeVos’s championing of charters as part of her school choice agenda has led to suspicion of the movement. And some presidential candidates have portrayed charters as an enemy of public education. All of these circumstances could turn into an opportunity to address the issues that matter to both supporters and critics of charter schools.

scholarly journals Exploring school choice and the consequences for student racial segregation within Pennsylvania’s charter school transfers

2017 ◽  
Vol 25 ◽  
pp. 22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erica Frankenberg ◽  
Stephen Kotok ◽  
Kai Schafft ◽  
Bryan Mann
Keyword(s):  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Charter School ◽  
White Students ◽  
Latino Students ◽  
Educational Equity ◽  
Racially Diverse ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Educational Environments ◽  
Level Student

Using individual-level student data from Pennsylvania, this study explores the extent to which charter school racial composition may be an important factor in students’ self-segregative school choices. Findings indicate that, holding distance and enrollment constant, Black and Latino students are strongly averse to moving to charter schools with higher percentages of White students. Conversely, White students are more likely to enroll in such charter schools. As the percentage and number of students transferring into charter schools increases, self-segregative school choices raise critical questions regarding educational equity, and the effects of educational reform and school choice policies on the fostering of racially diverse educational environments.

scholarly journals The Effect of Charter School Legislation on Market Share

2004 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
pp. 66
Author(s):  
Simona Kúscová ◽  
Jack Buckley
Keyword(s):  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Charter School ◽  
Market Share ◽  
Institutional Arrangements ◽  
Local Market ◽  
Improve Performance ◽  
Funding Sources ◽  
Enhance Efficiency ◽  
Using Data

Many proponents of school choice use the claim of the market’s capability to enhance efficiency and improve performance to call for its expansion. But no markets are perfectly competitive, and the local market for public goods is filled with institutional arrangements that make it differ from the neoclassical ideal. In this paper, we look at a particular institution—the provisions of charter school legislation—and assess how it affects the ability of charter schools to gain market share. Using data from the 36 states that had passed charter legislation by 2000, and controlling for a variety of other factors, we estimate a model of the effects of various provisions in the charter laws on charter school market share. We find that two such provisions, one concerning the sponsorship of charters and another their funding sources, appear to have a strong effect on the market share of charter schools.

Horizontal Differentiation and the Policy Effect of Charter Schools

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 239-276
Author(s):  
Michael Gilraine ◽  
Uros Petronijevic ◽  
John D. Singleton
Keyword(s):  
Public Schools ◽  
Public Education ◽  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Education Quality ◽  
Horizontal Differentiation ◽  
Learning Gains ◽  
Policy Effect ◽  
School Expansion ◽  
Aggregate Effect

While school choice may enhance competition, incentives for public schools to raise productivity may be muted if public education is imperfectly substitutable with alternatives. This paper estimates the aggregate effect of charter school expansion on education quality while accounting for the horizontal differentiation of charter programs. Our research design leverages variation following the removal of North Carolina’s statewide cap to compare test score changes for students who lived near entering charters to those farther away. We find learning gains that are driven by public schools responding to increased competition from non-horizontally differentiated charter schools, even before those charters actually open. (JEL H75, I21, I28)

scholarly journals Law and Policy Entrepreneurs: Empirical Evidence on the Expansion of School Choice Policy

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Heise
Keyword(s):  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Charter School ◽  
Event History Analysis ◽  
Rare Event ◽  
Economic Interests ◽  
State Legislation ◽  
History Analysis ◽  
School Voucher ◽  
Voucher Programs

87 Notre Dame Law Review 1917 (2012).This study leverages event history analysis to help explain the expansion of public charter school legislation between 1991–2006. This study expands previous work in two important ways. First, while critical distinctions separate public charter school and school voucher programs, both fall comfortably within the broader rubric of “school choice.” As such, it is difficult to understand the development of state legislation for one school choice variant independent of the other. Thus, this analysis includes the presence of publicly- or privately-funded voucher programs in a state as a possible factor influencing the adoption of charter school legislation in a state. Second, a methodological contribution emerges by comparing results generated by a complementary log-log model with results generated by a rare event logistic regression model. That school voucher programs’ influence on the emergence of state charter schools laws is robust across both models underscores school voucher programs’ salience to the emergence of charter school legislation. Understanding the emergence of charter school legislation as a defensive political move to deflect school voucher progress or a political compromise finds support in these results. Either interpretation of the emergence of charter schools’ ascendance, however, needs to account for the school voucher programs’ influence as well as important suburban political and economic interests.

When Management Policies Collide

2017 ◽  
pp. 1179-1191
Author(s):  
Brittany Larkin
Keyword(s):  
Special Education ◽  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Charter School ◽  
Technical Assistance ◽  
Parent Satisfaction ◽  
The Public ◽  
Policy Practice ◽  
The Face ◽  
School Laws

The public desire for school choice has led to the staggering growth of charter schools. Yet, charter schools are often criticized for their inability to maintain autonomy in the face of the requirements to provide special education services. This chapter will explore empirical research on charter schools and special education uncovering themes in policy, practice, access, funding, and parent satisfaction. The research recommendations also cluster into themes including governance, service delivery model, operations and technical assistance. Next, the charter school laws in each of the 43 states that allow charter schools were examined for evidence of the four recommended themes. The results indicated how some states were bridging the autonomous nature of charter school laws with the inflexible mandates of special education law.

scholarly journals Sorting Schools: A Computational Analysis of Charter School Identities and Stratification

2020 ◽  
Vol 94 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-64
Author(s):  
Jaren R. Haber
Keyword(s):  
Public Schools ◽  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Charter School ◽  
Parenting Styles ◽  
Text Analysis ◽  
Linear Regression Models ◽  
Educational Values ◽  
Race And Class ◽  
Methodological Problems

Research shows charter schools are more segregated by race and class than are traditional public schools. I investigate an underexamined mechanism for this segregation: Charter schools project identities corresponding to parents’ race- and class-specific parenting styles and educational values. I use computational text analysis to detect the emphasis on inquiry-based learning in the websites of all charter schools operating in 2015–16. I then estimate mixed linear regression models to test the relationships between ideological emphasis and school- and district-level poverty and ethnicity. I thereby transcend methodological problems in scholarship on charter school identities by collecting contemporary, populationwide data and by blending text analysis with hypothesis testing. Findings suggest charter school identities are both race and class specific, outlining a new mechanism by which school choice may consolidate parents by race and class—and paving the way for behavioral and longitudinal studies. This project contributes to literatures on school choice and educational stratification.

The Sorting Effect of Charter Schools on Student Composition in Traditional Public Schools

2010 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 215-242 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yongmei Ni
Keyword(s):  
Public Schools ◽  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Charter School ◽  
Linear Models ◽  
Disadvantaged Students ◽  
High Concentration ◽  
Traditional Public Schools ◽  
Charter School Policy ◽  
Student Sorting

This article investigates how Michigan’s charter school policy influences the composition of students by race and socioeconomic status in urban traditional public schools. Using 2 years of student-level data in Michigan’s urban elementary and middle schools, the dynamic student transfers between charter schools and TPSs are analyzed through a series of hierarchical generalized linear models. The two-way transfer analysis shows that the student sorting under the charter school program tends to intensify the isolation of disadvantaged students in less effective urban schools serving a high concentration of similarly disadvantaged students. The findings imply that a challenge for the state policy makers is to help disadvantaged students who are left behind in the most disadvantaged schools, without significantly reducing the benefits to students who take advantage of school choice.

scholarly journals Sorting schools: A computational analysis of charter school identities and stratification

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaren Randell Haber
Keyword(s):  
Public Schools ◽  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Charter School ◽  
Parenting Styles ◽  
Text Analysis ◽  
Linear Regression Models ◽  
Race And Class ◽  
School Year ◽  
Methodological Problems

Research shows that charter schools are more segregated by race and class than traditional public schools. I investigate an under-examined mechanism for this segregation: Charter schools project identities corresponding to parents’ race- and class-specific parenting styles and educational values. I use computational text analysis to detect the emphasis on inquiry-based learning in the websites of all charter schools operating in the 2015-16 school year. I then estimate mixed linear regression models to test the relationships between ideological emphasis and school- and district-level poverty and ethnicity. I thereby transcend methodological problems in scholarship on charter school identities by collecting contemporary, valid, population-wide data, as well as by blending text analysis with hypothesis testing. Findings suggest that charter school identities are both race- and class-specific, lending weight to arguments for further regulating charter school enrollments. This project contributes to literatures on school choice, educational stratification, and organizational identity.

Urban Charter Schools

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manya Whitaker
Keyword(s):  
Public Schools ◽  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
Standardized Testing ◽  
Charter School ◽  
Low Income ◽  
College Enrollment ◽  
The United States ◽  
School Students ◽  
Urban Charter Schools

Urban charter schools are public schools located in major metropolitan areas with high population densities. The majority of urban charter school students identify as Black or Latinx and often live in under-resourced communities. Urban charter schools are touted as high-quality educational options in the school choice market, yet debates about the merits of charter schools versus traditional public schools yield mixed results that substantiate arguments on both sides of the political aisle. However, even high-performing urban charter schools have a bad reputation as mechanisms of school segregation and cogs in the school-to-prison pipeline. Higher than average test scores and graduation and college enrollment rates do little to mollify those who complain about severe discipline, racial segregation, unqualified teachers, teacher attrition, rigid scheduling, and a narrow curriculum. Urban charter schools’ emphasis on standardized testing and college preparation may overlook the culturally relevant educational experiences that low-income, racially diverse students need to compete with their wealthier, White peers. As such, education reformers have offered a myriad of suggestions to improve urban charter schools. Most prominently is the need to racially and economically desegregate urban charter schools to enhance the social and material resources that supplement students’ learning. This includes increasing teacher diversity, which research demonstrates minimizes the frequency of suspensions and expulsions of racial minority students. Urban charter school teachers should also be knowledgeable about the sociocultural landscape of the community in which their school exists so that they understand how students’ out of school lives affect their learning processes. Finally, curricular revisions are necessary to support students’ post-high school goals beyond college enrollment. Enacting such reforms would facilitate equitable, rather than equal, learning opportunities that may help narrow racial and economic achievement gaps in the United States.

Charter Schools as Postmodern Paradox: Rethinking Social Stratification in an Age of Deregulated School Choice

1999 ◽  
Vol 69 (2) ◽  
pp. 172-205 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy Stuart Wells ◽  
Alejandra Lopez ◽  
Janelle Scott ◽  
Jennifer Jellison Holme
Keyword(s):  
School Choice ◽  
Charter Schools ◽  
School Reform ◽  
Charter School ◽  
Social Stratification ◽  
Potential Threat ◽  
State Education ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Economic Developments ◽  
Charter School Reform

For the last two-and-a-half years, authors Amy Stuart Wells, Alejandra Lopez, Janelle Scott, and Jennifer Jellison Holme have been engaged with a team of researchers in a comprehensive qualitative study of charter schools in ten California school districts. They have emerged from this study with a new understanding of how the implementation of a specific education policy can reflect much broader social changes, including the transformation from modernity to postmodernity. Given that much of the literature on postmodernity is theoretical in nature, this article invites readers to wrestle with the complexity that results when theory meets the day-to-day experiences of people trying to start schools. In their study, the authors examined how people in different social locations define the possibilities for localized social movements, and how they see the potential threat of greater inequality resulting from this reform within and among communities. They started with a framework that questioned how charter schools came into being at this particular time that is characterized by global economic developments and demands for a more deregulated state education system. This framework allowed the authors to examine the particularistic nature of a reform that defies universal definitions. Their purpose was not to definitively state whether or not charter school reform is "working," or whether or not it is leading to greater social stratification across broad categories of race, class, and gender. Rather, the authors focused on understanding how modern identities and postmodern ideologies converge and, thus, for whom charter school reform is "working," under what conditions, and on whose terms.

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