Now, perhaps “charter schools” – as strictly defined – are not the best solution. Perhaps “pilot schools” are a better option. In Boston, I know that there are a number of excellent high schools that are pilot schools. I confess I don’t know the exact difference, but perhaps someone can enlighten me some more on that front as well.
But getting back to my primary point: we as a state need to ask ourselves the hard questions. I’d point people to the Oprah episode with Bill Gates from earlier this year, but I can’t find the exact link. But the jist was this: Oprah followed a bunch of black and latino Chicago school kids as they toured a posh suburban white public high school, and then the suburban kids visited the inner city school. Both groups of kids (and yours truly too) were absolutely flabbergasted at the discrepancies between the schools.
But look in our own back yards. Take a walk to Madison Park high school in Roxbury. Check out the concrete wasteland surrounding it, check out its dilapidated facilities. Then check out a place like Newton North high school, and take a look at the designs famed architect Graham Gund has done for its new facility.
Now, I know it’s easy to say that it’s precisely because charter schools are draining money from school systems that these schools in black and latino communities are suffering. While that’s probably not exactly true, it could be a factor, and please, someone, demonstrate to me why it’s true if it is. But the innovation, the dedication, the cutting edge education that is going on at the vast majority of charter schools is too powerful to ignore because it is giving hope to literally thousands of kids who would otherwise be left behind due to latent racist policies that have existed for generations both inside and outside the educational arena. (I also recognize that there have been instances where charter schools have failed. But I argue that a)the successes far outweigh the failures and b) the media’s fascination with the failures is due to just that: the media’s fascination with failure as opposed to success (when was the last time you heard “news” that was good but wasn’t in the context of some “human interest story”?)
So, where does this leave me? Here: we should not be stifling innovation and creativity in the name of saving money. We should not stifle innovation because it’s taking money away from the non-charter public schools. (If this Hobbes-ian choice is occurring, the we should come up with a solution – and perhaps “Pilot schools” are an answer.)
For too long our educational system has reflected the racism that still thrives in our society today. It is only by creating a new, highly educated black and latino upper middle class that we will conquer these challenges. Because going to a prestigious college or university is such a master key for success in this world, we must do all we can to ensure more black and latino kids get into elite colleges. (Or, at the very least, sharply increase the percentage of black and latino kids that go to four year colleges.) Only then will our society become more equal, more fair, and more democratic.
Thanks.
By way of disclosure, I should state the following: I have studied critical race theory extensively, hence my thoughts on this issue. CRT is a much more complex field than simply thinking everything is racist – as too many people often assume. But after studying and working in the field, it’s not too hard to see how latently racist our society is. For another powerful example, take a look at how much higher asthma rates are in black and latino communities in Boston and you’ll know what I mean. That doesn’t mean we can’t fix it, that doesn’t mean we should all feel guilty. It just means that we need innovative, entrepreneurial ways to solve the problem, and I am of the opinion that the benefit provided by charter schools is one way to accomplish the larger goal of becoming a more just society.
Before we go any farther, I support pilot schools and Horace Mann charters, that are under the budget of the local school department. If a pilot or charter is truly innovative and replicable, you need to do it under the same budget and student assignment plan as the traditional public school.
<
p>
The Commonwealth Charters are another story. Commonwealth Charters are now the fourth largest system in the state (after Springfield, Worcester, and Boston). Local governments that pay for them have no say on their placement, yet they have a tremendous negative impact on the sending community.
<
p>
Think of them as a school voucher plan run like a health maintenance organization. You have a list of acceptable providers (state granted charters) and you can go to any one in the state, and the state will pay the tuition by garnishing the local aid account of the school system where you reside.
<
p>
Let’s set up the hypothetical situation. You run a school system, and 12 kids go to a charter school. One from each grade. Some were home schooled, some left private or parochial schools. No matter where they attended the previous year, your local aid is garnished for their tuition at a rate that usually exceeds $10,000 per child.
<
p>
If your school system loses one child from each grade, it doesn’t make it any less expensive to run the school system. However, the loss of $120,000 has an impact on the children left behind. Because of proposition 2.5, the schools can’t pass the cost of the charter school along to the taxpayers. The schools must make cuts to offset the loss of state aid. If we say those 12 kids and their $120,000 reduces funds for three teachers, here’s a potential impact.
<
p>
You have 80 children registered for kindergarten, 80 children registered for first grade, and 80 children registered for second grade. You have enough money for 12 teachers, giving you a class size of 20 per class. If you need to reduce three teachers (one from each grade), the 80 kids who would have been split between four teachers now only have three, and now you have an average class size of 26.66 instead of 20. Sure, the charter school kids get what their parents want, but the overwhelming majority remaining in the local system pay the price. When the numbers get bigger, the cost to the local community expands. Just look at Framingham, where the state forced a charter middle school into the community, and the loss of funds necessitated the closure of the Juniper Hill Elementary School. Again, a few parents get the choice they want, and a few hundred parents lose their school due to the economic impact of the decision.
<
p>
Commonwealth charters have no local oversight. The finance committee and town meeting can’t weigh the benefits of the charter, or bring the charter school leaders to the floor of Town Meeting to question their spending priorities.
<
p>
While some charter schools are very good, some are simply awful. And when the marketplace determines success, it’s not too difficult to attract enough of a market share to keep a bad product afloat.
<
p>
When the fiscal crisis hit four years ago, and Romney-Healey cut local aid accounts 20%, they didn’t cut back the authorization of new charters. While they asked local schools to “share the burden” of the pain of the recession, there was no similar sharing with the charters. The state Board of Education aggressively expanded charters during the past four years, with utter disregard for the impact on cash-starved school systems that have to pay the freight.
<
p>
The Grover Norquists and the bathtub brigade love charters, as a privatizaton tool. They get to starve the beast, and direct money to preferred providers. They say they want to break the unions, but they want to break public governance in the process.
<
p>
The current chair of the State Board of Education takes a Norquist view of public education. His day job: partner at the NewSchools Venture Fund, where he works to expand charter schools. There are other members of the Board with ideological or operational ties to the charter school industry. This is why the charter school issue, while not well understood by the casual observer, is so critical in this election. We need a new governor and lieutenant governor who will seek to reform the charter school law before any further expansion of the program. We need leadership that will look after the children who remain in the locally governed schools. We can’t afford to elect someone who doesnt understand the issue, or even worse, has actively looked to profit from the privatization of public education.
<
p>
The devil is in the details. There are some people advocating for charters who know exactly what they are doing, and are using this as a way to break local government. There are others who fall victim to the rhetoric of choice, the rhetoric of competition, the rhetoric of innovation. Simply speaking, choice is no real choice when it is choice with other people’s money. Competition isn’t competition when there isn’t a level playing field. Public policy is not helped when individuals can withdraw large amounts of money from the local aid account for a privately operated service.
<
p>
As a taxpayer, it is my obligation to provide public schools for the children of my town. It is not my obligation to pay tuition to support choice among multiple private bureaucracies.
Your knowledge of charter school appears to go beyond educated interest. I think it’s reasonable to inquire if there’s any bias. i.e. are you affiliated significantly with NEA, or administratively within the dept of education, etc….
<
p>
For the record, I support the growth of both charter and public but have no affiliation or financial interest in either.
I am not a member of the MFT or MTA. I am on the management side of the table for these negotiations, so I am as frustrated with many of the union contract provisions as anyone.
<
p>
If the legislature were intent on fixing the problems with silliness in workrules, they could give superintendents and school committees more management rights.
<
p>
My opposition to Commonwealth Charters comes from watching how the current charter law guts funding for publicly governed schools, and having to cope with the budget crisis that follows.
<
p>
Seems like someone might be slow to attack schools that are measurably and significantly driving huge gains for black kids until he was sure his preferred method was effective.
<
p>
2. Look, I get the logical reasons why someone who is on a district school board would oppose charter public schools. I’m no angel. If I had monopoly power, I’d make the same arguments, far less gracefully than Pablo.
<
p>
The only big superintendents who are vehemently pro-charter understand how friendly competition from other public schools helps EVERYONE….and those are rare souls, like NYC Superintendent Joel Klein.
<
p>
Why does he understand the corrosion of monopoly? His last job was lead Justice Dep’t lawyer in US versus Microsoft.
<
p>
3. I’d concede that charters aren’t working everywhere – in cities like Dayton Ohio or Washington DC, for example, results are not pretty (though parents still flock there, which tells you something about their alternatives).
<
p>
But in MA we happen to have some of the top-performing charters in the nation. Why not expand them in the LOWEST 10% of districts, particularly to provide options to low-income parents, and/or black and Hispanic parents?
When a Ford employee, expert in automotives, tells you, a novice, everything that wrong about a Chevy, can you tell if he’s wrong?
Pablo: thanks for those examples. While I agree with Gary’s comment that you probably have a political bent to your analysis, I also know that you are far more educated on this than I, so I should learn from you and others about this issue.
<
p>
But what of the race issue? What of the fact that black and latino communities that have been underserved have hope in this new, innovative schools? Should we do it through pilot schools? (BTW, what’s the difference between Horace Mann schools and Commonwealth Charter schools? For that matter, what’s the difference between those and a pilot school? How do those work? Big questions, I know, but getting answers to those might enlighten discussion here. I’ll look into them and see what I can find.)
<
p>
I guess if we have charter schools in Boston, those take money from the public schools in Boston, right? So then the public schools in Boston suffer? Is that your response to my question about racial fairness? Is it that we’re robbing Peter to pay Paul — i.e. we’re making Boston public high schools worse in order to fund Boston’s charter schools?
<
p>
I think this racial issue is not something we can put aside until we figure out better financial formulae; some issues transcend a fiscal analysis.
<
p>
But here’s a counter argument to that theory: what we’re really doing with some charter schools is training kids to be ready for the “white” world of downtown business, and in doing so, we’re perpetuating and enlarging the gap between the haves and have nots.
I don’t view this as a race issue. I view this as an economic equity issue.
<
p>
The main problem with what you call “communities that have been underserved” isn’t that they have worse teachers, or even fewer resources. Those things certainly have an effect, but hiring better teachers and building new buildings isn’t going to make the system “perform” up to speed with surrounding districts.
<
p>
No, the problem is that there is a high concentration of students from problem families. Families that don’t value education. Broken homes. Transient renters. Homes where there is drug abuse. Families that are, in essence, really screwed up. You name it. I’ve heard the stories from relatives who are teachers — like when they give a kid a warm jacket, and the parent takes it away and sells it the next day.
<
p>
Charter schools allow the people in those communities to essentially self-segregate from the problem kids. If you don’t particularly care about how your kid does in school, chances are you’re not going to take the time to apply to a charter school.
<
p>
My feelings are mixed. As a parent in Springfield, the ability to self-segregate will probably come in handy and do good for me. I like the idea of not having to pay extra to send my children to private school, and I like the diversity that my children will experience outside of a wealthy private school.
<
p>
But on the other hand, I think that charter schools will ultimately hurt the city because it makes the students left behind even harder to educate (and it will make it easier to stop trying).
<
p>
How hard would it be to educate a class of 20 excellent students and one problem student? What do you think the odds are of “reaching” that one problem student? I’d say they’re not bad because you can take a little time and attention away from 20 excellent students and give it to the struggling student.
<
p>
Now what about a class of 20 problem students and one exellent student who lost the charter lottery? What are the odds of reading those 20 problem students? What are the odds of even finding a teacher willing to try? What is the cost of trying?
<
p>
The only way to bring back problem schools — and by extension, urban areas — is to restore the balance within them. That means you can’t have a district with 75% poverty, or a school with 90% poverty, because the odds say that an overwhelming number of those students will be “problem students”.
<
p>
So looking through that lens, charter schools are a double-whammy, because they take both good kids and money from struggling schools and cordon them off, away from the rest.
<
p>
The question in my mind is, should we be trying to save everyone, or should we be willing to sacrifice some to save others? And the next question is, what happens to those who have been sacrificed? Aren’t they going to just wind up on the streets, making life miserable and harder for those who were “saved”?
<
p>
NoPol, the way you frame this makes it easy for me to continue to support charters, scholarships, vouchers — anything to give the kids with immediate potential and/or family support a better chance. It sounds like you’re placing the burden of fixing schools and even communities on children. Imagine telling a bookish sixth-grader (and her parents) that she must stay in a school that doesn’t meet her needs, may not give her a path to college, and exposes her to violence, because it is her responsibility to provide balance for the very kids who don’t do their homework, who act out and break rules, who maybe even bully her. Most of us would go to great lengths to “cordon off” our child from this situation.
<
p>
There is an immediate duty to give kids like this a chance. If that makes the job of fixing the whole school or the whole system harder, then so be it. It doesn’t necessarily make it impossible.
Our immediate goal must be to fix the system, not cure the symptom.
<
p>
Our goal must be to make Madison Park Vocational Tech more like Shawsheen Tech or Minuteman Tech.
<
p>
Our goal must be to make Boston English more like Brookline High.
<
p>
If we suddenly give people a voucher to drain money from the system, the schools left behind have less of a chance of improving. They stand less of a chance because the active and aware parents are gone, and because the money is gone.
<
p>
Also, let me ask a question. If this is about choice, why are:
Metco students worth about $3500 to the receiving districts?
School choice students worth $5000 (cost to sending district and value to receiving district)?
Charter school students draw in excess of $10,000 out of the sending district?
<
p>
Notice I said nothing in opposition to Metco or school choice. Those systems provide market driven alternatives that don’t kill the sending district. If I run a school system and lose 10 kids to school choice, I can go out and get 10 new kids from school choice (if my programs are good enough to attract outside kids). I can’t admit kids at charter school rates, only lose kids at $10,000 a shot.
<
p>
Clearly, the finances were designed to favor charters and to kill off other public programs.
One of the things that I think harmed Springfield was the internal “School Choice” program (not the external programs you mention), where parents could pick any school in the city (it was really a lottery, since many didn’t get their choice, and a day-care, since many parents made their choices based on keeping their kids on a bus in lieu of daycare). I think that the Choice plan diffused parental involvement, and made it politically easier to have bad schools.
<
p>
Fifty years ago, if a school was performing badly, the parents had a single choice (other than moving, which is extreme) — exert political pressure on the city or town to fix the problem, by getting involved.
<
p>
With internal School Choice, if you weren’t happy with your school you just picked another. That local school got neglected, and became worse and worse.
<
p>
Although internal School Choice may have been a lot better for some individuals, I think that it was worse for a lot of others. Call them free-riders, but it seems our school system, even our government, depends on the fact that we all benefit from the increased effort of some.
<
p>
By the way, it is clearly a Republican Goal to eliminate public education. Given how Republican goals tend to have very long implementation periods, I can definitely agree that Charters may be a tool towards that end.
<
p>
First, Illana Mercer is a outspoken Libertarian, not Republican. Republicans simply advocate more choice. Second, your link to Ms. Mercer’s commentary is broken: It should be THIS.
<
p>
opponents boil down to entrenched opponents that are VERY powerful –
<
p>
*school board members (hi pablo) who don’t like the competition
<
p>
*teachers union officials
<
p>
that’s it.
<
p>
2.
<
p>
Agreed. So what happened?
<
p>
In most cases, parent involvement works in middle class districts, and fails in poor districts, like Boston.
<
p>
Let me put it this way: a black kid in Boston has less than 10% chance to ever earn a college degree.
<
p>
At least now, a black mom has some choices – METCO bus to districts like Brookline or Newton; some charter public schools….the existence of which have spawned pilot schools. Any of these choices is much more likely to get the kid to ultimately earn a college degree.
<
p>
You’re saying the 50 years ago version is better, when a single mom earning poverty wages had the “single choice” of trying to overcome the HUGE power of entrenched interests to drive change?
Take the students and parents from Brookline and send them to Boston English and take the students and parents from Boston English and send them to Brookline.
<
p>
Brookline High will become as bad as you insinuate Boston English is and Boston English will become as good as you imply that Brookline High is.
<
p>
You ignore the main reason minority students are not performing. Its not the schools Pablo, its the kids and the parents and the culture.
I’m looking at the big picture, because it’s a perspective that the state must analyze.
<
p>
There are clearly ways to solve this problem without resorting to parents self-segregating their children on the public dime (although I’d argue that this has already happened with the people who fled urban districts for suburban districts long ago). Those methods could be expensive because they would be geared toward doing whatever it takes to make even the most education-averse student want to learn.
<
p>
There’s another side to this coin. Preumably that “bookish sixth-grader” still lives in the community that has increasingly violent failing schools. But as the “left behinds” are simply written off, they get more and more hopeless and violent. So maybe someday, when getting off that charter-school bus, this bookish sixth-grader is shot by one of the left-behind dropouts. Far-fetched? I don’t think so, because as more people have fled urban areas, we have seen those urban areas deteriorate more and more. And that has, in my opinion, significantly impacted our state’s economy. And at the tail end, it has increased development pressure and sprawl in other communities.
<
p>
The kids who make our schools bad aren’t inherently or genetically bad. They are the product of parent(s) who did not do their jobs. They will be burdens on society for the next sixty years. Some will be imprisoned, costing the state tens of millions of dollars over their lives. Many will be on public assistance, in public housing, on public healthcare.
<
p>
Shunting them into urban areas and putting up fences is making our state weaker. Those kids usually have kids of their own — and they don’t just have 2.2 kids, they often have many kids. That means that the burden will grow larger with every generation. We need a strategy to address this.
<
p>
Like I said, I’m on the fence here. I’m not opposed to self-segregation per se, but it seems to come with decreased funding and attention for the left-behinds. I’m not willing to take the position that those left-behind kids don’t deserve our attention and effort. But we already know what happens when the concerned parents flee one district for another — funding gets cut, attention to problems wanes, and people care less about those left behind. So I have to believe that this is what will happen for the kids who don’t get into charters.
You said:
<
p>
…hiring better teachers and building new buildings isn’t going to make the system “perform” up to speed with surrounding districts
<
p>
And then go on to identify the “real” problem:
<
p>
…the problem is that there is a high concentration of students from problem families. Families that don’t value education. Broken homes. Transient renters. Homes where there is drug abuse. Families that are, in essence, really screwed up. You name it.
<
p>
Having taught in urban schools, I think you are off the mark about the teachers. There are teachers who have the skills to work in an urban setting, and there are others who have the desire, and just need to be shown the way. Then, of course, there are others who don’t have what it takes, or who are burned out (not a bad thing, but for goodness sake leave the profession!).
<
p>
Teacher skill makes a huge difference. But, especially in union areas, there is pressure on teachers to no go “above and beyond”. I saw it when I taught — I was “discouraged” by the union leadership from starting an afterschool group because I wasn’t asking to be paid (in my mind, I already WAS being paid). And with Boston’s pilot schools, part of the recent contract put caps limiting the hours teachers could work. This is good for the union, but bad for the schools. And likely, it’s bad for the teachers who would have much more success with their students (and job satisfaction) if they were free from work restrictions.
One thing I learned in my engineering classes is that you don’t create a system that requires the perfect input to achieve the best output.
<
p>
I don’t doubt that there are some teachers who achieve remarkable results in urban environments. But overall, those teachers are rare. The problem is the same across the country. To my knowledge, there is no poor urban district that produces the same results as wealthy suburban districts.
<
p>
If only a handful of exceptional teachers can actually create positive results, then the system is designed to fail, and it must be reevaluated.
<
p>
I think this is part of an overall trend across the country where everyone needs to have “above average” employees. We need to have expectations for the average employee.
About “the system” that is. So, I don’t understand why you wouldn’t fully back charters. Maybe I need to reread your original comment?
<
p>
I didn’t say that these teachers were a rarity. I have no idea about that stat. But I firmly believe that it is a skill that can be developed, and any system that has the flexibility to cut those who underperform and to reward those who go above and beyond will increase their chances for success. KIPP is but one example of getting success on a large scale, all over the country.
<
p>
I’ve also taught in wealthy districts, and from my experience I can’t say that, when taught properly, we should not expect students from urban areas to perform as well. My guess is that kids from relatively stable homes are a bit more “immune” from poor teaching methods (parents can afford tutoring or in other ways pick up the slack).
<
p>
I agree that we can’t all be ‘above average’, but I think our expectations for students are still pretty low. I think the accountablity reforms are excellent for urban districts, and with one publicized measure (not saying MCAS is the be all end off of success), we at least have a target. Much better than the roaming that preceeded it.
I’m on the fence with charters. I think that the very thing that makes them attractive — the ability for parents to use them to self-segregate their kids away from students whose parents don’t care about education — is their biggest drawback.
<
p>
30 years ago a lot of people abandoned urban districts, much of it in response to the elimination of neighborhood racial segregation. And when that happened, a lot of energy, a lot of wealth, and a lot of good students left those urban districts. Those districts lost a lot of power too.
<
p>
I don’t think that charters offer far better teachers, teaching methods, or facilities. I think their key strength is their self-selectivity. I’m worried that charters use the same approach to “improving education” — segregation.
<
p>
I’m worried that when the “good” students leave the urban schools, that what is left behind will be ignored. I’m worried that when “choice” is offered, the response to the people who don’t make the right choice is “you don’t deserve an education for your children”.
<
p>
I’m worried what those kids will do to our community, and to our state when they drop out and have no marketable skills whatsoever, and no future in society.
<
p>
I’m also worried that the costs are impossible to properly allocate. Obviously the cost of educating one less child is minimal, so taking away $5k for that student is damaging to the host district. But on the other hand, when you take away 30 first-graders from a host district, that district should be able to survive without one or two extra teachers. But the hidden cost is that not all students “cost” the same to educate, and working on averages while allowing charter schools to cherry-pick the cheapest-to-educate students is a path toward disaster.
<
p>
I think that is the flaw that people operate under today. They look at a poor district that spends $10k per student, then look at a successful district that spends $6k per student, and proclaim “spending money doesn’t help”. But maybe the poor district needs $20k per student because the less-expensive students moved to the other district, leaving only the more-expensive students.
<
p>
I also cringe when I see so many schools in wealthy districts spending far above their “foundation budget” — because they can afford to — when most urban districts are spending right at their foundation budget.
<
p>
I think that the way to improve education for the entire state would be to put an equal proportion of students in every school in the state. No school would have a demographic advantage over another. I think that demographic advantages are primarily what make one district better than another.
<
p>
That is obviously impossible. But that’s why I see the complete opposite solution — more intense segregation — to be unpalatable, because it has clearly not worked for the students left behind.
You wrote:
<
p>
<
p>
Except that it’s not $5,000. It’s north of $10,000, and in some communities it’s significantly north of that number.
<
p>
Even at $10,000, it’s a huge problem. 30 kids are unlikely to come from one single grade in one single school. Even if that were the case, losing 30 kids would cut local aid by $300,000. When you cut teachers, you always end up laying off new teachers or you just don’t hire replacements for departing staff. Thus, you lose teachers at the bottom of the salary scale. Let’s use a generous number of $40,000 for a first year teacher.
<
p>
4 kids go to a charter school, lose $40,000 and one teacher.
30 kids go to a charter school, lose $300,000 and 7.5 teachers.
<
p>
That’s a huge hit.
Every time I catch you tossing that $10K figure, I’m going to hound you about ignoring the reimbursement. Please stop throwing around false data. The topic is too important.
Reimbursements are temporary and a small fraction of the local payment. They are subject to appropriation and the legislature has failed to appropriate in the past. Charters are permanent obligations to the sending municipality.
<
p>
Reimbusements don’t solve the underlying problem of the funding mechanism.
<
p>
Reimbusements often disappear in a heartbeat – such as the total elimination in the last Jane Swift budget.
…$5,687.
<
p>
There ARE school systems outside of Boston/Lawrence/Lowell/New Beige, ya know.
You are exactly correct that no amount of good people or resources will fix what is broken in these economically disadvantaged districts. It is absolutely true that charter schools is an attempt by families that care to separate themselves from those that don’t. A better leaning environment leads to better results, regardless of resources.
<
p>
This is why Catholic and some other parochial schools do so well with a tiny fraction of the public school budget, while paying their non-union teachers a tiny fraction of public school pay.
<
p>
So my question is: why haven’t the school districts created a place to send the problem cases in order to preserve the leabning environment for the rest? I think of this as less of a “dumping ground” for the disruptive than as a “life boat” for the rest.
How do you know that private or parochial schools are more effective? They don’t take MCAS, and there’s no student achievement data to make a valid comparison!
People are willing to pay to go there, rather than subject themselves to the free public schools. If they weren’t effective, they wouldn’t pay, and the schools would close. Tuition isn’t cheap, and people are smart enough to know not to waste their own money.
<
p>
If you are shopping for a car, and someone offers you one for free, you take it if it is remotely suitable for your needs. If, however, the free car has recently crashed into a wall at 100 mph, then you spend the money anyway, and pass on the “free” offer.
<
p>
And in NYC, where there is a large number of parochial schools, they do perform better on the statewide tests, with fewer resources, more students per teacher, and less teacher pay than the public schools.
One of the things you need to look at is racial segregation in the charters. In fact, many charters appeal and market within one racial community. Charters in Boston are more racially segregated than their BPS counterparts.
<
p>
This doesn’t necessarily provide for a quality education, either in a “white world” or any other world, for that matter. The Benjamin Banneker Charter in Cambridge is chronically underperforming – I think they are in NCLB trouble to the extreme – targeted for restructuring. But if one of the restructuring cures for a failing public school is to turn it into a charter school, what do you do to the failing charter school?
But it is much better for black people in Boston than what they have now.
<
p>
Easy. You shut down the school. That’s what happened last year with 2 Boston charter public schools, even though they outperformed many of the traditional Boston schools on MCAS. In other words, kids were sent back to schools with LOWER academic performance, just to honor the policy rationale for charters – flexibility in exchange for HIGHER accountability.
<
p>
DOE to charter public schools: Beat neighboring public schools on MCAS? Too bad. Not enough. We’re holding you MORE accountable. We warned you to right the ship. (As it should be).
<
p>
DOE to regular public schools: Even if your kids’ performance is among the lowest 2% of all schools, we won’t take any dramatic action.
Then why hasn’t the state shut down the Banneker charter in Cambridge or the Lowell Community Charter School in Lowell?
I don’t the details of either school. You should enlighten us:
<
p>
Looks like the Banneker has trended up.
<
p>
<
p>
But because most of the charters are populated by very civil rights-oriented staff, they disproportionately recruited black families.
<
p>
Now the cry is – “You serve TOO MANY black kids.” 65% in Boston charters versus 44% in district schools. One would think you’d laud charters for reaching out to those who’ve historically been least served by BPS.
<
p>
2. The only mildly integrated district schools in Boston are selective, like Boston Arts Academy or Boston Latin….and a few elementary schools in JP, Rozzie, W. Rox.
<
p>
Typical Boston district schools are HIGHLY segregrated, like the Burke, Madison Park, Orchard Gardens, etc.
<
p>
Most district schools are 90% non-white.
Just this morning, a guy from MA DOE pointed me to a facet of the Big Daddy Charter School Study which was just published.
<
p>
All the press coverage, and my own BMG post linked to by Hoss, focused on the simple fact that charters tended to outperform their sending districts. Consistently. Across every grade. In each of the 5 years studied. In a statistically significant way.
<
p>
But the real news is actually how much better BLACK kids do in charters.
<
p>
Over 5 years, there were 37 instances of black kids at charters DRAMATICALLY outperforming (pdf file) their sending district in math. By comparison, there were 3 such “district beats charter” examples.
<
p>
In English (pdf), black kids in charter schools outperformed black kids in sending districts 38 times. By comparison, there were 2 such “district beats charter” examples.
<
p>
Disclosure: as I’ve said on BMG often, I’m totally in the tank for charter schools, so take my views with necessary grains of salt.
<
p>
P.S. As you see on these graphs, the pro-charter results disparity just grows each year!
Giving a child an education through public funds is sacrosanct.
<
p>
But Pablo,
Why is the current system, which has evolved into one where the teachers’ unions have a weighted balance of power, viewed by liberals as one that transcends the physical into the metaphysical? A holy grail of educational sytems?
<
p>
Pablo,
If you don’t want to pay tuition to support choice among multiple private bureaucracies that’s fine. But no need to identify those who favor it, like Commissioner Driscoll with the “Grover Norquists and the bathtub brigade”.
<
p>
Same ole rhetorical tricks.
If someone so strongly opposes Charter, but I’d at least like to know the bias (if any) behind the opinion.
<
p>
I get the feeling that for whatever reason, Pablo has significant bias against cutting public school budget. That he/she is not an MTA member simply tells me he/she’s not a teacher. Maybe a public school administrator, maybe something else,
We are all bias in one way or another. It is the argument we make.
When a salesman sells you a car his only motivation is to make $$$. But, he gets you to buy it by pointing things out. He does not lie. (We hope) He simply identifies the facts that support his argument that you should buy the car.
Someone purporting to know about cars and recommends Ford. You’d want to know if he worked for Ford.
<
p>
Someone purporting to know about Charters and advocates against them? Same.
Because we are standing ina Ford Dealership.
I never said Commissioner Driscoll is with the “Grover Norquists and the bathtub brigade.”
<
p>
He just works for the State Board of Education.
<
p>
I will state that James Peyser and Abigail Thernstrom are charter members of the bathtub brigade.
Folks – new to the blog, great thread on charters. Pablo, please explain what is meant by “Grover Norquists and the bathtub brigade?”
<
p>
Do you know Abby Thernstrom? What was the basis for your comment?
<
p>
Fred
Your assertion that Commonwealth Charters have a “tremendous negative impact on the sending communitiy” simply isn’t true. Pablo, you have completely omitted the fact that districts are reimbursed for their charter school tuition.
<
p>
For instance, take a look at Worcester. In FY06, they received $6,108 in Chapter 70 funding per student. After reimbursement, their cost to send 1,637 students to charter schools was $5,494 per pupil.
<
p>
You say As a taxpayer, it is my obligation to provide public schools for the children of my town. It is not my obligation to pay tuition to support choice among multiple private bureaucracies. If we were to carry that logic forward, then let’s eliminate Chapter 70 funding altogether! Fact is, we all pay into the system to educate all children of the Commonwealth, and as a taxpayer, I prefer that the money follows the student to the school that serves them best.
Let’s go for the numbers:
<
p>
The mean reimbursement in FY06 was $2174 per pupil.
<
p>
From the final FY06 numbers, the average charter reimbursement was 21% of the local payment. Reimbursements are based on 100% of this year’s increase in charter enrollment, 60 percent of the previous years reimbursement, and 40 percent of the reimbursement two years ago. After three years, you are on your own.
<
p>
Like Somerville. 308.45 students. NO reimbursement. $3,362,048, or $10,900 per pupil. At best, 308 students represent 15 fewer classrooms, but they lose funding for 84 teachers. What do you think that does for the students who are attending Somerville Public Schools?
<
p>
Here are the per pupil garnishments for the top 50% of sending districts (in terms of numbers of students). The format of the data is:
<
p>
DISTRICT (per pupil state reimbursement) Per Pupil Local AFTER reimbursement
<
p>
UPISLAND ($474) $17,159
EDGARTOWN ($435) $15,454
TISBURY ($2345) $14,295
MARTHA’S VINEYARD ($1537) $12,264
LANESBOROUGH ($0) $11,860
CONWAY ($550) $11,690
TRURO ($5911) $11,545
CAMBRIDGE ($7253) $11,453
SOMERVILLE ($0) $10,900
WALES ($0) $10,896
WESTBOROUGH ($0) $10,891
OAK BLUFFS ($1802) 10,712
WILLIAMSBURG ($1695) 10,583
COHASSET ($0) $10,271
NAUSET ($762) 10,126
GROTON DUNSTABLE ($0) $9828
FALMOUTH ($732) $9720
HULL ($400) $9702
BOSTON ($1230) $9653
WHATLEY ($1395) $9586
FRONTIER REG ($1163) 9484
SOMERSET ($281) $9375
LAWRENCE ($905) $9295
WEST BRIDGEWATER ($655) $9245
PLAINVILLE ($0) $9234
HARWICH ($1639) $9168 <—Andrea Silbert, please note this one!
MEDFORD ($1868) $9144
BLACKSTONE MILLVILLE ($0) $9109
AYER ($1027) $9090
WALPOLE ($410) $9081
ACTON BOXBOROUGH ($1089) $9034
Somerville might have made an effort to convince those kids not to go to a charter by, perhaps, improving the non-charter option.
According to the Department of Education FY Charter Tuition and Reimbursements (Q4) the final numbers for Worcester are as follows:
<
p>
FTE charter enrollment: 1637.57
Total local payment: $15,243,537
reimbursement $2,372,448
facilities aid $1,270,752
<
p>
You cant count the state payments in column 7 because they are not included in the total local payments ($15,243,537) in Column 4. They offset the charges in columns 5 & 6.
<
p>
LOCAL OBLIGATION (after reimbursement and facilities aid) $11,600,297
Cost per pupil for Worcester: $7,083.84
State payment for Worcester kids in charter schools: $2,224.76 and dropping
<
p>
You can ask the Worcester School Committee about the cuts they needed to make to close the $11 million charter school shortfall. You can ask the superintendent how much it would have cost the district to bring the students back to the Worcester Public Schools. I am sure Superintendent James Caradonio would make the time to explain the problem to you.
Indeed, I subtracted columns 10 and 11 from column 9 rather than column 2. My error.
<
p>
However, the corrected figure of $7,083.84 is still less than Worcester’s average cost per pupil cost of $8,840. This is a positive for Worcester, not a negative!
<
p>
As for the figures on your other list (Edgartown et al), they are less than the average cost per pupil for those districts. So even though the amounts seem high, they aren’t out of line with what the district charges.
<
p>
I understand that the reimbursements are phased out over time, but if the students aren’t there, why should the district be receiving the money? The fact that they get reimbursed for several years for students that aren’t there gives the district ample opportunity to make needed adjustments.
<
p>
Worcester lost about 6% of its customer base to a competitor, and as a result it lost about 6% of its revenue. I recognize that incremental costs come into play, and I’m not saying that it costs 6% less to educate the reduced numbers. However, I also recognize that enrollment increases have been funded in the same manner — the whole foundation amount per pupil even though incremental costs didn’t increase for each additional student. Overall, there is a balance. At the very least it seems a bit hypocritical to decry the loss of revenue and not acknowledge the inverse increase.
<
p>
You should know that comparing the cost of charter school elementary students to a total expenditure is not valid.
<
p>
Look at the line items on the expenditure report, and the costs of running an urban school district, and answer these questions:
<
p>
1. How much does a charter school pay for health insurance for retired employees? Worcester pays $9.4 million.
<
p>
2. How much does a charter school pay for high-cost out of district special needs placements? You know they can run in excess of $100,000 per year.
<
p>
3. How many charter schools have football teams? Worcester reported almost $1.3 million for athletics and student activities.
<
p>
4. Vocational-technical education is expensive. Worcester runs a large vo-tech program. Do the charter schools?
<
p>
Worcester is required to transport kids to charter schools in the city. Where’s the transportation cost? In the city’s end of year report.
<
p>
You are also including the $14.5 million line item for school building assistance, while your per-pupil cost to the charters doesn’t include the facilities grant or the myriad state and federal startup facilities grant.
<
p>
Charter school kids are generally low-cost, easy to educate kids, and the garnishment for these kids is significantly in excess of the savings from the reduced enrollment.
Pablo,
<
p>
I am well aware that the PPE for high school and vo-tech students is higher than for K-8 students. I also know that the C.70 funding formula provides a greater amount of aid for those students, as well as those in the low-income and ELL categories.
<
p>
In presenting the numbers, my intent was to show that the costs are closer than the impression I got from reading your posts. Over $10,000 per student was what I think you cited as a common expense.
<
p>
I’m not for arguing that the charter school statute and funding mechanisms are perfect. For one thing, I would like to see if there is an advantage to or mechanism for ensuring that the demographic profiles of charters more closely match that of the sending district. I don’t want to force people into a charter, but if it’s a matter of doing more to ensure everyone knows what options are available, then it is worth pursuing. Just an example.
<
p>
You and I will always differ because I believe funding should be attached to the student, and you seem to favor preserving the district over the interest of the individual. I’m not saying I have that correct or that one is better than the other — just pointing out the philosophical difference that will persist in our conversation.
<
p>
I believe a dialog is important, however. I sense that you do too, and perhaps this is why we are both putting the effort into being sure the facts are correct. And so, on to your answers:
<
p>
1. How much does a charter school pay for health insurance for retired employees? Worcester pays $9.4 million.
Are you referring to item 9? The amount Worcester is paying is ridiculously high. Whether that is the fault of poor negotiating, a poor pension system, or just bad luck, I don’t know. But for a district five times the size of Westford, Worcester is paying 27 times as much for that line item. Something is amiss. I don’t know how charter school employee pensions are paid, whether it comes out of the school’s operating budget (they have line items that seem to encompass this). Do you? If charters to pay for their own, it seems there is a lot of room for improvement in Worcester’s case.
<
p>
2. How much does a charter school pay for high-cost out of district special needs placements? You know they can run in excess of $100,000 per year.
Yes, and I also know that an out of district placement is charged to charged to the sending district, not the charter. I also know this is because the circuit breaker funding is set up to reimburse the resident district, not the charter. So, while yes, I would agree this can bring up the average cost per pupil for the sending district, I don’t see that as a strike against charters.
<
p>
3. How many charter schools have football teams? Worcester reported almost $1.3 million for athletics and student activities.
Ah. Well, who ever said all students/parents want to see their resources used to fund expensive athletic programs to begin with!? One of the great things about charters is they don’t have to be like every other cookie-cutter public school. You cannot blame charters for saving/investing a dime if they don’t spend their resources on sports and activities.
<
p>
4. Vocational-technical education is expensive. Worcester runs a large vo-tech program. Do the charter schools?
Perhaps. Charters can have a focus in any area they choose. I haven’t read through all 60 some odd charters, but I would n’t at all be surprised to find examples of schools that focus on vocational education.
…Horace Mann Charter School – a charter school run by the regular school committee and superintendent, with union rules. For instance, all fifth grade students in Barnstable are in a Horace Mann charter – I’ve never been clear how that differs from ordinary fifth grade.
<
p>
Pilot school – a school which accepts kids from all over its town, who have a desire to have a concentration of study in certain specialty – typically, math or the arts. Also run by school committee, superintendent and unions.
<
p>
Commonweatlh charter – run by a board, which can be of parents like mine was or a for-profit or non-profit. Typically accepts kids from anywhere by lottery after application process. Non-union, no oversight by local elected officials, answerable only to DOE for curriculum and policy oversight.
<
p>
Not mentioned by Hoss – choice schools – local public schools who accept kids from outside thier town/region, in exchange for allowing their students to ‘choose’ to attend other systems if they wish. For instance, when my son graduated from his 130 person charter school, he spent two years at a 500 student ‘choice’ high school, before proceeding to the 2,000 student high school where we live. Local elected control, union rules, just a ‘hostage swop’ situation, if you will.
<
p>
AND the 800 pound gorilla NOBODY wants to talk about – parochial schools – religious based schools, which have functioned as de facto charter schools, esp. in Boston area, for decades, with no unions OR parental control.
<
p>
Disclaimer – I have no family or financial interest in the education industry, other than educating my own children.
And if the charter school trustees are blowing great sums of money on a bloated administration and building a cushy reserve fund, while the public system losing the revenue is laying off teachers and imposing bus fees, how do we vote the trustees out of office?
<
p>
If the charter trustees flaunt the open meeting law or the public records act, how do we vote them out of office?
<
p>
If they start teaching intelligent design, how do we throw them out of office?
<
p>
Or do we have to sit in Town Meeting and continue to pay for an unelected board that can squander scarce tax money as they please?
1 – you don’t. the board is answerable to the parents of the students attending the school.
<
p>
2 – You make a complaint to the State Ethics Commission, just like you do when the school committee goes into unautorized executive session for the prupose of excluding parents and teachers.
<
p>
3 – You don’t. a charter has the right to teach intelligent design, insofar as it meets the DOE state curriculim requirements, the same as home schooled kids (hey, Hoss, ANOTHER category never mentioned!). that is, they must teach all DOE required science, and can teach ID as an add-on if they want, subject to the parents who control the board.
<
p>
4 – the board IS elected. By the parents. Of the kids attending. Who have an interst in their child’s success. Rather than a political agenda.
<
p>
BTW – do you ALSO oppose busing for parochial school students at town meeting? Or allowing home schooled kids to play sports? Just ‘look for the union label’ all the way?
<
p>
That’s the point. Who looks out after the taxpayers? Or must we suffer through all these little academic sisters of the Turnpike Authority. At least we can hold the governor accountable for those appointments.
<
p>
And are they really answerable to the parents? Most charters I have seen allows the board to fill the vacancies, and the charter proponents get to select the initial board. Sounds like a self-appointing bureaucracy to me.
…where is the accountability to parents built into union-run public schools? The school committee? Ever tried firing a teacher with tenure? BEFORE they dance naked on the desk or come to school with a loaded weapon?
<
p>
‘Most’ charters aren’t all – and I wouldn’t send my kid to a school whose charter I didn’t agree with.
<
p>
As opposed to accident of address, whih governs most public school selection.
You could run for the school committee, and if you could convince your neighbors of the merits of your ideas, you would get elected. You could even get to negotiate terms of the school department’s contract with the teachers’ union. That’s lots of fun.
<
p>
You could go to Town Meeting, and question the superintendent and school committee about their budget. If you are dissatisfied, you could move to amend the bottom line number and the Town Meeting could vote to change the number. Just don’t increase it, because there’s Proposition 2.5 to limit your expenditures.
<
p>
And, yes, I have seen tenured teachers dismissed without a naked dance on the table. I also know what happens to the really good charter school teachers. They put their resumes in the photocopier and seek jobs in the public system.
..when the UAW attempted to organize my daughter’s day care center, because they had bought the ‘franchise (!), I was able to head the team that bargained them to decertification.
<
p>
You may be on to something there, Pablo! :>)
…go out and do something. The people who run most Massachusetts towns are unpaid volunteers, willing to put their egos on the line (oh, the sting of defeat) in order to make a difference. In many towns, seats on major boards are unopposed in annual elections. There are also many other opportunities to serve on appointed boards and commissions.
<
p>
Once elected, there is lots of help out there. The selectmen, school committees, finance committees, moderators, all have their own associations. Many have email support systems. You don’t have to be an expert, just willing to learn and put in some time for the good of your community.
<
p>
If anyone REALLY wants a say on the way things are run, go for it!
Unfortunately, those associations, funded by tax dollars are not immune from pushing ideology. MASC is one such organization that would be greatly improved if it simply cut off it’s lobbyist activities.
Which one of MASC’s priorities do you object to?
<
p>
MASC LEGISLATIVE PRIORITIES
<
p>
Adequate and Equitable Distribution of Chapter 70 School Aid
Full Funding for Local and Regional Transportation
Charter School Finance Reform
Full Funding of Special Education Circuit Breaker
Increased Funding for METCO
Streamline the 14 accountability, assessment and accreditation systems
<
p>
These priorities were voted by the delegate assembly, with a delegate elected from each school committee in the state. So tell me, should selectmen, school committees, and municipalities have an agenda and work to enact it, or should we just allow big corporations and corporate-sponsored think tanks like the Pioneer Institute to lobby for THEIR agenda?
Pablo,
<
p>
You obviously have some degree of resentment towards the Pioneer Institute, but at least they are funded by private donations.
<
p>
I understand that MASC has a delegate assembly, so as someone who disagrees with their priorities, I need to have a representative elected to my school committee, then hope that they are appointed as the school committee delegate, then hope that there are enough like-minded delegates to give voice to my values. There’s not a snowball’s chance in hell of that happening in the current political climate. But, I wouldn’t be nearly so upset if it wasn’t my tax dollars being used to support their lobbying.
<
p>
As for your question, I don’t support:
<
p>
Adequate and Equitable Distribution of Chapter 70 School Aid
There is no way that MASC can represent each and every district. One gets, another gives.
<
p>
Full Funding for Local and Regional Transportation
I see this as completely a local issue.
<
p>
Charter School Finance Reform
MASC is anti-charter school. I am not.
<
p>
Full Funding of Special Education Circuit Breaker
Possibly. But I wouldn’t support full funding unless the state took a more active role in determination of placements. Otherwise, it’s ripe for abuse.
<
p>
Increased Funding for METCO
I do not support METCO. The cost as compared to the number of students it benefit, the lack of data demonstrating that there is a benefit. Charters are a better way.
<
p>
Streamline the 14 accountability, assessment and accreditation systems
I do support this in theory, but rather than go after testing, I would have preferred focusing on the NEASC resource hog.
If there are two sides to the argument (and apparently there are two sides), shouldn’t we have that choice in November?
<
p>
If Romney-Healey and Healey-Hillman are for the current State Board of Education and their privatization policy, who needs Gabrieli and Silbert? That would be no choice at all.
Gabrielli is like Healey, you haven’t read his position paper on Education and how he would appoint the BoE. IMHO, it’s a strike against him.
I read the Gabrieli plan. I believe you are pointing to this:
<
p>
To me, this statement is 100% content free. It makes no mention of the ideology that he will seek out in appointing new members.
<
p>
For that, we only need to look at Mr. Gabrieli’s record. His for-profit charter school company relied heavily on friends on the hard-right of the privatization efforts. From a previous post on Gabrieli and Advantage Schools.
<
p>
It wasn’t ideology that raised a flag, because as you pointed out, the statement is “content free”. It was the membership criteria. It seems as if he’s trying to appease the PTO (I believe that was the group) who fought Romney for representation on the board. On second thought, maybe appeasment isn’t such a bad thing.