NYT: Charter Schools Lagging Behind, U.S. Data Reveal

[kskiska]

WASHINGTON, Aug. 16 - The first national comparison of test scores among children in charter schools and regular public schools shows charter school students often doing worse than comparable students in regular public schools.

The findings, buried in mountains of data the Education Department released without public announcement, dealt a blow to supporters of the charter school movement, including the Bush administration.

The data shows fourth graders attending charter schools performing about half a year behind students in other public schools in both reading and math. Put another way, only 25 percent of the fourth graders attending charters were proficient in reading and math, against 30 percent who were proficient in reading, and 32 percent in math, at traditional public schools.

Because charter schools are concentrated in cities, often in poor neighborhoods, the researchers also compared urban charters to traditional schools in cities. They looked at low-income children in both settings, and broke down the results by race and ethnicity as well. In virtually all instances, the charter students did worse than their counterparts in regular public schools.

more…
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/17/education/17charter.html?hp

[jpgray]

1. Good

I hate how these bastards are trying to kill off public education.

[WMliberal]

2. big surprise

I'm taking a page from the Mooninites and giving a digitized, expanging middle finger at the libertarians who said adding market forces would help improve education.

[noamnety]

3. trying to kill of public education?

Charter schools ARE public schools, at least in Michigan. Sometimes they are considered alternative schools - meaning if you are on the verge of getting expelled from a traditional school, the principal will agree not to kick you out, if you transfer to a charter school. So to get a true picture of the education, you'd have to look at the kids as they enter the charter school - were they already behind their counterparts, or did the lag get created at the charter school itself?

[Wickerman]

7. I think the study did so,a nd Michigan does the same

that is how Charter programs are evaluated. See the fine print of the study.

"Because charter schools are concentrated in cities, often in poor neighborhoods, the researchers also compared urban charters to traditional schools in cities. They looked at low-income children in both settings, and broke down the results by race and ethnicity as well. In virtually all instances, the charter students did worse than their counterparts in regular public schools."

that is how it is done - you select cohort schools and age/ed match kids for comparison purposes.

Here is how Michigan, like most states, selects their kids for Charters:

Charter public schools, or public school academies as they are known in Michigan, are independent public schools that operate under a performance contract called a charter.

Fundamentally, charter public schools are:

• Public schools governed by public officials;
• Free - they are prohibited from charging tuition;
• Open to all - if oversubscribed an official random selection drawing is conducted;
• Required to employ certified teachers;
• Required to administer the state MEAP tests; and
• Subject to health and safety codes, just like all other public schools.
http://cmucso.org/charter.asp?Link=resources/faq.htm

Note that the schools are open to all and that if oversubscribed an official random selection drawing is conducted..

[noamnety]

8. it doesn't address all factors

that is how it is done - you select cohort schools and age/ed match kids for comparison purposes.

I understand that part, but there is another factor that isn't included. The dregs factor. A traditional public school will often advise its problem students to go to a charter school, so they can get rid of them.

If you compare demographics, you'll see two kids, same ethnic group, same income, same age. But it doesn't show the hidden story that the kid at the charter school was already a problem student, which is why they got sent to an "alternative" school by their other principal.

I'm saying this as a charter school teacher. We have a specific mission related to the arts, but it's very common and incredibly frustrating that we consistently have area principals send us the kids that are screwing up in their schools. We can't turn them away, because we're public. But they manage to shove off their poor performers on us, so their test grades go up, ours go down. And if the student has the same behavior problems at our school, we have no other place to send them. So the first school gets rid of them by listing them as a transfer. But when we get rid of them, it's already their final stop, and so we have to list them as a drop out.

Not all of our students fall into that category - we have truly gifted kids as well, attracted to our arts curriculum (kids that want two hours of ballet a day, and so on). But our curve is not typical. We have an inverted bell curve, reflecting the ones that are there because they care about their education, nothing in the middle, and a group that fails almost every class, because they are the cast-offs from the traditional schools.

The study doesn't address whether the kids at the charter school have already been filtered and rejected by the traditional schools.

[wildeyed]

12. And test scores don't tell the entire story, either.

They are just one part of the educational picture. I did not select my daughters school solely for the test score, which are only average. The school is diverse and has allot of parent involvement and some gifted teachers.

There was a very interesting article in the NYT magazine a few months ago about a reformer in Harlem named Geoffrey Canada. The goal of his program, called The Harlem Project, is to give every kid in the neighborhood a bright future. Every single kid, not just the gifted or the ones with together parents who get them into the good programs. Every single kid. And charter schools are integral to his plan. Now his plan is still being tested, but I am hoping for success and if charter schools are part of that success, then I hate to totally write them off.

(I would link to the article, but it is paid content)

[keep_left]

13. this is exactly what they intended...

the "Every Child Left Behind" act to do. Manipulation of student populations and test scores has happened virtually everywhere there are problem students (i.e. all urban districts). Remember when it was discovered that the "Texas miracle" was a total joke, and that Rod Paige (now Secretary of Education) and friends had been purging students from the rolls, tracking them into other programs, etc. The upshot was that urban Texas districts had a dropout rate of 45%! They managed to spin a statistic like that into a "miracle".

[Wickerman]

14. Having been in education evaluation all I can respond then, if you call

your students dregs, then I hope to hell you never teach my kids. If you feel there are kids that can't be reached then I pity the kids you try to educate. If we give up on our youth at that age then we deserve the chaos this world has become.

It also would appear your district is confusing alternative schools and charter schools. Its apparent the faculty at your school is more interested in working with gifted children and continuing the abandonment and isolation the "cast-offs" and "poor performers". Its really sad there aren't teachers out there who give a damn about ALL kids, not just the special ones.

[noamnety]

21. misunderstanding

We love all our kids. The dregs comment was related to what the state measures us by - test scores and drop out rates. Not their worth as humans.

Myself, I've had a kid that was expelled for a knife incident continue to email assignments to me, knowing he wouldn't get credit for them, for the rest of the term, because he cared about the work he was doing in my class. And a few times I've had another student who had been expelled for violence out to my house, to work with another student on a project. Actually every kid that's been in my class and gotten expelled, has stayed in touch with me except for one - and that one I had a good relationship with, but I nailed him for drug use which led to his being kicked out, so I can understand him being bitter.

Don't confuse our frustration with the system with our commitment to teaching. Those are two separate issues. I've had some long talks with our director about this - he's a kindred spirit. I went into the job expecting to like working with the gifted kids more, but I've found the most rewarding experiences for me are indeed with the kids at the other end of the spectrum.

It is profoundly depressing, though, to have a student who is on the verge of dropping out, work with them through lunch, push them with extra work and extra assignments, get them actually interested in work, and know that you are responsible for them actually staying in school and graduating ... and knowing that they are contributing to your school being in danger of getting listed as a failure, because they aren't a great academic student. The success in those cases is invisible to the state. Only the teachers and students themselves understand it.

One more thing, because I am annoyed by your comment. Every teacher at my school got laid off this last year. Every single one of us. We were all full time, and got cut to part time. This was announced at a public school board meeting, a big messy scene with students crying thinking the school would close, teachers crying because we got no notice on this, it was a violation of our contract, and it happened in the middle of the school year, meaning the classes we would have to cut would affect every student's schedule.

The next morning, the teachers met for 3 hours, and at the end of it decided - unanimously! - to teach their full load of classes, even though we would not be getting paid for teaching all of them. Some of us had to get second jobs to pay the bills, I know one teacher had her phone service cut off, because she couldn't afford it.

You should be so lucky to have teachers like us, that care so much for the kids that we will demand to be allowed to teach for free.

[Wickerman]

22. Thanks for the clarification

sorry if I came down a little hard. I figured you were meaning to attack policy - however your first post to me came off more as an attack on the kids.

Coming from "the Texas Miracle" I saw way too many teachers who blamed the kids for the low scores rather than their administration, the policy, or even their own inability to make a connection to the troubled kids.

The reality is that being a teacher is much more than just teaching. YOu have to be part social worker - and part big brother or sister. It is asking a WHOLE lot - and my hat is off to those who do it well and who make the sacrifices that you and your colleages have. Maybe with a President Kerry we can get some money to help the rubber meet the road so that you can actually get paid to do your job.

thanks

[wildeyed]

23. great post

Thanks for clarifying some of the problems with excessive focus on test scores.

Sounds like you are a great teacher. Hope you are able to stay with it. I know many talented teachers who leave the field out of frustration with the bureaucracy.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

18. It would also be great if they compared "for profit" charters to

to non profits...I suspect non-profits probably perform better much like non-profit hospitals do.

[noonwitch]

28. Charter schools are not required to provide special education services

Public schools are. Learning disabled kids and emotionally impaired kids will remain with the public schools, for the most part, which needs to be considered when evaluating programs.

[noamnety]

30. charter schools do have to provide special ed

Charter schools are public schools, at least in my neck of the woods, and we are required to have a special ed teacher if we have special ed kids, and we have to meet all the usual requirements.

Autistic, paranoid schizophrenic, lead poisoning victims, physically disabled ... I get them all. I got an ominous headsup last year that I would be getting a blind student in my computer graphics class. The kid never showed up, but yikes. I'm pretty accomodating, but I am the first to admit I don't know how to teach graphics to the blind.

[aquart]

4. I'm shocked. Shocked.

Another BushCo swindle exposed.

[FightinNewDem]

10. Say what?

Charter schools are a "BushCo swindle"???

The first charter school law was written by a Democrat, Minnesota State Senator Ember Reichgott Jung.

Most of the leading charter backers among elected officials are Democrats, including Indianapolis Mayor Bart Peterson and NYC Councilwoman Eva Moskowitz.

President Clinton is an enthusiastic charter school proponent, and his Education Department provided significant assistance to charter schools.

Furthermore, there are a few things the NYT article failed to mention:

• Eighth graders in Colorado and Delaware charters schools outperformed 8th graders at all other public schools nationally in reading and math

• Fourth grade students in Arizona, California and Colorado charters outperform their traditional public school counterparts in their states in reading

• In California, charter schools produce stronger student achievement among low-income students than traditional public schools by a margin of nearly 5 percent

• Sixty percent of urban charter schools in Massachusetts outperformed comparable traditional schools on the 2003 MCAS exams

There's more here:

http://www.edreform.com/index.cfm?fuseAction=document&documentID=1806

and here:

http://www.eduwonk.com

(Incidentally, Eduwonk is written by two Democrats, Andy Rotherham and Sarah Mead)

[keep_left]

15. Ember Reichgott Junge is not exactly what I would call...

a poster child for the charter movement. She has totally and completely ignored the absolutely spectacular failures here in MN involving world-class Pentagon-level incompetence, embezzlement, and fraud. She is no longer in politics here, probably because of that. She's also the kind of person that goes on right-wing shows as an example of the "left". She's the Alan Colmes of MN.

Those stats are bogus and I would recommend people look at who's behind the group that is linked in that statement, and where the money comes from. The charter people have really become Kool-Aid drinkers on their failures. These are the kinds of failures that had they happened in regular public schools would result in the end of public education in this country, post-haste. People would be burning down school board meetings. And the charter backers are just like the band on the Titanic. Nothing to see here...everything's fine.

It should be instructive to all that the biggest pushers of charters have been right-wingers and Alan Colmes Democrats. Faux News did one of their idiotic "Breaking Point" features last year on this and they had one RW foundation talking head after another gushing over how wonderful charters were. Not a peep about the problems that were all too well documented.

For some sanity, see:

http://www.america-tomorrow.com/bracey/EDDRA/

Bracey has written several good books on these topics.

[TahitiNut]

20. A dog turd in a Baby Ruth wrapper is still a dog turd.

But feel free to chow down.


I'll pass. I'm not only non-partisan; I'm anti-partisan. Blind partisanship is for the brain-dead and prostitutes, imho.

[donco6]

38. Here in Colorado, charter schools are a new version . . .

. . . of "white flight."

Very few of the charter schools here are formed to accommodate the needs of low-performing students. Almost all are located in wealthy white suburbs where non-minority parents want control.

Big surprise - when you exclude all low-performing kids, your scores are higher! woohoo!

[proud patriot]

5. I'm going to say it ...Told you so

there I said it :-)

[PassingFair]

6. Oh crap! Does this mean...

... I won't be able to enroll my kids in a madrassa this September?

Long Live Public Education in America. I'm aiming for the school board!

[FightinNewDem]

11. Charter Schools ARE Public Schools!

[keep_left]

17. Sometimes only in name.

Quite often, for-profit management companies have been brought in to run charter schools: people like Edison Project and Tesseract. These are where the biggest and most spectacular failures have happened. We had an Edison school in Minneapolis where kids didn't get books for six months, computers sat around in boxes until they were so obsolete they couldn't run the software, and the Edison executive in charge of the school was using it as a jobs program for her family.

These failures are not anomalous. They have happened repeatedly and predictably all over the U.S. And in nearly all cases the regular public schools have had to go in and rescue the situation as hundreds of kids suddenly have no school to go to, sometimes almost overnight.

[keep_left]

25. That's actually a pretty funny point...

and sadly true. Immediately after 9/11, a charter (I think in AZ, which has a very unaccountable charter law) was shut down because it WAS a madrassa! I wish I was kidding about this. The story was covered a bit on cable news but got swallowed by all the 9/11 stories. They built the damn Islamic school in a strip mall or something. These are the kinds of people starting charter schools--it's about the lure of easy money. And that's true even in states like MN which have the most accountable charter laws. Whatever RW foundation helped them write up the laws, it turns out that it's almost impossible to shut them down in any state.

[TroglodyteScholar]

9. kick (n/t)

:kick:

[TahitiNut]

16. Proposition: "Charter schools will do a better job of educating children."

Remember, we don't establish charter schools and other privatized (for profit) approaches to education (and profits from public funds) on the bargain that they'd do "OK" or "almost as good" -- the bargain is they'd do better!

All the fucking bit-twiddling and nit-picking in the world on the test results this administration tried to bury in the dark of night doesn't get past the fact that this is, as responsible lifetime educators predicted, a failure!

I got so damned tired hearing privatization proponents rationalize their opposition to funding and support for public scholls by egregious bad-mouthing and the constant harangue that public education was 'failing' our kids, I just had to wait.

Well, the results are in. The bad-mouthers can take their criticisms and look in the mirror. No matter how poor they claim public education has become, the privatization prostitutes have done worse!

They can take their charter schools and vouchers and stick them up their greedy, constipated butts!

[keep_left]

19. Another point I can add...

The RWers got on board with charters after they got their asses handed to them over and over on voucher referendums and bills around the country. Sometimes the voters had the same referendum rammed down their throats repeatedly, even after the referendum had suffered a landslide defeat. You really have to ask yourself why. It's not because they care so much about the kids. It's totally, completely political, and their long-term goal is the end of academic freedom in this country in both primary and secondary education.

[wildeyed]

24. I understand your opposition to

for profit charter schools. They do not operate in my area so I am not well educated about them. But it sounds like you ahve many valid points.

What about non-profit charters? In some communities, frustration with the public alternatives has led them to start their own schools. Please note, I am not trying to argue with you about this, just genuinely interested in learning more about the subject.

[keep_left]

26. Well, there's a reason I'm opposed to them in general...

it's because MN has had spectacular flameouts with its charter schools, and almost no one (with the exception of the courageous Matt Entenza) has been asking the hard questions. MN has one of the strictest charter laws there is, and yet more than 33% of the charters can't produce auditable books, many of them end in sudden death (where the regular public schools have to absorb all the kids--and costs--of the failures), and the charters are also basically freeloading on transportation costs and bleeding the district dry. It's almost impossible to shut them down, even here in MN. Imagine how it is going to be in states like AZ which have very weak charter laws.

"Nonprofit" and "for-profit" are sort of meaningless when it comes to charters. Very often they bring in a for-profit management company but still call it a nonprofit. It's just like HMOs. You can basically manipulate your financial statement and call yourself anything you want.

Here in MN, we've had "charter schools" for years. They're called magnet schools, and they're very successful. And with the latest data from MN mirroring the NYT/NAEP analysis (charter schools do no better and often much worse), then shouldn't we be focusing on what works?

Here's the link to the MN data:

http://www.startribune.com/stories/462/4933740.html

[wildeyed]

27. Yes, I am all for what works.

And if charter schools are a boondoggle, we shouldn't have them. But I always hope something new will work. Although I guess I should be very very afraid of any innovations in domestic policy suggested by bushco.

In my city in the 90's the schools were really improving. One of the things they were doing was locating magnets in schools in economically struggling areas. And it seemed to be working 'cause test scores were going up. But then a group of white parents challenged race based assignment in magnet programs and won. That combined with economic woes and the schools have never really recovered.

So I guess allot depends on what the goal is. For me, to see all kids get a fair shot at a decent education, for others, to make sure that the 'haves' have more.

[keep_left]

29. Read anything by Jonathan Kozol.

He has tons of examples of this kind of behavior by people who should know better. And as for affirmative action, since when has Bu$hco ever been supportive of helping minority kids get into the best schools unless it fits a fundie agenda?

Part of the problem, I hate to say it, is the much-vaunted "local control" of schools. On the other hand, if more of those people disproportionately affected by these decisions would organize and show up at the school board meetings, some of this might change. People are always complaining about their schools, but these are some of the most directly democratic governance structures we have. People need to use them.

[noamnety]

31. why start a charter school?

IMO, the best reason to start a charter school is to focus on a specific aspect of education - an immersion into an area of interest. It's sort of like voting ABB vs. for Kerry. If you create a charter school because you don't like the regular schools in the area, I think it's better for everyone to try to work to improve the regular school. But if you have a specific vision, that's the time to create something new to make it happen.

Ours is a fine and performing arts school - modeled after LaGuardia high school (the Fame school). And you can't get what we offer at a traditional school. At a traditional school, you get basketball, football, cheerleaders. At our school, you get none of that. We oppose such things at our school.

But if you want to learn to use a dagger properly, we have stage combat classes. If you want bassoon reed making workshops, we have it. And instead of dodgeball, we have this:


It's a completely different environment, designed for a different sort of kid. For those familiar with the movie 8 Mile, we are 2 miles north of that, so in one of the most segregated areas of the nation, we pull a mix of Detroit inner city kids, and the Grosse Pointe crowd, for a nearly even mix of blacks and whites - which we could not do if we were a magnet school within one district instead of a charter school.

And it's free, and open to anyone who wants to come to it.

[Greyskye]

34. That so rocks

I would have done just about anything to get into a school like that when I was a kid.

The charter school my wife teaches at has a different sort of focus - it's a Montessori method teaching environment. I never really understood how different this is then traditional American public school teaching methods until recently. I've been trying to think how to describe it and do it justice, but I don't think I'm up for the task. But for certain types of students, this method really works well. This includes both really bright students who are bored at the pace of traditional classes, and special needs students with certain learning dissabilities.

Please remember that charter schools are public schools, and are free to anyone. But the good ones are popular, and can be difficult to get into. I think the population of the school my wife teaches at is around 300 students, with a waiting list of about the same size. My son is starting 1st grade there tomorrow, having graduated :party: from Kindergarten at this school as well. He's reading at a 3rd grade level right now, thinks that he wants to possibly be a paleontologist when he grows up, and has ADHD. He would go NUTS!:silly: in a traditional classroom, in this environment he's thriving.

[wildeyed]

35. We have a preforming arts school

and a montesorri school in my city. But the are called magnets, not charters. They are operated by the school district, not separate groups.

[donco6]

40. You shouldn't have to charter to get that, sadly.

We started two new high schools in our district. One an Expeditionary Learning HS for 400 kids, and another a Big Picture High School for 120 kids. Next year, we'll open a Coalition of Essential Schools Academy, another Expeditionary Learning school - this one with an emphasis on Arts, and a New Tech High School.

All were done without chartering, and with the full cooperation of the union. In fact, the president of the union was the first teacher hired to teach in the Big Picture school.

It's too bad some districts are just too big to consider this radical a move. I believe it's needed.

[Ilsa]

32. Bella Rosenberg of The American Federation of Teachers ROCKS!

She was on The NewsHour w/ J. Lehrer, Gwen Ifill moderating a discussion between her and a Deputy in the Admin's Education Dept. The Deputy tried to defend the lower scores as a "snapshot", but BR was ALL OVER that excuse because the test scores have been the Gold Standard for over three decades, and the charter school advocates had used test scores to promote their agenda.

BR was cool, intelligent, referred to charter schools as throwing the baby out with the bath water, and the states have been lax in holding the schools accountable. Said there were certainly some good charter schools, but so are there good public schools, so there is no reason to defend the disturbing news with anecdotes!

(Edited for typo.)

[Tight_rope]

33. All the money down the drain...kids ain't learning shit....

[Turanga Leela]

36. I'm amazed at the ignorance I'm seeing in this thread.

,,,and I would have thought that DU members would be a little more thoughtful and reasoned in their responses.

NOT ALL charter schools are run by for-profit corporations. My daughter attends a charter school here in eastern PA that is based on parental involvement...all decisions, from policy to curriculum to dress codes to lunch menus are decided by parent commitee. In addition, parents are expected to volunteer a certain number of hours every month. No profit motive for anyone.

Also, as someone upthread pointed out, charter schools are open to all. And yes, a lot of problem kids are steered towards my daughter's school, and THEY ARE required to provide special ed services.

I love our charter school. There is a waiting list a mile long, and just about everyone who has a child attending thinks its an amazing education.

I am sure that there are charter school horror stories...I've read some of them. But there are also outstanding schools in the charter system. People who overgeneralize and make statements like "kids ain't learning shit" are just freakin' ignorant.

[struggle4progress]

kick

:kick:

[DU GrovelBot]

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[progressivebydesign]

39. I knew this on a local level...

.. but I'm glad to see the data compiled nationally. The charter schools in our area were pushed by parents who thought their children were far too good for ordinary public schools, but too cheap to send them to private schools. The schools all tanked adademically, and the infighting amongst those running the schools.. and the parents.. was ugly.

I see charter schools as another way to bust the teacher's union, since I think many of them do not require a fully credentialed teacher to teach in them (i.e. Jenna Bush).

[RememberTheCoup]

41. Please contribute to my thread in the education forum

Please contribute to my thread in the health/education/social policy forum regarding charter schools and other programs.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

Thanks!