Choosing Charters

Choosing Charters PDF Author: Joshua L. Glazer
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 080775899X
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 265

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Book Description
Do charter schools strengthen students’ educational experience? What are their social costs? This volume brings together a group of premier researchers to address questions about the purposes of charter schools and the role of public policy in shaping the educational agenda. Chapter authors explore topics seldom encountered in the current charter school debate, such as the challenges faced by charter schools in guaranteeing students civil rights and other legal protections; the educational and social implications of current instructional programs designed specifically for low-income and minority students; the use of charters as school turnaround agents; and other issues that lie at the intersection of education, politics, and social policy. Readers across the political spectrum, both supporters and critics of charter schools, can use this book to inform public policy about the ways in which charters affect diversity and inequality and the potential to devise policies that mitigate the most troublesome social costs of charter schools. Book Features: Examines how charter schools affect diversity and equity in U.S. schools. Describes how segregation plays out by race, ethnicity, and income; by disability and language-minority status; and by culture, language, and religion. Considers charter schools within a broader social context of high poverty rates, changing demographics, and continued housing and school segregation. Examines charter schools in the context of a new federal administration that is forging its own path in education and other domains of social policy. Includes some of the most prominent researchers and commentators in the field spanning policy research traditions, methodological approaches, and theoretical perspectives.

A Study on Charter School Effects on Student Achievement and on Segregation in Florida Public Schools

A Study on Charter School Effects on Student Achievement and on Segregation in Florida Public Schools PDF Author: Seungbok Choi
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
ABSTRACT: Charter schools have now been in operation for two decades in the U.S., and for 15 years in Florida. Florida took the third place in the U.S. in the number of charter schools operated and the student enrollment in 2010. This study examined the assumed effects of charter school policy on the public school system: charter school effect on student achievement in charter schools and in TPSs, and segregation effects and stratification effects on charter schools and traditional public schools (TPSs). I applied three perspectives to investigate charter school effect on student achievement: School effectiveness theory, Market competition theory, and Social inequality theory. The racial/ethnic segregation effect and the socio-economic stratification effect were examined longitudinally and cross-sectionally. Datasets of primary and secondary public schools and county educational and demographic information covering 1998 to 2010 were obtained from multiple sources: the Common Core of Data from NCES, the Florida School Indicator Report, the Florida Department of Education, Florida Statistics Abstract, and Census Bureau. Hierarchical linear modeling was utilized to explore charter school effect in different organizational levels and hierarchical multivariate linear modeling was used to take into account the closely correlated relationships of the demographic compositions in public schools. The analyses of student achievement in charter schools and traditional schools indicated that charter schools and traditional public schools are significantly different from each other, and that the school characteristics were more influential on the school performances than county characteristics or the year effects, especially in the higher grades. Some charter schools achieved better in some subjects and grades in that they started at the lower scores than TPSs but grew faster during the period of 1998-2010. However, the charter school effectiveness turned out to be insignificant or even negative when control variables were introduced such as educational factors and demographic compositions. Market competition theory could not explain the variations in schools' FCAT scores, while social inequality theory explained them better. The findings of this study did not support the School Effectiveness Theory nor the Market Competition Theory in charter school movement. Instead, Social Inequality Theory was proved to be relevant to understand the differences in public school academic achievement. The analyses of segregation and stratification effects showed that charter schools were more racially and socio-economically segregated, and that they exacerbated the segregation and stratification in traditional public schools. The analyses of the Dissimilarity Index (DI) distribution among charter schools and TPSs revealed that the demographic compositions in charter schools deviate more from the county means than do TPSs during the period of 1998 through 2009. Charter schools had much lower proportion of free/reduced price lunch program students than TPSs in every school level, which was negatively related to the percentage of white students but positively to the percentage of black students. The years of charter school policy adoption in a county have similar effects on both groups: The longer it was since a county introduced charter school policy, the fewer black students and the more white students would enroll in charter schools. Overall, charter schools were likely used as pockets for white flight and self-isolation as well and exacerbated socio-economic stratification in public schools. The analyses of charter school DIs supported the warnings of white flight, self-isolation, and socio-economic stratification (Carnoy, 2000; Frankenberg, Lee, & Orfield, 2003; Rivkin, 1994). Findings of this study suggested that the increasing proportion of black students and free/reduced price lunch program recipients have enrolled in TPSs for all school levels along the years during the period of 1998-2009, but that the percentages of white students in TPSs have decreased year by year even though the rates are small. The analyses implied that charter schools were likely to locate around TPSs that had a higher proportion of a certain demographic group: The higher proportion of a certain demographic groups in a certain area would induce charter schools targeting these groups. Hierarchical multivariate linear models (HMLM) were introduced to detect the relative relationships between demographic groups. The multivariate analyses suggested that middle school charters were likely to locate around the TPSs with more white students and fewer Hispanic students, while elementary charter schools opened more around the TPSs with fewer black students. The location and targeting strategies of charter schools affected also the racial/ethnic distributions in high TPSs, even though the relationship got weaker. The proportions of free/reduced lunch program students in TPSs havd a consistently and significantly negative influence on the proportions of white students and a positive influence on the percentages of black and Hispanic students in TPSs. The academic performances of TPSs were highly and negatively related to the proportion of black students, while the relationship becomes much weaker to the percentage of white students and neutral to that of Hispanic students. The cross-sectional multivariate analyses suggested that charter schools created more racially segregated educational institutes in public education in Florida. The racial/ethnic compositions in TPSs were closely interrelated to the issues of the socio-economic stratification and residential division (Carnoy, 2000; Frankenberg, et al., 2003; Rivkin, 1994). The comparisons of the explained variance proportions by HMLM models and those of other models revealed that the percentages of white students were much more sensitive to the socio-economic and residential factors than the proportions of black students were, while the proportions of Hispanic students were much more sensitive to the charter school factors. The findings of this study highlighted the critical role of social context in public educational policies and the importance of policy design. This study rediscovered the old but important principle that charter school policy makers need to take into account the expectable but ignored or unintended consequences of the policy in public education system and the impacts of the policy on the non-choosers in TPSs as well.

Choosing Charters

Choosing Charters PDF Author: Joshua L. Glazer
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 080775899X
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 265

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Book Description
Do charter schools strengthen students’ educational experience? What are their social costs? This volume brings together a group of premier researchers to address questions about the purposes of charter schools and the role of public policy in shaping the educational agenda. Chapter authors explore topics seldom encountered in the current charter school debate, such as the challenges faced by charter schools in guaranteeing students civil rights and other legal protections; the educational and social implications of current instructional programs designed specifically for low-income and minority students; the use of charters as school turnaround agents; and other issues that lie at the intersection of education, politics, and social policy. Readers across the political spectrum, both supporters and critics of charter schools, can use this book to inform public policy about the ways in which charters affect diversity and inequality and the potential to devise policies that mitigate the most troublesome social costs of charter schools. Book Features: Examines how charter schools affect diversity and equity in U.S. schools. Describes how segregation plays out by race, ethnicity, and income; by disability and language-minority status; and by culture, language, and religion. Considers charter schools within a broader social context of high poverty rates, changing demographics, and continued housing and school segregation. Examines charter schools in the context of a new federal administration that is forging its own path in education and other domains of social policy. Includes some of the most prominent researchers and commentators in the field spanning policy research traditions, methodological approaches, and theoretical perspectives.

Choices and Challenges

Choices and Challenges PDF Author: Priscilla Wohlstetter
Publisher: Harvard Education Press
ISBN: 1612505430
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
As charter schools enter their third decade, research in this key sector remains overwhelmingly contradictory and confused. Many studies are narrowly focused; some do not meet the standards for high-quality academic research. In this definitive work, Wohlstetter and her colleagues isolate and distill the high-quality research on charter schools to identify the contextual and operational factors that influence these schools’ performances. The authors examine the track record of the charter sector in light of the wide range of goals set for these schools in state authorizing legislation—at the classroom level, the level of the school community, and system-wide. In particular, they show how the evolution of the charter movement has shaped research questions and findings. By highlighting what we know about the conditions for success in charter schools, the authors make a significant contribution to current debates in policy and practice, both within the charter sector and in the larger landscape of public education.

Charter Schools, Achievement and Segregation

Charter Schools, Achievement and Segregation PDF Author: Shira Danielle Butler
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 66

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Book Description
This literature review addresses the increasingly popular charter school movement and its effectiveness in academic achievement and multicultural diversity. It examines the literature starting with the foundations of the charter school movement to the present state of American charter schools. Implications for charter school counselors are discussed. Although charter schools are gaining support in some public arenas, and with policymakers, more evidence is needed before charter schools can embody public official's claims as the new solution in public education.

School’s Choice

School’s Choice PDF Author: Wagma Mommandi
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 0807779806
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 233

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Book Description
Access issues are pivotal to almost all charter school tensions and debates. How well are these schools performing? Are they segregating and stratifying? Are they public and democratic? Are they fairly funded? Can apparent successes be scaled up? Answers to all these core questions hinge on how access to charter schools is shaped. This book describes the incentives and pressures on charter schools to restrict access and examines how charters navigate those pressures, explaining access-restricting practices in relation to the ecosystem within which charter schools are created. It also explains how charters have sometimes responded by resisting the pressures and sometimes by surrendering to them. The text presents analyses of 13 different types of practices around access, each of which shapes the school’s enrollment. The authors conclude by offering recommendations for how states and authorizers can address access-related inequities that arise in the charter sector. School’s Choice provides timely information on critical academic and policy issues that will come into play as charter school policy continues to evolve. Book Features: Examines how charter schools control who gains and retains access.Explores policies and practices that undermine equitable admission and encourage opportunity hoarding.Offers a set of policy recommendations at the state and federal level to address access-related issues.

Let's Stop Calling it an Achievement Gap

Let's Stop Calling it an Achievement Gap PDF Author: Autumn A. Arnett
Publisher: IAP
ISBN: 1641135204
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 113

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Book Description
Between 1980 and 2005, 45 states were involved in lawsuits around equity of funding and adequacy of education provided to all students in the state. Indeed, this investigation could have included any cities in America, and the themes likely would have been the same: Lower funding and resources, disproportionate numbers of teachers and school leaders who do not look like the students they serve, debates over the public’s responsibility to provide fair and equitable education for all students in the jurisdiction, implicit biases from the top to the bottom and a resegregation of schools in America. Integration for Black families was never about an idea that Black students were better off if they could be around White students, it was about the idea that Black students would be better off if they could have access to the same education that White students had — but residential segregation still enables de facto school segregation, when it isn’t coded into policy. For the overwhelming majority of Black students, they’re stuck in segregated, underperforming schools. Schools where the teachers are dedicated to the mission, but where the cities and districts and states have failed to uphold their basic responsibility to maintain the upkeep of the schools and provide enough desks for each child and current textbooks.

A Smarter Charter

A Smarter Charter PDF Author: Richard D. Kahlenberg
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 0807773255
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
“A remarkable new book.... Wise and energetic advocates such as Kahlenberg and Potter can take the charter movement in new and useful directions.” —The Washington Post Moving beyond the debate over whether or not charter schools should exist, A Smarter Charter wrestles with the question of what kind of charter schools we should encourage. The authors begin by tracing the evolution of charter schools from teacher union leader Albert Shanker’s original vision of giving teachers room to innovate while educating a diverse population of students, to today’s charter schools where the majority of teachers are not unionized and student segregation levels are even higher than in traditional public schools. In the second half of the book, the authors examine two key reforms currently seen in a small but growing number of charter schools—teacher voice and socioeconomic integration—that have the potential to improve performance and reshape the stereotypical image of what it means to be a charter school. Important reading for policymakers, educators, researchers, and all citizens interested in the future of America’s public schools, A Smarter Charter features: Profiles of charter schools that are bucking the prevailing trends, including their performance data and the challenges they face. Best practices from successful charter schools, such as methods for attracting a diverse student body and examples of innovative teacher contracts. Reform strategies that can improve student outcomes in a variety of public schools, not just charters. “Kahlenberg and Potter have delivered a thought-provoking, serious contribution. Agree or not with their views on the purpose and performance of charter schools, they have important things to say on where charters have been, where they need to go, and how they can get there. Friends and foes of charter schooling, alike, would do well to read this book.” —Frederick M. Hess, resident scholar and director of Education Policy Studies, American Enterprise Institute “Read this book and draw inspiration and ideas from charter schools and educators bucking the trend and reclaiming that original, collaborative, and powerful promise and spirit. I hope parents, educators in all sectors, concerned citizens, policymakers, philanthropists—and charter sector leaders—will take its compelling message to heart and act on it.” —Dennis Van Roekel, former president, National Education Association “A tour-de-force, laying out in singular fashion what has gone wrong with the charter school movement, and what must be done to get it back on track.... A Smarter Charter is a must-read for those concerned with the future of charter schools and public education.” —Randi Weingarten, president, American Federation of Teachers

Charter Schools and Their Enemies

Charter Schools and Their Enemies PDF Author: Thomas Sowell
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 9781541675131
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
In dozens of places in New York City where a charter school and a traditional public school hold classes in the same building, charter school students in those buildings have achieved "proficiency" on statewide tests several times more often than traditional public school students taking the same tests. In 2013, a fifth-grade class in a Harlem charter school scored higher on a mathematics test than any other fifth-grade class in the entire state of New York. That included, as the New York Times put it, "even their counterparts in the whitest and richest suburbs, Scarsdale and Briarcliff Manor." Nationwide, charter schools have only a fraction of the number of students who attend traditional public schools. But charter schools enrollment is growing faster, especially in low-income minority communities. From 2001 to 2016, enrollment in traditional public schools rose 1 percent, while charter school enrollment rose 571 percent. In cities across the country, with many students on waiting lists to transfer into charter schools, public school officials are blocking charter schools from using school buildings that have been vacant for years, in order to prevent those transfers from taking place. Even in states where blocking charter schools from using vacant school buildings is illegal, the laws have been evaded. In some places, vacant school buildings have been demolished, making sure no charter schools can use them. Book jacket.

School Choice

School Choice PDF Author: Herbert J. Walberg
Publisher: Cato Institute
ISBN: 1933995041
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 144

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Book Description
School Choice: The Findings is the most comprehensive and up-to-date survey available, summarizing the research on charter schools, vouchers, and public versus private school effectiveness, from one of the country's most distinguished education scholars. The focus is on rigorous studies' those using randomized control groups (as in medical research), those that monitor achievement changes over time, and those based on large numbers of students.

The Emancipatory Promise of Charter Schools

The Emancipatory Promise of Charter Schools PDF Author: Eric Rofes
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 0791484327
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 330

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Book Description
This book opens up a critical conversation among progressive educators of various generations, races, perspectives, and social locations concerning one specific school reform initiative—charter schools. Eric Rofes and Lisa M. Stulberg bring together scholars who both study and actively participate in school choice reform and charge them to be "bold in their questioning and assertive in their own ambivalence" about this complex, controversial public issue and to include issues that are underexamined in the school literature, such as the impact of school choice on race and class politics and inequalities. The editors argue that charter schools are playing a powerful role in reviving participation in public education, expanding opportunities for progressive methods in public school classrooms, and generating new energy for community-based, community-controlled school initiatives. The result is a groundbreaking volume that pushes boundaries, questions assumptions, and rocks foundations of progressive thought.