January 5, 2021

"In city after city, from New York to New Orleans, charters have found ways to reach the children who have been most consistently failed by traditional schools."

"The evidence for their success has become overwhelming, with apolitical education researchers pronouncing themselves shocked at the size of the gains. What was ten years ago merely an experiment has become a proven means to develop the potential of children whose minds had been neglected for generations. And yet the second outcome of the charter-school breakthrough has been a bitter backlash within the Democratic Party. The political standing of the idea has moved in the opposite direction of the data, as two powerful forces — unions and progressive activists — have come to regard charter schools as a plutocratic assault on public education and an ideological betrayal. The shift has made charter schools anathema to the left. 'I am not a charter-school fan because it takes away the options available and money for public schools,' Biden told a crowd in South Carolina during the Democratic primary, as the field competed to prove its hostility toward education reform in general and charters in particular. Now, as Biden turns from campaigning to governing, whether he will follow through on his threats to rein them in — or heed the data and permit charter schools to flourish — is perhaps the most unsettled policy mystery of his emerging administration."

301 comments:

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Nonapod said...

Since the teachers unions hate charter schools and they're massive supporters of Biden I assume Biden will work to abolish them. For Biden money is far more important than assuring that children in underserved communities recieve a quality education.

mockturtle said...

have come to regard charter schools as a plutocratic assault on public education

But Charter schools are public education, are they not?

Big Mike said...

The political standing of the idea has moved in the opposite direction of the data

Describes many more ideas held by you and your precious Democrats than just charter schools. Anyway, Biden will side with the teachers unions. That’s as guaranteed as the sunrise.

Lloyd W. Robertson said...

The good things Trump achieved are going to be knocked down like 10 pins by Biden or his ventriloquist. So much for evidence-based policy.

sterlingblue said...

What will Biden do?

Whatever is worse for America and better for China.

Wince said...

Don't worry, Dr. Jill has this one.

Mike Sylwester said...

What happened to Common Core? Is that still a thing?

tcrosse said...

What's wrong with plutocrats? Isn't it the plutocracy that bankrolled Biden?

chuck said...

My prediction: Biden will go with the Union. Let's see if that holds up.

I'm Full of Soup said...

News from liberal publication that ain't really news unless you only consume liberal news!

Mike Sylwester said...

Why are charter schools a federal issue?

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Democrats hate success. Everything they do is for greed and grift, power and insider pay-to-play deals.

The teacher's union is a money laundering scheme for the left.

That's why students and parental choice must go to the back of the bus.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Biden is a corrupt pile of shit. Dragged across the finish line with cheating and ballot box stuffing.

He is a crook and his only purpose is to re-install the power center of the corrupt democrat party.

MikeR said...

Democrats care about teachers, not about children.

exhelodrvr1 said...

Democrats care about power. That's it. Period.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

"Unlearning" - The democrat party slogan for education in America.

You and your children can unlearn and get woke.

LYNNDH said...

Maybe by 2022 or 2024 the White Suburban "woperson" will start to change their voting habits once they learn that the Dems don't really like them either.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Charter Schools are often outside the reach of the corrupt Democrat Party Teacher's union money-laundering scheme. Charter Schools always perform better, and educate better than standard public schools. That why parents line up to get their children enrolled in a local Charter School and often there is a lottery.

When success happens outside of the democrat party's reach and control? It must be slaughtered, and killed.

That's why the collective corrupt left HATE charter schools.

Wince said...

Mike Sylwester said...
Why are charter schools a federal issue?

Because federal aid to primary and secondary public schools is what could be most easily converted into vouchers given directly to parents to use at the school of their choice?

wendybar said...

But the teachers unions can't make millions of taxpayer dollars if you send your kid to a school that actually teaches and doesn't indoctrinate.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Once the left are told to hate something by the media and the corrupt people on top of the corruptt democrat party - the hivemind obey.

Does not matter one bit if what they hate actually works.

Rick said...

Using Title IX (illegitimately) to create address sexual assault and harassment has proven a complete failure. It rarely addresses the issues it was supposedly created to manage at all and instead is used as a weapon against anyone the radical left opposes. Since the left created and directs it entirely on its own we should conclude this was the intended purpose. Nevertheless Biden supports it even announcing he will revoke the reforms implemented by Devos which themselves did not go nearly far enough. He justifies this by pretending the propaganda created to support the institution is true regardless of reality.

With this history how could anyone conclude reality is in any way relevant to Biden's decision making when it conflicts with the demands of a left wing constituency? It seems very obvious he will continue to protect left wing institutions regardless of their complete and continuing failure.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

The collective left HATE vouchers.

The idea that parents can have choice and leave a failing democrat run-corrupt teacher's union public school?

NOOOOOOOOO!

Dave Begley said...

What will be Biden do?

Destroy charter schools because they threaten the monopoly of the public schools and the teachers' unions.

Original Mike said...

"'I am not a charter-school fan because it takes away the options available and money for public schools,' Biden told a crowd…"

What options? As to the money, how is the school system poorer if the money follows the student? They no longer have to expend resources to teach that student?

Renee said...

The problem with charter schools is that they push students out, and if you're taking public tax dollars you can't do that. I have a son with a learning disability, no charter school will take him. And a lot of the students were probably in private schools, but they won their lottery slot for the charter.

Believe me, teacher unions play a large role here, but I don't get why tax dollars are spent for schools that do not have an elected school committee. They're private schools run on public dollars. At least the chartered vocational high school has an elected body. If a parents can choose their school, than don't judge when people use EBT benefits pay for lobster and steak.

These charter schools wouldn't last as private schools, when means they're really not that great at all. They just have an easier time expelling the IEP kids.

campy said...

"Maybe by 2022 or 2024 the White Suburban "woperson" will start to change their voting habits once they learn that the Dems don't really like them either."

It's scary that you think actual voters will ever matter in elections again. Aren't you paying attention?

Mike Sylwester said...

Which children have been most consistently failed by traditional schools?

To what extent does this problem involve only colored children who need more structure and discipline than they get in traditional schools?

Is that particular problem the only justification for charter schools?

Kevin said...

What will the "party of science" do?

Renee said...

@ Mike Sylwester

We nee more Joe Clarks.

Bill Owens said...

Remember when Biden was VP and his boss said that he was open to all policies that "worked"?
Yeah, neither do I...

Bluebutton said...

Charter schools are a federal issue because they may get a portion of their funding from the federal government and another from the state and none from local property taxes.

I teach and have my kids in a charter school. We have three main populations, kids who are odd and would be/were bullied elsewhere, religious minorities, and elite athletes who use the 4 hour school day to give them more flexibility to manage practice and study time. It's a niche, small school, but for the kids who attend, it is a setup they wouldn't be able to find elsewhere. What we don't have is much in the way of resources for special ed and very few extra curriculars. One size does not fit all.

Curious George said...

He'll back the union because charter schools aren't necessary. After all 'Poor kids' are just as bright as white kids.

Mike Sylwester said...

Renee at 9:33 AM
The problem with charter schools is that they push students out, and if you're taking public tax dollars you can't do that. I have a son with a learning disability, no charter school will take him. And a lot of the students were probably in private schools, but they won their lottery slot for the charter.

How will your son's education be improved if all the charter schools are eliminated?

jaydub said...

Biden has been wrong on every foreign policy position for the last 40 years according to close observers so why not take on education now? After all, he had to repeat third grade, lied about his "full scholarship" to law school, lied about graduating in the top half of his law class, lied about having three undergraduate degrees, etc. He should take this opportunity to eff up education the same way he effed up everything else over the past several decades. No one is likely to call him on it, and if they do he can just lie some more. Besides, his wife is a doctor.

Fernandinande said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Chuck said...

Just a word here on education and the Department of Education.

I would argue that Trump's one most effective cabinet secretary has been EdSec Betsy DeVos. Former MIGOP Chairwoman; scion of the Republican establishment in Michigan. Fundraiser and donor; 2016 Jeb Bush supporter; Trump skeptic; quietly and powerfully effective.

We'll see how she does, at washing the Trump-stink off after 2020.

Fernandinande said...

charters have found ways to reach the children who have been most consistently failed by traditional schools.

That's not true at all.

Which is why the article's link "as researchers have found urban charter students are producing higher achievement on state high-school exams and SAT scores" says no such thing.

In the rare cases where they claim that "So-and-so Charter school has great results!" and actually name a school, you can look up the school at greatschools.org, and at best it still sucks; it never fails.

MayBee said...

I bet most of these charter schools are built on foundations made of racist rocks. They should be torn down.

Mike Sylwester said...

Bluebutton at 9:39 AM
Charter schools are a federal issue because they may get a portion of their funding from the federal government and another from the state and none from local property taxes.

Is that the only reason why charter schools are a federal issue?

Suppose a particular charter school refuses all federal funding. Then will the federal government not have any say about that charter school?

SensibleCitizen said...

Charter schools need to donate massively to Democrat politicians. They only see green.

Spiros said...

No way. Government jobs provide economic security for the Black middle class. In Chicago, the Black middle class is overwhelming public school teachers, police officers and government workers. Not small businesses. Not lawyers. Not dentists. Not accountants. They're teachers and cops. So forget about it. Biden is not going to trash his supporters...

stevew said...

I doubt there is any mystery and uncertainty about what Biden/Harris will do regarding charter schools and schooling. They will stay in lock step with the public teachers and their union.

Jersey Fled said...

Forty percent of Philadelphia public school teachers send their kids to private charter schools.

One of the things about Jimmy Carter that I admired was that he sent Amy to a public DC school.

Temujin said...

Democrats have had a single-minded goal of destroying education for decades now. It did not start out as their goal, nor do they think of it as their goal, but their active role in propping up the two large teachers unions in return for massive campaign donations, while not allowing for competition in education, and working hand in hand with their friends in the media to portray school choice in any form as evil and a 'failed experiment' have done just that- destroyed education.

Just a day ago we had the comical Chicago area teacher posting instagram photos of herself poolside in Puerto Rico, while she puffed up a 'teachers movement' to allow teachers to continue to work remotely- for fear of the disease. This- while she's poolside at an island resort.

What Covid has done is to allow arenas full of parents to get a dose of what their kids education is like. And millions of parents are now either taking part in, or looking seriously at home schooling, charter schools, or other forms of school choice.

And here's the kicker that conservatives know- especially Black conservatives: Democrats have methodically and purposely destroyed generations of Black Americans by keeping them in bad schools, in bad cities. If you're a poor Black child born in the tough parts of Chicago or Detroit, it's all you can to do get to school safely. What happens in those schools is not education. It is not setting them up for a better life. It is not preparing them to get out of the ghetto. It is doing the opposite. Democrats have fought for years to protect the teachers unions over the lives of these kids.

And now the cover is coming off. When they've lost Jonathan Chait, the battle is already done. It's not surprising that the teachers and readers of New York Magazine, and 'experts' like Jonathan Chait are surprised. The rest of us are not. Not at all.

Jim Gust said...

"The political standing of the idea has moved in the opposite direction of the data, "

The perfect summation of what it means to the "the party of science."

Data? Democrats don't need no stinkin' data.

Gusty Winds said...

Biden will capitulate to whatever the Teachers Unions want. Why assume he actually cares about inner city education? No Democrat cares about inner city education. They care about their salaries, benefits, pensions, and power. We’ll see what happens tomorrow, but if Biden is installed as President, we’ll be spending six months wondering “what will Biden do” when he’s not doing or deciding anything. Then Kamala will be installed.

Mike Sylwester said...

Correction to my own comment at 9:37 AM
To what extent does this problem involve only colored children who need more structure and discipline than they get in traditional schools?

I meant to write Children of Color.

Please accept my apology and make the mental correction.

Mr Wibble said...

What options? As to the money, how is the school system poorer if the money follows the student? They no longer have to expend resources to teach that student?

There are a lot of costs that are fixed/sticky. If your student population declines by 10%, your building doesn't get 10% smaller. You might be able to make some reductions to staff, but not as much as you'd like.

Schools are like hospitals: they have to operate close to capacity in order to break even.

Howard said...

As Renee points out there's no silver bullet for education. We preferred public schools because we wanted our elite children to be exposed to underlings whom eventually become Trumpers. Also, the Charter schools in Santa Cruz catered to spectrum fidget spinners and lacked competitive athletics and vocational training.

IMO, schools need to offer more art, sports and shop classes. By severing kids from subjects that link physical activity and mental activity we have stunted the mental growth and stability of our young people.

ga6 said...

"Why are charter schools a federal issue?"

Once you take the King's shilling you are his vassal for life.



Fernandinande said...

The only advantages of charter schools are: lower cost, and they might not brainwash the kids as much or in the same way as do regular public schools. There's no measurable "three Rs" advantage.

Bob Smith said...

Biden or more likely President Harris will do exactly what the teachers unions tell them to do. We lost that fight long ago. Between spineless administration and uncaring parents we dumbed everything down so little Johnny wouldn’t get left behind. Now a substantial number of us are left behind. And at my advanced age WFC.

rhhardin said...

I'd guess that the charter schools don't teach resentment.

wildswan said...

The wise move for Cardona, the new Education Secretary, would be to split the number of charter schools in half.

Gusty Winds said...

The Teachers Unions have lost ALL credibility in 2020. They have successfully kept schools closed throughout the Chicago Suburbs, even though the population and the school boards want on-site education. I have friends that live in Lombard, IL and others in Elmhurst, IL. Their kids haven’t seen the inside of a classroom since March 13, 2020. Democrats are loving the control and the ability to flex their “importance” by holding communities hostage. Liberals don't care about educating anybody. They thrive on stupidity. Without it, they would have success at....nothing.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

If the corrupt left cannot control and milk something, it must be destroyed.

Bilwick said...

"In city after city . . . charters have found ways to reach the children most consistently failed by traditioonal schools."

Clearly, these monsters must be crushed!

Joe Smith said...

"What was ten years ago merely an experiment has become a proven means to develop the potential of children whose minds had been neglected for generations."

Nice passive statement about neglected minds. I wonder who neglected them?

Anyone? Bueller?

Sebastian said...

"their political support among Democrats has collapsed"

What's the issue? Dems want power. Teachers give them power. Ergo, Dems will do what the teachers want. QED.

Screw the inner city moms; they'll stay on the plantation anyway.

Tom Sowell wrote a book about it.

Original Mike said...

"There are a lot of costs that are fixed/sticky. If your student population declines by 10%, your building doesn't get 10% smaller. You might be able to make some reductions to staff, but not as much as you'd like. "

They could get rid of whole buildings.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

It's OK for a grocery store clerk to face hundreds of people each day.

Not OK for a teacher's union teacher to teach 30 students.

Safe safe safe and A-OK for teacher's union teacher to go on vacation.


Jersey Fled said...

The government has announced that the National Assessment of Educational Progress has been suspended through the 2022 school year "due to Covid".

Hide the decline. The damage caused by school lockdowns is massive, and we will not see the full results for years.

This is what you get when you elect Democrats.

Original Mike said...

Competition is the only thing that improves any organization.

Fernandinande said...

The perfect summation of what it means to the "the party of science."

Here's some of that "data":

"The single most rigorous study of charter schools yet conducted, funded by the U.S. Department of Education and conducted by Mathematica Policy Research, found that on average charter middle schools that held lotteries for entrance were "neither more nor less successful than traditional public schools in improving student achievement."

"The results of the Mathematica study gives context to previous research. A well-publicized study of charter schools by the Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) in 15 states and the District of Columbia studied 70% of the students enrolled in charter schools in the U.S. They found 17 percent of charters posted academic gains that were significantly better than traditional public schools, 37 percent of charter schools were significantly worse, and 46 percent were statistically indistinguishable. Another recent study by Zimmer et al. found that charters in five jurisdictions were performing the same as traditional public schools, while charter schools in two other jurisdictions were performing worse."

Mike Sylwester said...

I wonder if Jonathan Chait has enrolled his own children in a charter school.

Does he really care about "children who most consistently been failed by traditional schools"?

Or does he really care only about his own children not having to attend the local public school?

Winnie said...

Now, as Biden turns from campaigning to governing, whether he will follow through on his threats to rein them in — or heed the data and permit charter schools to flourish — is perhaps the most unsettled policy mystery of his emerging administration."

Is it? I feel there is much competition for the most unsettled policy mystery from the Biden administration.

AZ Bob said...

As a volunteer docent at a major museum, I can say without hesitation that the students from charter schools are way ahead of their local school counterparts. This is especially true in the poorest parts of the city. What I see the main difference is their attitude. I suspect that the biggest reason is that they come from families that care about how their kids do in school. People that don't care don't take the trouble to putting their kids in charter schools. And they don't do the things that help their kids become productive members of society.

tommyesq said...

Where was Jonathan Chait with this prior to the election?

Nonapod said...

Charter schools are far from perfect. I have no doubt that there's plenty of examples of poorly run charter schools or specific situations where certain children are excluded. But at least they offer more options and flexibility. To me the main take away is that primary education should be much more heterogeneous. The public school system is far too inflexible, one-size-fits-all. As a result you end up with is teaching to the lowest common denominator which actually does more harm than good in my opinion.

These are old arguments. It's easy to focus on the percieved failings of charters schools and conclude that they need to be defunded since they're not a magic bullet or whatever. But it doesn't matter anyway since the writing's on the wall, Big Union wants them gone and under the upcoming regime they'll get what they want.

Fernandinande said...

Does he really care about "children who most consistently been failed by traditional schools"?

Well, it would cost less for them to be "failed by" charter schools instead of traditional schools. Everyone should care about costs.

Leland said...

Among the talk of charter vs public; it is interesting Mike's faux pas in that "colored people" is racist but "people of color" is perfectly acceptable. Both are judging people by the color of their skin, but the latter is actually acceptable to deflect money to a political constituency to gain their support. And in that side discussion is the problem with charter vs public schools. The latter is being catered to as a political constituency to gain teacher union support, despite the evidence that shows it is bad policy. Alas, we have a government that runs on grift rather than making good choices that benefit all of us.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Biden will do what Obama did. Kill off school choice and tell parents who want the best for their children to go to hell.

The corrupt Teacher's union and one-size fits all indoctrination and pay-to-play democrat-teacher's union money whoring will prevail.


NCMoss said...

Biden may fail horribly at education (and competency) but he does get points for the most diverse administration evah!

Sam L. said...

"Apolitical education researchers"??? Really? And they haven't been beaten up (to be taught a "lesson")?? How can that BE??? (Sarc, off) (I'd rather it was ZARKOV, I loved those old Flash Gordon serials.)

Jersey Fled said...

Fernandinande:

Next time pick a study that isn't 16 years old.

But also from the same report.

"Charter middle schools' impact on student achievement varied significantly across schools.

Charter middle schools in urban areas—as well as those serving higher proportions of low-income and low achieving students—were more effective (relative to their nearby traditional public schools) than were other charter schools in improving math test scores."

Todd said...

Nonapod said...
Since the teachers unions hate charter schools and they're massive supporters of Biden I assume Biden will work to abolish them. For Biden and the teacher's union money is far more important than assuring that children in under-served communities receive a quality education.

1/5/21, 9:15 AM


Slight adjustment...

Big Mike said...

Liberals don't care about educating anybody.

Truth!

Skeptical Voter said...

Since when (never) have Democrats supported charter schools? Teachers unions hate charter schools--as it was in the beginnng, their hate is now and shall be forever.

Look to steal a phrase from Hillary Clinton, it takes a village of sorts to properly educate a child. You need good teachers and a school house for sure--but you also need parents who are supportive of education and involved with their children, and their children's education.

Not every child has that situation--particularly in "disadvantaged" neighborhoods. The charter school process is a way to select for families who want to be involved in their child's education. It separates the educational wheat from the chaff. Is it fair to judge a teacher in a public school whose potential "best students" are taken away from him or her and allowed to escape to a charter school? Probably not. Is it fair to put a potentially good student in an ill supervised badly disciplined hellhole of a classroom with a teacher who may be indifferent at best? Absolutely not.

jeremyabrams said...

OK, so it has been not only Black people but also America's poorest children who thrived under Trump's governance. Well.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Remember - every single thing the democrats do - is all for THEIR enrichment and THEIR power.

iowan2 said...

What happened to Common Core? Is that still a thing?

My take, like all bureaucracies, the powers that be, in this case Dr's, like Dr Jill, have handed down the TRUTH from on high, and every step down the ladder, the "experts" get busy redefining words, until they become meaningless, and gut the entire premise.

daskol said...

My prediction: Biden will go with the Union. Let's see if that holds up.

Of course. The notion that progressives oppose charters for any other reason than their progressive, public sector-union beholden leaders tell them to defies credulity. The data on charters is overwhelming, and anybody who opposes them is either ignorantly or knowingly advancing the cause of the powers that be over the interests of everything else. Charter schools are a very clarifying issue. They help in easily measured ways those kids who are most reachable for help--those whose parents will investigate options for their children beyond the zoned school, who know enough and care enough and are otherwise able to navigate the education system on behalf of their kids.

I have an old friend who's spent the last 15 years working in various capacities in education policy, from govt to nonprofits. He knows what charters have done, and how important they are to those families zoned for problematic elementary and middle schools. He knows what a huge impact politically problematic schools like Success Academy have had on the lives of kids in low income areas. Even still, politically he consistently supports candidates whose priority is shoring up the support of the teachers union over serving the most fragile members of their constituency. So sad.

jaydub said...

"One of the things about Jimmy Carter that I admired was that he sent Amy to a public DC school."

How did that turn out?

daskol said...

Any politician or educrat opposing charter schools is a transparently corrupt person whose interest is power and not serving her constituency. I've never seen an exception. Ignorance or corruption are the only two options, I suspect.

Carol said...

Sounds like charters are serving that small percentage of students who want to learn and don't have behavioral problems.

But regular public schools need them to sit by the problem students because just being there helps you know.

daskol said...

I don't want to ascribe good motives to Cuomo, as I doubt they explain much about him, but I did enjoy the hell out of his promotion of Eva Moskowitz (founder of Success Academy, probably most impressive chain of charters in NYC) as a mayoral candidate and his championing of charter schools, even if the main purpose was the humiliation and discomfort of Mayor Wilhelm.

mandrewa said...

Just Thinking Out Loud with Desi-Rae: Meet Katharine Birbalsingh

This an hour long discussion of a charter school in the UK by two women, one of whom founded the
charter school. Both of them are from Jamaica. And it's a worthwhile and interesting discussion,
although it takes an hour to listen to.

Part of the reason I listened to this was I recognized Desi-Rae's name from a list of videos that
YouTube was recommending to me today (thank you YouTube). And I listened to it because who knows
how much longer that will be possible. We are going into a period of darkness where many
thinking people are going to be censored.

Desi-Rae, for instance, has already been persecuted in the past. She has been removed from YouTube before
and also from Patreon -- and was denied the use of PayPal, or PayPal wouldn't allow people that wanted
to give her money to do it through PayPal. And what gets a person treated like this? Well in this video
Desi-Rae expresses her disdain for Black Lives Matter -- and guess what? -- that will probably be
sufficient reason to deny her the use of her credit card a year from now if we take the past as a guide.

So it's a good time to look around and try to find all the right-wing voices you appreciate and would
like to keep track of, because the odds are good that if you don't know their name now then you won't be
able to find them on YouTube and Facebook and Twitter pretty soon.

wildswan said...

It's my opinion that closing charter schools is one reason why the Dems unexpectedly lost so many votes in the big cities that they had to do what they did as poorly as they did it. They were not ready for the scale of the defeat. And I think also that closing charter schools is one reason why Dems do well among the "woke" of Drain County - even Chait admits that. But how do these differing votes play into that long-running debate over the meaning of IQ? - for it's certain that the wokies are high IQ and that they voted for Biden who is just like them as they like to say.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Biden:

'I am not a charter-school fan because it takes away the options available and money for public schools,'

That's is a lie.

The hivemind believe and obey!

Joe Smith said...

"We'll see how she does, at washing the Trump-stink off after 2020."

You're an ill-bred moron.

Trump stink?

She has two billion fucking dollars.

She gives zero fucks about what you or anyone else thinks.

Good for her.

Sebastian said...

"children who most consistently been failed by traditional schools"

I am in favor of choice and competition as a matter of principle, but at least in terms eventual achievement, the extent to which "children have been failed by traditional schools" is debatable, since outcomes depend heavily on individual aptitude and family environment.

Charters vary greatly in organization, staffing, and student population, and research on effects shows variable outcomes, so I also question the Chait argument. Of course, actual academic achievement level reached is not the only relevant measure of success.

As I recall, part of Milton Friedman's argument was that competition raises everyone's game. I am not sure charters are a big enough competitive threat yet to trigger that dynamic but if anyone knows of research testing his hypothesis, I'd be interested.

Owen said...

Temujin @ 9:48: "...the cover is coming off." I sure hope so.

Folks: a very good source (IMHO) of knowledge on charter schools is Thomas Sowell's recent "Charter Schools And Their Enemies." He knows whereof he speaks, and delivers a mass of data showing how (a good many, not all) charter schools blow the doors off public and even private schools. Not only do the kids outperform their "peers" at nearby public schools in tough neighborhoods; they outperform almost all other kids in the state on standardized tests. No wonder the unions fear and loathe them; and have taken extraordinary measures to buy politicians to crush them.

My hope is that, yes, the cover is coming off. Millions of taxpaying parents struggling to give their kids a chance, struggling to do their work remotely while Junior stares at a Zoom screen that is supposed to replace his math or history or English class; those parents are wising up. They have to. And I suspect they will not listen patiently to a lot of happy talk from the Dems on how charters are just not fair; how they steal resources that simply must be devoted to the teachers' union fund for overseas professional development conferences.

If this issue is handled well, it could split the Dems at a fundamental level. Yeah, I know, I'm a dreamer.

Dude1394 said...

Biden* will work to abolish them, the democrats have and always will work to abolish them. It’s not as if any of their other policies have done anything but destroy black peoples lives and homes. Black people are idiots for continuing to support their own destruction.

Dude1394 said...

Vouchers dammit.

Rick said...

One of my children had a year with a teacher who devoted the entire class to digressive rants touting the gold standard, disdain for the value of college, claims that men are inherently more rational than women, and other bizarre or offensive obsessions.

Note how Chait appeals specifically to left wingers. One of my sons could have had a wasted year in public school and I suspect most kids in his class did so. His standard class was the teacher handing out a few worksheets at the beginning of class and filling them out from a text. The teacher would read books during this time - questions were not allowed. Incompetence is not necessarily ideological, but that's the only incompetence left wingers won't make excuses for.

My wife ended up teaching my son the second grade material - and my younger sons went to a different school. You can make public schools work for you but it takes a tremendous amount of effort and knowledge that most people don't have - including myself.

Earnest Prole said...

Teachers’ unions are the strongest proof structural racism is alive and well in America.

Mr Wibble said...

They could get rid of whole buildings.

The really can't. As a practical matter they're often carrying a large amount of debt from financing construction / renovations of the building. It doesn't make sense to take on more debt to purchase another, slightly smaller building, and finding a buyer for a large school is going to be difficult, since the buildings are pretty specialized.

Michael said...

Chait can confront the Progressive narrative on charter schools because his wife understands this stuff from the inside as well as the outside.

"Everyone is a conservative about what they know best."

I'm Not Sure said...

"In the rare cases where they claim that "So-and-so Charter school has great results!" and actually name a school, you can look up the school at greatschools.org, and at best it still sucks; it never fails."

Assume, for the moment, that's true. If parents prefer that school over the local public school, the local public school must really suck. Why shouldn't parents be able to send their kids to the school they prefer?

Fernandinande said...

Democrats have had a single-minded goal of destroying education for decades now.

US schools are just about the best in the world.

Test scores are slightly worse - on average - than 30 or 50 years ago because US demographics have changed for the worse.

[Sowell] knows whereof he speaks, and delivers a mass of data showing how (a good many, not all) charter schools blow the doors off public and even private schools.

Why don't you post some of that data? Nobody else seems to know about it.

I'm Not Sure said...

They could get rid of whole buildings.

The really can't. As a practical matter they're often carrying a large amount of debt from financing construction / renovations of the building. It doesn't make sense to take on more debt to purchase another, slightly smaller building, and finding a buyer for a large school is going to be difficult, since the buildings are pretty specialized.


They can get rid of whole buildings if they try.

The school district where I grew up closed three junior high schools when enrollment fell. One is being used as a special education facility, the others were sold off, the buildings torn down and the land was developed as single family housing.

Fernandinande said...

Why shouldn't parents be able to send their kids to the school they prefer?

They should be able to. I'm got against charter schools at all, I'm against lying about how wonderful they are when in fact they're just about the same as public schools in education results (more often worse than better).

Kirk Parker said...

Mr. Wibble @ 9:52am,

What's this "breaking even" that you refer to? Public schools are inherently not businesses...

Owen said...

Classroom discipline is critical to kids' learning. Of course it can be overdone; but IMHO the most common problem in public schools seems to a lack of discipline. It only takes one jackass to make it impossible for every other kid to learn much. Who among us did not enjoy some hijinks? But the hijinks were kept within bounds, were rare; which in fact added a frisson to "putting one over." The year my teacher gave up on his class was the most terrifying in my life: a real "Lord of the Flies" vision of how bad things could be when the "adults" lost it. I cannot imagine how some of the teachers in "disadvantaged" schools can cope.

If --IF-- public schools were to return to a policy of discipline --summary expulsion of troublemakers-- the message would soon be absorbed. They could get back to teaching instead of running a prison. And a big part of what they could teach would be character. From which academic achievement often follows.

Yeah, I'm a dreamer.

Sebastian said...

"part of Milton Friedman's argument was that competition raises everyone's game"

Sorry to comment on my own comment, but Chait does have a link to a modest body of research on mixed but positive-leaning data on healthy competition.

wild chicken said...

Truth is K12 schools were forced to mainstream a lot of kids who used to go to separate schools.

It has been a huge burden and bright kids are basically ignored because there's no enough time to encourage them and handle violent sped students too.

And the more liberal reforms and gimmicks schools adopt, the less anyone respects them.

daskol said...

Owen, expelling kids from a neighborhood school is very difficult. Where else are they supposed to go? The problematic zoned schools are rife with kids who don't want to be there, but can't be kicked out because of compulsory education. That's why charters and/or vouchers are so crucial to helping those kids in such areas by offering them the chance to escape the school of last resort.

Eleanor said...

The concept behind the charter school movement was for these schools to become educational laboratories where different teaching methods could be tried out and evaluated before we tried to get the huge behometh known as public school to do things differently. To have a proved track record to pitch. To give these public charter schools the freedom they need to try out new ideas requires an acceptance that some charter schools will succeed and some will fail. Some will find their methods work very well with some students and not so well with others. The forces behind the charter schools never promised or imagined every one of them would exceed the standards set by the government to define a "successful student". Many of them argue with that definition of success. To get parents to offer their children up as guinea pigs, the charter schools often adopt a feature of a "magnet school". Many of the schools adopt a "specialty" to their curriculum like an enhanced arts or science program, or may be the school graduates every child able to function in two languages. Those aren't features of why there are charter schools. That's the bait. Any school that uses a charter to cherry pick the most involved parents and eliminates all the kids with special needs and behavior issues isn't doing an true experiment. We already know those kids will get higher scores even with the world's worst teachers. Anyone who wants schools to do better should support the charter school movement. Engineers don't build 500,000 cars without building a prototype and test driving it first.

Static Ping said...

It remains cute that the media is still pretending that Biden is in any way the president, given his obvious mental decline. Of course, they have lied about it all through 2020, so why stop now. Also, they have been lying about EVERYTHING for so long, so why stop now.

MadisonMan said...

Follow the Science until it's at odds with Unions.

Inga said...

“In the rare cases where they claim that "So-and-so Charter school has great results!" and actually name a school, you can look up the school at greatschools.org, and at best it still sucks; it never fails.”

So charter schools are taking federal funds from public schools with no better outcomes for the students? Seems like a waste of taxpayer dollars.

Birches said...

Where do you go to school Renee? Our charter in Colorado was happy to take kids with an IEP but the district refused to give the extra special ed funds those students were entitled too.

It's always about the money.

Fernandinande said...

"Both 9- and 13-year-olds scored higher in reading and mathematics in 2012 than students their age in the early 1970s (figure A). Scores were 8 to 25 points higher in 2012 than in the first assessment year."
[on a 500 point scale]

"Seventeen-year-olds, however, did not show similar gains. Average reading and mathematics scores in 2012 for 17-year-olds were not significantly different from scores in the first assessment year[1971]." (they peaked slightly in the 1990s).

The only important thing is what the kids know when they're done with school, so the small gains for 9- and 13-year-olds are just about irrelevant.

I Callahan said...

I am in favor of choice and competition as a matter of principle, but at least in terms eventual achievement, the extent to which "children have been failed by traditional schools" is debatable, since outcomes depend heavily on individual aptitude and family environment.

I think this is 100% true. And ironically, charter schools is proof of that, for 2 reasons: one, parents that select charter schools for their kids fall into the better "family environment" category - these are parents that actually care. The second reason is that these same kids won't get as distracted by the other nonsense that goes on in standard public schools - violence levels, gangs, kids whose parents don't care.

That said, it's a win for that subset of public school kids who at least have a shot at getting out of the ghetto. You can't save them all, but at least some get saved in an environment where charter schools work.

daskol said...

Besides the fact that they can kick kids out and also have some say in who they admit, a huge advantage of charter schools is that they don't need to hire union teachers and aren't bound by the DOE curriculum. They can get and promote young and enthusiastic teachers, and they don't need to keep burned out teachers doing their time until retirement. And thanks Inga for illustrating that opposition to charters is inevitably either borne of ignorance or corruption. I'm going with ignorance in your case, since your statement of the "problem" of charter schools is so completely incorrect.

Curious George said...

Let me guess, Fernandinande has a kid who is a public school teacher.

Joe Smith said...

Terrible schools (most are) are the biggest public policy problem facing this country.

And half of the population just doesn't care.

My boys never went to public school, and are doing great.

But millions of parents have no choice (hey, where have I heard that word?).

The entire country is being dragged down by the failure to effectively educate children.

But nothing will be done to fix it.

MadisonMan said...

because US demographics have changed for the worse.
What does that mean?

I Callahan said...

So charter schools are taking federal funds from public schools with no better outcomes for the students? Seems like a waste of taxpayer dollars.

The above statement is a perfect example of how public schools DON'T work, because the person making the comment can't follow a logical trail.

The outcomes ARE better for a subset of students. If there were no charter schools, the outcomes would be bad for ALL students. What part of this do you not understand?

Birches said...

I have no doubt that if extra federal and state money were available for kids with learning disabilities and special needs, charters would open that specifically cater to them. And they'd probably get better results.

I Callahan said...

In the rare cases where they claim that "So-and-so Charter school has great results!" and actually name a school, you can look up the school at greatschools.org, and at best it still sucks; it never fails.

First of all, this is an awfully blanket statement. It never fails? Second of all, are the outcomes better than the standard public schools for the same areas? Always - it never fails.

You're trying to make an apples to apples comparison here when it's not warranted.

Birches said...

Back when I attended elementary school, my mom had to lie about our address for years so I could go to a good school. Now, I could go to at least three different charters in the area.

Rick said...

Fernandinande said...
"The single most rigorous study of charter schools yet conducted, funded by the U.S. Department of Education and conducted by Mathematica Policy Research, found that on average charter middle schools that held lotteries for entrance were "neither more nor less successful than traditional public schools in improving student achievement."



This is addressed in the article so obviously you didn't read it. This is an old study. The same group has performed additional studies more recently which show the large improvements he mentions.

This is exactly what we would expect. The charter institutions themselves are learning what works and becoming better.

J Melcher said...

Renee said...
The problem with charter schools is that they push students out, and if you're taking public tax dollars you can't do that.

Well, the recently late Principal Joe Clark succeeded by pushing out hundreds of teens (I won't call them "students") from the public high school they had been forced to attend.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/celebrities/2020/12/29/principal-joe-clark-who-inspired-1989-film-lean-me-dies-82/4083822001/

After a year at Eastside, the bullhorn-toting Clark had expelled 300 students for poor grades and spotty attendance. But he raised the expectations of the remaining students, "continually challenging them to perform better," his family wrote.

That was then. NOW the only administrations with the spine to sort the students from the thugs work in (public) charter schools.

mockturtle said...

The Democrats/Teachers Unions don't want a truly educated populace. They want a stupid and 'woke' populace who will swallow every idiocy that the Progs dream up.

daskol said...

I'm not sure how things work elsewhere, Birches, but in NYC if you qualify for special educational assistance, you can typically get it wherever you go to school. For example, there are students in my kids' religious school who have educational assistants accompanying them all day, just as they would in a public school. The funds in this case are attached to the kid, not the school. For kids with severe learning disabilities, there are (very, very expensive) private schools that cater to their needs. The city provides reimbursement to parents for the often six-figure costs of these schools, although getting the reimbursement typically involves a court process each year to establish the level of need, and parents are often reimbursed a year or two after laying out costs. There are severe resource differences across schools in different areas, arising from the contributions raised by the parent associations, but the city spend on students, special and regular needs, is pretty consistent. The spend is high, and it's probably not a deficiency in the amount that accounts for our worst performing schools. The problems lie elsewhere.

n.n said...

Signal diversity (e.g. 50 state laboratory, market, people... persons) will, in principle, outperform single/central/monolithic solutions. An adaptive system. A higher order curve-fitting function.

daskol said...

Besides the fact that expelling kids is problematic for zoned schools of last resort (where else does the kid go?), schools are incentivized not to expel students because the schools funds are tied to headcount. As a result, spotty attendance is not considered as a problem in zoned schools: money for nothing.

Rick said...

Birches said...
I have no doubt that if extra federal and state money were available for kids with learning disabilities and special needs, charters would open that specifically cater to them.


For the most part parents don't want this, they want tehri kids mainstreamed so they sit next to yours most of the day and have special classes to handle whatever their extra needs are.

Ultimately the left's argument is that high performing kids should not be taught to maximize their potential, they need to be held back to maximize others kids' potential. This is outrageously offensive but the inevitable result of how they evaluate everything by group instead of by individual and focus on "equity" rather than excellence.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Russia Russia Corruption supporting Inga supports the anti-school choice movement of the corrupt left. buys false arguments. so shocked are we.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

from the link. and Chait is a leftist.

"The achievement gap between poor Black and Latino students in cities and rich white students in suburbs represents a sickening waste of human ability and is a rebuke to the American credo of equal opportunity. Its stubborn persistence has tormented generations of educators and social reformers. The rapid progress in producing dramatic learning gains for poor children, and the discovery of models that have proved reliable in their ability to reproduce them, is one of the most exciting breakthroughs in American social policy. For many education specialists, the left’s near abandonment of charter schools has been a bleak spectacle of unlearning — the equivalent of Lincoln promising to rip out municipal water systems or Eisenhower pledging to ban the polio vaccine. Just as the dream is becoming real, the party that helped bring it to life is on the verge of snuffing it out."

mockturtle said...

Well, the recently late Principal Joe Clark succeeded by pushing out hundreds of teens (I won't call them "students") from the public high school they had been forced to attend.

Disruptive students unwilling to learn should not be allowed to dilute and defeat the education of those who are willing.

Omaha1 said...

This quote from the linked article is cloaked in bullshit. The achievement gap is independent of wealth or socioeconomic status. "The achievement gap between poor Black and Latino students in cities and rich white students in suburbs represents a sickening waste of human ability and is a rebuke to the American credo of equal opportunity."

Parents should get whatever money is spent on their children's education directly, no vouchers, no funding for public schools. It is THEIR MONEY. If they had that money they could make whatever choices they want, including home schooling.

mandrewa said...

It's easy to 'win' a debate if you shoot the opposing debate team before the debate.

How can we evaluate what is going on when we have extraordinary rewards, like for most people just simply having a career, something that will support you and your family, if you publish papers that claim that charter schools are no better or worse than public schools, where for the other side is expected to do everything on a volunteer basis, and if they really do a good job of it, then they risk being expelled from the public forums.

So in this context it's completely inevitable that papers and studies will appear claiming that charter schools don't work. This will happen regardless of the actual truth, whatever it is.

So what do you do about this? People's choices are so limited. They can become 'experts' on the subject and make a significant effort and add their own personal voice to the debate. But for every such 'expert,' because they aren't really, there are ten thousand people who believe in reasoning by authority and will echo the politically-determined 'authority' and they will never recognize their errors because they didn't get their viewpoints by reasoning (other than the belief in authority) in the first place.

n.n said...

But Charter schools are public education, are they not?

This goes to the popular misconception: talent is equally distributed, but opportunity is not. Public education is a progression to a mean that will realize... nay, force this belief. It's reminiscent of the Democrat Atlanta's policy of "every child left behind" in the spirit of affirmative discrimination.

Inga said...

“The funds in this case are attached to the kid, not the school. For kids with severe learning disabilities, there are (very, very expensive) private schools that cater to their needs.”

Aren’t charter schools allowed to refuse entry to these children? Isn’t that what Renee has said?

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

More from lefty Chait:

"In college, I had a brief experience tutoring bright students who’d been taught depressingly little by the public schools of Detroit, which impressed upon me the cruelty of a system that denied so many kids any chance to develop their talent. But it wasn’t until I met my wife that I got interested in charter schools. Robin has devoted her career to education policy: She studied it in graduate school, taught at a low-income school, worked in local and federal education departments, researched for a liberal think tank, did executive-level work for a charter-school network. Her current role is with a nonprofit organization, consulting for and providing technical assistance to schools and state education bodies. Because of Robin, I’ve gained a window into a siloed world of experts who grasp both the state of research on charter schools and its staggering moral implications. Once you have scrutinized a machine that systematically squanders the intellect of an entire caste of citizens before they have reached adulthood, then glimpsed an alternative that reliably does the opposite, it is hard to stop thinking about it.

Charter schools face a crisis in large part because people don’t understand them. They haven’t existed long enough — the first one opened in the U.S. just 28 years ago — for most Americans to gain a passing knowledge of what they are or how they work. Polling shows that only about half the public can correctly state whether charters are public schools (true) or are free to teach religion (false). Solid majorities incorrectly believe they can charge tuition or select their students on the basis of ability. Even people who work professionally in politics tend to know little about the subject, which resides at the margins of familiar terrain and operates by a peculiar political logic that confounds the ordinary partisan dynamic."

Inga is down with the left's lie that Charter Schools are bad.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Charter Schools are public. They are not controlled by the nasty leftwing money wasting teachers union.

THAT is the problem.

Add to that we know Joe Biden is a racist - so killing off choice for blacks is right in his wheelhouse.

Inga said...

“For kids with severe learning disabilities, there are (very, very expensive) private schools that cater to their needs. The city provides reimbursement to parents for the often six-figure costs of these schools, although getting the reimbursement typically involves a court process each year to establish the level of need, and parents are often reimbursed a year or two after laying out costs.”

How many parents of children who’s child needs an IEP can afford to pay these exorbitant costs up front and wait for reimbursement?

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

mockturtle said...

The Democrats/Teachers Unions don't want a truly educated populace. They want a stupid and 'woke' populace who will swallow every idiocy that the Progs dream up.

Which is self-defeating because if they swallow anything you tell them, they're just as likely to swallow whatever someone else tells them and that can lead to you losing control.

Tell me again how the Democrats are the smartest people in the room!

narciso said...

Thats the first thing obama did, and yet sent his kids to private school

Howard said...

BFTP April, so you disrepute Ferdinandstein's stastictics showing lower performance compared with Marxist schools?

Where did you send your kids? Public, private, charter

Rick said...

J Melcher said...
NOW the only administrations with the spine to sort the students from the thugs work in (public) charter schools.


This developed because "public policy" lawyers (i.e., left wing activists with law degrees) sued the schools and convinced well meaning but stupid judges that the kids are owed an education regardless of their own behavior. As always happens when you remove consequences for bad behavior you get more of it. It isn't about "spine", the requirements were imposed from the outside.

Of course over time the administrations developed to support the new requirements. It's interesting to compare the institutional evolutions. The ones with left wingers using courts to enforce their beliefs have been deteriorating steadily for decades. The ones breaking free of those restrictions are improving.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

The lottery system to get in a local charter school is not based on anything - but luck of the draw. It's not a standards test at all. So it's fair, in that regard...

Parents are usually over-joyed if their child can get in a local charter school and leave the poorly run public school behind.

Chait acknowledges this here a bit.

Specifically, what the charter movement has developed is highly effective networks of public charters — such as Success Academy, the Knowledge Is Power Program, and Uncommon Schools — that specialize in closing the achievement gap between Black and white students. The fact that charters cannot select their students, and have to conduct admissions lotteries if they have more applicants than spaces, creates natural experiments. Researchers can compare the academic performance of children who win the lottery and attend a charter with those who lose it and attend a traditional neighborhood school. Every lottery study has found charters produce overall learning gains for urban students. Many of those gains are huge, effectively wiping out the educational inequities that have persisted for the entire history of American schools.

Oh no! Biden must kill that. Inga agrees.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

The discussion of school for kids with special needs is separate that the discussion about Charter Schools.

The special needs crisis in this nation is one that will come home to roost at some point.

exhelodrvr1 said...

Biggest problem with public schools is parents who don't take education seriously, and don't support the teachers.
#2 issue is excessive government involvement
#3 is teachers unions.

Charter schools limit all three of those. Doesn't mean they will be perfect, but they have a much higher likelihood of success.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

More from Chait, lefty.

n part because of charters’ messy evolution, the mounting proof that the schools work has been met with a nagging roster of objections. Some skeptics have raised the suspicion that these schools are merely “teaching to the test,” incentivizing teachers to robotically drill their pupils in narrow subject matter. But that wouldn’t explain the fact that, as researchers have found, urban charter students are producing higher achievement on state high-school exams and SAT scores and are enrolling in more Advanced Placement courses and scoring higher on those exams. Teachers don’t get paid based on how students do on those tests, and schools don’t control them and can’t cheat on them. The only way to achieve those across-the-board gains is to teach the kids more.

Another possible objection is that charters can only help students whose parents have the motivation to seek them out. This turns out not to be true either. Some cities have automatically enrolled students in charter schools and have still produced the same impressive learning gains. “Evidence from the lottery studies,” researchers summarizing the evidence conclude, “suggests that charter schools may actually be more effective at increasing the achievement of students who are less likely to apply.”

daskol said...

Even with lottery based admissions, there is a "selection bias" issue in comparing charter school outcomes to neighborhood schools. For the lottery schools, only kids whose parents are aware of the options and can navigate the application process end up entering the lottery. So you're starting with a pool of kids whose parents are pretty deeply involved in their kids' education. And even the lottery charters are usually not pure lotteries, but give priority to kids in a few nearby zones/districts, and also typically consider other factors, giving priority to siblings and, increasingly, lower income (e.g. free lunch) kids.

That's one of the ironies of the charter movement: almost everyone involved in the formation and administration of these schools, which are typically proponents of "progressive education," consider themselves deeply progressive. And yet they are at odds politically with the progressive politicians and bureaucrats and their NPC echo chamber. As Chait points out, the difference between people who support charters and those who oppose them is, outside of corrupt people advocating their own interests, awareness vs. ignorance.

Inga said...

“Biggest problem with public schools is parents who don't take education seriously, and don't support the teachers.”

I totally agree.

JPS said...

"What will Biden do?"

Whatever he's told by those who ran him. That was the deal.

This is my answer to that question in any context, not just re charter schools.

Skippy Tisdale said...

I have a son with a learning disability, no charter school will take him.

I don't believe you.

Chick said...

Does anyone know, where did Catholic Joe attend elementary school, was it the public school system or a school run by nuns? Follow up question, where did Hunter spend his elementary school years?

Omaha1 said...

BidenFamily...

"The discussion of school for kids with special needs is separate that the discussion about Charter Schools.The special needs crisis in this nation is one that will come home to roost at some point."

Yes this is different and separate. And special education is still not effective in any way shape or form. My son (who is now 34) was in Special Education for over 18 years and he did not learn to read or do basic math. He is cognitively disabled (about a 6-7 year old level intellectually but 12-14 year old level for self care and other things).

I'm sure that hundreds of thousands of dollars were spent on his "education" but overall it was a massive failure.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

more from Chait:

Doubters have fallen back on the claim that, even if charters help the students who enroll in them, the children left behind are harmed. It is true that shifting funding into a charter reduces resources for a neighborhood school. But the research, so far, doesn’t support a zero-sum view. A survey of all the studies attempting to quantify such an effect found “some support for the ‘healthy competition’ hypothesis” — that is, the notion that charters force traditional schools to improve — “and almost none for the hypothesis that students in district schools are harmed by the growth of charters.”

btw- schools are not funded with federal funds - but local state municipalities.
Again - Inga passes a poorly constructed argument about "federal funds". "waste!"


Howard- US Dept of education says what? LOL.

Joe Smith said...

"Does anyone know, where did Catholic Joe attend elementary school, was it the public school system or a school run by nuns? Follow up question, where did Hunter spend his elementary school years?"

Joe spent his formative years eating paste.

Hunter spent his youth sniffing glue.

See a pattern?

Fernandinande said...

from the link. and Chait is a leftist.

That might explain why he seems to live in fact-free fantasy land.

The statements below are from Chait's links:

"On average, charter middle schools that held lotteries were neither more nor less successful than traditional public schools in improving math or reading test scores, attendance, grade promotion, or student conduct within or outside of school. Being admitted to a study charter school did significantly improve both students' and parents' satisfaction with school."

+

"We found a strong and statistically significant negative association between students’ baseline test scores and charter schools impacts on their subsequent reading and math scores.

The higher the achievement scores of their incoming students, the more negative were the estimated impacts of study charter schools. On the other hand, when we split students evenly into two groups—those with higher versus lower baseline achievement levels—differences in impacts between the two groups were not statistically significant after adjusting for multiple treatment-control comparisons.

[IOW, charter schools tend to have a negative effect on smart kids]

•There were no significant differences in charter school impacts for other student subgroups.

Charter school impacts were statistically similar for student subgroups defined by race and ethnicity and gender."

Fernandinande said...

Perhaps "Educatrix Jill" will try to enlighten us.

Omaha1 said...

I mean for "special education" why not just teach them to wash dishes or clean bathrooms or something else productive. At least then they wouldn't just be sitting at home playing video games and watching TV which is what my son is doing now and for the last four years. It is sad!

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

more from lefty Chait:

"For years, perhaps the most devastating acronym in anti-charter sentiment was CREDO. The Center for Research on Education Outcomes at Stanford conducted a national survey in 2009 that compared the outcomes of similar kids (as measured by factors like family income) at charters and traditional public schools. The report found that charters were producing slightly worse outcomes than traditional public schools. If you’ve read much criticism of charters, you’ve probably seen a reference to the study, which skeptics have treated as the final word. But its conclusions have long since ceased to be true. Another CREDO study four years later found the sector had improved, and in 2015, a survey focused on charters in urban districts, where education reformers have concentrated their energies (and where gains have outpaced suburban and rural areas). It found urban charters on average gave their students the equivalent of 40 additional school days of learning in math and 28 additional days of learning in reading every year. CREDO’s studies confirm the conclusion that the lottery studies have found: In most cases, urban charters now provide the same group of students much better instruction."

mandrewa said...

The charter school discussed in Meet Katharine Birbalsingh
is the sixth highest ranked school in the UK, out of some 3,000 schools. And this is a school in a problematic
part of London with a demographic population that is doing very badly in nearby public schools. (Now I'm using a
U.S. terminology to describe this. These things go by different names in the UK context.)

And we can find the same sort of thing in the United States, if we look. There should be no question that
there are some charter schools that do extremely, almost unbelievably, well.

So what are these very successful schools doing that is so different? Now most of us, here, aren't going to
be all that surprised when we look into what they are doing. It's not like we (that is humanity in the
abstract sense) didn't already know this. The reason we are not doing these things in most schools is because
of the religious-political beliefs of most of the people in the educational system. And religion trumps reality.

mtrobertslaw said...

Uncle Joe's vaunted empathy comes to a skidding stop at the door of every public school whose students cannot write because they do not understand the rules of punctuation, who cannot do simple arithmetic without a hand calculator and whose 8th grade students can barely read.

Inga said...

“btw- schools are not funded with federal funds - but local state municipalities.”

Are you saying charter schools take NO federal funds?

“Charter schools are eligible for all federal financial support to the same extent as traditional public schools. Charter schools may elect to use the traditional student funding formula or propose an alternative formula to their authorizer.”

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Fernie - Your second link is complete junk.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Inga- generally speaking public schools are funded with local and state tax revenue, yes. Some federal assistance is available for specific programs.

Inga said: "So charter schools are taking federal funds from public schools with no better outcomes for the students? Seems like a waste of taxpayer dollars.

What does that mean?

Fernandinande said...

"I have a son with a learning disability, no charter school will take him."

I don't believe you.


Anecdotes are rarely worth believing or disbelieving, but there is a slight trend:

"We find that, overall, traditional public schools’ response rates are similar to the response rates from charter schools across treatment messages. However, there is a different response rate to messages that signal a child has a significant special need.

Traditional public schools exhibit no differential response rate to these messages, but charter schools are 7 percentage points less likely to respond to them than to the baseline message."
(Baseline response rate was 53%)

Omaha1 said...

nga said...
“For kids with severe learning disabilities, there are (very, very expensive) private schools that cater to their needs. The city provides reimbursement to parents for the often six-figure costs of these schools, although getting the reimbursement typically involves a court process each year to establish the level of need, and parents are often reimbursed a year or two after laying out costs.”

"How many parents of children who’s child needs an IEP can afford to pay these exorbitant costs up front and wait for reimbursement?"

I think with the hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on my disabled son's education I could have done a better job if they just gave me the money. He was involved with the public school system for over 18 years and somehow he never learned to read beyond a first grade level. Let alone learning any mundane skills that he could have used to become a more productive member of society. Yes I could have done more but I had to work full time as a single parent.

Inga said...

Charter Schools: How is the funding for a charter school determined?

Fernandinande said...

Fernie - Your second link is complete junk.

Thanks for the informative information, but, like I said, those were Chait's links.

Rick said...

narciso said...
Thats the first thing obama did, and yet sent his kids to private school


The second thing he did was try to kill the DC charter funding.

President Obama has relented in his opposition to a scholarship program in Washington, D.C., that allows poor students to escape failing public schools by providing vouchers that fund attendance at charter and private schools.

House Republicans succeeded in reauthorizing the scholarship program in 2011, but the president chose not to fund the program in his most recent budget request. That decision threatened 1,200 students who applied for scholarships this year.


This is amusing because Chait tries to credit Obama and Dems generally for the charter movement because he knows politics is the only relevant fact to left wingers.

Inga said...

“I think with the hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on my disabled son's education I could have done a better job if they just gave me the money. He was involved with the public school system for over 18 years and somehow he never learned to read beyond a first grade level. Let alone learning any mundane skills that he could have used to become a more productive member of society. Yes I could have done more but I had to work full time as a single parent.”

I’m sorry to hear this and agree you are probably right. Maybe individual parents will one day be reimbursed for the cost of educating their own child. It would be worth the money.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

There is a local successful Charter High School in Lafayette, CO. I know a teacher who works there, and she is lovely. I have no idea her political leanings but If i had to guess she's probably a democrat. I also know this school is extremely popular with both students and parents. It's a complete success. Everyone wants in.

No fair!

We don't want success.


Hopefully Biden will shut it down. Because fairness.

Instead of tearing down what works. Why not make public schools more competitive to the charter school model?

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Inga said

"I’m sorry to hear this and agree you are probably right. Maybe individual parents will one day be reimbursed for the cost of educating their own child. It would be worth the money."

That's called vouchers, Inga. You are against vouchers.
Stay on the plantation, Inga.

mandrewa said...

Ferdinande, do you actually understand what you are citing? Or are you just citing studies that you don't know how to evaluate?

You should realize that there is a fundamental problem with taking any negative study about charter schools at face value. And that basic problem is that people who have a huge financial incentive to do these studies. That huge incentive guarantees a result regardless of whatever the truth is.

Are you just lending yourself to spreading propaganda?

Because if you are not putting anything of yourself into this, that is really trying to understand things and look critically at them, that is all you are doing.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Fernie - that second link you posted - to the dept of Ed - I'm not seeing that linked anywhere in Chait's article.

Scott said...

The Teachers Unions have lost ALL credibility in 2020.

Look around you. Does credibility have anything to do with power?

GingerBeer said...

He'll do what Dr. Biden tells him to do. She is, after all, a member of the NEA.

Tom said...

Liberals: We desperately need to overcome the past 350 years of oppression of African Americans.

Also Liberals: Let’s help African American kids by trapping them in failing schools, siphoning off the tax dollars meant to pay for their education to our pockets, and attacking anyone who tries to improve the situation. To be kind, we won’t call it a plantation.

daskol said...

The way charter opponents wave around v1 of the CREDO study reminds me of the old-school nutrition science people who waved around "the China Study" showing red meat supposedly causes cancer when Gary Taubes was beginning the popularization of what's since become common knowledge regarding carbohydrates and the obesity epidemic in the West. Fixate on a single piece of work, ignore everything else, including the biases of the study's authors. That's "science," not science.

Left Bank of the Charles said...

Let's say a charter school is introduced into a school district, and the charter school gets 10% of the more highly-motivated students leaving the remaining 90% in the traditional public school.

Even if there is no difference in the educational attainment of the individual students, it's going to look like the charter school is providing a better education and the traditional public school is providing a worse education.

Inga said...

“That's called vouchers, Inga. You are against vouchers.”

So now you’re asserting that all parents who home school their children are given vouchers?

Public Resources Available to Homeschoolers

Scott said...

We only have Charter Schools because they are useful for Democrats to steal energy from the really threatening innovation: School vouchers.

You want stronger charter schools? Campaign for vouchers.

Mid-Life Lawyer said...

Of all the horrible policies of the Democrats, this policy is the most unconscionable to me. I have felt this way for many year. I considered getting involved with the charter school movement when I graduated law school and wish that I had.

exhelodrvr1 said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
narciso said...


The larger problem

http://invisibleserfscollar.com/titanic-alert-the-iceberg-problem-and-the-blueprints-for-proximal-volitional-regulators/

Its the software not the hardware

iowan2 said...

Inga said: "So charter schools are taking federal funds from public schools with no better outcomes for the students? Seems like a waste of taxpayer dollars.

I could provide you a link.... to the post your are commenting on that explains Charter schools are out performing public Schools

What was ten years ago merely an experiment has become a proven means to develop the potential of children whose minds had been neglected for generations

But trolls aren't big on learning from facts.

I have noticed, in the wide swath of our state I am familiar with, there are no charter schools. None in the community I live in,(one of the highest ELS schools in the state), none in surrounding districts. But here the teachers live in the community they serve, they are vested in outcomes.

Head Start has been around since the 60's In all that time, all the data generated in more than 5 decades, Zero impact on students past the 3rd grade. Yet Biden crows about expanding early childhood education. Because Biden refuses to follow the science.

exhelodrvr1 said...

Most public school teachers are good. The problem is that the bad ones impact a disproportionate number of the students. For example, a K-5 school with 4 classes per grade will have a total of 24 teachers (not including aides, subs, etc.) If just one of them - approx 4% of the total - is bad, 25 % of the students that go through that school will be impacted by having a poor teacher for one year. Families who take schooling seriously can make up for that, but if those students come from a family that doesn't keep on top of their education, there is a good chance that they will never catch up. That could happen in any school, but public school unions make it much harder to get rid of those poor teachers.

mandrewa said...

"Let's say a charter school is introduced into a school district, and the charter school gets 10% of the more highly-motivated students leaving the remaining 90% in the traditional public school."

"Even if there is no difference in the educational attainment of the individual students, it's going to look like the charter school is providing a better education and the traditional public school is providing a worse education."


There's no question there is some truth to that. But because the demand of parents for charter schools is way greater than the supply, and because slots are often awarded by lottery, we can compare the parents/students who didn't get to go to a charter school but wanted to, with those that actually did.

Presumably the two populations started off the same, but still we end up with a huge difference in average educational outcome in many cases. That fact demonstrates that the charter schools, or at least some charter schools, are doing something above and beyond having motivated parents.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

No Inga- I did not assert anything.

Inga said: "I’m sorry to hear this and agree you are probably right. Maybe individual parents will one day be reimbursed for the cost of educating their own child. It would be worth the money."

YOU Inga - are asserting you agree with the concept that "individual parents will one day be reimbursed for educating their own child" - that's actually the idea behind vouchers. That each and every parent can choose the education their child needs, and the money it takes, follows that individual child, and it is the parent's choice how it is spent.

Joe Smith said...

"So now you’re asserting that all parents who home school their children are given vouchers?"

Shouldn't every parent get a voucher for every child?

Why can't home-schooled kids participate in classes and activities at public schools?

Think of it as a hybrid model.

We paid hefty property taxes that went (and now go) toward funding local public schools, yet we sent our kids to private school.

Why shouldn't parents like us be able to get a return on our investment?

Liberals never speak of 'spending,' only 'investing' so I'm putting it in terms you can understand.

Same with 'choice.' I thought 'choice' was good.

Quayle said...

No monopoly ever wants competition.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

btw- Thanks to Ann for posting the article.
It is worth reading.

Rick said...

iowan2 said...
Head Start has been around since the 60's In all that time, all the data generated in more than 5 decades, Zero impact on students past the 3rd grade. Yet Biden crows about expanding early childhood education. Because Biden refuses to follow the science.


Biden supports Head Start because it is government funded babysitting. The education branding is only to sell the program to a naïve public.

Inga said...

‘I could provide you a link.... to the post your are commenting on that explains Charter schools are out performing public Schools. But trolls aren't big on learning from facts.”

Feel free, I’m sure the non trolls here would appreciate your link.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

We must find links that PROVE Biden is right.

We must destroy any worth while option to get our children out of failing public schools.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

If Biden says it - Inga buys it.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

The best part of the corrupt democrat platform - is when it hurts other democrats - and they still worhsip The Party.

Inga said...

“YOU Inga - are asserting you agree with the concept that "individual parents will one day be reimbursed for educating their own child" - that's actually the idea behind vouchers.”

Yes, but the comment of Omaha 1 and I was regarding vouchers for homeschooling, not voucher schools.

Inga said...

Charter schools.

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