Introduction:
Due to the decline in the quality of public education in Texas, state lawmakers passed legislation in 1995. The new law permitted the opening and implementation of charter schools. These new charters schools encourage and support innovative teaching for a variety of learning styles, improve the achievement of students, and provide options within the public school system (Terry and Alexander 2008, 4). Prior to the new legislation, there was no opportunity for choice within the public school system with regard to a child’s education, and children attended school according to their zip code. That deficiency began to change when the first charter school in Texas opened in the fall of 1996.
The Texas Education Agency (TEA) reports that the “first generation” of charters consisted of 17 schools and had a collective population of 2,412 students. Legislation initially limited open-enrollment charters to 20 schools; however, lawmakers increased the cap to 100 schools in 1997 and to 215 schools in 2001 (Story 2007, 1). As of 2007, Texas had one of the largest and most flexible charter school programs in the United States (Story 2007, 1). Currently, Texas charter schools serve over 113,000 students, an estimated two percent of all public school students. Moreover, of those 113,000 students in charter schools, 80 percent are minority and 60 percent are economically disadvantaged students (Terry and Alexander 2008, 7).
Research Analysis-Lifting the Cap:
The State of Texas currently has 210 active open-enrollment charter schools. In addition, Texas will likely reach the cap of 215 open-enrollment charter schools by 2009. If the cap remains in place, many parents and children will be at a disadvantage, unable to choose the best quality education for their families. Many charter education supporters have and will continue to push for greater parental control and increased accountability with an emphasis on improved public relations. However, these supporters encounter a lot of resistance, because opponents see charter schools as competition to the public schools. Consequently, increased restrictions and mandates stifle charter school growth.
If the Texas government and the education policy stakeholders review the statistical findings and evaluate the impact of open-enrollment charter schools in Texas, they will find a clear picture of the positive outcomes charter schools provide. It becomes apparent through the examination of the economic and social factors of open-enrollment charter schools that lifting the cap on the number of open-enrollment charter schools in Texas would be beneficial to the current public school system.
Contrary to common public perception, charter schools are public schools. Similar to public schools, charter schools cannot charge tuition according to state law. However, “charter schools have a significant amount of autonomy and are free to be innovative in educational and administrative practices,” as stated on the Resource Center for Charter Schools (Technology Help for Administrators 2008). Before a charter school in Texas breaks ground, the entity must submit a proposal, similar to a business proposal, for approval, which typically includes a mission statement, a philosophy and a vision. Furthermore, the proposal provides information regarding basic logistics, including class size, number of school days and hours, the programs that will service students and a projected budget. On many occasions, charter schools seek the help of outside agencies to provide guidance, classroom modeling, in-house training, and resources in order to assist in achieving the mission. For example, an open-enrollment charter school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania used a research based program / agency from San Francisco, California called the “Developmental Studies Center” (DSC). The DSC trained the faculty, provided resources and provided ongoing support in order to achieve the school’s mission and goal. In fact, the school bases its philosophy on a democratic model that gives students a voice, which promotes and fosters the students’ academic, social, and emotional growth. Significantly, this school recognizes the existence of multiple intelligences and diverse learning styles. One program that addresses the choice of students and multiple intelligences is the choice of electives for all of the student population once a week. They also incorporate a “service learning program” to assist in molding stewards of the community (Service Learning Programs, 2008).
Similarly, in Houston, Texas, “KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program) Academy Houston,” whose mission is to “help…students develop academic skills, intellectual habits, and qualities of character necessary to succeed in high school, college, and the competitive world beyond” is a very successful charter school that services grades 5-8 (U.S. Department of Education 2008). Texas recognized it as an “exemplary school” every year since 1996, and the U.S. Department of Education recognized it as a “Blue Ribbon” school. The dedication of its teachers and administrators, including being on call by way of cell phone 24/7 to address the academic needs of students led to this success of the charter school (U.S. Department of Education 2008). This innovative dedication would not be something conducive to the public school sector. In view of the fact that employees of mainstream public schools, are subject to collective bargaining and union contracts, have set hours and specific responsibilities in their contracts and do not deviate from them.
By employing the flexibility of the charter program and by working outside the traditional eight hours of instructional time for students, the American Youth Works in Austin, Texas is a charter school that is able to better focus on the unique needs of its students. The school allows students half a day to pursue employment opportunities, to participate in work study programs or to take care of family members, including the students’ own children. The school requires the students to fulfill only four hours of traditional instructional time in order to accommodate the individual’s life experience (Terry and Alexander 2008, 4).
Other charter schools may extend the school day in order to improve academic achievement or may extend the school year to expose the students to supplemental material and expanded learning. Equally important, a mission aimed at addressing the varied learning styles through the theory of multiple intelligences may be the goal of another charter school. There are even charter schools that focus on the arts, architecture and design, leadership, and literacy. Charter schools generally do not fit the traditional model of the mainstream public school; instead, they find ways to educate children and stimulate learning based on innovative ideas and strategies.
When a charter is operating, the entity will receive direct funding from the state and the federal government. However, charters do not receive funding for their facilities, so it is up to the charter school to raise money, solicit donations, apply for startup grants from the federal government or choose to borrow from private lenders (Terry and Alexander 2008, 5).
Terry states, in a “GO San Angelo” article, that charter schools may not charge tuition, teach religion, discriminate, or cherry-pick students (Terry 2008, 1). To elaborate, if a charter school encourages families to volunteer 20 hours of their time to help with various needs of the school such as painting, helping in the classroom, making packets, cleaning, etc., the school cannot in any way enforce this as a “requirement.” If a family is penalized in any way, such as a student being removed from school for incompletion of hours, it would be considered payment for education. Moreover, charter schools may not discriminate in the enrollment of students or cherry-pick, select a student based on academic performance, behavior, or other preferential selection, its admissions..
Charter schools require different regulations compared to traditional public schools (Terry and Alexander 2008, 5). An example is that charter schools, as opposed to mainstream public schools, require teachers to provide parents and guardians of students in their school with a written notice of their qualifications. Another example of the differences in regulation is under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), Federal Regulation Part 300, which reauthorizes the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEIA). Originally, law required charter schools to provide and complete academic testing for a child within 60 school days from the date of a request from a parent or guardian, while it required traditional public schools to provide and complete the same within 60 calendar days. Under the reauthorization, the requirement changed to 60 school days for both public and charter schools. Before this became universal for both mainstream public and charter schools, it was a disadvantage for the charter schools to adhere to the time restraint because it was more difficult in terms of the high cost of academic testing and limited funding.
To be sure, accountability is universal for district public schools and charter schools, as the pressure of No Child Left Behind impacts both sectors of education. Both are required to administer standardized tests, and all students must test at their current grade level rather than their level of ability. For instance, an eighth grader who is reading at a third grade level must take the eighth grade reading standardized test.
According to the article “Texas Charter Schools: An Assessment in 2005″, produced by the Texas Public Policy Foundation, “when student performance is evaluated on the basis of test scores, students in Texas charter schools perform on the average lower than do students in traditional public schools. However, when changes in test scores are used to judge performance, academic gains by charter school students can be demonstrated” (Patterson 2005, 5). This means that even though some charter school students’ performance does not exceed the performance of traditional public schools according to standardized test results, the students are individually making better academic progress in the charter schools. In addition, because most charter schools typically specialize in helping disadvantaged youth, many students in charter schools identify as an at-risk population for dropping out of school and come from low income homes which could hinder their test performance (Terry and Alexander 2008, 5). Accordingly, basing decisions of success on standardized test scores is an unfair assessment of charter school performance.
Currently, the government enforces some regulation on charter schools that forces them to shut down if they have two consecutive years of undesirable performance, which typically measures by standardized test scores. This is harsher and inequitable compared to the five years allowed for the mainstream public school districts (Terry and Alexander 2008, 5). For example, a charter school may be able to improve a fifth grade student whose reading level is equivalent to third grade but still fail with unacceptable performance because the student failed the fifth grade Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) test reading section (Terry and Alexander 2008, 1).
During the 2007-2008 school years, 113,760 students enrolled in charter schools in Texas, and an estimated 16,810 students were on a waiting list (Terry and Alexander 2008, 4). Houston’s regional charter school’s waiting list was the largest at 7,415 students; coming in second was the Dallas / Fort Worth region at 5,896 students, and Rio Grand Valley had 2,110 students. Furthermore, the Austin region had a waiting list of 623; the Corpus Christi region had a waiting list of 159; and the San Antonio region had a waiting list of 488 students (Terry and Alexander 2008, 4). According to Robelen, since these numbers stem from a survey in which only half of the schools participated, the actual number of students on a waiting list for charter schools in Texas is likely higher (Robelen 2008, 1).
The large number of students on the waiting lists for charter school enrollment demonstrates the significant demand for educational options, which is the fundamental purpose of the legislation for charter schools. The rapidly growing number of students on waiting lists demonstrates the need for lawmakers to lift the cap limiting the number of charter schools in Texas. When a charter school has more applicants than they can allow, an enrollment lottery determines which students will be attending the upcoming school year. Terry asks readers to “imagine parents, whose child is trapped in a low-performing public school, crying for joy that their child is randomly selected to attend a school with a track record of serving at-risk students with innovative strategies” (Terry 2008, 1). On the other hand, one can imagine the cries of a parent whose child is a student in a low-performing public school when their child looses the enrollment lottery.
There are four different types of charter schools: open-enrollment charters, district charters, university charters, and home-rule district charters. Open-enrollment charter schools service the largest population, 89,156 students as of the 2007-2008 school year. Open-enrollment charters are by definition independent school units and can have multiple campuses. The school district operates the district charter schools that consisted of 23,275 students in the 2007-2008 school years. University charters are generally in operation at public senior university or college and consisted of 1,329 students attending 19 different university charter schools in 2007-2008. Furthermore, a home-rule charter means districts have the ability to convert into charter school status which includes an extensive voting process. There is no cap on the number of district charters; however, there are no home-rule charter schools operating in Texas (Terry and Alexander 2008, 3).
Open enrollment charter schools do not drain financial resources from mainstream public schools because they do not receive state funding. In fact, the excess money in the state education budget applies to the student’s home district and the neighboring school where the child resides. For example, in the 2005-2006 school year, the cost per student in Texas was $9,629; charter schools were given approximately $1,500 less per student (Terry and Alexander, 2008a, 1). Thus, operating a charter school saves the district money in educating a child because charter schools expend less money per child.
Because charter schools receive less money per student compared to mainstream school districts in Texas, it is necessary for charter schools to incorporate fund raising into their fiscal plans. Moreover, charter school fundraising brings more dollars into the public sector. According to the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, in Illinois the total of public and private funding for charter schools brought in a total of $11 million dollars to help educate the youth. In addition, charter schools introduce new resources into public education. Grants provide funds designed for charter schools phases such as, planning, development, and initial implementation which are not available to the public school system if charter schools were not in existence (National Alliance for Public Charter Schools 2008).
It is incorrect for the districts in Texas to believe that charter schools negatively impact their bottom line or hinder their budgetary plan. In the event of the opening of a new charter school, the state provides the district with short term financial aids in order to prevent an impact on the school district revenue (National Alliance for Public Charter Schools 2008). Because charter schools typically enroll a diverse student body with a variety of characteristics, the fiscal impact is a factor of enrollment only (National Alliance for Public Charter Schools 2008). In addition, public and charter schools receive a percentage of money for students with disabilities; therefore, the public district receives an even higher amount than the $1,500 per special education student. Finally, socioeconomic factors dictate funding for individual students and services offered (National Alliance for Public Charter Schools 2008).
Districts can easily reduce expenses to adapt to charter schools. The National Alliance for Charter Schools, reports that school districts can often adjust to student enrollment fluctuations-where there may be some key adjustments the first year, the following years have little to no impact on the school district (National Alliance for Public Charter Schools 2008). The National Alliance for Charter Schools also believes that if a charter school is thriving, and the district cannot adjust to the fluctuation in enrollment, it is likely due to the district’s own failed policies and rules (National Alliance for Public Charter Schools 2008).
Charter schools in Texas increase the employment of teachers in the district as well. Many teachers struggle to obtain a teaching position once they graduate and charter schools open the doors for many of these qualified teachers to find a job in education. The state law only requires teachers to be state certified to work in a charter school if they specialize in special education or bilingual education (Terry and Alexander 2008a, 6). The state government in Texas does not require charter schools to employ certified teachers, but many choose to do so, especially with the shortage of teaching opportunities. Story supports this by stating statistics that show charter schools employ 26 percent of new teachers in the field compared to traditional public schools, which employ a mere 7 percent respectively (Story 2007, 3). In addition, charter schools can impact the traditional school district in a positive way by reducing the need for districts to hire new teachers by eliminating overcrowding, which reduces the average cost of hiring and training a new teacher, estimated to be about $8,000 per teacher (The National Alliance for Charter Schools 2008).
The impact of charter schools in the community’s economic and social growth is rapidly increasing. As stated earlier, charter schools do not receive funding for facilities from the state, however the districts that have charters schools receive and excess of approximately $1,500 per student that attends a charter school. Therefore, without the funding for a facility, charter schools renovate, remodel and/or rehabilitate existing property within a community in order to accommodate students. Having a charter school residing in a neighborhood has the potential to generate tax revenue and increase the value of real estate (National Alliance for Public Charter Schools 2008).
The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools also suggests that if charter schools are successful in educating students, it can reduce the dropout rate in high schools and increase college admissions and graduates. Texas seems to have a high dropout rate, and those students who graduate do not have the communication and math skills necessary for college and require remedial math and reading programs to qualify for admission to college (Terry and Alexander 2008, 4). One of the most successful schools in Texas is a charter school that reduced their dropout rates dramatically under the direction of the mission of their charter.
These charter schools often provide a safe haven for youth by providing aftercare and tutoring. Importantly, charter schools often give communities a sense of pride. Many charter schools offer Boy Scouts of America, sports, and other programs in order to facilitate teambuilding, self esteem, and help foster a sense of community, and growth in a child. Some charter schools open their doors for tutoring and mentoring on Saturdays to offer extra assistance as well as a safe setting for young learners. However, these programs are uncommon in the traditional public school district setting mostly because of the contract and collective bargaining processes of the districts. Charter schools have the ability to add the extra touches that impact students without the political constraints that traditional district schools face.
While charter schools do not seem like they would pose a significant threat to the financial operations of the public school system in Texas, there are some risks associated with the existence of charter schools. Because most charter schools operate like a business, there is a risk of misappropriation and improper allocation of funds. In addition, misconduct of administrators, teachers, and entities involved with a particular charter school could lead to a negative reputation of charter schools as a whole. However, limiting the number of charter schools based on isolated incidents of illegal activity, inappropriate behavior or misuse of power could prove to be harmful to the education system. Misconduct can develop in any entity, including public school districts.
Research shows that students from a traditional public school who attend charter schools for a period of two or three years improve more rapidly than students in the traditional public school district (Terry and Alexander 2008, 5). Not using a growth based system to measure the amount of growth, a student is able to obtain in the course of a year in the state accountability system is causing charter school to seem deficient (Terry and Alexander 2008, 5). Research from the “Texas Charter Schools: An Assessment in 2005″ produced by the Texas Public Policy Foundation, shows that students who left traditional public schools to attend charter schools performed better on average than they would have if they were still attending the traditional public school (Patterson 2004, 32). Thus, the correlation of charter schools and student achievement is significant, and students will benefit from the removal of the charter school cap in Texas.
Charter schools provide competition with the mainstream district schools which provides an unwanted positive impact on the district schools. It forces district schools to exhibit more accountability of staff and teachers and puts pressure on them to increase student performance. If the schools are functioning at low levels, parents or guardians will feel the need to remove their child from the district school by applying to a charter school. If lawmakers remove the cap and more options are available to parents and guardians, more choices for education will be accessible to students and parents. In addition, the competition between charter schools and public schools will cause school districts to increase their overall academic performance.
Patterson asserts the bottom line for charter schools in Texas as follows:
Charter schools are a valuable alternative to traditional public schools (Patterson 2005, 1).
Charters are especially effective with disadvantaged students (Patterson 2005, 1).
Charters challenge traditional public schools to improve student performance (Patterson 2005, 1).
Charters do a better job with high school students and alternative education programs (Patterson 2005, 1).
Conclusion:
The benefits a charter school can provide to the district public schools, parents, students, and the community significantly outweighs any negative impact charters may cause. The Texas legislature should eliminate the cap of 215 charter schools which prevents charter schools to operate in a free market (Terry and Alexander, 2008, 1). The 16,810 or more students on the waiting lists for charter schools prove the demand for charter schools. This demand, viewed in light of the current issues facing traditional public schools, proves that charter schools are working well in improving the quality of education. Many education analysts believe that the quality of a charter school education will increase overtime. Unless this demand meets the supply, tens of thousands of students will remain in an environment that may not promote academic, emotional or social growth. Equally important, these students will not thrive in their current placement and could regress to the extent of becoming an at-risk youth who could potentially drop out of high school, leading to a grim future. This proposed reform of lifting the cap could be an immense opportunity for Texas to become a leader in the charter school movement. The Texas public school system could stop the increase of real estate taxes to invest money in failing districts and make the choice to provide additional educational resources for the children of the state.
The bureaucracy that places a barrier to student learning and student performance is unconscionable. A simple solution to the education crisis Texas is facing would be to lift the cap while continuing to monitor all educational institutions. It is in the best interests of the child to allow parents and guardians to make the choice of where their child should attend school to get the best free, appropriate public education possible. The main purpose of the charter school legislation in 1995 was to give that choice to Texas citizens. That freedom no longer exists for thousands of citizens in Texas because of the cap on charter schools. Given the overwhelming evidence that charter schools are socioeconomically beneficial, lawmakers in Texas should increase or remove the cap altogether and make charter schools available to all of its citizens in 2009.
