Charter school misinformation
The University of Arkansas (UARK) recently produced a report that concluded US charter schools, despite being terribly underfunded, were performing favourably compared to US state schools, being only slightly behind state schools in test scores.
The report has, of course, been trumpeted by our own lovely right wing blogs here in NZ as proof that charter schools are the way forward. Predictably, Kiwiblog and the like were not so fast to look at criticisms of the University of Arkansas’s research.
In School Finance 101: UARK Study Shamelessly (& Knowingly) Uses Bogus Measures to Make Charter Productivity Claims, Bruce D. Baker picks the claims apart in great detail.
Note: Baker’s analysis is not a swift overview or cherry picking from a blogger, pundit or journalist playing to the crowd. He is well placed to critique the research – he is a Professor in the Graduate School of Education at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, where he teaches courses in school finance policy and district business management. The report was produced by the National Education Policy Centre at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
What did the UARK Research find?
The report found that student performance at charter schools is roughly on par Charter school misinformation | Save Our Schools NZ: