Is the Impact of Charters Schools on Achievement a Big Lie?
I have been called a charter school “lover” and a charter school “hater” in the same week. Are both true? Neither? I think we as a society must be pragmatic on charters. I recently had a conversation with my grandmother, who was a lifelong educator at a middle school in Saginaw, Michigan. She explained to me that based on what she had read in the newspapers and seen on TV— that charters schools had some promise. I think the jury is still out. In this post I will introduce my podcast on the education view on charters, include a new review of charters schools and student achievement released by the National Education Policy Center and then conclude with my comments on the new Edweek blog .
First here is a link to my interview with the Educational View on holding charters accountability for equity. I based my conversation on the post Don’t Trust Charters More than a Sweaty Used Car Salesman (A Citizen Research Template) where I lay out a citizen research template for parents and other stakeholders to study and understand the equity context for any particular charter school or charter chain. Click the link in the tweet below for the five minute broadcast.
Today, NEPC released a review of the CRPE report entitled A Meta-Analysis of the Literature on the Effect of Charter Schools on Student Achievement CPRE argued that,
- Charter schools on average produce results that are at least on par with and, in many cases, better than district-run public schools
- Charter schools are producing higher achievement gains in math relative to their district-run counterparts in most grade levels, particularly in middle school, and gains in reading that are similar to district-run schools in reading
- Charter school effect size has risen for both math and reading over time, though this trend is not statistically significant
- A small and growing body of literature on the relationship between charter school attendance and outcomes apart from achievement finds further evidence of large positive impacts of charter schools on high school graduation, college enrollment, and behavioral issues
The National Education Policy Center commissioned a peer review of Is the Impact of Charters Schools on Achievement a Big Lie? | Cloaking Inequity:
