What the Success Academy fight over kicking out students says about the charter movement
The biggest recent argument about charter schools boils down to this: Is it okay to suspend a 5-year-old from school? What about suspending him 10 or 11 times in a single year? What about making a list of the students you want to push out of your school?
These are the latest controversies boiling around Success Academy, a very successful chain of New York charter schools that are also a lightning rod for political fights. Two recent media reports honed in on the charter schools' strict discipline policies, arguing that the schools succeed in part because of whom they kick out.
This is partly a proxy war in New York politics, because Success Academy's founder, Eva Moskowitz, is an outspoken opponent of Mayor Bill de Blasio's education policies. It's also the latest manifestation of a broader argument about whether charter schools work because of the kids they educate or because of the way they teach. Whether you see Success Academy as an inhumane test-prep factory or an educational godsend for disadvantaged kids is probably a good indication of how you see the charter school movement as a whole.
Beneath the storm of controversy, there's arguably a quiet point of agreement. Charter critics say the results at places like Success Academy are driven by compositional effects — it's easy to have great test scores if you kick out the worst-performing kids. Charter proponents say that's not backed up empirically, and the bulk of the evidence says they're right.
But Moskowitz defends her school's harsh discipline by saying it's integral to the success of the kids who don't get kicked out. This means that even though Success Academy's great test scores probably aren't a direct result of its suspension policy, its record really is partly due to something traditional public schools can't imitate.
Success Academy is a very successful charter school chain — and it kicks out a lot of kids
Students at Success Academy schools do incredibly well on standardized tests, particularly compared with students in New York City schools as a whole. The charter school chain enrolls 11,000 students, most of them black or Hispanic and poor, in 34 schools across the city.
This year, 93 percent of Success Academy students tested as proficient in math in 2015, compared with just 35 percent of kids in New York as a whole; 68 percent tested as proficient in reading, compared with 30 percent citywide.
Even among urban charter networks, those are outstanding results.
"This is not 'remarkable,'" Robert Pondiscio, vice president for external affairs at the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute, wrote when Success Academy's 2014 test results came out. "This is Secretariat winning the Belmont by thirty-one lengths. It’s What the Success Academy fight over kicking out students says about the charter movement - Vox:
