Charter School Sector Swindles the Public, Burns Tax Dollars, and Cheats Children—Part 1
Many of us have been aware of problems with charter schools for a long, long time. For over two years now, the Network for Public Education has been logging reports in local newspapers when an entrepreneur is caught stealing tax dollars; or when a state, a school district or charter authorizer finally shuts down a charter school for academic malpractice; or when a charter school goes broke mid-school year leaving children without a school mid-semester.
But the past month has produced an uptick in reports of large scale charter school ripoffs and charter school failure.
At the federal level: In late March, the Network for Public Education published Asleep at the Wheel, an explosive report documenting the waste of billions of federal charter school startup dollars on schools that that never opened or opened and then shut down. The researchers conclude that if you want to start a charter school with seed money from the federal Charter Schools Program, you ought to hire a grant writer skilled at creating a compelling fictional narrative, because the Department of Education makes its grants almost exclusively based on the story spun in the grant application. And the Department of Education rarely follows up to monitor the schools it has funded—neither to prevent conflicts of interest and profiteering, nor to ensure equitable open enrollment practices nor to oversee academic services for students. (This blog covered NPE’s report here.)
But the federal Charter Schools Program is only a part of the problem. Charters schools are enabled in state law—in 44 states, and each state’s authorization and oversight laws are different. Most of the recent exposure of widespread problems with charter schools involves CONTINUE READING: Charter School Sector Swindles the Public, Burns Tax Dollars, and Cheats Children—Part 1 | janresseger
