New Missouri charter-school law would improve accountability
Michelle Rhee is the founder and CEO of StudentsFirst, a bipartisan grassroots movement that is working to improve the nation’s schools. She previously served as chancellor of Washington D.C., schools and before that founded the New Teacher Project, which helps districts recruit effective teachers to challenging schools. She splits her time between Sacramento, Calif., and Nashville, Tenn.
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If we really want to tackle the problems in our schools, we have to start relying on common-sense solutions that put the needs of students ahead of any other interests in the system. Fortunately, in Missouri, lawmakers advocating for a new public charter school law understand this.
Twin bills moving through the Missouri House and Senate represent a balanced approach to public charter schools, allowing successful models to expand while increasing oversight and accountability for all such schools.
Charter schools are public schools. They are free and open to all children in a jurisdiction, but they operate independently of local school districts and have more flexibility to innovate and try new approaches. On many occasions, I’ve seen traditional district schools adopt fantastic new programs that were first tried out in charter
