Seattle Schools Community Forum: Washington State Charter School Law Upheld

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Washington State Charter School Law Upheld

Washington State Charter School Law Upheld

On October 26, 2018, in a split decision, the Washington State Supreme Court ruled that the charter school law created by the Legislature, after a voter initiative was thrown out in 2012, is valid under our state's constitution.  Here's the ruling.

As someone who has never supported charter schools in Washington State, I wasn't pleased with the news but it also didn't surprise me.  Interestingly, one judge, Justice Barbara Madsen was clearly not buying it that the law makes charter schools legal.  From KUOW:

In one of the dissents, Justice Barbara Madsen said that the Charter School Act included too many exceptions on public control of charter schools.

"The Act creates a parallel public school system that provides a general education, serves all students, and uses public funds, but lacks local voter control or oversight," Madsen wrote.

The Court said - as they did in the first ruling against the initiative that brought them into being - that they were not ruling on efficacy of charters but on whether their existence violated our state constitution.

What does surprise me is that the ruling leaves open some fairly interesting issues that the Legislature will have to grapple with, some which could undermine charter schools.  I need to consult a lawyer on some of these issues but even reading as a layperson, I see problems for charters.
Issues:

- Charters limit the ability of their employees to organize ONLY at their school. 

 The majority of the justices saw this as unfair because it would be such a small group (and the strength of collective bargaining is in numbers). They said that Continue reading: Seattle Schools Community Forum: Washington State Charter School Law Upheld