Charter Schools: Not a School Reform Panacea

A study by the Stanford University Center for Research on Education Outcomes found that of the 2,403 charter schools tracked from 2006 to 2008, only 17% had better math test results than the public schools in their area, while 37% had results that were "significantly below" those of the traditional public schools and 46% had results that were "statistically indistinguishable" from their public school counterparts.

A study of high-performing public schools by the National Center for Educational Achievement shows that ongoing teacher collaboration and mentoring for diagnostic, rather than evaluative purposes, produces better outcomes than the high stakes testing way of teacher and student performance.

A University of Chicago study found that charter schools have not brought the improvements they were created to bring; also, they performed poorly in meeting the non-academic needs of the children. A September 2010 report described charter schools as floundering in Ohio, Arizona and California.

Segregation of students has also been to be a reality in charter schools. A January 2010 report by the Civil Rights Project found that 70% of black students were enrolled in charter schools that were 90 to 100 per cent black.

In an op-ed in the Albuquerque Journal, Tom Sullivan, superintendent of the Moriarty-Edgewood School District, wrote that: "Both the non-partisan Legislative Finance Committee and the State Auditor's Office have essentially concluded that New Mexico charter Schools are, in the aggregate, neither more effective nor more efficient than their traditional public school counterparts -- charter schools cost taxpayers dramatically more per student --... a Silver City [NM] charter with an environmental focus receives more than $11,500 per student, while the rest of Silver City's traditional students are funded at less than $8,000 per student."

Since teaching, at least in major cities, is a profession in which minorities are heavily represented, when reformers say we need to take down teachers' unions to give more opportunity to minority youth, they come close to saying that we need to destroy the black middle class in order to save it. The Chicago teachers' strike opposition was led by parents with children in private schools and whites; Latinos and blacks strongly supported the strike.

ADDENDUMS:
*A California appeals court ruled on April 14, 2016 that the state's protections for teachers do  not deprive poor and minority students of a quality education nor violate their civil rights.

*In 2015, there were fewer executions (28) than in the past 25 years, carried out in only six states. Fewer death sentences (49) were handed out, representing a large drop from the 315 executions carried out in 1996. Executions are largely confined to the "Bible States." (Source: Ron Steiner, "Repeal of the Death Penalty is a Step Toward Peace," peaceworker.org, April 11, 2016).

*"Across the nation, exonrees are being released without the benefits that the parole system affords to convicted felons: no addiction counseling, job placement, housing placement, or "gate money" -- about $200 in most places. States vary widely in their compensation schemes for the wrongfully convicted. Currently, only 30 states offer any kind of compensation at all. (Source" Jessica Pishko, "Exonerated But Still Judged," The Nation, March 28/April 4, 2016).