But drilling down into the data reveals that some charters are rising to the top at the local level.
In most of the Georgia school districts that are home to the highest concentration of charter schools, a higher percentage of charters passed the federal bar than traditional public schools.
Louis Erste directs the charter schools division at the state Department of Education. He says there’s also evidence that officials are getting better at judging applications to create charter schools, and so the quality of new schools is increasing. For example — first-year charters made AYP at a much higher rate than traditional schools or charter schools as a whole.
“We have a lot of lousy charter schools that are older, that haven’t gone away yet,” Erste says. They haven’t come up for renewal, so we haven’t had a chance to terminate them. The first year ones – they don’t get through the sieve if they don’t have commitment to high quality and the capacity to deliver.”
Erste says the report highlights that the state and local school boards need to be more aggressive about closing down low-performing charter schools.
“We’ve begun to be more aggressive, but we’re not all the way there yet,” he says. “So moving on to this year and moving forward with all new charter schools as well as all the old ones that are still hanging on – if they’re not performing at levels that are adequate they need to be closed.”
State lawmakers are currently debating whether to give the state power to approve and fund charter schools after local school boards have denied their application. The report on charters may give fuel to opponents of the proposed constitutional amendment who argue that expanding charters may not improve public education.
