In “Class Warfare” Brill paints a picture of a few excellent charter schools, and consistently juxtaposes their achievements to those of nearby traditional public schools, depicting charter schools as the more effective of the two. However, Weingarten is consistently quoted as saying charter schools on average don’t significantly differ from traditional public schools in influencing student achievement. Who is right? The answer is both portrayals of charter schools are actually correct, but both need more explanation.
On average charter schools are not more effective than traditional public schools when it comes to influencing student achievement in math and reading. However, saying “on average” without any explanation leaves out crucial information. The reason that charter schools on average do not significantly differ from the traditional school is because there is typically a lot of variation between individual charter schools. For example, the National Center For Educational Evaluation (NCEE) performed a study that provided evidence that charter schools located in large urban areas, or serve disadvantaged and low-income students, tend to be more effective than nearby public schools (Gleason et al. 2010). On the other hand, charter schools that did not serve a large proportion of low-income students, were outside of urban areas, or those serving already high achieving students were shown to have negative impacts on reading and math scores (Gleason et al. 2010). So, while charter schools can have a significant positive impact on students, they can also have negative impacts on students; both outcomes are seen, and the variation tends to be related to where the school is located and the socioeconomic status of the students.
When viewed in retrospect, these results make a lot of sense. Low achievement is rampant in large, densely populated urban areas, which also suffer from the debilitating influence of an inefficient bureaucracy. In these instances, a charter school that dodges around the system and is innovative can be extremely effective. In higher-income areas, public schools are typically better funded (more money going into the system in more affluent areas due to taxes), parents are more involved in their kids’ education, and kids probably come in at a higher achieving level because their parents are also well-educated. If a teacher doesn’t perform in these public schools, he/she will not only get pressure from the principal, but will probably also face a barrage of parent e-mails and visits.
Now that there is research on the effectiveness of teachers and the different types of schools, the next step is to figure out what is effective and how it can be replicated in different settings. Some questions I’m left with after this week include: why do charter schools negatively impact students in already higher-achieving areas, and why are charter schools less effective in less urban areas?
Gleason, P., Clark, M., Tuttle, C., and Dwoyer, E. (2010). The Evaluation of Charter School Impacts (NCEE 2010-4029). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance.
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4 responses to “Are Charter Schools Effective?”
You raise important questions about the effectiveness of charter schools. It is particularly interesting to break out their performance by their location. Many have claimed that there is a “creaming effect” caused by charter schools where they tend to siphon of the best students leaving the rest in traditional public schools. Brill disputes this claim, but it does seem like charters often end up with fewer of the most difficult to educate students — that is students with special educational needs.
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You bring up some very interesting points here, Courtney. I never thought to add in the variable of location or socioeconomic status in relation to the effectiveness of charter schools. I was somewhat under the impression that the varying effectiveness of charter schools was mostly due to the varying principles guiding the way each school operates.
I agree with you in that I think charter schools are generally more effective than public schools in urban/lower socioeconomic regions largely due to the fact that they are free to really experiment with strategies that are nontraditional or even not allowed in public schools. Similar to something you said – many students from urban areas need their teachers to be more than just teachers. Now as to why we don’t see the same pattern of effectiveness in higher socioeconomic areas – I can’t say I have many ideas.
It is also important to consider the purpose of a charter school and its placement in a certain community or city. We learn in Brill’s research that each charter has a specific goal and hopes to target a certain population. Considering the charter school has to be a lottery system and take students who may not be their target audience. Students are more likely to know and apply for charter schools when they have informed parents who are more involved and participate in their education. Thus parents with more time and education, which is in contrast to parers from low-income families who spend more time at work providing for their family. Thus most of the students who apply for a charter school will come from a higher-income family.
Regarding who applies to Charter schools, that’s why I love Geoffrey Canada’s experiment with the Harlem Children’s Zone, because he doesn’t wait for his applicants to come to him, he seeks them out. Unfortunately, the lottery doesn’t just choose kids from that pool, but it does allow for a more thorough examination of student achievement with different levels of parent involvement.