The Center for Education Reform, Author at The Center for Education Reform

Charters Coming to Phoenix

January 17, 2014 By The Center for Education Reform

The Arizona Charter Schools Association is engineering a plan that if successful, would open up to 25 charter schools in the low-income neighborhoods of Phoenix, AZ.

With the help of outside groups, learning programs that emphasize various subjects such as art and science are being developed, and educators are receiving proper training over a two-year period.

Charter administrators such as Julia Meyerson of the pilot Vista College Preparatory have also visited successful schools in other states to incorporate best practices.

For example, other schools in low-income areas have found notes in backpacks and weekend workshops to be more effective than email at engaging parents.

Charter proponents view the plan as a way to fulfill the promise of delivering quality educational options for kids.

“We have this promise of shaping our charter schools based on the needs of our communities, but we haven’t made good on it,” Lisa Graham Keegan, former Arizona superintendent, state representative and CER at 20 panelist, told the New York Times. “We didn’t force the issue of quality in the early days.”

Filed Under: Choice & Charter Schools

Daily Headlines for January 17, 2013

January 17, 2014 By The Center for Education Reform

Click here for Newswire, the latest weekly report on education news and commentary you won’t find anywhere else – spiced with a dash of irreverence – from the nation’s leading voice in school reform.

NATIONAL COVERAGE

Teachers’ union grades lawmakers
Washington Post, DC, January 16, 2014
The National Education Association, the country’s largest labor union, is handing out grades to members of Congress on Thursday, and it has found that that Senate Republicans have grown friendlier to its agenda while House Republicans have become cooler.

STATE COVERAGE

ARIZONA

Arizona Hopes New Charter Schools Can Lift Poor Phoenix Area
New York Times, NY, January 17, 2014
In Arizona, the charter school movement has sold itself as a safe alternative for middle-class families looking to avoid the maze of underfunded neighborhood schools. The movement is now expanding into this city’s most impoverished area for the first time, starting, in effect, an
experiment in urban education.

CALIFORNIA

Missed opportunity for school choice
Opinion, Orange County Register, CA, January 16, 2014
The behind-the-scenes story, however, is much sadder: in exchange for this mild reform, the bill’s author, Sen. Lou Correa, D-Santa Ana, had to agree to the demands of committee Democrats to strip out a key provision of his bill which would have empowered parents with real school choice.

Smoothing out California’s school funding
Editorial, Los Angeles Times, CA, January 16, 2014
Proposition 98, which was approved by the voters in 1988 to ensure that California’s schools were adequately funded, has not served the state or public education well. By requiring a set percentage of state revenue to go to public schools, it has inhibited the Legislature’s ability to make sound budgeting decisions, and it has not saved schools during the worst budget years, when there are exemptions to the funding guarantee.

COLORADO

Recall targeting two Peak to Peak Charter School board members fails
Daily Camera, CO, January 16, 2014
A recall effort prompted by the abrupt firing of Peak to Peak Charter School’s elementary principal Noelle Roni failed this week, with the two board members targeted retaining their seats.

CONNECTICUT

Charter schools are not the solution in Danbury
Opinion, Danbury News Times, CT, January 16, 2014
The headline for the Where I Stand on Friday, Jan. 10, is hard to argue with: “Our Kids are Counting onGreat Public Schools.” Of course they are. They should. I couldn’t agree more.

Judge rejects state’s request to delay school funding trial
Connecticut Mirror, CT, January 16, 2014
Hartford Superior Court Judge Kevin Dubay summarily rejected the state’s request Thursday for a lengthy postponement of an education-funding lawsuit over whether the state is meeting its constitutional responsibility of providing a “suitable education” for every child in Connecticut.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

Most D.C. residents give public schools low ratings in poll
Washington Post, DC, January 16, 2014
The share of District residents who think that the city’s public schools are performing well has more than doubled since the mid-1990s, but most continue to give low ratings to the schools, according to a new Washington Post poll.

GEORGIA

Teach for America sends its graduates to the classroom and the board room
Atlanta Journal Constitution Blog, GA, January 16, 2014
Teach for America has never pretended that its only goal was to place high-minded college graduates in struggling schools for short stints before they headed off to law school or graduate programs.

INDIANA

Goodwill opens charter schools to give dropouts a second chance at education
PBS Newshour, January 16, 2014
While working at one of the organization’s outlet stores, Koonce, 48, learned about Goodwill of Central Indiana’s Excel Center, a network of nine charter schools in his area designed to lure dropouts back to the classroom.

ILLINOIS

Landlords for 2 proposed Chicago charter schools have ties to Mayor Rahm Emanuel
Chicago Sun-Times, IL, January 16, 2014
Two people with ties to Mayor Rahm Emanuel could be among those to benefit from new, publicly financed charter schools up for approval next week by Chicago Public Schools officials.

LOUISIANA

Charter school to add 5th grade
The Daily News, LA, January 16, 2014
The state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education has approved a request by Northshore Charter School to add fifth grade for the 2014-15 school year in addition to already planned additions of third, fourth and 10th grades.

MISSISSIPPI

Desire not enough to start charter school
Jackson Clarion Ledger, MS, January 17, 2014
Dreams of establishing one of the state’s first public charter schools have fallen by the wayside for some Mississippians who wanted to give children in their area a better chance at learning despite local schools that are failing or all but.

Report: No ‘power grab’ evident in Common Core implementation
Jackson Clarion Ledge, MS, January 17, 2014
In a 94-page report released Wednesday, Mississippi’s Joint Legislative Committee on Performance Evaluation and Expenditure Review analyzed what’s known as Common Core, which is generally agreed-upon core academic competencies that reflect the preparation students need to be college- and career-ready.

NEW JERSEY

Extend N.J. school day, but do it the right way
Editorial, South Jersey Times, NJ, January 17, 2014
Embattled Gov. Chris Christie got a standing ovation on Tuesday when his State of the State address turned not to Bridgegate or tax reform but to extending the school day and school year for public school children.

NEW YORK

De Blasio, a Critic of Charter Schools, May Need Them for His Pre-K Agenda
New York Times, NY, January 17, 2014
As a candidate for mayor, Bill de Blasio positioned himself as a nemesis of
New York’s charter schools, arguing that they had a “destructive impact”
on traditional schools and should have to pay to use public classrooms

OHIO

Bill would tighten charter-school rules
Letter, Columbus Dispatch, OH, January 17, 2014
I thank The Dispatch for reporting on the alarming number of charter-school closings in Columbus. It’s very troubling how the schools listed in the report wasted precious education dollars and failed to live up to promises made to students and parents.

PENNSYLVANIA

Auditor general plans broad review of Pa. Education Department
Philadelphia Inquirer, PA, January 17, 2017, 2014
Pennsylvania Auditor General Eugene DePasquale announced Thursday that his office would begin a comprehensive performance audit of the state Department of Education to examine its oversight of schools.

Charter exodus continues in Penn Hills School District
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, PA, January 16, 2014
Some Penn Hills School District leaders are pressing to find out why so many students are leaving to attend charter schools.

Sources: Corbett will appoint Green to lead SRC
Philadelphia Daily News, PA, January 17, 2014
GOV. CORBETT will announce today that he is appointing City Councilman Bill Green IV to lead the School Reform Commission, the Daily News has learned.

SRC OKs renewal of 3 charter schools, nixes another
Philadelphia Daily News, PA, January 17, 2014
THE SCHOOL Reform Commission approved five-year renewals for three city charter schools, while taking steps to not renew the charter of another that serves mainly foster-care students.

Top-grade: Pittsburgh needs a high standard for teachers
Editorial, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, PA, January 17, 2014
The Pittsburgh Public Schools and its teachers union, the Pittsburgh Federation of Teachers, won such a prize — in the form of praise and a huge investment of dollars because of their long history of cooperation and ground-breaking collaboration on how to evaluate the work of teachers.

TENNESSEE

Gov. Haslam to bring back school voucher bill
The Tennessean, TN, January 17, 2014
Republican Gov. Bill Haslam said Thursday that he will support a school voucher bill this legislative session that’s similar to a limited measure he proposed last year, even though other GOP lawmakers say they’d like to see something a little broader.

Keeping school money at home: Georgia county finds charter success without outside operators
Nashville Ledger, TN, January 17, 2014
Georgia’s Hall County, touted as having the fastest-growing charter school population in the nation last year, didn’t earn its title by approving new schools to be operated by private companies.

New rules open more options for charters
Nashville Ledger, TN, January 17, 2014
A change in guidelines for charter school proposals in Metro Nashville is likely to trigger some adjustments in the city’s educational landscape, a charter school official says.

TEXAS

Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism
Slate Magazine, January 16, 2014
An investigation into charter schools’ dishonest and unconstitutional science, history, and “values” lessons.

WISD officials discuss correlation between dropout rates, grade retention
Waco Tribune, TX, January 17, 2014
About 11 percent of Waco Independent School District students have been held back a grade at least once, and officials say that is affecting dropout rates.

WISCONSIN

Defunct Milwaukee voucher school shows need for accountability
La Crosse Tribune, WI, January 17, 2014
A La Crosse legislator says fraud at a Milwaukee private school highlights the need for holding voucher schools accountable.

ONLINE LEARNING

Displaced Everest students to go home, virtual?
Palm Post Observer, FL, January 16, 2014
Students displaced by the closing of Everest Alternative School will have been integrated back into regular schools, or provided opportunities for virtual study or home study, by the time the school shuts its doors for good Jan. 16.

Online charter school petitions Banning Unified
Record Gazette, CA, January 17, 2014
Emphasizing online education, a couple of representatives from the planned online charter school Web-Based Academy for California (WACA) discussed their petition to open under the purview of Banning Unified School District during a hearing at the Jan. 9 Banning school board meeting.

Filed Under: Daily Headlines

Daily Headlines for January 16, 2013

January 16, 2014 By The Center for Education Reform

NATIONAL COVERAGE

Doubts over Common Core
Opinion, Washington Post, DC, January 15, 2014
Viewed from Washington, which often is the last to learn about important developments, opposition to the Common Core State Standards Initiative still seems as small as the biblical cloud that ariseth out of the sea, no larger than a man’s hand. Soon, however, this education policy will fill a significant portion of the political sky.

STATE COVERAGE

ALABAMA

School Choice Week encouraging options for parents
The Southeast Sun, AL, January 16, 2014
Despite the new options to Alabama students, the state has currently accepted only three of the six school choice options National School Choice Week endorses and encourages.

CALIFORNIA

Achievement-gap debate reaching peak
Opinion, San Francisco Examiner, CA, January 16, 2014
Years — even decades — of intense academic and political debate over closing the stubbornly wide achievement gap that separates Latino and black students from their white and Asian classmates are reaching a climactic point.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

Montessori school, Montgomery County’s only public charter, plans to close
Washington Post, DC, January 15, 2014
The only public charter school in Montgomery County will shut down at the end of the school year because it has struggled with its finances and can’t afford to stay open.

GEORGIA

Parent Trigger Bill May Come up Again in Legislature This Year
Atlanta Progressive News, GA, January 15, 2014
House Bill 123, the Parent Teacher Empowerment Act, commonly known as the Parent Trigger bill, care of State Rep. Ed Lindsey (R-Atlanta) and others, is rearing its ugly head again, this time for a possible State Senate vote.

ILLINOIS

Academics Blast CPS Charter School Expansion
DNAinfo, IL, January 15, 2014
A community forum organized Tuesday by groups looking to stop the expansion of charter schools was filled with crash-course lectures and calls to civic action.

MASSACHUSETTS

Gonsalves: Charter schools have unfair edge
Column, Cape Cod Times, MA, January 16, 2014
Members of the ad hoc support group Dennis-Yarmouth Save Our Schools are raising delicate but essential questions about public charter schools on Cape Cod.

Parents try out new BPS system
Dorchester Reporter, MA, January 16, 2014
The Home-Based school choice system, established for the coming school year, gives parents fewer choices, but gives them choices that are closer to home, according to Denise Snyder, the Senior Director For the Office of Welcome Services for Boston Public Schools.

MINNESOTA

St. Paul charter school votes to unionize
Star Tribune, MN, January 16, 2014
Education Minnesota scored a rare win in the charter-school sector Tuesday night when 25 teachers at a German immersion school in St. Paul gave 80 percent support to forming a union, making it the sole unionized charter school in the state.

MISSISSIPPI

Charter school would guide teens toward health careers
Clarion Ledger, MS, January 16, 2014
Jackson physician Aaron Shirley envisions a high school for Jackson youths that will prepare them for a health profession.

MISSOURI

Great schools change lives. How do we get them?
Editorial, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, MO, January 15, 2014
That’s the most important sentence in the 78-page education consultant’s report that the Missouri Board of Education might rely on to figure out how to turn around struggling urban school districts in St. Louis and Kansas City.

New proposal for troubled districts
St. Louis American, MO, January 15, 2014
On Monday the state’s controversial consultant CEE-Trust presented a plan for unaccredited school districts that gives individual schools more autonomy and eliminates the districts’ “central office” administration – a model similar to how charter schools operate.

NEW JERSEY

Views mixed on Christie’s call for more school hours
Philadelphia Inquirer, PA, January 15, 2014
Gov. Christie’s call in Tuesday’s State of the State address for lengthening the school day and year drew initial support, but it also raised some questions – and some eyebrows.

Vouchers appear to vanish from Governor Christie’s education agenda
New Jersey Spotlight, NJ, January 16, 2014
In education circles, one of the more notable parts of Gov. Chris Christie’s State of the State address on Tuesday was something he didn’t mention: school vouchers.

NEW YORK

An education reform without merit
Opinion, New York Daily News, NY, January 16, 2014
Like Lazarus strolling out of the grave, a proposal for teacher incentive pay rose from the dead in Gov. Cuomo’s State of the State address, despite a mountain of evidence suggesting that the idea, which sounds fine in theory, simply doesn’t work.

Buffalo diocese to close 10 of its Erie County schools
The Buffalo News, NY, January 15, 2014
Ten suburban Catholic elementary schools suffering from low enrollments and struggling with finances will close in June, Bishop Richard J. Malone announced today.

Charter schools should be part of universal pre-K
Editorial, New York Post, NY, January 15, 2014
There is untapped potential to increase access to pre-kindergarten in high-need communities through public charter schools, which serve many high-need students.

Let charters bloom
Opinion, New York Daily News, NY, January 16, 2014
Having clouded the future of charter schools, Mayor de Blasio and Chancellor Carmen Fariña would make a fateful error for thousands of children by curtailing one of the most successful experiments in urban education reform in decades.

Should Mayor de Blasio Unravel Bloomberg’s Reforms?
Opinions, New York Times, NY, January 15, 2014
Mayor Bill de Blasio has tapped Carmen Fariña as schools chancellor. Choosing someone who has been critical of Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s efforts to reform New York City schools suggests that many of the changes that defined Bloomberg’s tenure are about to be reversed.

NORTH CAROLINA

Good, bad schools in all types
Opinion, Fayetteville Observer, NC, January 15, 2014
My family and I arrived in Fayetteville recently, just in time for news about the opening of two new charter schools this fall in Cumberland and Harnett counties.

Teachers Fight Over Loss Of Tenure, New Contracts
WUNC, NC, January 16, 2014
There are 95,000 public school teachers in North Carolina, give or take. So how many, given their only chance to comment publicly on the end of tenure, would make their way to downtown Raleigh to voice their displeasure? Hundreds? Thousands, maybe? Try four.

OHIO

Cleveland principals deciding how to spend their school’s budgets as they gain authority under the Cleveland Plan
Cleveland Plain Dealer, OH, January 16, 2014
Erin Frew’s students at New Tech West High School aren’t reading well enough. So as the principal, she decided to increase class sizes this year to free up money for more reading help for her students.

Yost reveals ‘scrubbing’ audit to Columbus schools officials
Columbus Dispatch, OH, January 16, 2014
In a two-hour meeting yesterday, Columbus City Schools officials heard the findings of a state audit of student-data fraud in the district.

OKLAHOMA

Charter collaboration: Tulsa school board tours charter schools
Tulsa World, OK, January 16, 2014
Tulsa Public Schools is continuing to dismantle the wall that long divided it from the charter schools it sponsors.

OREGON

Oregon Charter School Considers ‘Arrowsmith Program’
Portland Tribune, OR, January 15, 2014
The “Arrowsmith program” leans on neuroscience to address learning disabilities. It’s already in some U.S. private schools. The program is on Thursday’s agenda for a charter school in Oregon City.

PENNSYLVANIA

Pa. auditor announces public meetings on charters
Philadelphia Inquirer, PA, January 16, 2014
Pennsylvania Auditor General Eugene DePasquale said Wednesday that his office would hold public meetings on improving the “accountability, effectiveness, and transparency” of charter schools across the state.

The way we’re funding schools is too high a price to pay
Letter, Philadelphia Inquirer, PA, January 16, 2014
IN PHILADELPHIA, watching our schools scrounge for money is a yearly event. Our schools are without full-time nurses and counselors, without librarians, without extracurricular activities; some are so overcrowded they don’t have enough desks.

TENNESSEE

Charter school company chosen to develop Springfield site
The Tennessean, TN, January 15, 2014
The Springfield Charter School Steering Committee has decided to work with Exalt Education as in its efforts to bring a charter school to the city.

TN Republican lawmakers seek ‘complete overhaul’ of textbook review panel
The Tennessean, TN, January 16, 2014
Wasting no time addressing what conservatives have called a pattern of bias in Tennessee textbooks, a Republican senator has filed legislation to give lawmakers a say over who sits on a key panel that reviews the materials.

WASHINGTON

Court treads delicate path on schools
Opinion, Bellingham Herald, WA, January 16, 2014
Normally we don’t quarrel with 8-1 state Supreme Court decisions, but we’re getting nervous about its approach to the Legislature and public school funding.

Legislature must follow WSAC education ‘road map’
Editorial, The Olympian, WA, January 16, 2014
Last week’s Supreme Court order sent state lawmakers scrambling to develop a complete plan before April 30 detailing how they will meet the K-12 funding mandate in the McCleary decision.

Spokane charter schools clear hurdle
Spokane Review, WA, January 16, 2014
People hoping to launch the first charter schools in Spokane faced no opposition Wednesday during the first and only public hearing on the controversial plans.

WISCONSIN

Reject independent charter schools
Editorial, Appleton Post-Crescent, WI, January 14, 2014
The latest attempt to privatize public education in Wisconsin comes in the form of independent charter schools — charter schools that operate outside the authority of public school districts.

ONLINE LEARNING

South Western wants to upgrade cyber program
The Evening Sun, PA, January 15, 2014
South Western School District is looking for ways to improve its online program and hopefully hire a few new teachers in the process.

St. Paul school district working toward computer-per-student status
Pioneer Press, MN, January 15, 2014
The St. Paul school district is contemplating a major investment in laptops and tablets that could eventually ensure each middle and high school student has a device at school.

Filed Under: Daily Headlines

Daily Headlines for January 15, 2014

January 15, 2014 By The Center for Education Reform

NATIONAL COVERAGE

Scoring School Reform by State
Wall Street Journal Video, January 14, 2014
Students First CEO Michelle Rhee on which states elevate the teaching profession, empower parents and spend public education monies wisely.

The Common Coring of Private Schools
National Review Online, January 15, 2014
That’s the central question the Thomas B. Fordham Institute seeks to answer in the report it released Tuesday. The institute proposes that state governments should require private schools to administer state tests to all students participating in school-choice programs, and that the results should be publicized.

STATE COVERAGE

ALABAMA

Birmingham school board will seek waiver that would grant sweeping hiring power to five principals in the Woodlawn Innovation Zone
The Birmingham News Bog, AL, January 14, 2014
The Birmingham Board of Education this afternoon will discuss a waiver it plans to submit to the state that would allow five schools to operate more like charter schools than traditional public schools, including the flexibility to make teachers reapply for their jobs if they want to stay at those schools.

Charter schools by another name? Birmingham BOE says waiver will allow flexibility, innovation; opposers worry they’re charters
The Birmingham News Bog, AL, January 14, 2014
The Birmingham Board of Education will submit a waiver request to the statethat would allow five Woodlawn-area schools to operate more like charters than traditional public schools.

ARIZONA

Greg Miller: The Truth about Vail District’s charter school conversions
Column, Arizona Daily Star, AZ, January 15, 2014
Everyone knows that anyone can make his or her case or agenda using statistics, which is what I believe Vail’s Superintendent Baker did in his Arizona Star guest opinion (12/18/13), about the very complicated financial systems that support our children’s education.

CALIFORNIA

3 Curious Reasons a Charter School Was Shot Down
Opinion, Voice of San Diego, CA, January 14, 2014
Nicole Tempel Assisi, founder and CEO of a proposed charter school called Thrive, showed up Jan. 7 at the San Diego Unified school board meeting expecting good news.

L.A. Unified needs enough iPads for the tests
Editorial, Los Angeles Times, CA, January 14, 2014
The school board should approve the purchase of more of the devices so that students can take the new Common Core exams on them this spring.

COLORADO

Student enrollment up in Colorado; DPS now largest school district
The Denver Post, CO, January 15, 2014
Enrollment in Colorado schools grew for the 24th year in a row, to nearly 877,000 students, a statewide increase of more than 40 percent over the past two decades.

CONNECTICUT

Administrators report smooth transition to teacher evaluations
Greenwich Times, CT, January 14, 2014
The transition to a new state-mandated teacher evaluation system has been generally successful so far, school administrators told parents during a workshop on the subject Tuesday.

FLORIDA

Beach school can’t take out-of-zone sixth graders
New Herald, FL, January 14, 2014
There will be one less School Choice option for fifth graders on the beach next school year. “Our capacity is just such that we have to be careful that we have room enough for the students that actually live in that zone,” said Superintendent Bill Husfelt.

Western Academy Charter School expansion planned
Sun-Sentinel, FL, January 15, 2014
Western Academy Charter School in Royal Palm Beach is yet again undergoing an expansion and this time it is coming with a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts & Math) Academy, which will bring two new sixth-grade classrooms in August.

GEORGIA

Education rankings show Georgia doing better, not good enough
Atlanta Journal Constitution Blog, GA, January 14, 2014
The good news is Georgia now ranks 14th in the country in a new report by a group that advocates education reforms. The bad news is took only a C-minus to earn that spot.

Don’t lower standards for teacher training
Opinion, Indianapolis Star, IN, January 13, 2014
The last year saw much controversy over emails obtained by The Associated Press in which (then-)Gov. Mitch Daniels and his advisers condemned the use of Howard Zinn’s historical writings at a 2010 Indiana University summer institute for teachers.

ILLINOIS

Geneva Schools Asked to Support Bill to Eliminate Illinois Charter Commission
Geneva Patch, IL, January 14, 2014
The Geneva School Board hears a pitch to support an Illinois House bill that would put the decision-making for charter schools back into the hands of the Illinois State Board of Education.

LOUISIANA

Policy wonks love, hate Louisiana’s school reforms
Times-Picayune, LA, January 14, 2014
The choice-and-charters education revolution has transformed New Orleans’ public schools and spread across Louisiana and the country.

MICHIGAN

Grand Rapids schools gauging community opinion in focus groups on school choices
The Grand Rapids Press, MI, January 14, 2014
Grand Rapids schools administrators are inviting parents and other community members to participate in focus group discussions about new and expanded school choices.

MISSISSIPPI

Group focuses on recruiting teachers
Clarion Ledger, MS, January 15, 2014
Mississippi wants to recruit more students into the teaching profession to curb a shortage in critical needs areas, including English and mathematics, but the Legislature probably won’t provide any additional teacher scholarships to accomplish the goal.

MISSOURI

All-Girls STEM Charter Could Open In 2015
St. Louis Public Radio, MO, January 15, 2014
Tisch is the founder of the Young Women’s Leadership Network, which operates a network of all-girls public schools and boasts a 93 percent graduation rate at its flagship institution in East Harlem.

School choice would solve MO’s actual problems, analyst says
Missouri Watchdog, MO, January 15, 2014
Missouri lawmakers are looking at legislation to fix the issue of students attending schools in failing districts.

State senator calls for education commissioner’s resignation
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, MO, January 15, 2014
Sen. Maria Chappelle-Nadal, D-University City, says she has grown weary of what she considers state Education Commissioner Chris Nicastro’s deception — and now she’s calling for the commissioner’s resignation or termination.

NEW HAMPSHIRE

Education tax credit program should be repealed
Editorial, Concord Monitor, NH, January 15, 2014
It’s not every day that the attorney general and the governor find themselves publicly at odds over important state policy, but it happened this week – and thank goodness.

Gov. Hassan takes both sides of school choice debate
Column, Union Leader, NH, January 15, 2014
Gov. Maggie Hassan would like to spend state revenues directly for scholarships to be used at any approved school, public or private in the state. At the same time, in the same term, she is arguing that legislation that does the same thing is an unconstitutional breach that must be stopped. Rarely has any leader been so directly and perfectly contradictory.

NEW JERSEY

Chris Christie’s State of the State: Longer school day needed, but how do we pay?
Editorial, Star-Ledger, NJ, January 15, 2014
It’s not likely to distract anybody from Bridgegate. But Gov. Chris Christie’s broad-stroke idea to extend our school year and school days, announced this afternoon, is worth its own moment in the sun.

Newark parents rip city’s school reorganization plan
Star-Ledger, NJ, January 15, 2014
The changes at Bragaw are part of Newark Superintendent Cami Anderson’s controversial One Newark plan that was unveiled last month. The plan features joint enrollment between district schools and the city’s charter schools, moves some schools to new locations and shifts the mission of others.

What Christie failed to mention in State of State speech about his education record
Washington Post Blog, DC, January 14, 2014
A big part of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s State of the State speech Tuesday was devoted to his record on school reform and his plans for moving forward — and it is worth noting the big difference between what Christie (R) says about his record on public education and what he actually did with public education during his first term in office.

NEW YORK

DiNapoli: Schools squeezed by flat revenue
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, NY, January 14, 2014
School districts in New York have struggled with fluctuating revenue over the past decade, including increases that averaged 1.3 percent over the last three years, according to a report today by Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli.

Free rent is over for NYC charter schools as de Blasio plans to make them pay
New York Daily News, NY, January 15, 2013
It’s a radically different political climate now for New York City charter school advocates. Unlike Michael Bloomberg, Mayor de Blasio is no friend of charters and has vowed make schools that can afford it pay for space. ‘It’s the norm around much of the country to charge appropriate rent,’ he said.

Gov panel slaps Bill de Blasio agenda with pre-K charters
New York Post, NY, January 15, 2014
Mayor de Blasio’s plan to impose limits on charter schools hit a brick wall Tuesday when a state commission recommended expanding the privately run schools by allowing them to add pre-K classes.

Now’s the time to even the field between New York City’s charter, public schools
Opinion, New York Daily News, NY, January 15, 2013
United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew says New York City charter schools should take four steps to mend relations with public school parents and students: Serve the neediest children; be good neighbors; open their business books; and stop treating kids as profit centers.

Success Academy charter schools in New York City garner praise, scorn
New York Daily News, NY, January 15, 2013
For eight years, ex-New York City Councilwoman Eva Moskowitz has been the lightning rod of the charter movement, raising millions from hedge funders and foundations as she aggressively worked her close connections to the Bloomberg administration to take over space in public schools.

The ABC’s of charter schools
Rochester City Newspaper, NY, January 15, 2014
You could call 2013 the year of the charter school in Rochester. Charters have been operating in the city for years, of course, but attention intensified last year and charter chatter was everywhere.

NORTH CAROLINA

New N.C. reading push brings expenses, opportunities and lots of testing
Charlotte Observer, NC, January 14, 2014
Lots more reading tests for third-graders, summer reading camps for up to 5,000 children and the need to restructure third- and fourth-grade classrooms next year are on the horizon as Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools works with the state’s new “ Read to Achieve” mandate.

OHIO

Citywide school choice campaign starts to take shape for the Cleveland Transformation Alliance
Cleveland Plain Dealer, OH, January 14, 2014
The Cleveland Transformation Alliance’s school choice awareness campaign for this year will start next month with the launch of the panel’s website, ClevelandTA.org.

Failure to launch
Editorial, Columbus Dispatch, OH, January 15, 2014
The Dispatch long has argued that Ohio needs to clean up the legal relationship between charter schools and their sponsors and operators, and that some up-front quality controls are needed to ensure that new charter schools have a reasonable chance of succeeding.

Graham school fight continues
Springfield News Sun, OH, January 14, 2014
Public district, charter disagree over sponsorship. Academy serves 280 students whose fate hangs in balance.

PENNSYLVANIA

Process Questions: Why are some city charter schools approved over others?
Pittsburgh City Paper, PA, January 15, 2014
But getting approval for a charter school — a school run by an outside group that nevertheless gets public money from the district itself — can be difficult. Between 2008 and 2012, the district has approved only two charter schools out of 15 proposed.

TENNESSEE

Expert: State Charter Authorizer Would Need To Have Its Own Vetting Process
WPLN blog, TN, January 14, 2014
If the Tennessee State Board of Education is going to get into the business of opening charter schools, a national expert says state officials will need to do their homework.

Metro magnet school lottery leaves parents looking around
WSMV-TV, TN, January 14, 2014
Hundreds of parents in Metro Nashville Public Schools got some disappointing news this weekend. They were hoping their child would land a spot in one of Metro’s top schools, but instead they got wait listed.

Plan to expand pre-K in Nashville earns high marks at school board meeting
The Tennessean, TN, January 15, 2014
A plan for prekindergarten expansion in Nashville that hinges on a system of new pre-K hubs received glowing early reviews Tuesday night from the board that would need to approve it.

WASHINGTON

State eyes adding standardized testing to teacher ratings
News Tribune, WA, January 15, 2014
For the fourth time in as many years, the Washington Legislature is taking a look at teacher and principal evaluations, responding to pressure from the federal government to force school districts to judge performance partly on student test scores.

WISCONSIN

Charter schools are public schools
Editorial, Wisconsin State Journal, WI, January 15, 2014
Wisconsin has 243 charter schools. Every one of them is a public school. So don’t buy the “privatization” scare tactics surrounding legislation to expand chartering options across the state. Charter schools aren’t privatizing public education. They’re invigorating public education by trying new approaches to learning.

ONLINE LEARNING

Forest Grove School District’s transfer analysis shows some students left for online programs
The Oregonian, OR, January 14, 2014
Months ago the Forest Grove School District began to compile data from inter-district transfer forms, with the goal of learning more about where students are going and why. Based on demographic study, the district has lost about 247 students since October 2009.

Janesville-Waldorf-Pemberton teachers flip their classrooms
Janesville Argus, MN, January 14, 2014
Envision a classroom where the students are on their iPhones with headphones in their ears. In some schools, this would be a problem. However, this is a regular occurrence in Mike Skinner and Ryan Luedtke’s math classes.

Lawrence School District to manage virtual high school program
KCTV5, MO, January 14, 2014
School districts starting virtual online schools is a trend that’s growing nationwide. The districts say it helps students living in more rural areas get a quality education.

Filed Under: Daily Headlines

NEWSWIRE: January 14, 2014

January 14, 2014 By The Center for Education Reform

Vol. 16, No. 2

PEAK PERFORMANCE. In a brief video testimonial, 16 year-old Savannah, a low-income student who is a full grade ahead and obtaining college credit, sums up her experience attending Pikes Peak Prep charter school in Colorado. With expenses such as books and transportation costs taken care of, students like Savannah can focus on education and pursue their dreams. Savannah’s dream is to attend college, where she will study to become a neuroscientist. This is a testament to the CO charter school staying true to its claim that at Pikes Peak Prep, “all roads lead to college — and beyond.” Hopefully with increased public support, lawmakers recognize the need to foster similar opportunities so underserved students can pursue goals of their own.

UNWANTED RIPPLE EFFECT. Some officials in leading Parent Power state Indiana are becoming wary of the amount of charter school authorizers, and the way in which authorizers…well, authorize. For a state that is home to authorizing superstars like Ball State – responsible for overseeing nearly half the charter schools statewide – Hoosier policymakers should know that properly instituting university authorizers increases school accountability and renders the number of authorizers a moot point. What’s problematic is when the same conversations shift to other states (i.e. Pennsylvania) where misplaced dialogue translates into misguided attempts at reform. Keystone State lawmakers would do well to tune out certain conversations, and instead listen from places such as Central Michigan University, the SUNY network in New York, and the number of other university authorizers that consistently oversee quality schools.

DESIRED RIPPLE EFFECT. One indicator that DC has above-average parent power and a robust charter school environment is the fact that there needed to be a city-wide convention so parents and students could properly survey all of the options afforded to them. Representatives of public charter schools in addition to traditional schools were on hand to show parents the potential benefits of their unique brand of education, a nod to the increased collaborative nature of the DC system. Whereas traditional schools have not traditionally participated in the convention, there is now a heightened awareness of the charter school ripple effect now perceived as lifting all boats and improving the district as a whole.

NO EFFECT AT ALL. The state of Maryland ranks 38^th in taking substantive action to improve educational conditions for all students. It’s previously been touted as number one, but the reality is that it’s in the bottom 12 in creating an environment where quality educational options can thrive. It is unproductive to tout a single testing statistic or reform as all the proof needed to assess a state’s educational progress, especially when those numbers are conflated to begin with. What’s worse, state lawmakers become less motivated to enact policies rooted in choice, accountability and data transparency aimed at empowering parents and students. State evaluation methods vary widely, but policymakers benefit most when given the equivalent of a cumulative GPA that gives the full picture, rather than focusing on singular metrics.

ALL ABOARD the National School Choice Week Whistle-Stop tour, coming soon to a city near you. The tour will begin in Newark on January 22 and make stops in Philadelphia, the District of Columbia, Charlotte, Columbia, Augusta, Birmingham, Jackson, Houston, San Antonio, Austin, Tucson, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Not stopping in a city near you? You don’t have to miss out on the biggest celebration of educational opportunity in history – you can host your very own National School Choice Week event in your own school or town! Get the supplies you’ll need here for free with the code CER2014!

Filed Under: Newswire Weekly, Newswire

Daily Headlines for January 14, 2013

January 14, 2014 By The Center for Education Reform

NATIONAL COVERAGE

Rep. George Miller, leading Democratic voice on education, set to retire
Washington Post, DC, January 13, 2014
Rep. George Miller’s decision to retire after 40 years in Congress, coming after the announced retirement of Sen. Tom Harkin (Iowa), means Democrats will lose their two strongest congressional leaders on education issues at the end of the year.

Weingarten slams teacher evaluation by student test scores
Washington Post Blog, DC, January 13, 2014
Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, the country’s second largest teachers union, has been a supporter of the Common Core State Standards for a long time but she has expressed concern in the last year over the way the standards are being implemented, saying that the rollout was “far worse” than the HealthCare.gov website.

When federalism meets Cantor’s voucher push
MSNBC, January 13, 2014
Last year, the Republican National Committee’s “autopsy” was light on policy prescriptions, but one measure was mentioned repeatedly: “school choice.”

STATE COVERAGE

ALABAMA

Selma City Schools responds amid danger of state takeover
WSFA, AL, January 13, 2014
Alabama School Superintendent Dr. Tommy Bice is not happy with the Selma City Board of Education, and strongly suggested last Thursday that the state will take over if things don’t get better in a hurry. Dr. Bice made remarks after the state school board work session.

ALASKA

Alaska group criticizes schools rating system
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, AK, January 14, 2014
The Alaska Policy Forum released its own ratings for each school in the Fairbanks North Star Borough last week, decrying the state’s own school rating system.

CALIFORNIA

Parent-trigger opponents plead not guilty to vandalizing Adelanto school
San Bernardino Sun, CA, January 13, 2014
Two Adelanto mothers bitterly opposed to their elementary school being handed over to a charter school operator last summer under the state’s parent-trigger law pleaded not guilty to vandalizing a classroom days before the handoff was set to take place.

State education officials to vote on school funding reform
Visalia Times-Delta, CA, January 13, 2014
After months of sometimes angry debate, California education officials are set to take up rules this week aimed at making good on Gov. Jerry Brown’s promise to invest in the state’s future by overhauling how public schools are funded and directing more money to the neediest students.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

Training is important, but all new teachers need on-the-job help
Washington Post Blog, DC, January 13, 2014
In the first two parts of this series, we surveyed various routes to teacher certificationand discussed the challenges of learning to manage a classroom. New teachers also need targeted coaching, opportunities to collaborate with and observe experienced teachers, and help with lesson-planning.

FLORIDA

Once a priority, ‘parent trigger’ idea no longer figures in group’s education agenda
Tampa Bay Times, FL, January 14, 2014
A national advocacy group that in recent years has pressured Florida lawmakers to adopt the controversial “parent trigger” school takeover plan will not push that initiative again in 2014.

State set to tweak learning standards
Tallahassee Democrat, FL, January 14, 2014
From requiring fourth-graders to master cursive writing to re-codifying learning requirements for calculus, Florida’s education department has proposed dozens of changes to the Common Core State Standards, which the state adopted in 2010.

GEORGIA

Atlanta school board changes legislative priorities
Atlanta Journal-Constitution, GA, January 13, 2014
The newly elected Atlanta Board of Education on Monday voted against asking state lawmakers to make all schools proportionately share financial liabilities — language that was aimed at having charter schools contribute to pension debts.

ILLINOIS

Nonprofit seeks charter legislation support from school boards
Courier News, IL, January 13, 2014
A nonprofit coalition of unions, community organizations and faith-based groups is making the rounds asking administrators and school board members from 18 local districts to support legislation that would disband the state charter school commission.

INDIANA

Lawmakers continue to ponder Common Core Standards
Shelbyville News, IN, January 13, 2014
As state lawmakers returned to the Statehouse in Indianapolis, they did so with educators, parents and political enthusiasts watching them closely when it comes to what the next step will be for Common Core.

LOUISIANA

Group likes accountability in La. voucher program
The Advocate, LA, January 14, 2014
Louisiana’s controversial voucher program is one of at least four nationwide that includes key accountability measures, a pro-voucher group said in a report issued on Tuesday.

The Long March for school reform
Column, Times-Picayune, LA, January 11, 2014
Once again Louisiana finds a key plank of its school reform program – popular with parents and approved by a majority of state legislators – under attack in the courts. Will this ever end?

MICHIGAN

Detroit schools plan events to attract students
Detroit News, MI, January 13, 2014
Detroit’s public schools have scheduled events in their campaign to attract new students and stem enrollment losses.

MISSISSIPPI

Miss. House Speaker Gunn: Teachers have waited long enough for pay raise
Jackson Clarion Ledger, MS, January 13, 2014
House Speaker Philip Gunn said waiting to work out a merit system for teacher pay will take too long, and teachers deserve a raise now.

Nashville Prep defined by academic rigor
Jackson Clarion Ledger, MS, January 14, 2014
If your child attends the public charter school Nashville Prep, he will be in a safe and orderly atmosphere.

MISSOURI

KC Schools Need Drastic Reform, Report Says; Changes Could Apply Statewide
St. Louis Public Radio, MO, January 13, 2014
To reverse student performance in Kansas City that it calls “disastrous,” a consultant hired by Missouri education officials is proposing a makeover that would direct more money to individual schools, recruit outside nonprofit groups to run them and address non-academic needs such as health care, nutrition and even laundry services to prepare students better to learn.

Proposal would disband failing Missouri school districts
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, MO, January 14, 2014
The Missouri Board of Education heard a proposal Monday that calls for a drastic departure in how the state addresses failing schools — by disbanding those school districts altogether.

NEW HAMPSHIRE

Hassan files brief encouraging prohibition of scholarships for religious schools
Concord Monitor, NH, January 14, 2014
Gov. Maggie Hassan waded into the education tax credit fight yesterday by filing a legal brief encouraging the state Supreme Court to uphold a lower court ruling that prohibits the scholarships from going to religious schools. This puts Hassan, a Democrat, at odds with the attorney general’s office, which has been defending the law.

NEW JERSEY

Gov. Christie education proposal: Longer school day, shorter summer break
Star-Ledger, NJ, January 14, 2014
With his State of the State address today, Gov. Chris Christie will dive into the national debate over whether more class time is better for students.

NEW YORK

Clash begins between NYC’s charter, district schools — with de Blasio’s stance obvious
New York Daily News, NY, January 14, 2014
The city’s once-mighty charters have fallen sharply out of favor post-Bloomberg. Mayor de Blasio, siding with the critics who contend the charters’ success came at the expense of public schools, has vowed to charge them rent, threatening their ability to survive. But charter schools won’t go down without a fight.

Class Size Matters executive: Funds drained for NYC public schools thanks to charters
Opinion, New York Daily News, NY, January 14, 2014
Many charters raise millions from private sources, and many charter school CEOs earn as much as $500,000 a year. Many charters also feature abusive disciplinary and ‘pushout’ practices to ensure high test scores. The city must turn its attention to maximizing opportunities for all children, rather than just a chosen few.

De Blasio’s plan to kill charter schools
Column, New York Post, NY, January 14, 2014
Kiss charter schools good-bye. That’s been a top Team de Blasio goal since the new mayor was polling in the single digits and courting the teachers’ union, and Schools Chancellor Carmen Farina on Monday telegraphed hints as to how the mission is to be accomplished.

StudentsFirstNY executive on city charter schools: Choice is vital
Opinion, New York Daily News, NY, January 14, 2014
The wealthiest New Yorkers have an array of options — paying for private school, moving to a neighborhood with better schools or even moving outside New York City. Charter schools help to level the playing field by giving choice to the 99%.

NEVADA

Advocacy group says Nevada on the right track with education reforms
Las Vegas Sun, NV, January 14, 2014
A national group advocating education reforms commended Nevada lawmakers for instituting new school policies they hope will improve student achievement.

NORTH CAROLINA

Forum’s focus is charter schools
Charlotte Observer, NC, January 14, 2014
Representatives from new charter school applicants in south Charlotte will meet with parents and residents during a 6:30 p.m. Jan. 16 forum at Raintree Country Club.
The forum comes on the heels of the Jan. 9 approval of 26 new charter schools in North Carolina by the state Board of Education for the 2014-15 school year.

NC board to consider 62 charter schools that applied to open in 2015
News & Observer, NC, January 13, 2014
More than 60 new charter schools are still in the running to open in 2015 – 50 percent more than were considered for this coming fall – under a new board that’s more friendly to the nontraditional public schools.

Pender moves to classify teachers under new law
Star News, NC, January 13, 2014
Fewer than 100 Pender County teachers would be eligible to receive bonuses under a state plan that rewards teachers who give up their tenure, members of the district’s school board heard Monday.

Two local charters dropped from consideration
Durham Herald Sun, NC, January 13, 2014
Two of the eight charter schools that applied to the state to open in Durham next year have been dropped from consideration by the N.C. Charter School Advisory Board.

OHIO

Cleveland “scrubbed” 2010-11 state report cards of 3,500 students’ results; some officials being investigated
Cleveland Plain Dealer, OH, January 13, 2014
Cleveland school district officials who improperly “scrubbed” more than 3,500 students from the district’s state report card results will be investigated for possible professional conduct violations, the Ohio Department of Education announced today.

OKLAHOMA

Plan of action is just what the Oklahoma City school district needs
Editorial, The Oklahoman, OK, January 14, 2014
IN describing a plan for Oklahoma City Public Schools that will dominate the second half of his one-year term as interim superintendent, Dave Lopez invoked the words of U.S. Army Gen. George Patton: “A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week.”

OREGON

Portland students and teachers union supporters flood school board meeting
The Oregonian, OR, January 13, 2014
More than 400 community members flooded Monday night’s school board meeting to show solidarity with the Portland Association of Teachers, with students eventually interrupting the meeting with loud chants.

The Future of School Choice in Oregon: Education Savings Accounts
Opinion, Oregon Catalyst, OR, January 13, 2014
Lower and middle-income families, meanwhile, too often are trapped with one option—a school in need of improvement assigned to them based on their zip code.

PENNSYLVANIA

Bethlehem schools face $16.9 million deficit in preliminary budget
Allentown Morning Call, PA, January 13, 2014
The deficit is driven by a $6.7 million spike in charter school costs and $4.4 million rise in pension obligations, district officials said at Monday’s school board Finance Committee meeting. All other expenses combined are projected to increase by $5.7 million.

Bill requires schools to make budgets public
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, PA, January 14, 2014
The Pennsylvania House on Monday approved legislation requiring the state to create a searchable online database of the revenue and expenses of school districts and charter schools.

North Phila. nonprofit aims for ‘D. June Brown’ charter in Harrisburg
Philadelphia Inquirer, PA, January 14, 2014
A new North Philadelphia nonprofit has taken the unusual step of naming the charter school it wants to establish in Harrisburg for Dorothy June Brown, who last week was acquitted of six counts of fraud by a federal jury but will be retried on the 54 counts the panel could not agree upon.

Residents tell SRC of concerns about universal enrollment
Philadelphia Inquirer, PA, January 14, 2014
For more than a year, a working group has been exploring sweeping changes to the way students apply and are assigned to city schools – a universal enrollment process that would boil Philadelphia School District, charter, and possibly private schools’ application and assignment systems into one.

TENNESSEE

Emerald Youth Foundation plans Knox Co.’s first charter school
WBIR, TN, January 14, 2014
A long-time advocate for Knoxville’s urban youth plans to open the first charter school in Knox County.

Math for Tennessee seniors doubles as remedial course in college
Memphis Commercial Appeal, TN, January 13, 2014
Based on her ACT results last year, Erial Cole knew she would have to take remedial math in college. Now, a year later as a senior, she’s finished the class online and can’t wait for statistics, her next college math class.

Tennessee’s grade from education group marred by ‘F’ for school choice
The Tennessean, TN, January 14, 2014
Lacking a school voucher system and a law that lets charter school operators turn to the state for approval, Tennessee gets an “F” for school choice, according to a national education-reform group.

WASHINGTON

Seattle teachers’ union expected to voice opposition at charter school public meeting
Seattle Times Blog, WA, January 13, 2014
Potential operators of Washington’s first charter schools can expect some tough questions from members of the Seattle teacher’s union at a public forum Monday evening at South Seattle Community College.

ONLINE LEARNING

Kaneland leaves online-learning cooperative venture
Chicago Daily Herald, IL, January 13, 2014
The Kaneland school board decided Monday to drop out of a five-district group planning joint online and blended online-and-classroom instruction.

Lawrence district cancels K12 Inc. contract
Lawrence Journal World, KS, January 13, 2014
Lawrence school district Superintendent Rick Doll announced Monday that the district has taken the management of Lawrence Virtual High School over after the school posted a graduation rate last year of just 26.3 percent.

Maine commission reviews applications for four new charter schools
Portland Press Herald, ME, January 13, 2014
Two virtual schools are among the applicants hoping to open new charter schools in Maine.

River Forest wants to save budget with ‘virtual’ education option
Post-Tribune, IL, January 13, 2014
Facing a growing budget deficit and shrinking enrollment, the River Forest Community School Corp. hopes to reverse the trend with an online program that allows students to learn at home, but enjoy extra-curricular pursuits at school.

Filed Under: Daily Headlines

McDonnell says charter schools have grown in Virginia

January 14, 2014 By The Center for Education Reform

Nancy Madsen, Richmond Times-Dispatch

Former Gov. Bob McDonnell was not shy about about claiming success during his final State of the Commonwealth Address. Among the accomplishments he cited in his hour-long speech: “We expanded charter” schools.

Charter schools are alternative primary or secondary academies that receive tax dollars but are not subject to all of the regulations and laws that govern public schools. In exchange for the waivers, the institutions sign a charter guaranteeing certain results.

While charter schools have become popular in many states, they’ve encountered stony resistance from local officials in Virginia. So we thought McDonnell’s claim of expansion during his administration — which ended Saturday — was worth a look.

Taylor Keeney, a McDonnell spokeswoman, cited figures from the state Department of Education showing there were three charter schools in Virginia when McDonnell became governor in January 2010 and now there are six.

The growth, when put in a national perspective, is microscopic.

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, there were 5,274 charter schools across the country in 2010-11, the most recent figures available. The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools reported 6,004 charter schools for the 2012-13 school year. The states with the most charter schools were California with 1,065; Florida, 576; Arizona, 534; Ohio, 374; and Texas, 280. In the region, North Carolina had 107; the District of Columbia, 57; and Maryland, 52.

McDonnell has often blamed the resistance in Virginia on local school boards which, under state law, have the final say on whether a charter school is opened. In 2010, he backed legislation that would have allowed the state Board of Education — which is appointed by the governor — to override any locality’s rejection of a charter school..

The General Assembly passed a watered-down version of the bill that keeps the final decision in local hands. It provides a process by which a charter school whose application was denied could return to the local school board for reconsideration.

In 2012, McDonnell backed successful legislation that established a state panel of experts to help prospective charter schools prepare applications to local school boards. It also mandated that approved charter schools receive per-student funding that is “commensurate” with other public schools in the locality.

Officials from two national organizations advocating charter schools told us they were unimpressed with McDonnell’s record, saying three new academies over his four-year term does not represent a change of culture in Virginia. The Center for Education Reform rates Virginia’s laws second worst among the 43 states that have charter schools.

Similarly, the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools ranks Virginia No. 39 out of 43 in its rankings of laws.

“Virginia is the the rock-bottom tier of states,” said Todd Ziebarth, senior vice president for state advocacy and support at the alliance.

“They may have opened the door, but they shouldn’t expect a stampede,” Ziebarth said. “One of the big takeaways under the McDonnell administration is a general disappointment in the charter school community because McDonnell seemed to support charter schools and made some tweaks every year, but at the end of the day, his administration didn’t result in very significant changes in the law.”

Our ruling

McDonnell, citing accomplishments during his term, said charter schools in Virginia “expanded” during his administration. The number rose from three to six — barely a ripple in a nation of about 6,000 charter schools. The tiny increase underscores a larger truth unmentioned by McDonnell: He was unable to change state laws that are highly unfavorable to charter schools.

Adding three new new charter schools does represent a expansion, however. McDonnell’s statement is accurate but omits the context: Virginia still has just a handful of charter schools. We rate the statement Half True.

Filed Under: CER in the News

School Choice Educates Kids – And Parents

January 13, 2014 By The Center for Education Reform

Mary C. Tillotson, Watchdog.org

One of the greatest challenges for school choice proponents is simply educating parents that they have a choice.

“If we’re going to really have parents engaged in knowing what all their options are, someone’s got to go and tell them,” said Jonathan Butcher, education director at the Goldwater Institute.

His group has published a school choice guide for Arizona parents. The booklet has information on each choice—what education savings accounts are, for example—who qualifies, and how to pursue each option.

The Center for Education Reform (CFER) keeps a Parent Power Index on its website, ranking states based on teacher quality, school choice, transparency, and other information to help parents make good choices.

“There’s a huge disconnect between policy implementation and practice, especially when it comes to educational choices,” said Kara Kerwin, CFER president. “Once a law gets passed, you’ll have those that defend the status quo working hard to quell any excitement about it. Sometimes we put these options or these choices in the hands of bureaucrats who don’t know how to communicate with parents.”

School choice proponents are taking to the streets, mailboxes, and community centers to get the word out. Here’s what some are doing.

Florida
Word of mouth marketing and community outreach has been the most sustainable and effective way to spread the word in Florida, said Alissa Ciaramello, vice president for marketing at Step Up for Students.

Step Up provides tax-credit scholarships for Florida K-12 students who are homeless, in foster care or whose families make up to 185 percent of the federal poverty level, allowing those students to attend private schools if they choose.

“We want to empower those families, parents and caregivers to find the best educational option for their child because we’ve found that education is one of the ways to break generational poverty,” Ciaramello said.

The effort isn’t intended to be anti-public school, she said, but pro-family.

“We don’t play into the failing school model,” she said. “We just want the families we serve to have choice about their child’s education, and a school may do well for one child but not for another.”

The group works with community-based agencies, schools, families, employers, and faith-based providers to connect information with families.

“Really, we try to find anyone and everyone who spends time with our families, but it’s a very multi-faceted approach—top-down and bottom-up,” Ciaramello said.

Step Up includes information about school choice in newsletters or on websites for community groups, she said. They’ve stuffed Happy Meal bags at McDonald’s and partnered with other groups that work with foster kids, homeless families, or senior citizens who may be raising their grandchildren.

“[Scholarship families] felt empowered, humbled and grateful to have this opportunity for their children, and they’re very happy to spread the word,” Ciaramello said.

Arkansas
Lawmakers in Arkansas considered tax-credit scholarships and voucher programs in the most recent legislative session, but neither passed.

“People are just learning about school choice in this state, and I think there are a lot of questions,” said Virginia Walden-Ford, founder of the Arkansas Parent Network. School choice bills are likely to return when lawmakers do, she said.

So Walden-Ford travels the state talking about school choice. The meetings are well-attended and parents are excited, she said. But they have a lot of learning to do.

“I said, ‘Let me give you information about school choice,’ and they’d ask, ‘Well, what is school choice?’” she said.

“We provided information about…what states have school choice programs and how they’re working, particularly in Louisiana and Florida and D.C.,” she said. “We talk to parents about how effective school choice programs can be for kids who just aren’t doing well in a traditional setting.”

She gave parents opportunities to ask questions and discuss their feelings about their kids’ schools.

National School Choice Week
Every community is different, and no one method of spreading the word will work everywhere, said Andrew Campanella, president of National School Choice Week.

The organization promotes a week in January—about the time parents are enrolling their children in school for the upcoming year—to celebrate “school choice regardless of choice,” Campanella said.

That includes traditional public schools, public charter schools, magnet schools, private schools, virtual schools, and homeschooling.

Last year, the country saw about 3,600 School Choice Week events, and Campanella said he hopes for about 5,000 events in 2014.

School Choice Week is intentionally decentralized; participants plan events in their communities and don’t need permission from the organization. Participants have hosted school fairs, rallies, roundtable discussions, movie screenings, and community service activities.

“In a society where for so many years, parents didn’t have school choices for their kids, we almost become conditioned to know that you’re going to be assigned to a certain school, and if you don’t like it, there’s nothing you can do about it,” he said. “So when people hear they have a choice, they’re often very surprised.”

He said he hopes parents begin thinking about K-12 education the way many of them think about higher education: “What school are we going to send our child to?”

“There still needs to be a lot of work done in reaching parents in the communities where they live and communicating with them in the ways they receive their news and information,” he said.

Filed Under: CER in the News

Daily Headlines for January 13, 2014

January 13, 2014 By The Center for Education Reform

NATIONAL COVERAGE

Diane Ravitch’s ideas on school policy are worth listening to, even if you disagree
Column, Washington Post, DC, January 12, 2014
I’m a fan of school policy pundit Diane Ravitch. On the jacket of her latest book, “Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America’s Public Schools,” I say she is “our best living historian of education.” Her passion and intellect are a great national resource.

Maryland Bumped From Number One to Number 38
WBFF-TV, MD, January 9, 2014
Though Maryland schools once held the title for best schools in the nation, Education Week has revamped their scoring and instead of ranking, focuses on the quality of student achievements. As a result of the change, Maryland schools have dropped down the list to number 38.

School Choice Educates Kids—and Parents
Heartland Institute, January 13, 2014
One of the greatest challenges for school choice proponents is simply educating parents that they have a choice.

The Federal war on school discipline
Opinion, New York Post, NY, January 11, 2014
With much ballyhoo, the Obama administration announced this week that it will keep a close eye on school districts that discipline minority students at higher rates than whites.

STATE COVERAGE

ALABAMA

Scholarships could be biggest impact of Alabama Accountability Act: Almost $25 million given
The Huntsville Times Blog, AL, January 12, 2014
An afterthought in a controversial school choice law is likely to have a far greater impact than the legislation’s original design, according to a review of state tax data.

ARIZONA

Private school voucher expansion premature
Editorial, Arizona Daily Sun, AZ, January 13, 2014
As the Arizona Legislature prepares to reconvene, we are struck once again by the absence of any substantive proposals to increase this state’s woefully inadequate funding of K-12 public schools.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

Autonomy considered as way to improve D.C.’s struggling Dunbar High School
Washington Post, DC, January 11, 2014
Dunbar High School, once renowned as an elite institution for African American students and now one of the District’s worst-performing schools, has been quietly working on a proposal to seek greater autonomy within the D.C. public school system, according to interviews and documents.

D.C. Prep uses Big Data to evaluate tablet-based education apps
Washington Post, DC, January 12, 2014
One Saturday in December, a group of 24 data scientists spent 24 hours in their Arlington office, racing to make sense of information about how students at a Northeast Washington charter school learn.

N.Y.-based Democracy Prep to take over struggling Imagine Southeast charter school
Washington Post, DC, January 10, 2014
New York-based charter school operator Democracy Prep has agreed to take over Imagine Southeast, a large public charter elementary school in Ward 8 that narrowly escaped being closed last year for poor academic performance.

Thousands of parents attend D.C. schools festival to shop for educational opportunities
Washington Post, DC, January 11, 2014
Thousands of parents descended on the Walter E. Washington Convention Center on Saturday for the D.C. Education Festival, a one-stop school shopping event meant to help families navigate the city’s growing — and sometimes overwhelming — number of school choices.

FLORIDA

Another School Choice In Florida: Single-Sex Classrooms
WLRN, FL, January 13, 2014
A handful of public schools in Florida have either all-girls or all-boys classrooms. More could be coming.

Charter school changes considered
Tampa Tribune, FL, January 12, 2014
Kid’s Community College knows how to get it done when it comes to starting up a charter school in Hillsborough County, submitting successful applications for learning centers that opened in 2005, 2010 and 2012.

State Education Commissioner grilled by lawmakers about new Florida standards and assessments
Bradenton Herald, FL, January 13, 2014
When Pam Stewart became state education commissioner in September, lawmakers said they would give her time to untangle the complicated issues facing the education department.

IDAHO

Renew Idaho teacher ‘bonus’ pay
Editorial, Idaho Press Tribune, ID, January 12, 2014
Probably the biggest question Idahoans had before Gov. Butch Otter’s State of the State address on Monday was what would the governor propose in the way of education funding — and how would that compare with the bold increase Superintendent Tom Luna was asking for.

ILLINOIS

CPS watchdog targets faked school attendance, grades
Chicago Tribune, IL, January 12, 2014
The wrongdoing laid out in the latest report from the inspector general for Chicago Public Schools includes cases of school administrators faking data, a problem the district watchdog said has been a particularly troubling development in recent years.

KENTUCKY

William E. Ellis: Equity in education still Kentucky’s challenge
Op-Ed, Lexington Herald-Leader, KY, January 13, 2014
Money is not the only measure of improving education, but it is and always will be one of the prime features of this process.

MASSACHUSETTS

Charter’s program is of value to tutors, students alike
Opinion, Boston Globe, MA, January 11, 2014
THE TUTORING program at Match Charter Schools, covered in Lawrence Harmon’s Jan. 4 column (“Define tutors as what they are: volunteers,” Op-ed), is a proven, powerful remedy for the achievement gap and key to Match’s decade-long success with low-income students in Boston. Every student at Match receives two hours of small-group tutoring a day, in addition to four hours of rigorous classroom instruction.

In support of Cape Cod’s charter schools
Cape Cod Today, MA, January 12, 2014
The charter haters – and yes we include Messrs. Turner and Wick – will twist logic to say that charter schools don’t include low-achieving students or low-income students. So what?

‘Unanimous’ opposition to charter school
North Andover Citizen, MA, January 11, 2014
The North Andover School Committee has formally voiced their opposition to the proposed STEAM Studio Charter School with a letter to the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

MINNESOTA

Minnesota charter school monitors to face more scrutiny from education department
Pioneer Press, MN, January 12, 2014
Minnesota is preparing to step up oversight of the nonprofits, school districts and colleges that monitor the state’s charter schools.

MISSOURI

School reform group set to issue report
Columbia Daily Tribune, MO, January 12, 2014
A private education reform group is preparing to release its recommendations for turning around Missouri’s unaccredited school systems, even as debate swirls over whether the consultant was appropriately awarded the contract.

NEW HAMPSHIRE

Charter funding: A small step forward
Editorial, Union Leader, NH, January 13, 2014
Incredibly, the average per-pupil cost to educate a child in a New Hampshire public school is about $13,700. For a 20-child class (which is the average class size in the state for grades 5-8), that comes to $274,000. That is for a regular public school. Charter schools manage to educate children for much less.

Finding funding next step for bill to increase charter school aid
Concord Monitor, NH, January 12, 2014
A bill to boost charter school aid that passed the House this week faces a tough road in the House Finance Committee, tasked with determining where to find the more than $2 million the bill would cost.

NEW JERSEY

Camden RFP for renaissance schools pulls in some big names
New Jersey Spotlight, NJ, January 13, 2014
Camden‘s quest to build more renaissance schools under the Urban Hope Act has attracted some more big names from the charter movement.

NEW MEXICO

All charters don’t boost performance
Column, Albuquerque Journal, NM, January 12, 2014
For the school year 2013-2014, New Mexico is spending $157 million for charter schools. How is that money being spent, and what is the return on the investment? And is the student performance improving?

NEW YORK

Deep pockets feed push for education tax credit in N.Y.
The Journal News, NY, January 11, 2014
Some of America’s richest, tied to archdiocese, pour cash into bid that could shift $250M in N.Y. revenue to schools of choice

Denying parents standing in anti-charter case
Editorial, New York Post, NY, January 13, 2014
Recently, we commended the mayor for his wisdom in questioning a lawsuit that challenges the city’s plans to have 30 charter schools share space with traditional schools. The test now is whether he and his schools chancellor will speak up so charter parents get their day in court.

NORTH CAROLINA

Advisory panel recommends school close
Carteret County News-Times, NC, January 11, 2014
Despite new leadership and efforts to improve, it appears Coastal Academy for Technology and Science, a charter high school here, may be forced to close its doors at the end of June.

New NC charter schools have work to do to open this fall
News & Observer, NC, January 14, 2014
North Carolina’s newest charter schools have a long way to go before they can open this fall. The 26 charter schools approved Thursday by the State Board of Education now have to complete a lengthy checklist of items over the next several months, including hiring staff, recruiting enough students and securing a location.

School choice boom brings options, challenges for families
Lake Wylie Pilot, NC, January 10, 2014
An extraordinary season of school choice begins now, bringing new opportunities and challenges for parents around the Charlotte region.

Student-assignment plan leaves some schools overcrowded, others underutilized
Winston-Salem Journal, NC, January 11, 2014
Beginning the first of the year and continuing throughout the next several months, families will weigh their options and decide which school their students will attend in the fall. For some, it’s an easy choice.

OHIO

A third of Perrysburg teachers sign up for performance-based pay
Toledo Blade, OH, January 11, 2014
Nearly one-third of the Perrysburg teachers have chosen to be paid under the new performance-based pay scale instead of receiving a flat 1.25 percent raise in each of the next two years.

Columbus has 17 charter school failures in one year
Columbus Dispatch, OH, January 12, 2014
Schools closing at alarming rate, costing taxpayers and disrupting the lives of hundreds of students

Watchdogs can profit from charter school oversight
Columbus Dispatch, OH, January 12, 2014
“Sponsors” are responsible for overseeing the $780 million in state tax money that flows to Ohio charter schools each year.

OKLAHOMA

Some Oklahoma City school administrators face termination, superintendent says
The Oklahoman, OK, January 13, 2014
Oklahoma City’s interim public schools chief said he plans to fire several high-ranking administrators as early as this week, part of a plan to shake up district operations and improve academic performance.

PENNSYLVANIA

At Radnor High, a look at ‘what schools should be’
Philadelphia Inquirer, PA, January 12, 2014
RADNOR Jillian Hughes attends a public school with 22 Advanced Placement courses, 96 percent of students going on to college or trade school, and a sense of community so strong that 300 students formed a club just to turn up and cheer at school sporting events.

Teacher evaluation fight may prove costly
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, PA, January 13, 2014
After the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation awarded Pittsburgh Public Schools $40 million in 2009 to help improve teacher quality, the district and its teachers have received national attention for working together.

SOUTH CAROLINA

Haley’s education plan could help local poor schools
Morning News, SC, January 12, 2014
At Scranton Elementary School on Thursday Gov. Nikki Haley spoke to students about what it means to be a leader not a follower at an anti-bullying assembly. But with district officials before the event, and with the press afterward, the first-term Republican tried to show that she intends to be the former when it comes to tackling poverty’s vast implications on education, a topic talked about and proven time and again in South Carolina, but never acted upon at a statewide level.

Public schools outperform charter schools
The Herald, SC, January 11, 2014
On Oct. 29 a guest editorial in The Herald ended a report on public charter schools by concluding that “the innovation and out-of-the-box thinking that charter schools offer is a worthy state investment.”

TENNESSEE

Harwell: A ‘Mistake’ for MNPS to Waste Money On Charter Authorizer Legal Fight
Nashville Scene, TN, January 10, 2014
Lawmakers on Capitol Hill tend to pick and choose whether opinions by the state attorney general carry significant legislative weight or are simply the signed opinion of a single lawyer.

Packing public dollars off to private school
Editorial, The Tennessean, TN, January 12, 2014
Legislation to allow referendums on wine sales in grocery stores may be the toast of the General Assembly session that will convene this week, but education reform is most likely to be the main course.

School board group fights any vouchers
Opinion, Daily News Journal, TN, January 11, 2014
TSBA firmly believes in the success of Tennessee’s public schools and the opportunities they have provided and continue to provide to children.

Schools’ Marketing Intensifies as Choices Grow
Memphis Daily News, TN, January 11, 2014
January is a busy month on the school choice front in Shelby County. The state of Tennessee has an open-enrollment policy within school districts that allows students in low-performing schools to attend a different school.

Teachers seek lawmakers’ ears
The Daily News Journal, TN, January 12, 2014
Teachers hope the Tennessee General Assembly will find a better way to evaluate them.

TEXAS

New school guide helps Dallas parents through maze of school choice
Dallas Morning News, TX, January 11, 2014
Each year, Children at Risk ranks Texas public schools. And each year, the education nonprofit fields calls from parents who feel trapped at failing schools.

WASHINGTON

Charter-school applicants to pitch plans at public forums
Seattle Times, WA, January 12, 2014
Charter-school operators must prove they have both a strong educational vision and business savvy if they want a shot at opening one of the state’s first charter schools.

Dropouts flooding Kent’s second-chance iGrad school
Seattle Times, WA, January 12, 2014
Kent educators combed through transcripts and discovered 2,600 young people in their district without any kind of diploma or credential. Enter iGrad, an unusual program linking dropouts with college, that has been flooded with kids who want a second chance

WISCONSIN

Charter schools Myth v. Fact
Milwaukee Courier Weekly, WI, January 11, 2014
This Thursday, January 9th, the Urban Education Committee is holding a public hearing on Assembly Bill 549 in Madison.

Most of Madison’s largest private schools staying out of voucher program again
Wisconsin State Journal, WI, January 12, 2014
For the second year in a row, most of the Madison area’s largest private schools don’t plan to participate in the state’s new private-school voucher program.

Wisconsin teachers should consider organization choices
Letter, The Gazette, WI, January 12, 2014
As many local educators are aware, Wisconsin’s largest teachers’ union, WEAC, and the American Federation of Teachers are considering a merger. This merger is due to both unions’ declining membership.

ONLINE LEARNING

APS inks online course deal with charter
Albuquerque Journal, NM, January 13, 2014
Albuquerque students can once again enroll in online courses with Southwest Secondary Learning Center, but a new agreement will prevent them from using the classes as a graduation bailout.

Jefferson Parish public schools to split $1.2 million for blended learning
BayouBuzz, LA, January 10, 2014
Eleven struggling public schools in Jefferson Parish will split a $1.2 million state grant to buy computers and software and to integrate them into the classroom, the school system said Friday. Jacob Landry, the system’s chief strategy officer, said the grant will improve education through “blended learning.”

Space troubles for virtual school
The Recorder, MA, January 13, 2014
Greenfield Commonwealth Virtual School officials had hoped to start the year by moving into the top floor of the Arts Block in downtown Greenfield. But complications with the space have thwarted that move.

Students learn online at home during snow days
Daily Standard, OH, January 10, 2014
The brick-and-mortar school was closed three days this week due to snow but students continued learning via online instruction.

When Computers Are Co-Teachers
The Atlantic, January 10 2014
On a rainbow-colored rug in a predominantly Latino neighborhood six miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles, 26 fidgety second graders are reading a phonics passage about helping wildlife. Some detect the main idea quickly, shooting their hands in the air. Others need more time and attention. The teacher, Mark Montero, asks questions trying to keep everyone on track.

Filed Under: Daily Headlines

Daily Headlines for January 10, 2014

January 10, 2014 By The Center for Education Reform

NATIONAL COVERAGE

Harlem ninth-grader bowls over Obama with precocious introduction preceding White House ceremony
New York Daily News, NY, January 9, 2014
President says Kiara Molina’s eloquent remarks, delivered before he announced the five locations designated as ‘Promise Zones’, amounted to ‘one of the best introductions I’ve ever had’. Kiara attends Promise Academy amid Harlem’s St. Nicholas Houses.

Leave de Blasio alone, Mr. Cantor
Editorial, New York Post, NY, January 9, 2014
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor was in town this week with a timely defense of charter schools.

STATE COVERAGE

ALABAMA

Selma City Schools in danger of state takeover
WSFA, AL, January 9, 2014
Alabama School Superintendent Dr. Tommy Bice is not happy with the Selma City Board of Education, and strongly suggested Thursday that the state will take over if things don’t get better in a hurry.

CALIFORNIA

Court warns lawmakers to move faster on public-school funding
Seattle Times, CA, January 9, 2014
The State Supreme Court urged lawmakers Thursday to make more progress toward increasing education spending this year.

Embracing charter schools as educational option
Commentary, San Diego Union-Tribune, CA, January 9, 2014
Does the Golden State consider school choice a priority? Over the next decade, changes in the state’s reform of funding and facility legislation will answer this question. Recent stories in U-T San Diego and the latest news release from the California Charter Schools Association (CCSA) detail more than 500,000 charter school students currently enrolled statewide, with 50,000 additional students remaining on waiting lists.

Teach for America comes to San Diego
San Diego Union-Tribune, CA, January 9, 2014
He is part of San Diego County’s first crop of Teach for America educators — more than 20 newly minted teachers who joined local schools for the 2013-14 academic year.

CONNECTICUT

Trending: How we close the academic divide
CT Post, CT, January 9, 2014
Schools throughout southwestern Connecticut are struggling to close a wide achievement gap between economically disadvantaged students and their better-off peers.

FLORIDA

Florida House panel proposes big changes to charter schools
Bradenton Herald, FL, January 10, 2014
A House panel is pushing forward with big changes to the state charter school law. A draft bill released this week by the House Choice and Innovation Subcommittee would require charter school governing boards and school district to use a new model contract. It would also enable the state Department of Education to perform technical reviews of charter school applications.

GEORGIA

Carrollton School Board gets update on charter, CES project
Times-Georgian, GA, January 9, 2014
The Carrollton Board of Education was given the most current information on numerous significant initiatives in the system during a Thursday morning work session heavy on updates.

ILLINOIS

Archdiocese to close 6 schools at end of year
Chicago Sun Times, IL, January 9, 2014
They’re on a mission from God. Adopting that mantra, Our Lady of Victory Catholic School has about a week to raise money and come up with a plan to restructure its budget — $400,000 deficit and all — or it may have to shut its doors, said the school’s principal Jennifer Hodge.

Chicago doesn’t need more school choice
Opinion, Crain’s Chicago Business, IL, January 10, 2014
Chicago closed a record number of neighborhood schools this year with the message that the district faced a billion-dollar deficit and had 511,000 seats for only 403,000 students. Over and over we heard Chicago Public Schools CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett and Mayor Rahm Emanuel say we must redirect scarce resources to existing schools to benefit students.

LOUISIANA

East Baton Rouge district facing revenue loss with expansion of charter schools
Times-Picayune, LA, January 9, 2014
As the East Baton Rouge school district reworks school boundaries and introduces new programs, it’s also trying to stave off a potential loss of students who could be attracted to a slew of new charter schools opening in Baton Rouge next year.

State launches probe of East Baton Rouge Parish school system
The Advocate, LA, January 9, 2014
The state is launching an investigation of the East Baton Rouge Parish school system amid allegations of “discrepancies among student graduation records,” state Superintendent of Education John White said Thursday.

MAINE

Poverty impacts Maine students’ grades, researchers say
Portland Press Herald, ME, January 9, 2014
The study came after the LePage administration began a report card-style ranking system for schools.

MASSACHUSETTS

Charter school makes pitch for students at open house
South Coast Today, MA, January 8, 2014
City on a Hill is little more than a concept right now, but it’s one that’s intriguing enough to attract dozens of prospective students to an open house at the Whaling Museum Thursday.

MINNESOTA

Minnesota wants more oversight from charter school authorizers
Pioneer Press, MN, January 9, 2014
Minnesota is telling the overseer of a St. Paul charter school a plan to address serious missteps there falls short.

MISSOURI

Snow leaves many transfer students without transportation
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, MO, January 10, 2014
Many transfer students from Riverview Gardens who attend the Kirkwood district missed class Thursday while their classmates had school.

NEW HAMPSHIRE

House backs charter school funding
Eagle Tribune, NH, January 10, 2014
Only a day after the new legislative session began, charter school advocates said yesterday they were pleased the House of Representatives gave preliminary approval to more funding for the schools.

NEW YORK

City Study Tracks Transfers by Charter School Students
New York Times, NY, January 10, 2014
Addressing a common criticism of New York City charter schools, a study released on Thursday said that in general their students were not, in fact, more likely to transfer out than their counterparts in traditional public schools.

Union president calls for no-confidence vote on ed chief
Capital New York, NY, January 9, 2014
The state’s largest teachers’ union will soon consider a vote of “no confidence” for state Education Commissioner John King, the union’s president said Thursday on YNN’s “Capital Tonight.”

NORTH CAROLINA

Jenkins: NC teachers get offered a rotten deal thanks to legislators
Opinion, News & Observer, NC, January 10, 2014
There’s a good reason why a recent op-ed article by former Gov. Jim Hunt has proved popular with readers. It’s because people, particularly parents of school-age children, agree with the four-term “education governor.”

Let innovative models flourish in K-12 education
Column, Durham Herald Sun, NC, January 9, 2014
As I travel around the state, I am sometimes asked by well-meaning skeptics: “instead of providing additional options to students, why not build it within our existing traditional public school system?”

N.C. approves 26 new charter schools for fall 2014
Times-News, NC, January 9, 2014
The State Board of Education gave final approval Thursday for 26 new charter schools to open this fall – the largest expansion of the program since the late 1990s.

State approves 11 new charters to serve 3,200 Charlotte-area students next year
Charlotte Observer, NC, January 9, 2014
RALEIGH Eleven new charter schools planning to serve 3,200 students in Mecklenburg and Cabarrus counties got the go-ahead to open in August, as the N.C. Board of Education approved 26 new charters on Thursday.

OHIO

Cleveland school district will better promote STEM programs to Hispanic students under new civil rights agreement
Cleveland Plain Dealer, OH, January 9, 2014
The Cleveland school district must promote its science and technology high schools more to Hispanic students to increase the number of Spanish-speaking students at the schools, the district and the civil rights office of the U.S. Department of Education agreed this week.

PENNSYLVANIA

Jury acquits charter-school founder of six counts, deadlocks on rest
Philadelphia Daily News, PA, January 10, 2014
AN EMOTIONALLY tense jury hopelessly deadlocked yesterday on 54 of 60 counts against charter-school founder Dorothy June Brown in her lengthy federal fraud trial, while unanimously acquitting her of six charges.

Yes, schools can improve
Letter, Philadelphia Inquirer, PA, January 10, 2014
As happens every few years, the Philadelphia public schools face a crisis. In Christmas week, no less, dozens of academic-oriented school activities including debate, the Science Olympiad, and the Northeast High Space Research Center, were slashed. National Public Radio blames budget cuts, with new resources going to charter schools.

SOUTH CAROLINA

Haley’s education reform plans ‘a pleasant surprise’
Opinion, Aiken Standard, SC, January 10, 2014
S.C. Gov. Nikki Haley announced extensive plans for K-12 education reform on Wednesday – among them new reading initiatives, additional support for children in low-income communities and funds for technology.

Private school-choice on hold in S.C.
The Herald, SC, January 9, 2014
Karl Hoecke had just given a tour of his school Thursday that featured stops by the library, paintings he made of the four seasons, and the place where they store the “Bunnies’ Brew” – organic fertilizer the students make in their garden using their pet rabbit’s poop – when his classmates gathered around him.

TENNESSEE

AG: State charter authorizer bill ‘would likely’ withstand constitutional challenge
The Tennessean Blog, TN, January 9, 2014
A proposal to hand the state new power to approve charter school applications on appeal “would likely withstand any facial constitutional challenge,” Tennessee Attorney General Robert Cooper opined in a legal opinion released Thursday.

TEXAS

Texas governor candidate Davis announces education plan
Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, TX, January 10, 2014
Texas gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis made the first policy announcement of her campaign Thursday, offering proposals aimed at luring new public school teachers with guaranteed college admission, teaching jobs and loan forgiveness.

WISCONSIN

Charter legislation worries Kenosha Unified principals
Kenosha News, WI, January 9, 2014
Proposed state legislation that would eliminate school district-operated charter schools like those in the Kenosha Unified School District is worrying local educators.

Independent charter school debate highlights ideological divide
Milwaukee State Journal, WI, January 9, 2014
A contentious proposal to expand independent charter schools in Wisconsin worries public-school advocates because it would further reduce aid to traditional districts and open the door for more private companies to run public schools.

Public Weighs In On Charter School Expansion
WUWM, WI, January 10, 2014
Charters are public schools operated by private businesses or non-profits. They operate independently and have greater flexibility than traditional public schools.

ONLINE LEARNING

Los Angeles Library to offer high school diplomas
Associated Press
January 9, 2014
The Los Angeles Public Library is evolving from a place where people can check out books and surf the Web to one where residents can also earn an accredited high school diploma.

Schools may have alternative to snow days
WWLP 22News, MA, January 9, 2014
Students are back at school now after an extended winter vacation. Many schools closed last Thursday and Friday due to a snowstorm. In Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the inclement weather didn’t stop some schools from holding classes. They had “cyber days” instead of snow days; teachers gave assignments online.

Teachers in Boardman Using iPads to Teach Science
KNDU Tri-Cities, OR, January 9, 2014
Teachers at Riverside Junior-Senior High in Boardman, Oregon are using technology to keep students engaged in the classroom

Filed Under: Daily Headlines

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