August 2014 - Grow Schools

Welcome to Charter School Capital’s weekly round-up where we feature charter school news about operations, policy, funding for charter schools, charter school facilities financing, and other trends.
This week we have two fascinating reports released by experts at the forefront of the school choice movement. Tell us your thoughts in the comments below!

Fact or Fiction? New Report from National Alliance of Public Charter Schools (NAPCS)

The National Alliance recently released a report that examines some myths and inaccuracies about public charter schools.
Here’s a summary of the topic found on the first page of the report:
“Between the 2008–09 and 2013–14 school years, the public charter school movement experienced a dramatic 80 percent increase in the number of students and an astounding 40 percent increase in the number of schools.
Despite this growth, there is still an overwhelming unmet parental demand for quality school options, with more than 1 million student names on charter school waiting lists. While charter schools enjoy tremendous bipartisan support among policymakers and the general public, they also have some vocal critics who perpetuate a number of myths about charters. This paper lays out some of these myths and provides responses based on facts and independent research findings.”

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2014 Education Next Survey Report Released

Education Next’s yearly survey on education policy was released this week. There are over 50 questions in total. They cover a wide range of topics such as American school performance compared to other countries, school spending, school choice and college readiness.
The survey, in it’s eighth year, is administered to a representative sample of American adults and public school teachers.
The report points out that the public is gaining awareness of school choice, and continuing to support it. “The practice of school choice has now spread to such an extent that more than one-fourth of all American families have a school-age child who has been educated elsewhere than in a traditional public school. Many American families are ignoring the bright lines routinely drawn between traditional public schools on the one hand and charter schools, private schools, and home schooling on the other. ”

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Independent Charter-Approval Boards Being Opened in More States

An article in Education Week examines the growing number of states that are creating independent charter school authorization boards.
“Such boards go by different names but are generally authorizing bodies separate from other state and local agencies whose sole purpose is to authorize charter schools statewide. The press for quality—a recurring theme in the charter school debate—has pushed authorizing to the center of the discussion because, many argue, charter schools ultimately reflect the caliber of their authorizer.”

Desert Star Academy, a college preparatory charter school in Arizona, opened its doors this past Monday. The Arizona State Board for Charter Schools approved the academy’s charter school application for the 2014-2015 school year in February.
“It has been a day two years in the making,” said School Director and Principal Margie Montgomery. “We’re so excited to provide the community with a quality school incorporating a college preparatory curriculum.”
After working with the Charter School Capital team to receive vital start-up charter school funding, Desert Star Academy welcomed 82 student scholars on its first day. The charter school, geared towards kindergarten through sixth-grade students, recites their school’s Scholar’s Pledge each morning and has a combination of computers and tablets in every classroom.
“We’re thrilled to provide charter school funding to help Desert Star Academy finally open its doors to students,” said Frank Yanez, the Arizona Client Services Representative for Charter School Capital. “Not only is the Desert Star Academy staff an exceptional group of educators, but they’re very motivated to get every one of their students into college. Fort Mohave is lucky to have this resource for their kids.”

Welcome to Charter School Capital’s weekly round-up where our team will feature charter school news about operations, policy, funding for charter schools, charter school facilities financing, and other trends.
This week is all about school staffing and “the growing need for school choice.” Tell us your thoughts in the comments below!

Why are 50% of U.S. School Staff Non-Teaching Employees?

A new report released by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute examines why the number of non-teaching staff in the United States has increased by 130% in the past 40 years.
Here’s a summary of the topic found on the first page of the report:
“The number of non-teachers on U.S. school payrolls has soared over the past fifty years, far more rapidly than the rise in teacher numbers. And the amount of money in district budgets consumed by their salaries and benefits has grown apace for at least the last twenty years.
Underneath the averages and totals, states and districts vary enormously in how many non-teachers they employ. Why do Illinois taxpayers pay for forty staff per thousand pupils while Connecticut pays for eight-nine? Why does Orange County, Florida employ eleven teachers aides per thousand students when Miami-Dade gets by with seven”

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The Cost of Neighborhood Schools, and the Growing Need for School Choice

The former executive of New Schools for New Orleans, Neerav Kingsland, has written an essay for the Washington Post about the challenge of neighborhood schools.
“For much of our nation’s history, neighborhood schools have been bastions of exclusion, not inclusion. And this exclusion persists to this day.

For every child who gets preferred access to a neighborhood school, there are many other children denied access to this same school. What is inclusive for one set of students is exclusive for a much larger set.”

Kingsland’s essay follows the announcement that the D.C. mayor’s office has released plans to redraw elementary school boundaries, a proposal that could affect thousands of families.

Bad news was delivered to a number of education advocates hoping to place a California school bond on the November ballot.
During the Senate Appropriations hearing on Monday, the California Department of Finance came out opposed to AB 2235 by Assemblywoman Joan Buchanan. AB 2235 was the vehicle for the school bond.
The California school bond measure subsequently went to the Appropriations suspense file which means there will be no immediate action taken on it.
This kills the hopes of it reaching the ballot as the legislature has created a deadline of Wednesday to pass measures to be placed on the November ballot.
This is all occurring while there are crucial negotiations going on over placing a water bond on the ballot. While there is no consensus on the language for the water bond, there is a mad rush to meet the Wednesday deadline meaning negotiations are constantly ongoing.
Though there was never administration support for a school bond, supporters made a strong push in the press over the last two weeks to shore up support and refine their message.
But pressure to do a water deal and the administration’s unwillingness to add more debt to the state coffers finally sunk the measure.

Welcome to Charter School Capital’s weekly round-up where our team will feature news about charter school operations, policy, funding for charter school, facilities financing, and other trends.
As charter school leaders and their teams prepare for students to return to school this Fall, at lot is going on in the charter school world. We hope you’ll find this round-up valuable. Read on!

New Report Shows Encouraging Improvement in Arizona Charter Schools

The Arizona Department of Education’s recent release of the 2014 AIMS test scores show that more than 70% of Arizona charter schools have improved in math and reading. The Phoenix Business Journal interviewed Ildi Laczko-Kerr, vice president of academics for Arizona Charter School Association, who noted:
“The fact that we saw such a large number of our schools improve from one year to the next is reflective of the changing systems in their schools and designing them to meet the needs of their students.”

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Strong Reactions to University of Arkansas’ Report on Charter School Productivity

Last week in our charter schools news roundup, we featured a new report released by the University of Arkansas that looked specifically at cost effectiveness and ROI when comparing the productivity of public charter schools to traditional school districts.
The report has stirred-up some debate among public charter school and traditional school district experts. NPR’s All Things Considered interview education policy experts Ted Kolderie and Joe Nathan who argue that the comparison made by the University of Arkansas doesn’t actually add up.
But Eric Hanushek, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, voices his support for the report after reviewing the report’s methodology and key findings. “This study is path breaking and is likely to spearhead a new and important policy debate. Until the 2008 recession, schools largely acted as if they were immune from considering finances and returns on expenditures, but we now know that this is no longer possible. This timely study invites a more rational discussion of policy choices, not just with respect to charter schools, but also in a wider context.”
Patrick Wolf, the University of Arkansas head researcher, gets into more detail about the study he lead with his team in a Wall Street Journal interview and an Education Next response piece.

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Washington Post: D.C. Charter Schools Sue City, Alleging Unequal Funding

The D.C. Association of Chartered Public Schools filed a federal lawsuit last Wednesday under the grounds that the city has provided unequal funding to charter schools. According to the Association, since 2008 charter school students have received roughly $2,150 less each year from District of Columbia than the district students.

Charter School Capital supports the efforts of many state charter school associations across the country. In Ohio, charter schools are well-served by the new leadership at the Ohio Alliance for Public Charter Schools (OAPCS). Darlene Chambers is now the President and CEO at OAPCS. Below is an except of her recent letter that appeared on the OAPCS website as well as a link to read the letter in its entirety…

Letter from OAPCS President & CEO, Dr. Darlene Chambers (Excerpt)

This is a pivotal moment in Ohio’s charter school movement and I am honored to serve as President & CEO of OAPCS at this critical time. Those who already know me recognize I am a strong advocate in charter schools and all that they represent: innovation, entrepreneurialism, and choice. For those who don’t yet know me, my position on charter schools is they were founded and have thrived for a simple reason: one size no longer fits all when it comes to education. Parents should decide what’s best for their children. Our duty is to provide quality options…
A quality education for every child is a fundamental right that all of us can work together to achieve. OAPCS can address the challenges and improve educational options for all public school children in Ohio, but I need your help and I ask for your support as we continue on this important effort together. For too long, the charter school debate has been pitted in partisan rhetoric when the focus needs to stay on what is best for the children in Ohio. Collaboration is the key for achieving goals and we seek your input, feedback and support.
Over the next months, I am thrilled to have the opportunity to meet with you and share your story with the community. Please help me spread the word and share the positive messages about all that’s going right in our schools serving 120,000+ students. At the end of the day, charter schools provide a viable, important option – often for students who would not have access to a high-quality educational opportunity without them. Let’s work together to ensure all students have access to the education they deserve regardless of their zip code.

Read the full OAPCS letter.

A recent interview in Education Week highlights some charter school policy issues to watch for this year.
Todd Ziebarth, the senior vice president of state advocacy for the National Alliance of Public Charter Schools gives us a guide to 2014 charter school policy.
Here’s an excerpt from the interview:
Q. What policy trends do you expect to see in the charter sector this upcoming year?
A. Funding and facilities is one, authorizing and accountability has been and will continue to be a policy trend. I think we counted about seven states in the 2014 session that took steps to impact charter authorizing and accountability.
I do think that set of anti-charter bills that came up in Illinois will continue to come up. One in particular which is the whole issue of full-time virtual charter schools. That is often an issue of debate in new charter laws. The question is: Will this [law] allow full-time virtual charters and will they be for-profit?
Of all the issues in the charter space, that one seems to be the most problematic for folks. It combines full-time virtual education with another challenging issue which is for-profit providers. For some people, full- time virtual education is a problem; for others, for-profits, is a problem. But the bigger question is are full-time virtual models a good fit in the charter space?
There’s a lot of heat around that issue, and my guess is that will continue to be one of the more problematic issues.
The entire article is available at Education Week.

Charter schools are changing the face of education in America, and whenever change starts to happen, debate tends to follow.
Most charter school administrators and educators are used to hearing a wide spectrum of questions and concerns – some better informed than others.
Ember Reichgott Junge, charter school advocate and author of Zero Chance of Passage: The Pioneering Charter School Story , has been touring the country talking about her book, and addressing common charter school myths and misperceptions including those around charter school funding.
A story in the Minnpost last week highlights specific misconceptions that Junge frequently discusses:
1) Charters divert money from school districts
One of the most heated, and complex, issues in the charter school movement is whether public money should follow the student, which is the way the system is currently designed, or whether the students should follow the public money.
“The question here is who gets to spend it,” said Junge, “the parents and the teachers at the school or a district superintendent? … The real issue is that superintendents don’t get to spend the money the way they want.”
2) Charter schools don’t perform as well as district schools
Junge correctly points out that you will find studies supporting both sides of this argument, and that there isn’t a simple answer. “it’s a false comparison. Whether the school is a charter or district run is not what determines whether kids learn,” she said. “And that’s determined by whether the school is engaging its students.”
Ember Reichgott Junge is a former US Senator for Minnesota. She is highly regarded among charter school experts for helping author the nation’s first charter school law in Minnesota.

If there’s one thing we know at Charter School Capital, it’s charter school growth strategies.
We’ve supported charter school expansions, strategized about new locations, and created charter school funding opportunities. Not only has our team been able to support high-quality and accessible education for every student, but each school has given us incredible insight into what works, and what doesn’t.
In fact, charter school growth is one of our favorite topics to discuss with charter schools and leaders. That’s why we were excited when asked to participate in a webinar for the Florida Consortium of Public Charter Schools (FCPCS).
We’ve been providing working and growth capital and facilities financing to charter schools in Florida for nearly two years, and the demand from charter schools continues to grow. There’s currently 623 public charter schools operating in Florida with a student population of 229,233 currently enrolled in public charter schools. Click here to learn more about charter schools in Florida.
FCPCS is one of the oldest and largest charter school associations in the country. It has over 400 charter school members, and provides advocacy, support, resources, and networking opportunities to new and existing charter schools, parents and students.
Here’s the blurb from FCPCS’ website promoting the webinar: Charter School Capital will present recommendations and information on building a growth strategy for your charter school. Stuart Ellis, co-founder and CEO of Charter School Capital will explain best practices and common obstacles for charter schools during the start-up, growth and sustainability phases.
This event is only open to members of FCPCS, but we will recap the main charter school growth strategies on our blog, and you can find past presentations on similar topics on our SlideShare. Click here to download past presentations.
If you have questions about how Charter School Capital can help your school grow, or alleviate some growing pains, we’d love to hear from you.