Charter School Legislation: California Bills Dead for the Year

We think it’s vital to keep tabs on the pulse of all things related to charter schools, including charter school legislation, informational resources, and how to support school choice, charter school growth, and the advancement of the charter school movement as a whole. We hope you find this—and any other article we curate—both interesting and valuable.
Here’s a quick update on the latest in California charter school legislation:
On Thursday the legislature wrapped up its house of origin deadline. The house of origin deadline is the deadline for the State Assembly to pass all Assembly bills to the State Senate and the State Senate to pass all Senate bills to the State Assembly. Bills that do not pass become two-year bills since this is the first year of the 2019 – 2020 legislative session. These bills are essentially dead for the year but will have one month, next January, to be passed onto the other house.
AB 1506 (charter school cap) and SB 756 (charter school moratorium) both failed to pass their respective houses meaning they are dead for the year. This is a huge relief to the charter school movement as both bills represented a threat that had not been seen before. A number of lobbyists and advocacy groups worked in a coalition to kill both bills and their work prevented either of the authors from getting a majority vote in their houses. Actually, neither bill even came up for a vote. The authors did not attempt to move them because they knew that they were short on their vote count.
So Thursday was a good day for California charter schools!

Since the company’s inception in 2007, Charter School Capital has been committed to the success of charter schools. We help schools access, leverage, and sustain the resources charter schools need to thrive, allowing them to focus on what matters most – educating students. Our depth of experience working with charter school leaders and our knowledge of how to address charter school financial and operational needs have allowed us to provide over $1.8 billion in support of 600 charter schools that have educated over 1,027,000 students across the country. For more information on how we can support your charter school, contact us. We’d love to work with you!

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Charter School Due Diligence: The Added Value of Partnering with Charter School Capital

At Charter School Capital, our mission is to help charter leaders access, leverage, and sustain the resources their schools need to thrive, allowing them to focus on what matters most – educating students. In addition to the extensive toolbox of solutions we provide to help charter schools thrive, another key benefit of partnering with us is the value added by our in-depth due diligence process. We hope that our thorough process can be utilized as just another set of eyes in support of the important work that Authorizers, back office providers, and financial managers are already doing to support charter school success.

Due Diligence

Many of the items we are reviewing in the due-diligence process (to make sure that schools are in compliance with our funding requirements) actually may overlap with the compliance that they have to maintain with the State, their Authorizer, financial manager, or back office provider. This comprehensive due diligence process is just an added benefit that our school partners (and back office providers, authorizers, financial managers) are receiving for free, as partners of Charter School Capital.
That’s not to say that we are focused on highlighting what schools are doing wrong, but rather we’re always solution oriented. Our goal is to help them figure out ways to bring them back into compliance if for some reason an issue has gone unattended.
Another important service that we provide our school partners—at no additional cost— is financial guidance.

Finances

School leaders are experts at educating students but may not always also possess that same expertise around budgets, finances or working with cashflows. But because it’s one of our requirements, we’ll work together with them at no additional cost, to build that out. Once developed, this helps schools foster an understanding of the consistent cash flow they’re striving for because they can now actually see it month by month. This process helps school leaders become more strategic about budgeting and avoid the short-term mistakes that can lead to unintended long-term consequences.

Corporate Governance

We can also provide guidance in various corporate governance areas. For instance, when a school schedules a board meeting to approve various matters or Charter School Capital documentation, the school must meet all open meeting requirements such as notices, quorums and voting requirements. These requirements can be imposed by the Authorizer or by the school itself via its bylaws. As part of our diligence, Charter School Capital reviews all of the conditions and ensures that the requirements are fully and timely met. We can also brief the school on any open meeting requirements that may be governed by State law.
Our team also tracks the school’s charter holder’s corporate status, including State good standings, annual reports, and lapsed entity formation filings. While we cannot file corporate documentation on behalf of the school or charter holder, we can provide reminders when a filing is due or has lapsed.
Ensuring that the school’s charter holder remains in good standing is one of our most important underwriting objectives.
Finally, as part of our standard due diligence, we run various searches that might reveal new or old liens or judgments that the school may not be aware of or have not been timely satisfied. In most cases, these liens collect interest until paid. We can guide the school in how to get the liens or judgments removed, or, in some cases, satisfy them out of the funding proceeds.
These in-depth due diligence processes we have in place for our school partners can also be seen as a value add for Authorizers, back office providers, and financial managers. Providing these additional services to our charter partners is 100% in service to our mission of providing charter leaders with the critical resources they require to spur growth and build more sustainable futures for their schools.

Since the company’s inception in 2007, Charter School Capital has been committed to the success of charter schools. We help schools access, leverage, and sustain the resources charter schools need to thrive, allowing them to focus on what matters most – educating students. Our depth of experience working with charter school leaders and our knowledge of how to address charter school financial and operational needs have allowed us to provide over $1.8 billion in support of 600 charter schools that have educated over 1,000,000 students across the country. For more information on how we can support your charter school, contact us. We’d love to work with you!

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Are Charter Schools Really Hurting Traditional Public Schools?

Editor’s Note: This op-ed article was originally published here on March 22,2019 by Show-Me Institute and written by Susan Pendergrass.
Charter schools are tuition-free public schools. The public funding that follows a child to a traditional public school, also follows that same child to a charter school. The money, therefore does not inherently belong to traditional public schools specifically, but rather to the individual child’s education. This allows for choice in education and supports the right of families to select the best option for their children whether it be a traditional public school or a public charter school. This article shares an enlightening perspective.
We think it’s vital to keep tabs on the pulse of all things related to charter schools, including informational resources, and how to support school choice, charter school growth, and the advancement of the charter school movement as a whole. We hope you find this—and any other article we curate—both interesting and valuable.

DON’T CHARTER SCHOOLS HURT PUBLIC SCHOOLS?

Without a doubt, the question that I get most often about charter schools is, “But don’t they hurt the public schools?” Setting aside the fact that charter schools are public schools, the short answer is charter public schools don’t hurt traditional public schools any more than other factors that can affect enrollment. But they may challenge them.
The assertion seems to be that all children who live within the borders of a public school district are the property of that school district, unless their parents can pay to opt them out. If free public charter schools become available and parents choose them, then they’re rejecting, and thereby hurting, their local school district.
When a parent chooses to send a child to a charter school, the state funding that would have been sent to the public school district where that student lives is sent, instead, to the charter school the parent has chosen. Federal funding, such as that for low-income students or students with disabilities, also, theoretically, follows the student. Some, but not all, of the local funding may go with the student. The same is true whether the student chooses a charter school, moves to another school district, or moves to another state. The local public school district is no longer tasked with educating the student, so they no longer get the money to do so.
It’s true that districts with declining enrollment may struggle to downsize, at least quickly. The same is true whether parents are choosing to move out of the district or whether they turn to charter schools. But the solution isn’t to prevent kids from choosing charter schools because the district can’t afford it, any more than it would be reasonable to prevent parents from moving out of the district.
Public school districts have some options when faced with the loss of students to charter schools. They can consider it a challenge and do what’s needed to bring parents back. They can collaborate with the charter school to better serve the needs of all students. They can move away from long-term fixed expenses to a nimbler way of doing business, similar to how many charter schools finance their buildings. Or they can complain that the world’s not fair.
All students are guaranteed a free public education by the state, and the power over that funding should be in the hands of parents, rather than locked into a public school district. And defenders of the status quo should stop calling for protected status for schools that parents don’t choose.

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Atlantic Montessori Charter School Partners with Charter School Capital to Add a Campus and Pay Off Debt

Atlantic Montessori Charter School (AMCS) was founded by their passionate and dedicated Executive Director, Juana Garcia, with the mission to provide quality instruction following the founding principles and philosophies of the Montessori Method. They strive to create a learning environment that respects children as unique individuals in an atmosphere of caring, creativity, kindness, firmness, dignity, and independence. Their first campus, Pines, is a K-3 school and they’ve since added an additional campus, West, a K-5 school.

Challenges

The struggle to find funding was frustrating as other lenders would not take the time to explain things clearly.
AMCS wanted to expand to a second campus but needed $80,000 for a deposit and the first month’s rent.
In order to expand to a second campus, a daunting fight with the city for approval led to over $100,000 in legal fees.
With 122 students, it was difficult to operate paycheck to paycheck with no leeway or the ability to pay back their substantial legal debt.

Solution

Charter School Capital helped AMCS access working capital to finance their new campus deposit (and first month’s rent) as well as pay off their legal bills.
Charter School Capital purchased state aid payments due to AMCS from the State of Florida; and, in exchange, provided funding to the school they needed, when they needed it.
Charter School Capital also worked with AMCS to devise a plan to stop using receivables payments after a certain period of time.

Charter School Capital’s approach, they way they explained everything to us in detail—how everything worked—made us feel like we weren’t stupid for asking the questions we had. We felt like we could trust them. It all comes down to their exceptional customer service. — Juana Garcia, Executive Director, Atlantic Montessori

The Result

The funding provided by Charter School Capital helped springboard AMCS’s success. It enabled their expansion; helped them pay off legal fees; increase enrollment; purchase needed Montessori materials; provide training for their teachers; acquire new computers and furniture; and covered basic operational costs. Executive Director, Juana Garcia, the life force behind Atlantic Montessori Charter School, is now looking toward their future. In addition to some facility renovations and upgrades, her dream of opening a middle school may be on the horizon now for this now growing, thriving school.

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Editor’s Note: This post was originally published here on March 26, 2019, by The 74 and written by Richard Whitmire. Whitmire is author of several books, most recently “The B.A. Breakthrough: How “Ending Diploma Disparities Can Change the Face of America.” Whitmire is a member of the Journalism Advisory Board of The 74.
We are always thrilled to highlight the exceptional work that charter schools are doing, and this story exemplifies the opportunities that charter schools are creating, especially for low-income students across our country. This report specifically looks at college success records at the major charter networks serving low-income students.
We think it’s vital to keep tabs on the pulse of all things related to charter schools, including informational resources, and how to support school choice, charter school growth, and the advancement of the charter school movement as a whole. We hope you find this—and any other article we curate—both interesting and valuable

New Numbers Show Low-Income Students at Most of America’s Largest Charter School Networks Graduating College at Two to Four Times the National Average

By Richard Whitmire
A fresh look at the college success records at the major charter networks serving low-income students shows alumni earning bachelor’s degrees at rates up to four times as high as the 11 percent rate expected for that student population.
The ability of the high-performing networks to make good on the promise their founders made to struggling parents years ago — Send us your kids and we will get them to and through college — was something I first reported on two years ago in The Alumni.
Writing the new book I’m about to publish with The 74, The B.A. Breakthrough: How Ending the Diploma Disparity Can Change the Face of America, provided the chance to go back and revisit those results. (You can track B.A. Breakthrough updates here.)
The baseline comparison number is slightly different but still dismal — just 11 percent of low-income students will graduate from college within six years — while for the big, nonprofit charter networks that serve high-poverty, minority students, most of them in major cities, the rates range from somewhat better to four times better and, in some cases, even higher.
The improved chances of earning a degree held while the ranks of charter alumni grew and the data became more robust. In some cases, the numbers are getting stronger and at least one prominent network, Uncommon Schools, predicts its graduates will close the college completion gap with affluent students in the next several years and surpass it a few years after that.
“Our mission is to get students to graduate from college, and that has influenced everything we do while we have students in elementary, middle and high school,” said Uncommon CEO Brett Peiser. “We’ve learned a lot about what works in helping students succeed in college, and everyone is focused on that goal.”
Ever since the first charter school was launched in Minnesota 27 years ago, educators watching the experiment have asked the same question: What lessons do they offer traditional school districts? Now, we may have that answer: Greatly improved odds that their alumni will earn college degrees.
Assuming that the charter completion rates persist, there’s a reasonable chance that their lessons learned could transform the way traditional school districts see their obligations to their graduates: How do they fare in college, and what effective methods from the charters could they start adopting to improve their outcomes later in life? Currently, almost no traditional districts track their alumni through college, although those in New York, Miami and Newark are moving in that direction.
All these issues get laid out in The B.A. Breakthrough. The book’s theme: The college success strategies pioneered by these charter networks are combining with entrepreneurial programs to spread data-driven college advising to high school students who lack it and with a growing commitment from colleges and universities to embrace low-income, first-generation students and ensure they walk away with degrees despite their vulnerabilities. Together these efforts add up to a breakthrough.

The charter network leg of the breakthrough

Given that college success is measured at the six-year mark, only recently has it become possible to evaluate the charter networks. In 2017, The 74 published a first-ever look at those rates as part of its series, The Alumni.
As with that project, the 11 percent college success rate used for comparison comes from The Pell Institute. That statistic provides an imprecise measurement, however, because it doesn’t take into account that most of these charter students are not just low-income, but also minority students living in urban neighborhoods whose college completion odds are even more daunting.
Comparing college graduation rates across charter networks is not easily done. KIPP, for example, tracks all alumni who completed eighth grade with KIPP, regardless of whether they go on to a KIPP high school. That puts KIPP in a category by itself. The other networks use the traditional approach of tracking only their high school graduates.
Even among the charter networks that track their high schoolers from graduation day, there are significant variations. While all the networks draw on the same foundational source, the National Student Clearinghouse, which matches the IDs of high school graduates to enrolled college students, some networks invest in their own tracking system, which picks up students missed by the Clearinghouse system. That makes their data more accurate and likely to produce higher rates.
Given the complexities, I divide the charter data into three groups:

Category 1 — Tracking from eighth grade, record-keeping that KIPP says is necessary to account for dropouts:

KIPP (national): As of the fall of 2017, KIPP had 3,200 alumni who were six years out of high school. The network’s national college completion rate is 36 percent for all alumni who completed eighth grade at a KIPP school and 45 percent for those who graduated from a KIPP high school. That counts students who entered a KIPP high school in ninth grade and stayed a year or more. In the national group, another 5 percent earned two-year degrees; in the group that graduated from a KIPP high school, another 6 percent earned two-year degrees.

Category 2 — Networks that use both Clearinghouse and internal tracking data:

Uplift Education (North Texas): Thirty-seven percent of the 1,075 graduates of the classes of 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014 earned bachelor’s degrees within six years. When associate’s degrees are included, that climbs to 40 percent. If calculated just on the classes of 2011 and 2012, the rate would be 57 percent.
Uncommon Schools (New Jersey and New York): Fifty-four percent of their alumni earn a bachelor’s degree within six years. Among those, 39 percent earn a bachelor’s within four years. Drawing on data that track students currently enrolled, Uncommon predicts that it will close the college graduation gap with high-income students (58 percent) in the next few years. Within six years, Uncommon expects to hit a success rate of 70 percent.
DSST Public Schools (Denver): Among the 1,075 alumni, starting with the class of 2011, half earned bachelor’s degrees within six years.
YES Prep (Houston): The network has 974 alumni from the graduating classes of 2001-2012. Among the earliest graduating classes (2001-2008), 52 percent earned a two- or four-year degree within six years of high school graduation. Of the most recent graduating classes (2009-2012), 40 percent earned a four-year degree and 6 percent earned a two-year degree within six years of high school graduation.
Noble Network of Charter Schools (Chicago): Noble has 2,259 alumni who are six years or more out of high school. Among that group, 35 percent have bachelor’s degrees, 7 percent have associate’s degrees and 9 percent are still in college.

Category 3 — Charter networks that rely solely on National Student Clearinghouse data:

Achievement First (New York, Connecticut and Rhode Island): There were 74 alumni from the classes of 2010-12. Of those, 34 percent earned bachelor’s degrees within six years. Another 2 percent earned associate’s degrees.
Green Dot Public Schools (California): Green Dot has 6,601 alumni from the classes of 2004-2012. Of those, 14 percent earned bachelor’s degrees by the six-year mark. Another 15 percent completed two-year degrees. (Green Dot has a less aggressive college success program than other networks, and, as seen in its absorption of the failing Locke High School in Watts, it takes on significant challenges.)
Aspire Public Schools (California and Tennessee): Aspire has 619 alumni from the classes of 2007-2012 who have reached the six-year point. Of those, 26 percent earned bachelor’s degrees, a rate that rises to 36 percent when associate’s degrees and certificates are included.
Alliance College-Ready Public Schools (California): At Alliance, 610 of their 2,617 alumni have reached the six-year point. Of those, 23 percent have earned four-year degrees. When two-year degrees are added in, the percentage rises to 27.
IDEA Public Schools (Texas, Louisiana): At IDEA, 508 alumni have reached the six-year mark. Of those, 38 percent earned bachelor’s degrees. Another 4 percent earned associate’s degrees in that time. (Another 2 percent earned either a bachelor’s degree or an associate’s, but it’s unclear which, due to reporting issues.) The network says it is experiencing steady improvements: Whereas only 31 percent of 2009 IDEA graduates completed college in six years, 50 percent of its 2012 graduates did.

Single charter schools:

There are a few solo charters, not part of networks, with significant numbers of alumni who have passed the six-year mark.
One example from Boston, a city which has some of the longest-running charters, is Boston Collegiate Charter School. There, 51 percent of the 177 alumni six years out earned bachelor’s degrees; another 8 percent earned two-year degrees. The school appears to be experiencing sharp increases in success rates: For the class of 2014, 79 percent graduated from college within four years.

More on the data

Consider this an early take on the promise charters made to offer better odds on college success. For many of the networks, the number of alumni who have reached the six-year mark is modest. We’ll know more as larger classes graduate and reach that milestone.
Comparing the networks is difficult because some use internal tracking systems that pick up students missed by the Clearinghouse. For example, networks using only Clearinghouse data miss students exercising their privacy rights, known as “FERPA blocks” for the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. That shields their college transcripts from outside review. In a time when immigration issues are contentious and parents (and some students) could face deportation, FERPA blocks are an attractive option for families. The number of blocks varies greatly by region, with few on the East Coast exercising the option and as high as 6 percent of all students attending West Coast colleges opting to shield their records, according to the Clearinghouse.
Translation: Charter networks such as IDEA Public Schools, with many of its schools located in Texas border towns, that also rely only the Clearinghouse data, are likely to show lower success rates.
Also tricky: When comparing the charter alumni to the broader student population, what’s the right comparison number to choose? The 11 percent Pell number I’m using should be viewed as a rough marker. First, that makes the denominator all low-income students — not just low-income high school graduates — which suggests the 11 percent figure is low. But the fact that most of these networks enroll minority students from urban neighborhoods suggests 11 percent is high because the Pell number would include low-income Asian and white students, who across income levels have higher college graduation rates than black and Hispanic students. Bottom line: The 11 percent emerges as a useful if imprecise comparison figure.

Watching a network do the math

By necessity, all the college graduation data are self-reported. Outcome figures from the National Student Clearinghouse, which is private, are proprietary to the networks, which pay the Clearinghouse for the information. For the sake of transparency, I asked one network, Uncommon Schools, to open up its books for me so I could observe both processes, the Clearinghouse data combined with its own tracking data.
In April 2018, I met Ken Herrera, Uncommon’s senior director of data analytics, in Newark at North Star Academy Charter School. There, Herrera clicked on his laptop and showed me a listing of alumni. For privacy reasons, the students had been “de-identified” and showed up only as numbers on the modified Salesforce (the customized business software Uncommon and other networks use to track their alumni) program. Twice a year, said Herrera, usually in March and October, Uncommon sends a list of alumni names and their dates of birth to the Clearinghouse for tracking. Why just some? Because Uncommon saves money by omitting names of alumni who, for example, already had their college graduation confirmed through a university. In about two weeks, the Clearinghouse sends back an Excel sheet with the information it collected on the asked-about students: where they are in school and what term — fall semester, for example — they are in.
If Herrera sees a “no match,” which happens about 10 percent of the time, he and the counselors investigate. At networks that don’t track alumni individually, that student would be counted as a dropout. When digging into it further, Uncommon finds out whether they truly have dropped out by contacting the university or the family or the student, whatever means is available. They also track down whether it’s just a matter of having entered the wrong birth date or a name mix-up, such as a nickname used when enrolling in college. If it is just a bookkeeping issue, the counselors request a copy of the college transcript so the error can get fixed.
Another reason for the “no match” might be the FERPA block, which prompts the Uncommon team to contact the students and convince them to unblock their records. Some universities make records disclosure an opt-in process, done every semester, which makes life especially difficult for Herrera, because if the student fails to take action the default status is a FERPA block.
In early April each year, Herrera meets with the counseling team to sort out data omissions, a painstaking, student-by-student process. “We’ll say, ‘This is what the Clearinghouse says about the student, here’s what Salesforce says about the student. What are we going to do about this conflict?’” That leads to a counselor personally investigating: Where is the student? When all the data issues get settled, Uncommon can calculate its college success figure.
Now the trickier issue: Unlike most other networks, Uncommon predicts where its college success rate is headed. Here’s what Uncommon predicts, as noted above: In roughly six years, the college success rate will rise to about 70 percent. Given that 70 percent exceeds the rate for well-off white students, that’s a remarkable prediction. What’s it based on? Uncommon tracks its alumni by cohorts, so it can establish a historical rate for, let’s say, how many students drop out between their freshman and sophomore year in college.
“When we look at each of those [dropout points] we can predict where an individual cohort is going, based on those historical rates, and predict what we think their graduation rate is going to be,” Herrera said.
Currently, Uncommon is seeing significant improvements, such as half the historical rate of dropouts between the sophomore and junior years. Also an issue: Uncommon is growing. By the year 2022, it projects 1,000 graduates a year, compared with the roughly 400 current graduates. That also figures into the math, because younger cohorts, which are showing better persistence rates, have a bigger impact on the overall college success math. The newer cohort, for example, is showing a 50 percent success rate at the four-year mark (older cohorts achieved that only at the six-year mark). Thus the prediction: 70 percent overall success rate within six years.
So why the improved persistence? Most of that, says Herrera, comes from strengthening the high school curriculum and programs such as Target 3.0, a mandatory class to boost the grade point averages for all students with a GPA less than 2.5.
“What we found, perhaps unsurprisingly to many people, but I think really profoundly for us, was that students with higher GPAs were more likely to graduate from college,” he said. “When we cut the data, getting above a 3.0 GPA [in high school] was very significantly correlated with future college success.”

Where all this leads

Yes, it is early to be judging college success among these networks, but not premature. There are thousands of alumni in these calculations, and their academic outcomes are crucial. If their success persists and, more importantly, if their lessons learned are picked up by the far larger traditional school districts, we could be looking at one of the most successful anti-poverty programs ever seen in this country.
There’s no guarantee it will happen, but the seeds are there, all explained in the upcoming The B.A. Breakthrough.

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Six Charter School Sustainability Tips from Experienced Charter School Leaders

We hope these six charter school sustainability tips help your team be more adaptable, strategic, data-driven, analytical, and efficient—all in support of your school’s continued success.
1. BE MINDFUL OF—AND ADAPTABLE TO—PIVOTAL MOMENTS
An active board member retires, a storm renders three classrooms unusable, a well-loved teacher leaves. It’s impossible to predict every circumstance that can disrupt a school’s operational rhythm and culture. The important thing is to acknowledge the disruption when it occurs and to have a plan to maintain operational and cultural continuity for your students no matter what.
2. UNDERSTAND THAT STRATEGIC ENROLLMENT = STABILITY
Mature-stage schools are past the point of increasing enrollment by 30 – 40% every year, and that’s great news. But remember: strategically increasing enrollment can be an effective way to ensure financial and operational stability. If you have staff and space in your facility, weigh the financial costs and benefits of recruiting a small number of students to every grade, in addition to the traditional focus on the incoming class of kindergarteners, sixth graders, or ninth graders.
3. CONTINUE TO FOCUS ON A DATA-DRIVEN CULTURE
Ensure that everyone, including students and parents, knows the goals for the academic year and can access school-wide metrics whenever they like. Keeping the goals and the metrics top of mind will help to keep everyone focused and let you know if you’re meeting key benchmarks along the way.
4. CELEBRATE YOUR SUCCESS AND VIEW FAILURES AS STRATEGIC OPPORTUNITIES
Celebrate every goal that’s achieved, award that’s won, and staff member that receives recognition. But look at the failures, too. That’s where your opportunities for improvement lie. Analyzing failures can be a great way to begin next year’s strategic plan.
5. DEVELOP THE PILLARS THAT DEFINE THE CULTURE YOU WANT TO HAVE
Look back at your charter; have you fulfilled the promises you made at the outset? Sit down with your team and think about the values at the core of who you are now and who you want to be in the future. Choose four or five pillars so students and staff can remember them, and give public recognition to any individual who goes out of their way to embody a value.
6. ASSESS ALL MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS REGULARLY
We’ve all been there—using a billing system that makes you grit your teeth or sitting through half a dozen interviews with unqualified candidates. At any school there will be frustrations on occasion, but schedule time to review and replace faulty and time-wasting systems whenever possible.

Click here to download this resource in single-page PDF format.

The Charter School Growth Manual
Whether you’re just beginning the process of starting up a charter school, looking to expand, or trying to prioritize your next steps, download this guide to get expert tips and pitfalls to avoid as you grow.
For this charter school resource guide, we turned to our wide network of charter school experts for best practices and strategies for success at every stage of maturity. All of the advice in this book comes from experienced charter school leaders who have been where you are now—they understand what you’re facing and the pitfalls to avoid.

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Charter Schools: Parents Deserve the Right to Choose

Editor’s Note: This is an insightful opinion piece written by Raymond J. Ankrum, and was originally published on March 18,2019 by Citizen Ed, here. Mr. Ankrum is the current Superintendent of the Riverhead Charter School. Mr. Ankrum has gained notoriety as a school turnaround expert. He is enthusiastic about helping students from low (SES) find ways to end generational poverty through educational advocacy.
We think it’s vital to keep tabs on the pulse of all things related to charter schools, including informational resources, how to support school choice, charter school growth, and the advancement of the charter school movement as a whole. We hope you find this—and any other article we curate—both interesting and valuable.

Stop Blaming Charter Schools for the Failures of Traditional Public Schools

Let’s please stop blaming charter schools for school failure.  I know we’re easy targets, but I assure you  that education is just outright bad for [People of Color] PoC.
Pundits that are against charter schools and school choice have stated: “Black and LatinX parents aren’t smart enough to choose schools for their children.”  To the individuals that are shaming these parents for choosing for their children, I say, “we’ve been down this road before.” Historically, we have always had folks telling us what’s best for us.
Regardless of where you stand on the school choice argument, the one fact we can’t debate is that parents have the absolute right to choose the education that best fits their children.

Healthy Competition.

Sports, occupations, politics, everyone has competition. The beauty of education is that no one model works for 100% of students. We are continually practicing new strategies to teach students.

“Parents are fed up with traditional public schools. They have watched these same schools fail generations.”

Recently, some have said that parents choose charter schools because they “don’t do their due diligence.” In fact, It’s 100% the opposite. Parents are fed up with traditional public schools. They have watched these same schools fail generations. Due diligence comes in the form of the generational poverty experienced by relatives that attended and continue to participate in these failure mills disguised as educational institutions. There is no better spokesperson than someone that has continuously failed at a task. The lived experience of these parents has to account for something.

Agree to Disagree.

We can agree to disagree on the intellectual prowess of those that seek school choice. As a parent that has chosen to educate my child in a charter school, I find it somewhat non-sensical that folks have the nerve to question me about my child and my decision. I’ve done my “due diligence.” Now what? You want me to put my baby, in a school that has failed generations? But, I’m the crazy one?
For the last three years, we’ve spent close to undergraduate tuition at a state school in NY, to ensure our daughter was ready for pre-K. I know many families are not as blessed to be able to allocate that kind of money towards their child’s education. However, these are the very families that need more than just a status quo education for their children. A quality education should help to break cycles of poverty, not continue to create them.

The Story.

Every school choice parent has a story. Every child of a “choice” parent that has attended a public school and no longer attends that school also has a story to tell. Instead of persecuting these parents, let’s find out their stories. Have you ever asked a school choice parent why they chose the school they selected? This type of dialogue would be far more engaging. It may also help to get to the root of the problem, and learn why certain schools no longer work for certain types of students.

The Nuance of Blame.

Let’s be real here. Charter schools are relatively new. Experts may disagree on the era in which public schools began to deteriorate. You have some that say public schools were never intentioned for Black and LatinX students. Wherever folks reside in the argument, we should all agree that public schools need to improve for minority students.
If you’ve never stared poverty in the face, don’t talk to me about the choices I make for my child.

Enough of the Blame Game.

Okay, people. Let’s grow up. We have identified the problem. It isn’t charter schools. It is terrible schools. Now that we’ve identified the problem as bad schools, how do we fix them? Blaming the competition is not the answer. Admitting there is a problem, and committing to addressing the issue is the first step towards resolving it.  Stop blaming charter schools.
We need genuine and thoughtful dialogue. Enough with this “let’s blame charters” argument because it is getting tired.

Since the company’s inception in 2007, Charter School Capital has been committed to the success of charter schools. We provide growth capital and facilities financing to charter schools nationwide. Our depth of experience working with charter school leaders and our knowledge of how to address charter school financial and operational needs have allowed us to provide over $1.8 billion in support of 600 charter schools that have educated over 1,027,000 students across the country. For more information on how we can support your charter school, contact us. We’d love to work with you!

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California Legislative Update: Governor Presents May Revision

Here’s your latest California legislative update:
Last week, Governor Newsom presented the May Revision to his January budget proposal. The Revision reflects funding and policy changes to the Governor’s original proposal. Below are some of the more prominent changes in the document.

The May Revision includes $101.8 billion ($58.9 billion general fund and $42.9 billion from other funds) for all K-12 programs.
Proposes $696.2 million ongoing Proposition 98 funding for special education. This is $119.2 million more than the January budget proposal.
Includes $500,000 one-time non-Proposition 98 funds to increase local educational agencies’ ability to draw down federal funds for medially related special education services and improve the transition of three-year-olds with disabilities from regional centers to local educational agencies.
Includes $89.8 million one-time non-Proposition 98 funds to provide 4,500 loan repayments (of up to $20,000) for newly credentialed teachers to work in high-need schools for at least four years.
$44.8 million one-time non-Proposition 98 funds to provide training and resources for classroom educators to build capacity around inclusive practices, social emotional learning, computer science and restorative practices as well as subject matter competency.
Includes $15 million one-time non-Proposition 98 funds for broadband infrastructure.
$1 million one-time non-Proposition 98 funds, available over four years, to the State Board of Education to establish a state Computer Science Coordinator.
Includes an additional $150 million in one-time non-Proposition 98 funds to reduce the employer contribution rate in 2019-20 for CalSTRS. This is in addition to the $3 billion included in the January budget.

The Revision also includes a specific section on charter schools; see below.

California legislative update for Charter Schools:

The Administration is committed to a system where traditional and charter schools work together to serve the best interests of all students in a community. The May Revision proposes statute to level the playing field for both traditional and charter schools. Specifically, the May Revision includes the following proposals to prevent families from being wrongfully turned away from the public school of their choice:

Prohibits charter schools from discouraging students from enrolling in a charter school or encouraging students to disenroll from a charter school on the basis of academic performance or student characteristic, such as special education status.
Prohibits charter schools from requesting a pupil’s academic records or requiring that a pupil’s records be submitted to the charter school prior to enrollment.
Creates a process for families of prospective and current charter school students to report concerns to the relevant authorizer.
Requires the Department of Education to examine the feasibility of using data from the California Longitudinal Pupil Assessment Data System to identify charter school enrollment disparities that may warrant inquiry and intervention by corresponding authorizers.

These proposals build on charter school transparency legislation signed by the Governor earlier this year and other legislation proposed in the Governor’s Budget that better aligns the governance, transparency, and accountability requirements of school districts and charter schools.
The Governor’s Budget identified growing charter school enrollment as a factor affecting the fiscal condition of some school districts. The Governor requested that the State Superintendent of Public Instruction convene a task force to examine the fiscal impact of charter schools on school districts. The Charter Task Force is expected to deliver recommendations to the Administration by July 1.

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National Charter Schools Week: How We’re Celebrating Amazing Charter Schools

It’s the beginning of National Charter Schools Week and what better way to celebrate than to share some amazing charter school stories and images from our 2019 Charter School Honor Roll! We were blown away by the inspiring, not-enough-positive-words-to-say-about-them, submissions for this year’s Charter School Honor Roll. Selecting just 30 winners out of the hundreds of submissions across the five categories was no easy task, to be sure. This blog post hopefully pays homage to just some of the amazing submissions that we’ve received from across the country.
Note: The photos below are in no particular order, just a compilation of some of the great photos that were sent in with submissions. And, for the sake of brevity, the submission excerpts below may not be the submission in its entirety.

Charter School Growth

Kenner Discovery Health Sciences Academy, Louisiana

In its first year of operation the school welcomed 420 students in grades PreK-3rd, 5th, and 6th. Now, in its sixth year, the school has a bustling student body of 1,536 students in PreK-11th grade. Since its opening Discovery has had an active wait list of over 1,000 students.
~2019 Honor Roll Winner: School Growth

Towpath Trail High School, Ohio

Towpath Trail High School is dropout recovery high school located in Akron, OH. It is managed by Oakmont Education and served just over 100 students in 2012. Towpath recently opened a satellite campus and now serves just under 500 opportunity youth across its two locations. Towpath also recently opened a career tech wing where students can earn industry credentials in the fields of Healthcare, IT, Construction, and Manufacturing. Oakmont and the school have partnered with Habitat for Humanity and the construction students have just begun work on building a new house in the community that when complete, will go to an under-resourced local family. Academically, the school has met standards on Ohio LRC and has grown its number of graduates each of the past 6 years. And the school’s growth has allowed the board to purchase both buildings. Towpath is making a difference in the lives of hundreds of students who are the definition of “at risk” and they’re making a difference in the Akron, OH community. They’re doing this by providing a safe environment with a multitude of wraparound services, helping students earn a high school diploma that most think is out of reach, and by offering industry credential career tech pathways in high need fields that provide opportunities for jobs paying living wages immediately upon graduation.
~2019 Honor Roll Winner: School Growth

Charter School Leadership

Mission View Public Charter, California

Principal Berry has demonstrated leadership and vision geared toward increasing student learning through academic integrity. She does not want her students to simply “get through” their courses, she wants them to grow through their coursework. This is evident through policies and procedures she has put into place to ensure academic integrity.
~ 2019 Honor Roll Winner: School Leadership

Amana Academy, Georgia

Mr. Ehab Jaleel, has shown a dedication to not only his students and staff but also to the greater community. They are actively looking to replicate their model (Number 1 STEM Certified K-8 School in Georgia) to offer their model in underserved areas of Metro Atlanta.
~2019 Honor Roll Winner: School Leadership

Compass Charter School, California

Compass Charter School Leadership is built from a team. Of hard-working, inspirational and highly capable leaders. Amir three years ago the school was on the verge of closing. One of the board members, Jay Luis, took over as CEO and has turned the organization around closing underperforming campuses and increasing enrollment substantially. JJ Lewis and compass charter schools could be equally nominated for growth and strong leadership. In fact, it is difficult if not impossible to grow a school without strong leadership. I have had the pleasure in the honor of working with JJ for the last few months and find that he had he is compassionate and empathetic but also drives a hard bargain. Compass leadership is the type of leadership that is always a joy to work with.
~2019 Honor Roll Winner, School Leadership

Positive Charter School Climate

The Bronx Charter School for Better Learning, New York

BBL has developed an inclusive community and culture that contribute to an exemplary school climate of scholarship, connection and high achievement. Productive relationships lie at the center of all action where the school fosters trust and gratitude filled relationships between staff within their schools, across locations and also with neighbors within co-located space. Knowing that learning, progress and development do not occur in spaces of discomfort, BBL goes above and beyond to ensure their staff and students are happy.
~ 2019 Honor Roll Winner, Positive School Climate

Pine Springs Preparatory Academy, North Carolina

At Pine Springs Preparatory Academy, teachers have their students work both collaboratively and individually in the classroom, promoting teamwork, as well as independence. With an unwavering respect for discipline, the PSPA classroom is very demanding yet vastly rewarding.” When asked about Pine Springs, students respond that the school provides project-based learning experiences, a safe learning environment, discipline and rigor. The school gives them opportunities and is focused on relationships. Pine Springs teaches students to have ownership and be critical thinkers in a global world. The mayor of the town shared at a ceremony that Pine Springs is the only school in town he does not get complaints about which is a direct result of a positive school climate and the heart each staff member gives to such an amazing school.
~ 2019 Honor Roll Winner, Positive School Climate

Community Service

Early College High School, Delaware

HIA works hard throughout the year to “multiply good” through its participation with the Jefferson Awards’ Students in Action program. This past school year, HIA has completed multiple service projects. It’s Hoops for Hurricanes in October raised funds for an Early College HS in South Carolina where many of the students were negatively impacted by the hurricane. In addition to collecting donations, HIA organized a basketball tournament where many in the ECHS community participated or helped out. HIA has also raised funds for Delaware Coalition for Prostate Cancer through a “No Shave November” fundraiser, collected cans for the Delaware Food Bank, volunteered with the Special Olympics’ State Bowling Tournament, helped promote other organizations’ fundraisers like Wreaths Across America and Rock Your Socks, and also organized a Candygram sale for Valentine’s Day. The proceeds from the Candygram sale fund the HIA care package project to benefit Shepherd Place, a family homeless shelter in Dover, DE.
~ 2019 Honor Roll Winner, Community Service

Leadership Prep School, Texas

Leadership Prep School (LPS) empowers students to be servant leaders. Teachers and students have both taken the initiative to create community service projects. Each year, LPS computer science high school students raise money to purchase computer parts, build desktop computers from scratch, and donate the computers to “make an authentic impact.” For the past two years, students have chosen Computer for the Blind as their charity. The unemployment rate for blind people is 63%, so many cannot afford computers. Donating 17 computers provides online access to individuals who were otherwise disconnected because of blindness. This past fall, seventh-grade math/science students from LPS used their project-based learning assignment to raise $1500 to battle childhood cancer. The students worked in teams and used math ratios, business math and chemistry to create the best slime to sell at the school carnival. They donated $1500 raised from the sale of the slime to Team Connor whose mission it is to raise funds for childhood cancer research and inpatient programs. A team of fourth graders pitched the idea of a buddy-to-buddy peer mentoring program where fourth graders would partner with two to three kindergarten or first-grade students to help them with English / Language Arts learning. LPS elementary principal, Michelle Creamer, said that when the students approached her with their idea, she provided them with guidance and suggestions, but ultimately she left the coordination and implementation of the project to them. LPS Fourth-grader pitched a service project idea to his teachers, principal, and classmates after his family contributed to World Vision to purchase farm animals to provide food and income and help build sustainable communities across the globe. With his classmates, they launched a school-wide fundraiser and exceeded their goal of raising $2720 to purchase 28 farm animals in less than three weeks.
~2019 Honor Roll Winner, Community Service

Charter School Student Achievement

Signature School, Indiana

Signature School, Indiana’s first charter high school founded in 2002, focuses its International Baccalaureate (IB)-based curriculum on fine and performing arts, science, technology, mathematics and the liberal arts. Signature, an open-admission high school, believes all students, given proper support, are best served by high expectations. All, regardless of GPA or test scores, are expected to be IB diploma candidates. In May 2018, 361 Signature students sat for 999 Advanced Placement (AP) exams. 198 Signature students were designated AP Scholars by College Board in recognition of their exceptional achievement on the AP exams. 89% of seniors participated as IB diploma candidates. Signature continues to expand student achievement opportunities, becoming an AP Capstone school in 2018. All students take AP Seminar and AP Research courses; all are eligible to earn the Capstone Diploma. The Class of 2018 included three National Merit Finalists and six Commended Scholars, roughly 14% of the total graduating class. 92% received the Indiana Academic Honors Diploma. This class also collectively performed 7,894 hours of community service and generated $22.6 million in scholarship offers. Beyond the classroom, Signature’s participation in national science fairs continues to grow. Two sophomores participated in the Intel International Science Fair in Pittsburgh. Another advanced to round two in the highly competitive American Mathematics Competition for the second year in a row. Signature’s success has been consistently recognized by respected national publications. The Washington Post ranked Signature the third Most Challenging High School in the nation, and US News and World Report ranked Signature the 17th Best High School nationally. Thank you for the opportunity to nominate Signature School, which consistently exemplifies student achievement through its emphasis on rigor and excellence in academics, the arts, integrated technologies and community service.
~2019 Honor Roll Winner, Student Achievement

RISE, Colorado

At RISE, we address social injustices while valuing scholar identity through innovative planning and “empathy” interviews. As a college prep school, we serve all scholars whether gifted, Emerging Bilingual, scholars with Individual Education Plans (IEP) and/or scholars in our Multi-Intensive center. Therefore, the category of “Student Achievement” looks different at each level, but one thing that remains true for all scholars is experiencing achievement that is meaningful. Examples of scholar achievement at RISE include (but are not limited to): an outstanding 11th grader winning the Marshall-Brennon Moot Court Competition and heading to the national competition in D.C. while his peer, a member of the Colorado Youth Congress, will be speaking with Denver’s new superintendent about important issues facing our community. One of our oldest scholars, who has an IEP, completed necessary coursework to begin his alternate path to graduation, which included securing part-time employment; he is also the lead in the school musical. One scholar testified at the Colorado State Capitol on HB-1032 and then weeks later won 2nd Place at the State Speech Championships. An unmotivated scholar has made tremendous progress in controlling his explosive anger by practicing coping skills and has even started encouraging his peers to find better paths when they fall off-track. A young woman scholar in our Multi-Intensive center informed staff about what she felt was a violation of her personal space and comfortability and, in a formal meeting, advocated to get her schedule changed to feel safe at school again. Two other speech & debate scholars took 2nd place in Duo and Drama at State in our very first year in CHSAA. Finally, a small group of 11th graders partnered with their teacher and principal to co-create a new course entitled Life 101 where scholars earn civics & economics credits via real-world simulations.
~2019 Honor Roll Winner: Student Achievement

To see the complete list of this year’s winners, click here!

And be sure to join in the National Charter Schools Week conversations! Our team will be following along and featuring some of the happenings and activities on our social channels including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.

Don’t forget to use the hashtags #WeLoveCharterSchools #CharterSchoolsWeek

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Charter School Governance: What is an Academic Excellence Committee?

EDITOR’S NOTE: We’ve curated this informative post from our knowledgeable friends at BoardOnTrack and was originally published here. BoardOnTrack is the platform, partner, and community empowering charter boards and executive leaders to reach a higher bar, together.
They equip trustees with a powerful combination of data and proven practices to govern for growth, without drowning in the details that form the underpinnings of good governance. You can learn more about how their platform can help you to build a better board, a board that enables sustainable growth for exceptional results, here.
We hope you find this—and any other article we curate—both interesting and valuable.

What’s an Academic Excellence Committee?

Academics are at the very heart of your organization, and your board is focused on ensuring nothing short of excellence.
The Academic Excellence Committee is absolutely essential to providing the necessary level of support and oversight required to successfully govern a multimillion-dollar public organization.

Key Responsibilities of an Academic Excellence Committee

The committee’s primary responsibilities are to:

Ensure that the full board and the CEO have a shared vision of academic excellence and a clear road map to achieve it
Ensure that all trustees understand the academic promises in the charter and accountability plan — and how well the organization is performing against those promises
Educate the full board to conduct proper oversight of the academic program

Sample Academic Excellence Committee Goals and Tasks

As with any committee, your Academic Excellence Committee’s work should be organized around goals and tasks.
One of your committee’s primary goals might be:
Develop a process to educate and train the full Board on proper academic oversight by March 1st. Submit growth plan to authorizer by March 1st deadline.
And, to ensure you meet that goal, you might assign specific committee members the following tasks:

CEO and leadership align on key academic indicators of success.
Chief Academic Officer {CAO} drafts presentation outlining the academic vision of excellence and key indicators of success.
Committee reviews presentation at its next committee meeting and discusses training/education plan.
CAO and committee chair reserve time on next month’s board meeting agenda for training.

Best Practices for Making Your Academic Excellence Committee a Success

Understand the Role and Functions of this Committee

The main purpose of the academic excellence committee is to measure the academic results of the organization against the goals established in the organization’s charter, accountability plan, and annual CEO goals.
In one sense, the Academic Excellence Committee is similar to the Finance Committee. Both exist to monitor performance against stated goals. For the Finance Committee, this means measuring financial results against the budgeted goals. For the Academic Excellence Committee, this means measuring organizational outcomes against stated goals for metrics such as:

performance on state tests,
performance on nationally normed standardized tests (e.g., the TerraNova, SAT 10, etc.)
performance on interim assessments (e.g., Achievement Network tests, the STEP, the DIBELS, or interim assessments created by the school).

In addition, this committee may look at budgets to actuals on metrics such as attendance, student and staff retention, and family and staff satisfaction surveys.

Focus on Outputs Rather Than Inputs

One of the biggest pitfalls for Academic Excellence Committees is to engage over inputs—the means by which the organization pursues its mission, rather than outcomes — the objective data used to assess how well the organization is meeting its mission.
Inputs are management-level issues, which should be handled by the CEO.
Outputs are what the board should be focused on and governing towards.
The best Academic Excellence Committees help CEOs set clear goals for the year, by building on outcomes that are related to the mission. They then set up check-ins throughout the year, at which they meet with the CEO to monitor progress towards those goals.

Your Committee Members Don’t Have to be Educators

While it can be useful for some members of the Academic Excellence Committee to have a background in education, it is by no means necessary in order to participate meaningfully.
Many effective Academic Excellence Committees don’t have educators on the committee.
We find that the key functions of the committee — helping the CEO to set ambitious goals and then monitoring data to assess progress towards those goals — are often well met by people with strong analytical skills. These people need not be educators.
The best Academic Excellence Committee members are those who are very analytical, are great at digesting data and asking good questions, and do not have to have an academic background.

Keep Your Focus on Board-level Work; Not Management Level

Academic Excellence Committees should not be involved in management-level work like:

evaluating teachers
selecting, designing, or reviewing the quality of curricula
planning professional development for teachers
interacting with teachers or other staff members on a regular basis (i.e., daily or weekly)
interacting with families or students on a regular basis (i.e., daily or weekly)
presenting themselves as an outlet for staff, family, or student complaints or concerns that have not first been formally addressed to the CEO

Your organization strives for academic excellence. Having a strategic Academic Excellence Committee in place provides the necessary support for optimal growth.

Want to learn how to recruit, build, and manage your Board as you grow?

Join us Thursday, May 16th, 2019 at 9:00 a.m. PT/ 12:00 p.m. ET for an exclusive webinar:

Board Governance 101

For your school to reach its goals, meet its mission, and be set up for success, you need to build a well-structured, well-staffed, and well-trained Board of Directors. In this important webinar, our partners and industry experts on Board Governance, Board on Track, will be sharing their expertise on the ins and outs of recruiting, building, and managing your governance team as you grow.
Join us and learn:

Board basics: Who should be on your governance team and what should they do?
How to build a strong board: Strategically recruiting for diversity and skills
Tips to govern for growth: How to face challenges and changes at any stage