Is U.S. Education on the Wrong Track? One Study Says Yes

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published here, by The 74. The most intriguing finding from this study about how U.S. education affects industries was that 85 percent of business leaders surveyed said one or more market-driven reforms must take place: implement greater school autonomy (59 percent), replace underperforming schools (39 percent), and expand charter schools (34 percent). Just 15 percent of respondents said traditional school management models should remain intact.
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 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. Please read on to learn more.

Exclusive: New Survey Shows a Majority of Business Leaders Believe U.S. Education ‘on the Wrong Track,’ Many Fear Poorly Performing Schools Could Harm Their Industries

Cities and towns looking to grow their economies are likely misdirecting their efforts if their priorities are not centered on education, a new national survey of business leaders suggests.
In canvassing 234 local business leaders on the state of their public schools and how they could be improved, Business Forward found that a majority believe that American K-12 schools are “on the wrong track” — and 1 in 4 are concerned that poorly performing schools will negatively impact their businesses.
“When considering relocating, good schools are a primary consideration for both companies and prospective employees,” P. Morgan of San Antonio, Texas, said in response to the survey.
The leaders surveyed represent a wide spectrum of industries, business sizes, and more than 40 U.S. states and territories. Two out of three also have children who either graduated from or are currently enrolled in public schools. Business Forward is a national nonprofit that works with local business leaders across the country for networking, programming, and advocacy.
“My children have graduated. The schools seem worse since then,” E. Karle of Lexington, Kentucky, said in the survey. “We need a strong commitment to education across the country or we will have trouble finding qualified employees. … Whatever else we must skimp on to save money, we must not skimp on our schools.”
Half of those executives surveyed said American schools are underfunded, and half of those business leaders were more concerned with poor students than their own. Many called for increasing funding for the state’s neediest schools as a means of closing the opportunity gap between rich and poor districts, reducing income inequality, and supplying integral talent to their businesses.

This trepidation comes as the U.S. economy surges, readying itself to expand in the second half of this year at the fastest rate since the Great Recession. The rapid growth has allowed employers to continue to hire, driving the unemployment rate — sub-4 percent — toward its lowest level in 50 years.
But there’s a widening gap between the rising number of job openings and the number of workers with enough education and skill to fill them, which could debilitate economic growth in the long term, according to a paper released last week by President Trump’s Council of Economic Advisers.
Proposals in the House and Senate seek to allocate more federal funding toward workforce training in fiscal 2019 — albeit at lower levels than advocates have hoped.
Overall, 3 out of 4 business leaders surveyed expressed the need for one of three issues:

Greater accountability and autonomy for teachers and principals
Practical skills and technical training
Equitable and more funding for schools in poor communities

While there is support for greater accountability, the leaders surveyed expressed caution in handling schools like businesses. A number of respondents denounced reforms that create schools modeled like factories, treating students as “outputs” or “widgets.” Instead, they said, schools should act as service providers in which students are the “customers.”
To improve schools so they can provide skilled workers, 85 percent of business leaders surveyed said, one or more market-driven reforms must take place: implement greater school autonomy (59 percent), replace underperforming schools (39 percent), and expand charter schools (34 percent). Just 15 percent of respondents said traditional school management models should remain intact.
Disclosure: Walton Family Foundation provided support to Business Forward for this survey and provides support to The 74.

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 $1.6 billion in support of 600 charter schools that educate 800,000 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 Students Get Recognized by the National Honor Society

At Charter School Capital, a big part of our mission is to further the charter school movement and celebrating the achievements of charter school students, so we are thrilled to be sharing this incredibly inspirational story of success!
We recently had the honor of speaking with Debra Sellers, from Cincinnati College Preparatory Academy (CCPA), and learned how she persevered to get CCPA’s deserving charter school students acknowledged by the National Honor Society (NHS).
More than just an honor roll, NHS serves to recognize students who have demonstrated excellence in the areas of scholarship, service, leadership, and character. Sellers knew that CCPA’s hard-working and dedicated public charter school scholars deserved recognition the same way their traditional public-school counterparts have since 1921. But it wasn’t going to be easy.

About Debra Sellers

Debra came to CCPA in 2014 as an online instructor, facilitating online courses. For the past two years, she has been serving in the capacity of the guidance counselor. She’s been a guidance counselor and career access coordinator for schools ever since 2002. Prior to her work at CCPA, she was working for Cincinnati Public Schools. Her broad and impressive background includes an undergraduate degree in Human Resources (HR) Training and Development, a Master’s Degree in Social Work with an emphasis in mental health, and a long-running professional career in education.
Sellers is currently CCPA’s Guidance and Career Counselor, but I wanted to better understand how her diverse background and training led to this particular role and why getting NHS recognition for her students would be so important to her.
“I thought, how am I helping? … With HR, I trained in development. You train, and you develop students to transition into the workforce or college. That allowed me to be able to use my experience in that area helping them with resumes, interviewing, assessing what the needs were over the years, and just being able to give them some guidance in that area.
Then, when I thought about grad school, I would have gone for guidance counselor. But, I also have this double life. I work in a residential treatment facility. So, I’ve work in chemical dependency treatment prevention for the past seventeen years. So, I ended up getting a master’s in social work because it was a broad degree that could land me kind of anywhere. Because with social work you are a counselor, you are helping people. You are meeting their needs and trying to get them connected to community-based organizations, helping them to think about basic things like food, clothing, and shelter.
I kind of put those two together, but my resources together, which has been very beneficial to me as I am working with high school students making their transition to the larger picture called life.”

In hot pursuit of National Honor Society Recognition

Coming from her experience with previous schools, she knew that student performance recognition was very important for motivating students towards academic success. Recognition, however, was only one piece of the puzzle. Practically speaking, and from her HR background perspective, she knew that recognition from an organization such as the National Honor Society looks really good on a college resume.
She made the first request to the NHS for CCPA in 2014, but at that time, they were not accepting charter schools—only traditional public schools. The frustrating result was that she wasn’t able to get CCPA students recognized. For the past nearly four years, Sellers was unapologetically tenacious, refusing to give up.

“I knew it would be a really nice motivational piece to encourage students to excel academically because I know it looks good on a resume, and it looks good on a college application. It just, it helps to boost morale, self-esteem, and just encouraging the students to continue what they had already been doing—achieving academically.”

“Every year I would call and then they kept saying, ‘You have to go online.’ And I did, and it just wouldn’t go through. I started in 2014. I just kept trying.
In 2017, I called the National Honor Society (again) and told them what I was trying to do and what had been my issue over the last several years. They were like, ‘Well, just go ahead and re-submit your application again this year.’ Then, when it was approved they simply said, ‘Okay, now you just have to pay your charter membership.’ I was like, ‘Oh my God. Oh my God. We’re going have a National Honor Society!’”
With a chuckle, she goes on to share that she was equally excited when that they said, “You’re going to be billed.” And, from her enthusiastic recounting of that moment, I can safely say I don’t think anyone has ever been more excited to get a bill … ever.
“When they finally opened to us, I was like, ‘Oh yes! We have to do this!’”
I asked her what she thought changed – finally in 2017 – to make the NHS want to recognize charter school students. “Well, I don’t think they recognized charter schools, period. You had to go to a more traditional high school. I think that they looked at the fact that they are accredited, each state recognizes them, and that there’s a growing number of public charter schools nationwide.”

This was a big deal

Becoming a member of the National Honor Society is – as the name perhaps already implies – a tremendous honor for students. One that’s been experienced by high school scholars at traditional public schools around the country for decades. For this, CCPA’s first year having their charter school students recognized, Sellers wanted to make sure it had all the pomp and circumstance that the CCPA honorees, their proud families, and school community deserved.
”We just really wanted it to be something that the students knew this was a big deal. We put together a formal ceremony. We had all the candles, the pinning, we did the oath, we had a guest speaker (a TV personality from the local station), we held the ceremony in the evening, we had 33 students, and they all signed a book. It was really a nice ceremony.”
But, for even more impact on the students, Sellers kept the induction into the NHS as well as all of the planning for this huge event a secret from the honorees.
“I didn’t tell them. I kept wandering around the school and asking them random things. I gave certain kids cards and asked them for their addresses. I never told them what it was, and they had no idea until they received the letter at home. I wanted it to be a surprise for them to know that they were being recognized. After receiving their letters, they excitedly came back and asked, ‘What is this? What is this?’ So, I gave them a little background of what it was. The following Monday their names were on the school marquee in the atrium so the whole student body could see who the National Honor Society inductees were.”

Just the beginning

An impressive 33 tenth, eleventh, and twelfth graders out of CCPAs 182 students were recognized this March. The graduating seniors were specially recognized with stoles that included their new National Honor Society patch.
Sellers shares,“I wanted them to know that this is an honor and it says something about you … you and the work that you have done during your high school years, and this is a way of being recognized—and it’s by a reputable organization, the National Honor Society.”
Sellers is not stopping here and is dedicated to continuing her progress ¬– and not just for the CCPA students. Although students cannot become members of NHS until high school, she’s getting a jumpstart on middle-school-aged students in her area to begin thinking about the National Junior Honor Society (NJHS). “If I have my wish, we’re going down to junior high. They have one that’s for sixth, seventh, eighth graders. I’m trying to get them on board. That’s my goal this year. If you get them to really be thinking about the bigger picture, if you say, ‘I want to become an engineer,’ you don’t start that in your senior year. You start that back there. It’s a process.”
We are always honored to share the amazing work that charter school leaders are doing across the country to make a difference and help forward charter school movement. Debra Sellers is a prime example of the commitment, dedication, and outstanding work charter leaders are doing—and that deserves our recognition. We thank her for taking the time to speak with us and for paving the way for other charter schools to motivate and honor their students’ achievements in the same way.

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Halfway through the academic year, one of the nation’s largest online charter schools, Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow (ECOT), is closing abruptly, leaving families of the roughly 12,000 Ohio students scrambling to find other schooling options. According to one Marietta Times article, “ECOT students would have to be accepted by their local public school districts, some of which already started preparing for that scenario.”
We can imagine that many students, families, and schools might be in panic-mode as they struggle to figure out what to do in light of the sudden ECOT school closure. Getting students, their transcripts, and other records transferred quickly and efficiently is just one of the challenges being faced. As area schools scramble to help, they may be wondering how they’ll be able to fund this unexpected growth and the costs associated with increased enrollment. This is where Charter School Capital can help. Whether your school is taking on many new students or just a few, we can help fill any funding gap so you can get back to your focus—educating kids.

In order to make sure other charter schools are able to re-home these students, we’re offering flexible funding to Ohio schools to offset the costs of teachers, staff, onboarding, and facilities in order to enroll them. We can secure funding to offset the unexpected costs in as little as 14-30 days to make sure you can serve those students. Let us know how we can help.

Get started by filling out our interest form, emailing us at growcharters@charterschoolcapital.com, or calling our Ohio representative Michelle Godin directly at 971.634.1897.

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Charter School Capital, the nation’s leading provider of growth capital and facilities financing to charter schools, reported today that construction of the second building on the Wayne Preparatory Academy (WPA) premises is underway. Located at 600 Tommy’s Road in Goldsboro, N.C., the new 29,396 square foot building will serve middle school students of the charter school starting in the fall of 2018.

Charter School Capital’s facilities arm, American Education Properties (AEP), purchased the 53- acre property occupied by Wayne Preparatory Academy earlier this summer for $9.2 million. The charter school currently serves scholars in grades K-7. The existing 31,469 square foot complex on the property was built in 2014 along with a 2,500 square foot building which will serve as a preschool for 3-, 4- and 5-year-olds.

“We are extremely pleased to support Wayne Preparatory Academy in their growth, adding a middle school to serve the community’s educational needs,” said Stuart Ellis, CEO of Charter School Capital and AEP. “Once the middle school building is completed, 350 additional scholars will have access to the quality education provided by the dedicated team of educators at WPA.”

The new middle school building will include 18 classrooms, a gymnasium/multi-purpose room complete with a stage, and a library and media center. Construction and design of the new middle school facility is being directed by the board and staff of Wayne Preparatory Academy.

“It is so exciting to see this new middle school come to fruition,” said Wayne Preparatory Academy Board Chair, Sharon Thompson. “We are incredibly grateful to the team at Charter School Capital for helping make the dreams for our school community become reality. And our academic program continues to exceed expectations providing the education our students desperately need.”

Once the new middle school building is completed, Wayne Preparatory Academy has its sights set on adding a high school to its program.

“Wayne Preparatory Academy is on the threshold of remarkable growth,” said Taft Morley, chief operating officer of American Charter Development. “It takes an incredible combination of desire and wherewithal to convert a grand vision into reality, and that is exactly what is happening at this impressive charter school.”

For more information on how Charter School Capital can help you assess your charter school’s facilities needs, check out our website and contact us at GrowCharters@CharterSchoolCapital.org.

Greg Richmond, the President and CEO of the National Association of Charter School Authorizers (NACSA), works with school systems and authorizers nationwide to improve authorizing practices and create great charter schools. In a recent article for The 74, Richmond talks about why the important work of authorizing is often misunderstood in the world of education reform.
“There’s work to be done to address misunderstandings as well as rightful critiques. Some criticize authorizers for stifling innovation, while others call out authorizers for allowing failing schools to replicate and grow,” explains Richmond.
It is Richmond’s goal to bring attention to the qualities of good charter school authorizing:

It’s about creating good public school choices for families – Good authorizers evaluate the risk/reward trade-off about which schools would provide the best education opportunities for children
It’s about spurring innovation – Protecting the autonomy of teachers and school leaders allows them to be problem solvers in their communities
It’s about clear expectations on the front end and strong accountability on the back end – Otherwise known as the “tight, loose, tight” approach, this means letting the school choose how to achieve its goals but holding schools to expectations at renewal time

Richmond believes that without good charter school authorizing, the sector will continue to face “rightful criticism” from across the political spectrum. Read the full article here for more of Richmond’s thoughts on the responsibilities of good school authorizers.

About 15 years ago, charter school leaders decided to up the ante from seeing students through high school graduation and into a four-year college to seeing them all the way through college graduation. Data shows that their efforts have paid off. Now charter school students are graduating from college at a rate of 3-5 times the national average, which in recent years has been at a rate of 59% for first-time, full-time undergraduate students. To put this into further context for charter schools, historically only about 9% of students from low-income, minority families (which also describes the demographics of most students in the charter school network), graduate from college. This rate pales in comparison to the 77% of students from high-income families graduating college.
This radical change has been credited to the KIPP network of charter schools after realizing that their graduates were struggling to finish college. They changed the name of their college success program from “KIPP To College” to “KIPP Through College.” Read the full article from The 74 to see what other schools are doing to achieve the same goal.

Charter School Capital, the nation’s leading provider of growth capital and charter school facilities funds to charter schools, announced today that its facilities arm, American Education Properties (AEP), has purchased the building located at 600 Tommy’s Road in Goldsboro, N.C., from American Charter Development for $9.2 million. Funded earlier this summer, the acquisition provides a long term home for current tenant, Wayne Preparatory Academy, a charter school currently serving grades K-6.
Acquisition of the Wayne Preparatory Academy property is the first charter school facilities funds transaction by the company in the state of North Carolina. It was made possible through a $500 million pool of capital launched in 2014 designed specifically for charter school facilities needs. Currently there are 41 charter school properties under management, $450 million, and the company continues to increase its pool of available capital earmarked specifically for charter school facilities financing.
“We are very pleased to empower Wayne Preparatory Academy with a permanent home, and fully intend to allow the school’s administrators complete access and full control of their building,” said Stuart Ellis, CEO of Charter School Capital and AEP. “With a student body that is at capacity, and a healthy waiting list, Wayne Preparatory Academy is by all accounts growing, and we look forward to expanding its facility to accommodate that growth.”
A 31,469 square foot complex situated on a 50-acre parcel, the Wayne Preparatory Academy facility was built in 2014. The school has 17 years remaining on a 20-year lease, which the company will assume and reconfigure as part of the transaction.
The company will begin an expansion of the Wayne facility to accommodate growth of the middle school population through the 8^th grade, which is planned for the 2018/19 school year. Wayne Preparatory Academy will also add a high school to its program once the facility is built out.
“There is more to this transaction than simply financing. It is Charter School Capital’s testament of support for the growth and future of Wayne Preparatory Academy,” said Taft Morley, chief operating officer of American Charter Development. “We have been delighted to support the school through its growth thus far, and are heartened in knowing that the school facility will be a top-notch environment fostering excellence in education for many years to come.”
Today, more than 1 million students find themselves on waiting lists for their local charter schools. The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools continues to highlight the lack of facilities options available to charter schools as a major issue charter leaders face. To meet this demand, charter schools require facilities that address the unique growth needs of each school and community and require access to charter school facilities funds to expand. Charter School Capital focuses solely on charter school needs, providing customizable facilities financing options to charter schools. Charter leaders retain control of their buildings and are afforded the flexibility to make the modifications necessary to expand their enrollment and academic programs.
To date, Charter School Capital has invested $1.5 billion to 550+ charter schools supporting 650,000 students across the country. Currently we have more than 40 charter school properties under management.
For more information on how Charter School Capital can help you assess your charter school’s facilities needs, check out our website and contact us at GrowCharters@CharterSchoolCapital.org.

Charter School Capital’s facilities arm, American Education Properties (AEP), has acquired two Florida charter school facilities for $30.5 million from ESJ Capital Partners and MG3 Developer Group.
The charter schools operating in the two facilities are Renaissance Charter School at University in Tamarac, Fla. and Kid’s Community College Southeast Riverview in Riverview, Fla. The Renaissance property was acquired for $22,296,330, and the Kid’s Community College property was acquired for $8,208,100. As part of the acquisition, the company has assumed the existing 20-year leases on both properties, which expire in 2032 and 2033, respectively. The two properties encompass a total of 134,000 square feet on 11.81 acres.
This acquisition marks AEP’s second transaction with ESJ Capital Partners and MG3 Developer Group. In late November, 2016, AEP/Charter School Capital acquired five charter school facilities from the sellers.
“It is such an honor to positively impact the future of the nearly 2,000 students that attend these two impressive Florida charter schools,” said Stuart Ellis, president and CEO of Charter School Capital. “We enjoyed working once again with ESJ and MG3 to arrive at terms that will give the charter school operators the peace of mind that comes in knowing their facilities are securely theirs to operate for years to come.”
Renaissance Charter School at University operates as part of Broward County Public Schools. Located about 10 miles northwest of the Fort Lauderdale business district, the charter school opened in 2012 and will serve 1,426 students in the 2017-18 school year. Managed by Charter Schools USA, one of the oldest and largest charter management organizations (CMO) in the country, the K-8 charter school operates in one 105,002 square foot building on 8.91 acres. The building was originally constructed in 1982 and renovated in 2015.
Kid’s Community College Southeast Riverview operates under the Hillsborough County School District. Located about 15 miles southeast of the Tampa business district, the charter school opened in 2003 and is slated to serve 397 students in the 2017-18 school year. The K-8 charter school operates on a 2.9-acre parcel in a single two-story building built in 2013 that is comprised of 28,998 square feet. It is independently operated by Kid’s Community College, a CMO that manages a total of eight charter schools serving Pre-K through high school.
Today, more than 1 million students are currently on charter school waiting lists. The National Alliance for Public Charters schools continues to highlight the lack of facilities options and funds for charter facilities available as a major issue charter leaders face. To meet this demand, charter schools require facilities that address the unique growth needs of each school and community and require access to capital to expand. Charter School Capital focuses solely on charter school needs, providing funds for charter facilities that are customizable. Charter leaders retain control of their buildings and are afforded the flexibility to make the modifications necessary to expand their enrollment and academic programs.
To date, Charter School Capital has invested $1.5 billion to 550+ charter schools supporting 650,000 students across the country. Currently we have more than 40 charter school properties under management.
For more information on how Charter School Capital can help you assess your charter school’s facilities needs or provide funds for charter facilities, contact GrowCharters@CharterSchoolCapital.org. Also check out more facilities information on our website.

NPR’s education news site, nprEd , recently posted an article giving a rundown on charter schools, namely what ARE they and how are they different from other private and public schools?
Despite ever-growing numbers of charter schools in the country (3.1 million students currently enrolled in charter schools across 43 states), most Americans have no idea how charter schools work. The 2014 PDK/Gallup poll on public attitudes toward education found that while 63% of those asked favored charter schools (without a definition of what a charter is), 48% of those surveyed didn’t know they were public, and 57% thought they charged tuition.
The article covers how charter schools work, how they’re funded, who runs them, and whether they’re better than their public school competition. Read the full story.