-Caveat Lector-
SCHOOL COMPETITION EMERGING, THANKS TO CHARTERS
Charter schools, which are growing in number, are beginning to
force traditional public schools to try to improve, observers
report. But there are still too few charters to have a major
impact on American education. Reformers hope that will change
over time.
o A school district would have to lose 6 percent and 9
percent of its enrollment to charters to feel real
pressure to compete, says Caroline Hoxby, who teaches the
economics of education at Harvard University.
o Arizona, with 274 charter schools -- more than any other
state -- counts fewer than 4 percent of its youngsters in
charters.
o When 5 percent of Washington, D.C., children fled the
city's traditional public schools for charters last fall,
the school system -- among the most wretched in the
country -- fought the chartering of new schools, but did
little to win children back by firing awful teachers or
improving reading scores.
o Nevertheless, University of California researcher Eric
Rofes studied 25 school districts for signs of
competition, and found that one-quarter of them made big
changes to their programs because of competition from
charters.
Here are some of the improvements he found:
o The Grand Rapids, Mich., school district started an
environmental-sciences middle-school program when an
environmental-sciences charter opened nearby.
o Lansing, Mich., began all-day kindergarten, and
Williamsburg, Mass., school districts offered after-school
programs when charters opened.
o After a charter in Orleans, Mass., bought vans to ferry
its students to community activities, the public high
school did the same thing.
o Arizona's Wilson elementary school district was so
distraught that students were dropping out of ninth grade
that it chartered a high school of its own.
In themselves, these reforms may not be earth-shaking, but they
demonstrate that competition works, experts point out.
Source: June Kronholz, "Charter Schools Begin to Prod Public
Schools Toward Competition," Wall Street Journal, February 12,
1999.
For more on Charter Schools
http://www.ncpa.org/pi/edu/edu3.html#c
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