Ohio Goes After Charter Schools That Are Failing

Yesterday's front page NYT article on Ohio's efforts to shut down failing charter schools raises lots of interesting issues and generated plenty of comments.  The main lessons here are: A) A crappy charter law leads to lots of crappy schools; and B) It's really hard to shut down even the crappiest of schools -- but must be done or it undermines all charter schools.
 
Here's Andy Rotherham's take on Eduwonk (http://www.eduwonk.com/2007/11/tin-soldiers-and-dillon-coming.html):

       Tin Soldiers And  Dillon Coming!
 
        NYT's Sam Dillon turns in an important story on charter schools in Ohio.  It's really two stories, the Ohio narrative and the larger political story. On the former, two key quotes:

        “If chronically lousy charters aren’t closed, the charter movement will continue under assault from its opponents” -- Todd  Ziebarth

        "Mr. Ryan said it was hypocritical to sue failing charters without moving against Ohio’s scores of failing neighborhood schools."

On Ziebarth, couldn't agree more. On Ryan, not sure it's hypocritical, the circumstances are different, but it's surely both political and not in the best interest of kids. Here is where the Joe Williams "no crap" doctrine comes in -- states shouldn't tolerate lousy schools of any stripe. Sure, it lacks the elegance of say the Monroe Doctrine, but for poor kids it's more important right now.

Dillon also does a nice job  explaining why Ohio is somewhat anomalous as a charter school state. That  points up the basic narrative here and why what's happening in Ohio is worthy  of the front page of The Times...the political story and possible  implications.

And here's Nelson Smith, President of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools:

Ohio Hits the Times <http://publiccharters.org/content/blog/detail/3207/>

“If chronically lousy charters aren’t closed, the charter movement will continue under assault from its opponents” says our own Todd  Ziebarth --
 hitting the nail on the head in Sam Dillon’s NY Times piece on the Ohio charter situation today. In fact, no one’s been tougher on this issue than the charter community itself.  Remember that it was the Alliance, NACSA, and the Fordham Institute that called for a “housecleaning ” last year, which led the General  Assembly to adopt automatic-closure laws last December for schools that linger on the Academic Emergency list.

Dillon does a pretty balanced job of  reporting the facts and the politics — although he omits the backroom dealing between Attorney General Marc Dann and the teachers’ unions. More should have been made about the nature of Dann’s attack on three (and maybe more) charters by going after their charitable-trust status. If this approach stands, it will place in jeopardy every kind of nonprofit — hospitals, foundations, you name  it — that incurs the displeasure of a politically ambitious AG.

And of  course, since this story was about Ohio, it left out the big context. One PR pro told me this morning that “It is not the greatest day when 'failing' and  'charters' are in the same NYT headline.” In fact, the big national headline should be “Most Charters Succeeding” -- a point amply demonstrated in our review of 70 charter achievement studies. Kids  are gaining faster in charters than in other public schools, and our schools are closing the achievement gap.

So, yeah, we gotta get funding right, and gotta get facilities, and gotta support all the good operators — but  folks, we also have to make damn sure that crooks and chronic laggards are banished from our ranks.

And finally, below is the Education Gadfly.  Excerpt:

The state report card makes clear that charters perform as well, or as poorly, as the district schools with which they compete. So, it makes no sense to attack just charters and leave undisturbed the poorly performing district schools, where many more tens of  thousands of children are trapped.

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Ohio Education Gadfly, 11/8/07:
Good charter schools can still lead resurgence in Ohio education

http://www.edexcellence.net/institute/gadfly/issue.cfm?edition=Ohio

Today's New York Times published an article headlined "Ohio Goes After Charter Schools That Are Failing," noting that more than half of the state's 328 charter schools received either a D or F on the state's report card issued in August (see here <http://www.nytimes.com/pages/education/index.html> ).


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Ohio Goes After Charter Schools That Are Failing


By SAM DILLON
Published: November 8, 2007
www.nytimes.com/2007/11/08/us/08charter.html

COLUMBUS, Ohio  — Ohio became a test tube for the nation’s charter school movement during a decade of Republican rule here, when a wide-open authorization system and plenty of government seed money led to the schools’ explosive proliferation.