The NYT's coverage of the education issue has been getting a lot better (especially the editorial page), so it was surprising to see such poor piece of reporting in this article on charter schools in NY state. The reporters admit that the article was spoon fed to them by the union ("a review of public documents shows that many charter schools have spent money in questionable ways and have experienced significant conflicts of interest. The documents were obtained by New York United Teachers, the state teachers union, and provided to The New York Times, which corroborated the data.") and it basically parrots the union's talking points. Of course, among 200 charter schools in NYS, there will be some that are lousy and/or do things they shouldn't – these schools should be reprimanded or shut down. But one thing I'm sure of: if you did a close examination of the 200 public schools nearest to the charter schools, you'd find 10x the amount of mediocrity and malfeasance!

Charter school advocates, including Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, are vigorously lobbying for a bill that would more than double the number of charters in New York State and would send at least $2 billion in taxpayer money a year into the charter system.

Supporters want the bill to pass before the June 1 deadline by which states must apply to win a share of $700 million in Race to the Top federal education grants that place a premium on an expansion of charter schools.

Charter school advocates argue that the schools' freedom from traditional rules enables them to make dramatic improvements, but that same freedom can present some problems: a review of public documents shows that many charter schools have spent money in questionable ways and have experienced significant conflicts of interest. The documents were obtained by New York United Teachers, the state teachers union, and provided to The New York Times, which corroborated the data.

The problems underscore what many critics say is New York's weak system for policing how charter schools, which are publicly financed but privately run, spend money.

Anyway, this is old news – the union's report was released last month – and the reporters didn't even call the NYC Charter Center or the New York Charter School Association for comment/rebuttal. Had they done so, they might have included this scathing rebuttal by Peter Murphy:

The state legislature will again be considering in the next 30 days whether to raise the cap on charter schools along with other reform measures to better position New York State to compete for round 2 of the application process for federal Race to the Top funds.

The New York State United Teachers, knowing this, came out with another hit piece on charter schools (here). We've seen this tactic before; for example in December 2006 when outgoing Gov. George Pataki proposed raising the cap, and again this past January before the application deadline for the first round of Race to the Top.

The Daily News editorial today said perfectly what this whole NYSUT anti-charter exercise of innuendo is about, by describing it as "propaganda in a battle to stop the Legislature from raising the cap on potential charter school openings. The union is fighting tooth, nail and insinuation because teachers in most charters are not unionized." (In fact, fewer of them are getting unionized with the recent news of KIPP teachers in NYC voting to drop UFT representation.)

Ironically, NYSUT's report reveals the substantial documentation and oversight of charter schools by their state overseers, SUNY and the Regents. The report's bevy of insinuations shows the lack of evidence of anything awry in many of the incidents discussed in the report.

…Accountability for thee, not for me, sayeth the teachers union. Hopefully, that will change someday.

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