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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Eye On Boise

New state report shows Idaho charter schools strong on academics, but low on poor, minority students

A new state report praises Idaho charter schools for their academic performance, but acknowledges that fewer minority and low-income students attend them, writes Kevin Richert of Idaho Education News. On Wednesday, Idaho’s Public Charter School Commission released its first-ever annual report on charter schools. The State Board of Education panel is the authorizing body for the vast majority of Idaho’s charter schools; the rest answer to local school boards.

The annual report focuses only on the 35 charter schools under the commission’s purview. Among schools examined is the highly rated Coeur d’Alene Charter Academy, which was named Idaho’s most challenging high school in a Washington Post study released this month. The report found that fewer than 2 percent of the academy’s students qualify for free- or reduced-price school lunch; the Coeur d’Alene School District’s overall rate is 40 percent. The academy also has no special education students or students with limited English proficiency, the report found. Richert’s full article is online here.



Betsy Z. Russell
Betsy Z. Russell joined The Spokesman-Review in 1991. She currently is a reporter in the Boise Bureau covering Idaho state government and politics, and other news from Idaho's state capital.

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