Spokane7
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So why does Idaho continue to add six charter schools a year? Each represents a new layer of administration. Each drains an average of $1.3 million in state dollars from its host district. Sure, the traditional school system has fewer children to educate, but its costs don’t decline. You still need to hire a teacher whether her classroom has 24 or 23 students. Not surprisingly, some districts have found themselves raising supplemental property tax levies simply to maintain their programs after a charter school got launched in their back yards/Marty Trillhaase, Lewiston Tribune. More here. Also: Now’s not the time to create charter schools/Idaho Press Tribune
Question: Should charter schools be spared/expanded at the expense of public schools?
D.F. Oliveria is a columnist and blogger for The Spokesman-Review. Huckleberries Online was judged the best 2008 Idaho newspaper blog by the Idaho Press Club. And the best 2007 news blog in the Pacific Northwest by the Society for Professional Journalist. Print Huckleberries is a past winner of the Herb Caen Memorial Column contest by the National Association of Newspaper Columnists. The Readership Institute of Northwestern University cited this blog as a good example of online community journalism.
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pthompson on June 17 at 10:39 a.m.
Charter schools give the best ROI
jreighley on June 17 at 11:06 a.m.
Schools should that work should be opened and schools that fail should be closed.
I would tend to suspect Charter Schools perform better, but that is probably easy enough to find out. I tend to think that all schools should be empowered as charter schools. One curriculum doesn’t fit all. If each school where empowered to use the methods and curriculum that best served it’s community, the results would be better, and there would be a better sense of what is working and what isn’t.
florined on June 17 at 1:19 p.m.
I encourage the concept of charter schools. Having said that, I caution that “performance” has to be defined before evaluation can be valid. And the definition has to be based on purpose and resources, including the student population.
JamesBond on June 17 at 1:41 p.m.
I’ve been massively disappointed in charter schools, but I also have some real serious beefs with how all public schools are allowed to operate in this state. The mantra of “local control” is a misunderstood and svengali-like toxin. We’ve got hundreds of little fiefdoms in this state, far more than we need. As I’ve said before, I live in a district that promised to close several underfilled and old schools when it passed a massive bond a few years ago. I still have three elementary schools, two of which are old and way under capacity, within 1 mile of my home. Ridiculous.
Bent on June 17 at 11:27 p.m.
I am an unabashed supporter of the Cd’A Charter Academy. I have graduated three excellently educated children from that school, and I have one more who would have nothing else but to graduate with honors from the CCA.