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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Bid For Innovation Now Before Senate

John Webster For The Editorial

Thanks to Gov. Gary Locke, Washington state parents may yet be offered an attractive new choice: charter schools.

Locke, who considers excellent education his No. 1 priority, has been negotiating with legislators to iron the last wrinkles from a charter school bill. Approved 72-22 by the House, HB2019 awaits action in the Senate.

If the negotiations succeed, Washington’s most troubled public schools at last will be able to try this fast route to reform. It’s about time. Elsewhere around the nation, 800 charter schools enroll 200,000 kids.

Experience in other states, from Massachusetts to California, indicates charter proposals are most likely to emerge not from pleasant neighborhoods where parents are relatively satisfied, but rather from troubled schools where parents and teachers are desperate for an alternative - desperate enough to organize a new approach.

Charter schools operate with public funds but offer teachers freedom from some of the regulations and paperwork that inhibit innovation. Charter schools also can free administrators to get rid of mediocre teachers and grant merit pay increases to outstanding teachers. Many charter schools are built around themes, such as technology or the fine arts, that inspire students to excellence and show the link between learning and fulfillment.

Significantly, Locke assumes approval of charter schools will be followed by an increase in state education outlays, as home schoolers and private school students are attracted back to an improving public system.

Safeguards, of course, are essential in a charter school. When Washington voters defeated a 1996 charter school initiative, safeguards were lacking. But as the governor’s participation attests, those concerns are being addressed.

One crucial safeguard would require charter schools to measure their effectiveness with the student-testing regimen being developed under Washington’s 1993 school reform law. Without a common yardstick, schools can’t be accountable and successful innovations can’t be identified.

Another important safeguard, among many in HB2019, allows a charter school to be disestablished if students fail to meet educational or financial performance standards aren’t met.

But the reason charter schools are popular is that standard-issue government schools are the ones whose performance leaves parents and teachers hankering for something better. Where parents are satisfied, there’ll be no charter school proposals because creating one takes so much work. Where parents aren’t satisfied, they should have a choice.

, DataTimes The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = John Webster For the editorial board