One of the most frequently-used arguments in favor of charter schools is that bad charter schools can be quickly shut down, whereas bad public schools can continue year after year doing a disservice to their students with a near-guaranteed stream of taxpayer-funding.
A new Stanford University study shows that urban charter schools, on average, perform better than public schools. But it should come as no surprise that there are charter schools that score poorly on traditional metrics.
So the question is, who should decide which charter schools are “bad” and must be closed?
Typically, it’s up to the charter school’s sponsor — be it a state, local or other institution — to close a charter school. In Washington, D.C., there is a charter school board that makes the call.
Still, the factor of parental choice is often lost in this debate. If enough parents want to keep sending their kids, should government tell them they cannot?
In a USA Today column published Tuesday, author Richard Whitmire made the case for shutting down bad charter schools. One of the key phrases in his opening paragraph about Benjamin Banneker Charter School of Technology in Kansas City, Mo., was “Banneker parents seem to like it.” Whitmore goes on to say that closing bad charter schools is essential for the charter school movement. He emphasizes that the purpose of independently operated, publicly funded charter schools is that they outperform other publicly funded schools.
The argument holds water, but taxpayer funds serve the public best when individual parents can choose where those funds go. With charter schools, funding follows the child from their traditional public school to the charter school. The funding given to charter schools isn’t just a revenue stream, but money tied to a family that has paid its share of taxes and deserves to choose where those taxes get spent.
When parents choose to keep their student at a charter school, it means their taxpayer dollars serve them better at the charter school rather than their traditional public school.
The most important factor in whether a school stays open or closed should be whether there are enough students to keep the school viable.
Upholding a viable student population is rarely an issue for traditional public schools, which are mostly insulated from competition and have a built-in stream of students. Public schools don’t need to work as hard to attract students because public schools are the default option.
Too often, when government decides which schools get closed, they box charter schools into the same metrics applied to traditional public schools. The entire point of charter schools is that they serve a different need in a community that traditional public schools cannot fulfill. For example, a charter school specializing in the performing arts should not be judged on its math and reading scores.
Responding to Whitmire’s column, American Enterprise Institute Scholar Rick Hess wrote, “I find so disconcerting the high-profile call to shut down a charter school with average test scores — especially one that excels in ways not reflected in reading and math scores. It eschews the ability of schools to expand in varied ways, instead bowing to a prefab, thoroughly bureaucratized notion of what good schools look like and how the performance of all schools should be gauged.”
Bad charter schools should be shut down. But perhaps more emphasis should be put on letting families vote with their feet, and their own taxpayer funding, to decide which ones are truly bad.
