A higher percentage of District children are flocking to charter schools than anywhere else in the nation except New Orleans, according to a new report.
Thirty-eight percent of D.C. Public Schools students are enrolled in public charter schools, putting the school district behind only New Orleans’s towering 61 percent.
The District’s 27,660 charter school students placed the system eighth among districts in terms of total enrollment for the 2009-2010 school year, down from sixth the previous year, the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools’ annual report found. Los Angeles topped the list with nearly 70,000 charter students, followed by Detroit and Houston.
This is the first year that four city school districts — New Orleans, D.C., Detroit and Kansas City, Mo. — saw at least one-third of public school students enrolled in charters.
“It tells us that there is a strong and continued demand for these innovative schools,” said Anna Nicotera, the report’s author and the research director for the National Alliance. “People want to be able to choose the best public school option for their child, and public charter schools are giving families that chance.”
The District has 52 public charter schools.
Erin Dillon, senior policy analyst for independent think tank Education Sector, said the District’s high charter participation is less about the charters and more about the other option: D.C. public schools.
“It’s a reflection of the poor performance of the District public schools historically,” Dillon said. “Parents interested in living in the city are desperate for options, so charter schools are a pretty natural fit.”
DCPS trumpeted its first enrollment increase in 39 years this school year with a bump of about 1.6 percent to 46,515, to be officially confirmed by auditors, and hailed as the fruit of Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee’s reforms. A day later, the D.C. Public Charter School Board announced its unaudited enrollment increase of 7 percent over the last school year.
Graduation rates and test scores climbed during Rhee’s 3 1/2-year reign, but her blunt leadership style isolated angered the teachers union and many voters. She resigned last month after Mayor Adrian Fenty lost his bid for re-election.
Dillon predicted that charter school enrollment would remain high in the years ahead, but the growth may slow: “It’ll be a real test of what Michelle Rhee did and improvements made in the District as to whether or not [DCPS] can successfully compete with charter schools and get those kids back.”
