The myth of charter schools

Former Bush I Department of Education Assistant Secretary of Education in the administration of President George H.W. Bush Diane Ravitch has been working for the past several years to explode the myths that charter schools, stripped of public control yet still funded by the public, improve education. In her Nov. 11, 2010 NY Review of Books article "The myth of charter schools" in which Ravitch dissects the recent propaganda film "Waiting for Superman" she notes that charter schools fail at more than twice the rate of public schools. A pro-charter school study conducted by a Stanford professor progress on math tests "concluded that 17 percent were superior to a matched traditional public school; 37 percent were worse than the public school; and the remaining 46 percent had academic gains no different from that of a similar public school. The proportion of charters that get amazing results is far smaller than 17 percent.Why did Davis Guggenheim pay no attention to the charter schools that are run by incompetent leaders or corporations mainly concerned to make money?"

But the real clincher of Ravitch's analysis applies to my fellow LWIP parents: "Why propound to an unknowing public the myth that charter schools are the answer to our educational woes, when the filmmaker knows that there are twice as many failing charters as there are successful ones? Why not give an honest accounting."

The same honest accounting would apply to the LWIP charter proposal which appears to be backed by a Walmart and Gates foundation funded law firm and lobbyist groups which have been mired in a number of scandals with failed and even corrupt charter schools that have failed and closed across California which I will be reporting on in future postings. In fact, one charter in Oakland failed just days ago due to apparent embezzlement of $1 million. We should take heed to Ravitch's warnings:

"The propagandistic nature of Waiting for “Superman” is revealed by Guggenheim’s complete indifference to the wide variation among charter schools. There are excellent charter schools, just as there are excellent public schools. Why did he not also inquire into the charter chains that are mired in unsavory real estate deals, or take his camera to the charters where most students are getting lower scores than those in the neighborhood public schools? Why did he not report on the charter principals who have been indicted for embezzlement, or the charters that blur the line between church and state? Why did he not look into the charter schools whose leaders are paid $300,000–$400,000 a year to oversee small numbers of schools and students?" The un-transparent behavior of my fellow parents pushing to turn our program into a charter school should be a warning to us all about how this could end up in a few years time.

Ravitch's recent book The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education (New York: Basic Books, 2010) is a must read for all of us. It is not merely a warning about fraudulent education "reform" such as charter schools but also a lesson in what public schools are getting right—such as the small schools within a school we have built up for 3 decades in our own District.

Charter schools began as a means to facilitate new experiments in small schools within the public school context. Several decades later they are now the wedge into dismantling our public schools and transforming education into a profit making business especially for the expensive consultants, foundations, lawyers, and lobbyists who stand to profit by feeding at the public trough and suing to increasing their size of the pie.