Charter Schools

Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO), along with several co-sponsors, has introduced a new bill that would establish charter-school-like teacher and principal preparation programs, termed “Preparation Academies.” The proposed legislation aims to better prepare students for college and careers by increasing the number of effective teachers and principals who serve high-needs schools and hard-to-staff subjects like science and math.

Early education stakeholders should watch the bill closely because while it doesn’t delineate what grade levels would be included, it is safe to say that it would include academies that prepare K-3 teachers and elementary school principals.  What is unclear is whether the bill could also apply to the training of pre-k teachers.

Last week, Early Ed Watch attended an event at the American Enterprise Institute on the federal role in public education. Five panels – discussing 11 papers – explored the last 50 years of federal education policy. The point was to ask whether federal incentives, penalties and role-modeling – the “carrots, sticks and bully pulpit” of the event’s title – are doing any good in improving American education.

New York City Mayor Bloomberg’s plan to increase the number of charter schools in the Big Apple has generated a lot of buzz since Bloomberg announced it last week. Charter schools are independent public schools that are publicly funded, publicly accountable, and free of charge to students, but operated by independent nonprofit boards, rather than school districts. In late September, Harvard researchers released a study showing that predominantly disadvantaged students who attend New York City’s public charter schools are making more progress towards closing the achievement gap with their suburban peers than a control group of NYC students who remained in NYC public schools.

Mayor Bloomberg has proposed a number of steps to expand the number of charter schools in New York City, including raising the state cap on the number of charter schools, raising additional funding for charter school facilities, and co-locating charter schools with public housing projects.

KIPP, a network of high-performing charter schools serving low-income, predominantly minority students, recently announced plans to dramatically expand the number of KIPP schools operating pre-k and elementary programs.

Paul Tough, whose blog on education is rapidly becoming one of our favorites, writes about some of the challenges facing New Haven's Amistad High School. Amistad is part of the Achievement First network of high-performing charter schools and opened two years ago to serve students coming out of Amistad Academy middle school.

Last week the Rhode Island legislature passed legislation to allow the creation of "Mayoral Academies," a new type of charter schools that would allow Mayors to recruit high-quality, nationally proven charter school operators to open new charter schools in their cities. Its a great idea that should help foster quality growth in what's currently a relatively weak charter school sector in Rhode Island.

We've spent a lot of time over the past two weeks talking about the Democratic presidential candidates' early education agendas, so today we're going to devote some time to the Republican candidate, Senator John McCain. So far, McCain hasn't said much about education issues, and hasn't offered any sort of education policy agenda. That's hardly surprising, as McCain has never been particularly involved on education issues in the Senate, and education issues were not a major issue in the Republican primary campaign. Richard Whitmire reports that McCain's advisors are about to start unrolling a series of education proposals-but predicts they won't include a significant early education component.

There are lots of good reasons for McCain's advisors to incorporate an early education component in the education agenda they're formulating. For starters, it would be counterintuitive, and it would also help cast a more positive light on some of the areas where McCain is weaker.

Further, it's probably easier for Republican politicians to support innovative ideas on early education than on K-12 reform right now. Conventional wisdom within the pundit class holds that teachers unions make it difficult for Democrats to advance compelling school reform ideas. But the politics of school reform are equally fraught for many Republicans. The conservative base loathes NCLB with a passion to rival that of the most strident teacher unionist and strongly opposes any expansion of the feds' role in schooling. Moderate Republicans know that the suburban parents they represent aren't thrilled by NCLB or reforms that might shake up a status quo that works pretty well for them now. And, as the Sol Stern controversy demonstrates, the conservative constituency for education reform is increasingly divided between choice-niks who think vouchers are the only answer, and devotees of curricular reform. In other words, for a politician who's never evinced a particular passion for education issues, the waters can't look too appealing in K-12 reform.

A growing number of charter schools across the country are offering high-quality pre-k programs, and charter schools can be a valuable source of pre-k capacity as states expand publicly funded pre-k. But in too many states a variety of policy barriers prevent charter schools from playing a role in state pre-k programs.

Children's Defense Fund President Marian Wright Edelman devoted her Huffington Post column last week to singing the praises of Excellence Charter School, an all-boys school in Brooklyn, New York that seeks to combat the high-dropout rates for African American men by providing a strong academic curriculum in an environment that supports students' social and character development.