Understanding Charter Schools

What is a Charter School? 

Charter schools are public schools--independent, tuition-free, non-religious, highly-accountable, cost-efficient public schools--operated according to a specific charter approved by a state's official charter school authorizer. There are now approximately 3,600 chartered public schools in the United States serving over 1,000,000 students.

As of December 2005, eight (8) charter school have been authorized in New Hampshire by the State Board of Education. Of theese, 6 are open and operating; 1 (Goffstown) will open mid-year 2005-2006; and one plans to open September 2006.

Federal Definition

Schools of Choice

Chartered public schools are schools of choice, and are nationally encouraged for meeting the choice provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act.

Students and teachers choose to attend a chartered public school–-no one is assigned. Thus, chartered public schools only thrive if they meet the needs and expectations of parents, teachers, and students.

Independent

Chartered public schools are independent public schools. They are designed to have increased autonomy and to be free of many state statutes and regulations which are required of other public schools. In exchange for the increased freedoms, the charter school must abide bye stringent guidelines of the charter.

Charter schools must abide by all the laws and guidelines named in the charter school law. These include health and safety regulations and basic civil rights guidelines that apply to public schools. They must use public accounting and public meeting guidelines. They are governed by a public Board of Trustees who basically have the same functions as any other public school board.

In New Hampshire, the charter public school, for all practical purposes, functions like a small public school district in all areas except for special education. Special education decision-making stays with the host school district, as does the special education funding. By law, the chartered public school and school districts can have mutually advantageous collaboration, e.g. food programs, sports, courses, contracts for services or tuition amounts. Whatever the school purports to do, it is supposed to be independent enough to focus on its specific goals and purpose as spelled out in its charter—not the state’s goals for other public schools.

Accountable
The charter school concept permits more freedom and independence in exchange for greater accountability for results. Charter schools must focus on results--outcomes. Each charter has specific goals and objectives. Unlike traditional public schools, if the chartered public school does not meet its goals or is poorly managed, the charter to operate can be revoked. The New Hampshire charter school system requires quarterly reports and annual financial audits. Many but not all charter schools are designed to serve at-risk populations—students who for whatever reason do not thrive in the public system or who underachieve.

Financially Efficient

In New Hampshire, the chartered public school must be very efficient as it has lower per pupil funding than the traditional public schools. The charter school receives no less than 80% of the per pupil cost of the sending district if authorized by a local school district and receives no less than the state's adequate education funding if authorized by the state (30-60% of per pupil funding) plus additional sums from a special fund to bring financial support closer to average student cost levels (assuming there is money in the fund).

Chartered public schools cannot require taxpayers to raise money for school construction, although these is an exception if the public school owns the building used. These schools must locate and use space based on lease, purchase, or gift.

Creative use of existing local or state facility space can save the public significant taxation for education. When 50 or 100 students are extracted from an overcrowded school, the need for a school district’s facility renovation/addition can be resolved.

As an independent school, the chartered public school is not bound by existing union contracts and can develop its own salary and benefit programs. For example, a chartered public school could have a choice benefit program allowing the same dollar amount of benefit to young and senior teachers. Many chartered schools accommodate their decreased per pupil cost through new and different ways of doing business. Financial sustainability is a challenge for chartered public schools and the best of these schools are entrepreneurial, creative, and resourceful.

Potential Benefits
Considerable gifts and federal grants, not available to traditional public schools, are available to independent chartered public schools. The vision of smaller, high-performing, independent public schools is appealing to many businesses, educators, and philanthropists.

A chartered public school is one way a community can grow without huge taxable debt. Chartered schools can relieve crowding, lessen building enrollments in the home public school, and can decrease either the need for a new school or the size of a new school or addition.

In these days of No Child Left Behind and requirements for underperforming schools to offer “choice” or costly supplemental services to students, the charter school is the federal government's top choice for meeting NCLB provisions.

Charter schools are considered one of the best ways to address drop-out recovery and drop-out prevention, a national high school initiative.

In a small state like New Hampshire, charter schools can help the state develop specialty high schools that are difficult for small cities and rural areas to develop, e.g. a state high school for science and mathematics.

Most important, the small charter school provides a choice for students, and usually these schools serve students who are not thriving in the larger system but who thrive in these unique systems, creating real future opportunity for young people—opportunity based on a successful public education.

Sound Basic Concepts

The basic concepts of chartered public schools are:
1. Smaller schools with a specific purpose or style will exist that give parents and students a choice about their public school.
2. The charter school discussion about outcomes and reporting seems to stimulate change for the better in the traditional public schools. This is called the ‘ripple effect’ and is seen in most states. Some people think this phenomenon is related to competition but other people think that the new dialogue about success and achievement is just contagious.
3. New Hampshire charter school law states it wants to encourage "public charter schools with specific or focused curriculum, instruction, methods, or target pupil groups."
4. Charter schools are intended to be free market schools of choice, with more autonomy and less regulation in exchange for more accountability toward outcomes.
New Hampshire charter school law states its goals:

• "to improve pupil learning and increase opportunities for learning"
• "to enhance professional opportunities for teachers"
• "to establish results-driven accountability ...and require the measurement of learning"
• to exempt charter schools from state statutes and rules, … to provide innovative learning and teaching in a unique environment”
• "to make school improvement a focus at the school level"
• “to have schools that meet the needs and interests of multiple communities, regions, and even the state”
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National Goal

Currently, our national education goals include expanding choice in public education and stimulating many more "quality" chartered public schools, decreasing the number of high school drop-outs, reforming our model of high school education, raising our levels of achievement, and assuring all students thrive in the public education system. Research suggests that more types of schools to assure “choice” and “fit” is the wave of the future. Smaller schools are thought to be the most effective schools because of the stronger sense of engagement and community.

Federal grants and programs to support charter school planning and start-up exceed $400 million. The average start-up award this year was $450,000 (for 36 months). New Hampshire was awarded a $7.2 million, 3-year grant to provide charter school planning and start-up here. An additional $500,000 was awarded because of so much interest in these unique schools from all corners of the state.