Charter Schools Ruled Unconstitutional in Washington State

Bombshell indeed, this will make for quote a chaotic first week of school!

This is my main disagreement with the charter concept. They are publically funded but not publically controlled or accountable. They are effectively a direct transfer payment from tax payers to private corporations.

And now we come across two questions:

1) Can similar law suits in other states be far behind?

2) Where will Ancalagon's little one go?

Without a doubt there will be similar lawsuits to come and I look forward to seeing the for profit school industry held more accountable than they are. Florida is especially bad with them.

I'm all for parental choice, but we need to make sure that the schools we're sending our children to are held up to the same standards as public school.

On a similar note Id love to see some lawsuits against these "for profit" colleges that charge thousands for a degree that is worthless.

Regarding college, there needs to be reforms for sure, but it's difficult for me to cry crocodile tears for all the Women's Studies, Philosophy and Basket Weaving majors that didn't do their own homework on what careers were available to them. That isn't the fault of the college.

T.R is talking about diploma mills -- unaccredited, expensive, and promising gold behind the rainbow of their "degree" programs.

I'm not talking about basket weaving.( that's actually a course?) I'm referring to actual degrees that normal colleges offer that aren't accepted by actual employers.

Even public universities are turning into money grubbing entertainment centers for our ill-begotten offspring to idle 4+ years away to the tune of 10k's worth of dollars. The policies of the last 30 years have totally screwed higher learning for most of the US.

This. They advertise on the radio and T.V all the time. Ive yet to meet a single person who was able to get a job with a degree from one of those places.

The sad thing is that state schools aren't really any better, as you still get charged thousands of dollars per semester, and thousands more if you live in the dorms (something many of them force all freshmen to do), and only few and far between seem to get jobs right out of school. Hell, one of my friends went to school to be an air traffic controller, but he's applied twice for Oklahoma City and been turned down. Instead he ended up self-studying and getting a license to be some kind of a dispatcher and a few months later landed a job that pays more than a newly minted engineer would start out with.

An important fact to keep in mind:
Under Washington law, a charter applicant must be a nonprofit corporation. The nonprofit corporation must be either a public benefit corporation as defined in RCW 24.03.490 or a nonprofit corporation as defined in RCW 24.03.005 that has applied for tax exempt status under Sec. 501(c)(3) of the U.S. Internal Revenue Service Code.

Secondly the idea that schools need to be held accountable to local voters doesn't fly with me. That's how you get kids with no sex ed and text books that teach creationism. I'd rather either local or state officials should appoint school boards. We have too many elected positions in general. And it's like that just b/c it is on a ballot that means voters will educate themselves. Instead you end up with fringe groups (say creationists, or this math curriculum, or that particular issue) being the prime movers. How about we concentrate on electing legislators that good at breaking down complex issues (or more accurately have staff that can, and they decide)?

In the past when the Supreme Court has struck down a popular initiative the Governor has called a special session and the law reworked to be constitutional. There is a possibility of this occurring.

Here's a good thread on for profit universities:
http://wordforge.net/index.php?threads/no-love-for-for-profit-universities.100238/

This seems like a good ruling.

Charters are accountable to no one. And the experience in states that have them suggest that they "succeed" by weeding out any hard to educate kids, then profit by focusing on those kids sho would thrive in any school. It's not a question of local vs. state control, but a question of no control.

Most charter schools don't actually improve anything plus they end up costing more. Their main benefit seems to be political as politicians can pretend they are doing something and it enables Republicans to bust unions. When score do improve better than average it is usually because charter schools can kick put low performing, special needs, or problem kids. Those troubled kids then end up in nearby public schools where they drag down numbers.

It is not really improving anything other than tossing out the hard cases and dumping them on someone else. Oh, and the side political benefit of union busting for Republicans.

What prevents charter school employees from unionizing?

Again, you appear to have not read about Washington's system.

10. What is the State Board of Education’s role for public charter schools?

Chapter 28A.710 RCW assigns duties to the SBE for implementation and oversight of the charter school law, including:

• Approval of local school boards to be authorizers of charter schools.
• Overseeing the performance of school districts it has approved to be authorizers, with the power to revoke chartering authority if the district fails to remedy identified problems in the operation of the schools it has authorized.
• Setting an annual timeline for submission of charter applications to all authorizers and approval or denial by the authorizers.
• Establishing an authorizer oversight fee, deducted from the state allocation to the charter school and transmitted to the authorizer for the costs of carrying out its duties.
• Certifying approved charters as within the limits on the number of charter schools that may be established.
• Issuing an annual report, in collaboration with the Washington Charter School Commission, on the state’s charter schools for the preceding school year.
• Recommending, after five years, whether the Legislature should authorize the establishment of additional charter schools.

Once again, this is not the case with Washington's law:

7. Who can enroll in a charter school?

RCW 28A.710.020 provides that a charter school is a public, common school open to all children free of charge. A charter school may not limit admission on any basis other than age group, grade level, or capacity and must enroll all students who apply within these bases. An authorizer may not restrict admission to a charter school to students residing within the boundaries of the district in which the school is located. (RCW 28A.710.050.)

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8. Is a charter school required to serve children with disabilities, English language learners, and other student with special needs?

Yes. RCW 28A.710.020 provides that a Washington charter school functions as a local education agency (LEA, i.e., a school district) under applicable federal laws and regulations and is responsible for meeting the requirements of local education agencies and public schools under those federal laws and regulations, including the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement (IDEA) act, the federal Educational Rights and Privacy Act, and the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA, also known as the No Child Left Behind Act). As noted above, a charter school may not discriminate in its admissions policies and practices against students with special needs. In addition, RCW 28A.710.130 provides that a charter school application must describe thoroughly the school’s plans for identifying, successfully serving, and complying with applicable laws and regulations regarding students with disabilities, students who are limited English proficient, students who are struggling academically, and highly capable students.

http://www.sbe.wa.gov/faq/charters.php

In Washington if they don't improve student performance they are shut down.

24. Is a charter school subject to the same accountability requirements as other public schools?

RCW 28A.710.040 provides that charter schools must participate in the statewide assessment system developed by the Superintendent of Public Instruction under the state law on academic achievement and accountability. Charter schools are additionally subject to their own, distinct accountability requirements that do not apply to non-charter public schools. A charter contract may not be renewed, when its five-year term is up, if the charter school’s performance falls in the bottom quartile of all public schools in the Achievement Index developed by the State Board of Education, except if the school demonstrates exceptional circumstances that the authorizer accepts as justifying renewal. A charter school is further subject to individual accountability requirements set in its charter contract, which must include a performance framework setting out the academic and operational indicators, measures and metrics that will guide the authorizer’s evaluation of the school over the term of the contract. The performance framework must include, at a minimum, student academic proficiency, student academic growth, achievement gaps in both proficiency and growth between major student subgroup, attendance, recurrent enrollment from year to year, and, for high schools, graduation rates and postsecondary readiness.

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25. Can a charter school be closed for unsatisfactory performance?

Yes. A charter contract may be revoked at any time or not renewed at the end of the contract term if the authorizer determines that the charter school:

1. Committed a substantial and material violation of the charter contract or any of the requirements of the charter school law.
2. Failed to make sufficient progress toward the performance expectations in the charter contract.
3. Failed to meet generally accepted standards of fiscal management, or
4. Substantially violated any material provision of law from which the charter school is not exempt.

Authorizers must follow processes and procedures set out in law (RCW 28A.710.200) in order to revoke or decline to renew a charter contract.

All true in just about every state where it has been tried. @Ancalagon seems to think there's something magic about the virtuous Washington charter law, but it has similar language to the code in other states. He doesn't realize that none of that actually prevents what happens in practice.

Link? I'd like to see state's with similar language (please cite their code as I have done) that have the problems you describe.

One of the benefits of being the 42nd state to enact charters is that we had 25 years of other state's experience to go off of.

How many other states don't allow for religious or for-profit charter corporations OR operating contractors?

The rules in a lot of states say charter schools specifically have all union contracts nulled. The teachers also become at will employees so any of them who attempt a unionization drive can simply be fired. Those that remain tend to not want to risk their jobs by working to help organization drives.

Even worse is when charter schools get handed over to for profit companies to run.

That low?

You check under your bed at night for republicans don't you?

We definitely need more unions to protect the jobs of shitty tenured teachers.

I usually check my closets.

I can't say for certain, without digging deep in the code, but I doubt very much that Massachusetts allows religious operators. We don't even allow Catholic Charities to run adoption services. I am less certain about for profit corporations, but that's a huge gray area anyway. Many non-profits are corrupt and interested in enriching principle officers. And many "non-profits" hire for profit services (look at who runs testing services across the country). So no, I haven't dug far enough in to the code, but I do know that such a rule doesn't do what you would want it to do. Here is our Charter School law:

http://www.doe.mass.edu/lawsregs/603cmr1.html?section=all

You won't have to read very far to see many of the same rules you've cited as uniquely protecting Washington from fraud. They don't. I've seen it in action and can tell you that it doesn't matter if the law requires non-discrimination so long as Charters can set their own standards for discipline and academic promotion. Charter Schools admit plenty of disadvantaged minorities. But if you review their list of graduates, those kids have disappeared.

Some good research on this and other negative consequences of the charter movement:

https://danley.camden.rutgers.edu/2014/08/11/guest-post-where-will-all-the-boys-go/

http://specialednyc.org/comparing-s...hools-with-nearby-traditional-public-schools/

And what of those who do graduate? Turns out even when they game the system, Charters have inferior long term results:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2...etion-rates/NXYEKQuTO16dFzrBtuZNnI/story.html

And if you still aren't convinced, follow the money. Charter school management companies (even the non-profits) are controlled by the same people who sell curricula and testing services. Do you not see a conflict of interest? Because it's pretty massive. Private testing services generate results adverse to public schools, these same companies use the results to push for privatized education, run by the testing companies and paying big money for services and material designed by again, those same companies. It's a complete scam. And then, to further justify the scam, they weed out special ed and ESL and other difficult students, feeding them back in to the regular public schools.

I am the first to say the Daytons of the world need to get shit canned, that said, Republicans certainly have the habit of scapegoating teachers even though they are the ones under funding schools.

Plenty of blame to go around.

But I'm pretty anti union. They do a lot more to protect scumbags or rob the company than they do to help people with legit grievances.

Yes, when they were created they were needed, not so much now.

Some stats from Boston that a group of parent activists compiled. It all comes from the data published by the district and charters, as required by the state.

ELL as % of student population:
Boston Public -- 31%
Boston Charters -- 10%

SPED as % of student population:
Boston Public -- 21%
Boston Charters -- 13%

Does it look like charters are taking the same pool of students? What happens once they are there? This is an average for Charters in Boston offering through 12th grade (most common is 5-12). The percentage of 5th grade enrolled charter students who complete 12th grade is 41%. For Boston Public Schools, that number is 79%. But let's keep diverting money away from improving existing schools, and spend it instead on corrupt private corporations who educate fewer and less challenging students yet achieve worse results.

Do you mean that charter school teachers aren't allowed to unionize, or just that contracts from the public school districts don't automatically carry over?

Usually when they become charter schools all contracts are void and technically they could reunionize but practically, as they are now at will employers, they can and do fire teachers who push to help organize to unionize. Yes, that is illegal but they just have to come up with some vague excuse and now the burden is on the fired teacher to prove them wrong. That almost never happens.

http://www.salon.com/2014/01/13/teach_for_americas_pro_corporate_union_busting_agenda_partner/