The debate of charter schools has been an ongoing discussion in education for years with proponents on both sides of the issue.
Are charter schools an alternative for failing public schools? Do charter schools offer better opportunities? Do charter schools take funding away from public schools?
Charter schools, according to the Missouri Department of Elementary & Secondary Education, are independent public schools that are “free from some rules and regulations that apply to traditional public school districts.” They must have a sponsor, are non-sectarian and may not charge tuition or fees. Like public schools, they receive funding by reporting their average daily attendance to the department.
Currently, charter schools can only be operated in St. Louis, Kansas City or an unaccredited school district. At the start of this school year there were 36 schools operating in Kansas City and St. Louis.
With House Bill 581, which changes provisions relating to charter schools, in the Missouri House of Representatives for a potential vote, a school administrator and two local legislators weigh in with their take on the proposed law.
Poplar Bluff R-1 Superintendent Dr. Scott Dill said while he is not opposed to charter schools and believes they have a unique position within the state educational community, he does not agree with the way HB581 is written.
“I am very much opposed to using tax dollars as a subsidy for the privatization of education,” Dill said. “I do believe charters are inevitable and as such, I want to work with the legislators to ensure when they are established, they are established equitably and the playing field is level.”
HB581 restricts a political subdivision from targeting a charter school with an ordinance or policy that limits the acquisition or use of property by a charter school or for educational purposes (Section 67.139, RSMo).
This bill expands where a charter school may be established to include any county with a charter form of government, any city with a population greater than 30,000, or any school district accredited without provisions.
“We have studied this bill in depth,” Dill said. “This puts every school district, every community in Missouri susceptible to having a charter open in their jurisdiction.”
Dill added that if a concerned group of citizens approach a local board of education and requested for a charter, the board has the authority to create one. “If the local board denies their charter,” Dill said, “under this bill, they would then appeal to a commission appointed by the governor made up of people, according to the language of the bill, who are ‘pro charter school’ to sponsor their charter.”
Dill went on to say charter schools would ultimately take away from any public school, not just Poplar Bluff R-1, the vital tools necessary to do the work for which they were established.
A main concern HB581 raises for Dill is that charter schools are not run by a locally-elected board officials and are not held to the same accountability and performance standards as public schools.
“Yet, they will be utilizing public tax dollars to fund their educational efforts,” he said.
Representative Jeff Shawan does not believe that charter schools elsewhere in Missouri will impact funding for area schools.
“This bill, if passed, is one small step to deal with institutional school failures in Missouri and is an opportunity for the education establishment to respond with plans to effectively reduce school failure,” he said.
Shawan, who represents all of Carter and Ripley counties, and parts of Butler and Wayne counties, said he is taking several points into consideration when looking at HB581.
“First, this bill in no way affects school districts in our region or anywhere in rural Missouri,” he said. “Charters can only be considered in communities with a population greater than 30,000. Exceptions to this rule can only be sought with local school board support; therefore, local control is protected.”
While Shawan added he believes citizens need and should expect better outcomes in rural Missouri, on balance, the area educates children “relatively well.”
“Second, this bill puts significant ‘teeth’ into performance standards for charter schools,” he said.
If the charter schools do not meet established criteria, they loose charter status, he added.
“Third, I have an obligation to consider the education prospects for students in the urban areas of our state where the existing system has failed, often times for decades,” Shawan said. “I have heard the cry from urban parents who struggle, wishing for education opportunities for their children.”
Shawan went on to say he welcomes opportunities to improve HB581 or develop other bills that protect the longterm health of the public school system, which is so vital to the future of our children.
“No one on either side of this bill should consider me unwilling to discuss improvements or alterations to existing charter legislation,” he said.
After hearing hours of testimony and reviewing evidence over the past several years, Senator Doug Libla has come to a conclusion regarding charter schools.
“Charter schools have a very dismal record of success in urban school districts and I see no value in the expansion of this failed ‘pilot program,’” he said.
If charter schools were to come to a district, Libla said he believes they “would/could take a large percentage of tax collected per pupil.”
Multiple funding issues raise concerns for Dill.
R-1’s average expenditure per students is around $10,000, and according to Dill, the reason it’s a little higher than other area schools is due to two factors.
Dill said R-1 invests a lot in the education of its students and the district just came through a major series of construction projects.
“Our voters in Poplar Bluff voted a levy for us to conduct those projects. We have debt service and capital project levies to pay the debt on those,” he said. “Under the auspicious of this bill, tax money approved exclusively for the use of Poplar Bluff R-1 students and public tax payer money could be sent to a school that has nothing to do with our community.”
In the worst-case scenario, if this bill were to pass, Dill said the district could conceivably be forced to raise taxes in order to meet the debt obligation that was approved by the voters in the first place to service the needs of a school that has nothing to do with Poplar Bluff.
HB581 is sponsored by Rebecca Roeber, a Republican representing part of Jackson County, including much of Lee’s Summit and Greenwood.
Three areas in particular Dill would like to focus on in the bill would be keeping control with the local boards of education, annual evaluations of charter schools rather than every three years and place student admission and discipline polices which are consistent with statutes of Missouri public schools.
Several attempts to reach Rep. Hardy Billington, who represents parts of Butler and Dunklin counties, for comment on the issue were not returned by press time.
“I really have great respect for both freshman legislators, they have been very responsive to calls and inquiries and I know they are faced with a difficult choice,” Dill said.
In an in-depth study on the effectiveness of charter schools, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) conducted seven public hearings around the country from December 2016 through April 2017 in New Haven, Memphis, Orlando, Los Angeles, Detroit, New Orleans and New York.
There were pros and cons on charters versus traditional schools found at each hearing. The findings that emerged across the seven sites included lack of educational investment and quality education in central cities, perceived benefits of charter schools, accountability concerns and perceived problems with charter.
The perceived problems found were with issues of access and retention, concerns about quality, issues of accountability and transparency, transportation challenges and concerns about for-profit charters.
As part of the hearings, charter school operators, advocates, students and parents were also invited to testify.
The theme that charter schools are performing an important mission was common across all the hearing sites. According to a number of charter school advocates, students who graduate from their schools are very likely to attend college.
According to the NAACP, some studies have found that students who attend charter high schools are more likely to attend college. Other research suggests that charter schools may attract more motivated students who are more likely to attend college, regardless of the type of high school they attend.
After having heard all of the testimony from the hearings, the NAACP reported that while there are certainly some charter schools serving students well, there are also a wide range of problems with the operation of charters across the country that require attention.
“Public schools need to examine themselves and commit in making sure we are teaching what students need to know in the 21st century,” said Libla, who represents Butler, Carter, Dunklin, Mississippi, New Madrid, Pemiscot, Shannon and Stoddard counties.
Dill said public schools are engaged in a continuous cycle of self improvement.
“We may not be perfect, we may not get it right every single day, but establishing a separate system of education will not help us be better at the reason we were established,” he said. “It will limit our ability to be effective.”