Happy New Year, CharterFolk.
I hope your holidays were great ones.
One of my resolutions this year is to be more steady in my CharterFolk output, even as my regular work responsibilities grow. I will still aim for a brief post mid-week and a full column on the weekends. But both may end up being shorter this year than I have done previously. For mid-week posts, you may see me provide more updates about under-appreciated news items of importance to charter schools.
That is the focus of today’s post. I had originally thought I would make it a “national” whip around. Then a CharterFolk reader forwarded me an article about interesting developments in Canada, which made the update “continental.” Soon after that, I saw news from the UK that I thought should be included. So, the whip around became “global” in the end.
Such is our work – deeply rooted in local communities, but rippling out in ways resonating with efforts happening around the world.
CharterFolk Resilience in North Carolina
We start with a story I’m remiss for not having covered previously – the resilience that CharterFolk in western North Carolina are showing to overcome the heartbreak of the massive storm that happened there this fall.
The story of this charter school student’s survival puts in repose the stakes that so many have faced.
It’s a situation that reminds me of the extraordinary efforts that CharterFolk undertook during and after the fires in Paradise.
Folk pulling together at a moment of great need.
Now we see it happening again Tar Heel-style.
Both the North Carolina Association of Public Charter Schools and the North Carolina Coalition for Charter Schools are taking steps to help charter school communities recover. While nearly all schools have faced challenges, six are thought to be in particularly high need. I paste below direct links to donation pages as well as summary information about each school provided by the Coalition.
- FernLeaf Community School: This was the charter school with the most damage. The K-4 classes were located by Cane Creek. The school is known by their hands on, outdoor education. The storm totally destroyed four school buildings. They are not sure if they can rebuild on the land by the river. The school is located in Fletcher, NC. They began the school in 2016. This is a K-12 school with an enrollment of around 675 students. School’s website.
- Franklin School of Innovation: This charter school has their annual fundraiser during the fall. Of course, this year it was cancelled. The school can no longer expect gifts from families and companies in the area, just too much devastation. They are very concerned about their operating budget because this fundraiser can bring in as much as $70,000. This year doesn’t look promising. Franklin School of Innovation is a K-12 school with an enrollment of around 700 students. They started in 2014. School’s website.
- Francine Delany New School for Children: This small charter school is in the heart of Asheville, NC. They had families affected and are reaching out to those families. Francine Delany New School for Children is a K-8 school with an enrollment of around 200 students. The school is one of the oldest charter schools in the state. They started in 1997, one year after the charter law was passed in the state. School’s website.
- Evergreen Community: This charter school is also in Asheville, NC. Evergreen is a K-8 charter school that started in 1999. They have an enrollment of around 430 students. School’s website.
- Brevard Academy: This charter school is in the small mountain town, Pisgah Forest. Their parking lot and sidewalks require repairs to ensure student and staff safety, and the roof needs work to prevent further damage. The hurricane disrupted their ability to fundraise for their Arts/STEM building. They were hopeful to complete this important facility this year. However, due to redirected resources and ongoing recovery efforts, reaching their fundraising goal for this building in the near term has become increasingly challenging. It is a K-8 school with around 425 students. They began in 1998. School’s website.
- ArtSpace Charter School: This charter school was located in one of the hardest hit areas, Swannanoa, NC. A miracle their buildings were not destroyed, but they have needs helping families that lost everything. They are a K-8 school, with an enrollment of around 450 students. The school began in 2001. School’s website.
CharterFolk is making $200 contributions to all six schools. If any of our readers might be able to contribute as well, all of us here at CharterFolk would very much appreciate it.
Association Prevails Again in Michigan
This is one that I updated readers about frequently late in 2024 – the lame duck session that Michigan Dems called in order to ram through changes before they lose control of the legislature. Among their top priorities was inflicting massive damage on charter schools under the guise of “greater transparency.”
Fortunately, the duck proved lame in more ways than one.
Congrats to the Michigan association (whose CEO Dan Quisenberry is a CharterFolk Board Member) for once again holding off an onslaught against charter schools …
… and for showing us once again the origins of charter school power:
Association.
How Students End Up With No Seat in Chicago
Meanwhile, we can’t afford to take our eye off this one, CharterFolk.
Chicago is the latest national example of the tragedy that ensues when status quo interests secure control of public education. They enact policies that are the polar opposite of what students and families need. In so doing, they lay bare the reality of the dysfunction that bedevils so much of public education in its current iteration.
As difficult as it is to believe, this is the status quo that many policy makers in our country go out of their way to defend. A status quo that fires a superintendent for refusing to enter into a loan that would cripple the district’s future budgets. A mayor who is a former teacher union employee having to off board members and appoint new ones just to get the firing done. And now those new board members directly entering into negotiations with the union.
It shows how, in school districts across the country, teacher unions end up, literally, on both sides of the table, while students end up with no seat at all.
Part of our task in the years ahead is to make policy makers think more deeply about the brokenness they are casting their lots with. It starts with more deeply understanding what gives rise to the sad dysfunction occurring in so many large urban school districts. Chicago Public Schools is as instructive as any school district in the country right now. So don’t be surprised to see us returning to the Windy City again and again in 2025.
School Choice Sans Accountability
Speaking of instructive situations, I wanted to highlight this one:
It’s not the first time this has happened – a charter school about to be held accountable for low academic performance converting itself into a private school able to collect publicly funded vouchers.
In many parts of the country, public education is in a process of rapid evolution right now. What its new DNA will ultimately end up looking like is still very much in question.
Situations like this make plain what we should want embedded in that new DNA: genes guaranteeing both parental accountability (the ability of families to vote with their feet) and public accountability (closure for low academic performance and/or fiscal mismanagement).
Charter schools, of course, are the only species of public education that already features both such genes.
In the short term, the fact that charter schools are the only truly accountable entities on the public education landscape poses something of a threat.
Longer term, though, our accountability will be seen to be one of our greatest strengths.
It will keep us genetically inclined toward continuous improvement while much of the rest of public education will continue to trend toward ever greater dysfunction.
Canada Moves to Make a Longer Term Bet on Charter Schools
Rippling out across the continent, we see CharterFolk north of the border preparing to make a bigger, longer term bet on charter schools based upon the clear success that charter schools have had to date.
It’s an interesting article about a rare group of proactive policy makers attempting to be thoughtful. How do they eliminate barriers preventing charter schools from playing an even bigger part in public education without making changes that would lead charter schools to recreate the brokenness found in many traditional public schools? It’s exactly the kind of conversation we’re going to see more of in our country as charter schools are asked to take on ever more responsibility for public education in the years ahead.
Attempting to Advance What Doesn’t Work in the UK
I end with a ripple going out across the Atlantic.
Last month we saw England’s public schools again show strikingly positive results.
Over the past two decades, England’s public schools have made great progress relative to schools in other countries. One of their primary reform strategies, as we have written about here often, is a thriving charter school sector. (They’re called “Free Schools” there. )
Unfortunately, the rest of the UK hasn’t allowed charter schools to exist. Their results reflect it.
Now, for the first time in a generation, the Labour Party is taking control of the national government, and the nonsensicalness of their ideas for public education are stunning to behold – not bringing to other parts of the UK what has worked in England, but bringing to England what hasn’t worked everywhere else!
Last month, I wrote about the challenges facing the left coming out of November’s elections. One of the biggest is that they’re becoming understood to be defenders of things that simply don’t work.
It’s not just happening in our country, CharterFolk.
It’s happening around the world.