This week, a New York Times report on a Success Academy charter school keeping an apparently short-lived list of students who have “got to go” set off the latest firestorm around the high-performing network. Founder Eva Moskowitz has since pushed back, saying it was an isolated incident.
Success Academy is New York City’s largest charter school network and serves mostly black and Hispanic students, who perform much better on state tests than the citywide averages. The network’s critics have long argued that it achieves those results in part by weeding out weak or difficult students, and the list appeared to lend some validity to those accusations.
Ms. Moskowitz, who spoke on Friday at a news conference, said that the list existed for only three days before [Success Academy Fort Greene Principal Candido] Brown was admonished and that he changed course. Nonetheless, nine of the students on the list eventually left the school.
Success has long been the subject of smears from charter school critics. But its discipline practices have also drawn critiques within the school choice movement, and from some parents.
That raises broader questions that touch other issues, like admissions policies, which found their way into this week’s headlines. Under what circumstances should schools have more authority to weed out disruptive students when they enroll by choice? What does this mean for the system as a whole?
Meanwhile…
Test scores fall on the latest Nation’s Report Card, bringing lamentations from reformers but cause for celebration in urban districts like Chicago, Miami-Dade and Washington, DC. State comparisons can be insightful, but steer clear of misNAEPery or over-reactions.
A study funds “overwhelming negative impact” from virtual charters schools, all the more so in Florida. State policies matter. The most in-depth media report on the study is here.
Most of the applicants for Nevada’s new ESA program come from wealthy neighborhoods, but let’s not jump to conclusions. Parents of current private-school students feel left out.
That time school choice shook the earth in California. Part 2 comes Tuesday.
Many school choice supporters are cool to the Title I portability proposals now moving through Congress.
Quote of the week
Charters mimicked a lot of what we were able to do in our small schools at Harper [High School]. It was the idea of being able to have autonomy over a lot of things that we felt like were going to be important to our success.
— Noble charter school network founder Tonya Milkie, on the early days of the movement in Chicago.
Tweet of the week
Black voters overwhelmingly support high-quality educational options. See full results: https://t.co/BQWLh8hw7d#BAEOSurvey#k12#edreform
— BAEO (@ntlBAEO) October 29, 2015
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