Saturday, June 27, 2009

Keller on Charter Schools in WSJ

The Boston charter school debate garners another look by the Wall Street Journal today, courtesy of an op-Ed by WBZ's Jon Keller. He breaks down the lay of the land after Menino's speech a couple of weeks back, and semi-confirms the Boston Collegiate rumor (without naming schools).

Saturday, June 20, 2009

HGSE on MA Charter School Cap

Professor Tom Kane posts here on Mayor Menino's charter school proposal, and Katherine Merseth (HGSE) and Marc Kenan (Mass Charter School Association), respond. As a poster at Universal Hub commented, it looks like there is some support from the HGSE folks for Sam Yoon's proposal, while MCSA is worried about limiting charter school entepreneurs.

Patrick on "Smart Caps"

Looks like Governor Patrick is going to be filing legislation on a "smart cap lifting" for charter school, or so says Secretary Reville in last month's DOE "Board in Brief." Also in there, mention of his Readiness Schools, although the names, Advantage, Alliance and Acceleration, do say much about what they're going to be...I'll do some digging to see if I can find out.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Rotherham and Whitmire on Duncan Charter Proposal

Eduwonk Andrew Rotherham and Richard Whitmire have a piece in US News that praises Arne Duncan's call to expand good charter schools and close the lousy ones. MATCH and Roxbury Prep are held up as examples of schools at the top of the charter school ranks and the Massachusetts logjam is also mentioned in passing.

Monday, June 15, 2009

Massachusetts Gets a C

The pro-charter schools Center for Education Reform has ranked all the state charter laws. Massachusetts gets a C.

Maybe that will change with all the proposals floating around...

Friday, June 12, 2009

Lehigh on Charters, Menino, BTU

Scot Lehigh comments on the "paradigm shift" in his Globe column today. He makes a couple of noteworthy points.

He mentions that the Patrick administration is retooling their charter school proposal. The new plan, while not solidified, would only lift the cap for underperforming districts. However, it would no longer require front end demographic jiggering that runs counter to the open lottery enrollment structure that is currently in place.

He also focuses on the Boston Teachers Union's role in Mayor Menino's shift on charter schools. He writes:

"TALK ABOUT barriers lifting and paradigms shifting.

Suddenly, support for charter schools, once the lonely province of public-policy entrepreneurs and intrepid, union-defying pols, has become positively mainstream.

For that, you can credit a pro-charter Democratic president, recent Boston Foundation-sponsored research demonstrating their educational efficacy, persistent pressure from both Boston dailies, a developing mayoral race in the Hub - and, oh yes, the myopic resistance to change displayed by the leadership of the Boston Teachers Union."


Later, he goes on to say:

"Further, the macro message is clear: After years of trying to nudge the existing system along, only to be thwarted by the BTU, the mayor has concluded he can't get the changes he needs by working solely within that system.

Menino acknowledges as much, noting the BTU has filed grievances over pilot schools - designed to be the city's in-district alternative to charter schools - and over a plan for performance pay for advanced-placement teachers.

"I have been out there working with them, and now we are in arbitration on two simple matters," says Menino. "When is it going to be about the kids?"

Finally, Lehigh points out that none of this will matter if the state legislature doesn't jump on the lift the cap bandwagon. Hopefully the momentum that's built up over the past week will start to have an impact.

Thursday, June 11, 2009

Bulletin Weighs In

The local free newspaper chain, the Bulletin, has weighed in on the mayor's new education proposal. The editorial can be found here. There's also an article on the charter school proposals of mayoral candidates Flaherty and Yoon here.

A Witness to Tragedy

In a piece of sad news, MATCH students (and students from other Massachusetts schools) witnessed the murder at the National Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. yesterday, the Herald reports.

Boston Phoenix Comments Too

The Phoenix also has an editorial on the mayoral campaign debate that's been raging this week over charter schools and BPS. The big takeaway from the perspective of the Phoenix?

"The three-way emphasis on charter schools demonstrates two things.

First, it shows how competition can spur political change. It took pressure from Flaherty and Yoon for Menino to become more welcoming to the idea of more
charter schools.


Second, the fact that three of the mayoral candidates embrace the charter concept is an unspoken criticism of the politically powerful teachers union. Even more than the punishing fiscal realities of today, the union is the biggest single obstacle to making Boston Public Schools better."

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Boston Globe: Raise the Cap!

The Globe editorialized today that the state should lift the cap on charter schools to get kids off the waiting lists and to get access to the federal "Race to the Top" funding.

While the Globe doesn't take a specific position on how the cap should be lifted, they do call Mayor Menino and Governor Patrick to task for their timid support for this issue. They seem more supportive of Michael Flaherty and Sam Yoon's proposals.

Seems like there is some momentum building on this issue. Hopefully, Beacon Hill will get the picture and get moving.

Mayoral Candidate Kevin McCrea

In the comments section of one of the Globe articles on Menino's charter school position, Kevin McCrea (or someone posting has him) posted a response:

"All three of my opponents have now jumped on the Charter School movement.
Charter schools are doing some fantastic work around the country and in this
City. A kid who was on my baseball team who lives on Geneva Ave. in Dorchester
just got accepted to a Charter School and his family tells me that they know
that is the only way he will get a good education.

But that is the problem, even when we lift the cap on charters we are tacitly admitting that there are other schools which are failing. Why is that none of the candidates say that they will not tolerate bad schools anywhere in the City? Why have all three of these candidates tolerated these bad schools for all the 40 years or so combined that they have been in office?

The two elephants in the room are busing and failing schools. Raising the cap on charters only slightly addresses getting more kids out of the regular schools and into better charter schools. In addition, there is no guarantee that the kids who need it most will get into those charter schools, instead it could be that many of these favored seats will go to favored people.

President Obama has been impressive in his desire to tackle the big problems. I think we here in Boston can tackle big problems, which is why I want to put good schools in every neighborhood, and then eliminate the busing system which currently wastes about 10% of our resources that could otherwise go towards better
schools, supplies and teacher salaries."

Update: You can find the same post at McCrea's blog, so it seems like it is him.

From Failure to Success

Here's an inspiring article from the Globe about a senior at Prospect Hill Academy who turned her life around and is going to Boston College next year.

Menino Speaks!

Here's a YouTube clip of yesterday's Menino speech on charter schools and performance pay from his website.

OK, I Think I Got It

So now that I've had some time to digest the Menino move more carefully, this is how I understand it:

Menino was frustrated that many BPS schools were seriously underperforming, so a couple of years ago he brokered a deal to increase the number of pilot schools. The BTU balked and stonewalled and new pilots didn't emerge quickly enough as a result. Menino is trying to go around them. (Why now? Seems like politics.)

Menino's new plan would allow him and Carol Johnson to take over BPS schools, turn them into "in-district" charter schools and try to turn them around in that format. The benefit would be that the school would not be governed by union rules so that the Boston School Committee could have more flexibility around using longer days and years. Then, the teachers could choose to reunionize or not at some later date.

Menino does not seem interested in opening new charter schools, just reconsituting old schools as charter schools. However, instead of having other entities (read: CMO's) run these new schools (a la Green Dot's takeover of Locke High School in LA), Menino would like the BSC to run them. This seems like a direct slap at the BTU, implying that the union is the primary problem. Bold statement to attack the union during an election campaign...

Am I missing anything?

More on Menino and Charters

From CommonWealth Online:

Will Menino campaign against the teachers' union?

For many, the phrase "charter school" conjures up images of parental choice and innovation, of passionate young educators taking the place of frowsy, lazy clock-watchers in sensible shoes. So it makes sense to attach the word "charter" to any new educational beast -- and that's exactly what Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, who is running for a fifth term, did today before a meeting of the Boston College CEO Club.

Menino announced he will file legislation to create something known as an "in-district charter school" -- and, if this effort fails, he'll support lifting the current statewide cap on charter schools. Charter schools are privately run, and they are exempt from many of the work rules found in traditional public schools. (The new MassINC research report Incomplete Grade: Massachusetts Education Reform at 15 cites "consistently positive effects for the city's charter schools" and recommends a lifting of the state cap on such schools.)

Loud applause accompanied Menino's promise to support lifting the charter cap, which marks a reversal for the mayor. But puzzled glances followed Menino's mention of in-district charters. "What is that?" one reporter asked another as the mayor made his way off the podium and was joined by Boston Public School Superintendent Carol Johnson.

When speaking to the press afterward, Johnson and Menino acknowledged that creating in-district charters isn't exactly about creating new schools. The idea, instead, is to re-organize low-performing traditional schools under the charter school mantle, and thereby take them out of the hands of the Boston Teachers Union's seniority and length-of-schoolday rules. "We need more flexibility," said Johnson. "We need to put our best teachers and leaders in the places where our students are not doing as well as they need to." She added that the term "in-district charter" doesn't exist elsewhere in the country, at least to her knowledge.
"In-district charters," then, sounds like code for a school department takeover of the lowest-performing schools. After all, the mayor essentially will be asking the Legislature's permission to ignore the contract rules he negotiated with the teachers' union -- not in all schools, but in some of them.

He's also following the money. Menino said today's call for in-district charters and for "performance pay" are both designed to help Boston compete for $5 billion in federal education grants, to be awarded beginning in early fall.

"President Obama and Secretary [of Education Arne] Duncan have told me they want to invest in reforms that turn around low-performing schools," said Menino. "We have been pursuing these reforms and will seek these federal resources." With $5 billion in grants (and a fifth term in City Hall) up for grabs, expect to hear more about charters and performance pay, whether in-district or out.

Tuesday, June 9, 2009

The Equity Project

The New York Times recently profiled the new hires of The Equity Project, the Washington Heights (NYC) charter school that's opening next year with teachers making $125K plus bonuses.

Most of the discussions of this school in the press and on the web has been about the salary and "all-star" quality of the teachers. I certainly don't begrudge the teachers for making the salaries they do; I think all of us wish we could make money like that as teachers. Here are the questions that I'll be interested is seeing answered as the school gets off the ground next year.

  • Will these teachers, some of whom aren't currently teaching in urban schools, be ready for the different challenges that they will face in this school? I think even the best teachers may not be ready to face the challenge of entire classes of kids way behind grade level if they haven't done it before. I hope, for their sake and the sake of the kids, that they're up for it.
  • Will a staffing model that requires teachers to take on additional adminstrative burdens during or after their teaching day be successful? Can amazing teachers continue to be amazing when not fully focused on their classes? Will they be able to do everything that's being asked of them? Just paying them more doesn't give these teachers more hours in their already busy days. How many balls will be dropped as teachers try to balance their teaching and administrative duties (and personal lives)? I like that the administrators in my school make sure that we don't have too many extra burdens that take away from our teaching and work with kids.

I hope this school is successful ; I'd love to visit in a few years to see some amazing teaching.

Newsweek Rankings

The Newsweek ranking of top high schools is out, for what it's worth.

The top three Massachusetts schools (and the only 3 in the top 100) are all charter schools:
  • #23 Sturgis Charter High School
  • #84 MATCH Charter School
  • #93 Mystic Valley Regional Charter School

Response to Menino Charter School Shift

The intial internet reponse to Mayor Menino's shift on charter schools is pretty harsh, but not from the usual sources. Typically, calls for more charter schools get out a fair mix of charter supporters and naysayers. This time, though, the response has been mainly anti-mayor, with only a little serious discussion of the merits of his proposal.

Here are the major lines of attack I'm seeing after perusing the web:
  1. The mayor is doing this purely for political reasons. He's responding to positions taken by Yoon and Flaherty earlier in the week.
  2. The mayor is a flip-flopper.
  3. This isn't a serious proposal; he has no power to change state law and has no intention of actually pushing this idea. We're supposed to forget about this by 2010.
  4. Why would new schools under the Boston School Committee do any better than the schools currently under their jurisdiction?
  5. If the mayor is the incumbent and he's all about education, how come he's only taking this position after 16 year?

I think his biggest mistake is this quote: “The status quo doesn’t work in education.” The mayor's going to be regretting that one for a long time. Flaherty and Yoon will surely jump all over it, since they're campaigning on the fact that Menino has been around too long. Now, it seems like he's admitting that his tenure has not done enough for the schools.

I'm not sure who the mayor is trying to reach with a proposal that seems like either a more restrictive form of charter schools or a less restrictive form of pilot schools. It seems a little like Governor Patrick's Readiness Schools: a political calculation that admits the need for school choice but doesn't run the risk of losing teachers unions support by supporting existing, non-unionized charter schools.

In this case, it seems like none of the vested interest groups are particularly impressed. It's clear from Richard Stutman's quote in the Herald that the BTU is opposed. Supporters of lifting the charter school cap will be unimpressed by the "in-district" limitations.

From my point of view, it seems silly to try another type of school choice when we have a well-tested model just itching to expand and a copy-cat model that's been less successful.

UPDATE: The Globe article, an update on the orginal boston.com posting, includes quotes that echo some of the comments above. I find it interesting that Menino wants to allow the lowest performing schools in BPS to be turned into charter schools. I wonder which schools will be tapped for this program if it ever happens? A charter school in the building that currently houses Mildred Avenue Middle School would be awesome, though you know that will never happen. To echo Jim Stergios in the Globe article, why doesn't Menino move ahead with a plan to turn low perfoming school in BPS into Horace Mann charter schools?

Mayoral Candidate Tom Menino

In a shocker, Mayor Menino reversed his long-standing opposition to charter schools in a speech today. You can find coverage at the Globe and at bostonherald.com.

Some choice bits are reprinted below.

From The Globe:

Mayor Thomas M. Menino, who has for years expressed deep reservations about charter schools, abruptly shifted course today and said he is eager to open new ones in Boston to help transform the city's poorly performing schools.

In a speech to hundreds of chief executives, Menino said he would file state legislation that would allow the city to create "in-district" charter schools.

Unlike traditional charter schools, which Menino has argued drain money from traditional public schools, these charter schools would be established and controlled solely by the Boston School Committee. In a point sure to spark opposition from organized labor, the schools would not need to be unionized,
although the teachers could vote to form a union. Menino said the schools would
also have more flexible work hours and rules, in an attempt to attract better
teachers and tailor the school day to students' needs.

If the bill does not pass by the end of this legislative session -- July 31, 2010 -- Menino said he would call for lifting the overall cap on charter schools.

"The status quo won't work," Menino told a luncheon at the Boston Harbor Hotel of the Boston College Chief Executives' Club. "We've got to make real changes."

Observers said Menino's position represents a sharp reversal.

"I thought the ideas were good and a bit surprising," said former Senate President Thomas F. Birmingham, who helped write the 1993 Education Reform Act that paved the way for the state’s first charter schools. "The mayor has been a long-time, major opponent of charter schools and I think this is an exciting propositon -- both the in-district charters and the affirmative commitment, if he can't get that legislation through, to eliminate the cap."

Menino's embrace of charter schools comes after his rivals in the mayor's race, City Councilors Michael F. Flaherty and Sam Yoon, released plans earlier this week that expressed support for more charter schools in Boston.

"Politically, it's extraordinary for the mayor of the city of Boston to come out for charter schools like this," Birmingham said.

From the Herald:

Mayor Thomas M. Menino proposed merit pay for teachers and in-district charter schools to boost student performance, but the teacher’s union is skeptical.

“The status quo doesn’t work in education,” Menino said following a speech to a group of business leaders at a
Boston College Citizen Seminar today. “We want to raise underperforming schools, but we can’t get it done on pilot schools and advanced placement because of arbitration. Give me a break.”

In a plan short on details, Menino said he will seek legislative approval to authorize city-run charter schools free from union rules on hiring, budgeting and length of the school day. While the staff can unionize, he said, union approval will not be required to create the schools. If the legislation is not adopted on Beacon Hill, the mayor said will lift the cap on charter schools.

Menino did not know how much the schools would cost, or how many would be
created. But he said the Obama administration is making $5 billion available under a competitive grant program through the American Recovery & Reinvestment Act that could fund the idea.

(Richard) Stutman (BTU President) also noted that the union continues to oppose charter schools. “We already have well-functioning schools in the city of Boston and we are not against talking about improving those schools,” he said. “But we oppose charter schools.”

Monday, June 8, 2009

Mayoral Candidate Sam Yoon

Last week, the Roslindale Transcript carried a column from Sam Yoon blasting the BPS five-zone proposal and Mayor Menino, and laying out his position on education. He's supporting a number of positions, including one on charter schools:


"Create “Smart Caps” on charter schools. If we’re going to be innovative about education in Boston, we need to encourage the innovators who have a proven record of success. We have some of the country’s best model charter schools. Keeping a lid on them makes no sense. We should lift the cap for successful pilot and charter schools."


Later this week, Yoon going to run with this "Smart Cap" proposal as seen in this press release on his campaign website:

Yoon Proposes “Smart Caps” on Charter Schools
Calls for Increase in Funding Limits for Effective Schools
June 8, 2009

BOSTON- City Councilor-at-Large and mayoral candidate Sam Yoon will propose legislation on Wednesday that would lift the funding cap on high-performing charter schools in Boston.

“We need fresh and innovative thinking for our public schools, which is why I’m calling for ‘smart caps,’” said Yoon. “We have a faltering education system, but many of our charter schools have a proven record of success in closing the achievement gap. By increasing funding for our top charter schools, we can substantially improve the quality of Boston’s public education.”

Yoon’s proposal calls for a “smart cap,” which raises the spending limits on those charter schools that have a proven, multi-year record of high achievement. The state currently limits spending on charter schools to 9% of a school district’s budget. At Wednesday’s City Council meeting, Yoon will submit a home-rule petition that calls on the state legislature to increase limits on high-performing schools to 20%.

A smart cap would allow successful charter schools to accommodate more students by expanding their campuses and hiring additional teachers. Certain schools are already inundated with more applicants than they have seats. Last year, the Edward W. Brooke Charter School in Roslindale received 1,100 student applications for only 100 openings.

Yoon said the popularity and success of some charter schools should send a message to lawmakers.

“The need for more quality choice is clear,” said Yoon. “If charter schools are successful we should allow them to replicate their success.”

Update:
You can watch Yoon discuss his position on a Smart Cap with Jon Keller of WBZ here. The part on charter schools is about 6 minutes into the 8 minute piece.

Mayoral Candidate Michael Flaherty

Mayoral candidates are starting to take positions on education, in general, and charter schools, specifically.

Michael Flaherty's position was outlined in the Globe today. He also opposes the five-zone proposal and supports charter school expansion.

On charter schools, the article says,

"Flaherty's support for more charter schools also runs counter to the position of Menino, who has long argued that the funding formula for charters is unfair. For each student who attends a charter school, a portion of state aid gets redirected from the city school system to the charter school. Boston is near the state's maximum limit of allowed in the city, and Flaherty said the city needs to convince the Legislature that it should raise the limit."*


More from Flaherty can be found at his campaign website in his education policy paper. The charter school position is copied below in it's entirety.


"Certainly, there are conflicting opinions as to what is the best strategy to ensure that our children receive a strong and quality education. But we all lose if we can’t come together to agree that no one approach works for every student. While the idea of school choice is often talked about, we shortchange that discussion when we can’t commit ourselves to the belief that real school choice can only happen when we allow money to follow the child. Michael supports continued investment in our city’s charter schools because he recognizes the valuable learning opportunities they provide to Boston’s students.

Many critics of charter schools have charged that the success in charter schools has more to do with demographics than curriculum design and implementation. However, a breakthrough January 2009 study by The Boston Foundation debunked the myth that high student performanceat charter schools is a result of student “pedigree” and not innovative teaching practices. The study controlled for the intangible factors of parent involvement and student motivation by tracking the MCAS scores over time of two groups of charter school applicants who either enrolled at a charter or attended BPS. The results revealed that the charter school students outperformed the BPS students, particularly in middle school math. Advocates for charter schools believe this study highlights that the curriculums and policies of charter schools – not student demographics – are the reason for high student performance at charters.

Many charter schools, including our own MATCH, the Neighborhood House Charter School and the national KIPPS schools have strong records of success. Ignoring the successes of these charter schools handicaps our ability to improve the quality of education available to Boston students. The city of Boston must work with the State Legislature to raise the current cap on charter schools so that underperforming districts such as BPS have the opportunity to expand parents’ choice of quality public schools."

The Globe's Scott Lehigh was high on Flaherty's education position (and not much else) in his column last week.

"Flaherty's support for more charter schools also runs counter to the position of Menino, who has long argued that the funding formula for charters is unfair. For each student who attends a charter school, a portion of state aid gets redirected from the city school system to the charter school.

Boston is near the state's maximum limit of allowed in the city, and Flaherty said the city needs to convince the Legislature that it should raise the limit."


*Note: The portion of aid that is redirected is the per pupil allotment that is attached to every student. Since BPS no longer is educating charter school students, their funding no longer goes to BPS. In fact, BPS gets partially "reimbursed" for 3 years after a student leaves the district and moved to a charter school."

Valedictorians

Congrats to the graduates of 2009! The valedictorians of the Boston charter schools were listed in the Globe on Sunday.
  • Academy of the Pacific Rim: Sabrina Hansen, Tufts University
  • Boston Collegiate: Laura Saniuk-Heinig, Cornell University
  • City on a Hill: Tiffany Egbuonu, Bryn Mawr College
  • Health Career Academy: Melissa Rocha, University of Rochester
  • MATCH: Sabbanie Montfleury, Boston College

Codman Academy was noticeably absent from the list. If anyone knows why, I'd love to hear about it.

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

More Cap Support

The Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce is on board for lifting the cap.

MCAS Scaled Scores

Over at Gotham Schools, Skoolboy, the resident educational researcher and statistician, has been talking a lot about how the most statistically valid way of comparing test data is to look at average scaled scores, instead of proficiency rates. He argues that proficiency rates can be misleading because they don't tell you if kids are near the top or bottom of each category range. In New York, they publish both proficiency rates and average scaled scores for each test in each grade.

In Massachusetts, the DOE publishes the percentage and numbers of students at each score range, which they also compile into a number called the CPI. I've been looking around on the DOE website to see if I can find scaled score data with no luck. If someone knows how to find this data, it would be great if you could post it below.

Update: From Bob Lee, who is MCAS Chief Analyst at the MAESE, responded on the comments page:

"We don't have an interval scale in Massachusetts. In other words the difference between a 216 and a 218 is larger than the difference between a 222 and a 224 so our Technical Advisory Committee (and I agree) doesn't want us to compute average scaled scores. Use the CPI, it has 5 intervals that are equal. Otherwise you have to use medians or the scaled score equivalent of the average scaled score."

Update II: My understanding of CPI is that is separates kids into 5 groups (Advanced and Proficient, High Needs Improvement, Low Needs Improvement, High Warning and Warning). The problem that I see is that it does a good job of accounting of sorting the kids and schools on the low end of the spectrum but does not allow for differentiating schools on the top end. Here's an example: School A has 80% of kids scoring proficient and 20% advanced on the 8th grade math test. School B has 20% of kids scoring proficient and 80% advanced on the same test. Which school and kids are performing better at math? CPI says they are equal; I say they're not. CPI sets an important, but low bar. As a teacher, I want all my kids to be proficient or advanced, but I want the advanced section as high as possible, too.

To Lift the Cap or Not?

Last week, MassINC published a report on the impact of the last 15 years of education reform in Massachusetts. You can find the full report here. While the primary focus was not charter schools, the report pushes for lifting the cap for a number of reasons. The full comment is below:

"Closer to home, there has also been a recent and influential study that compares the performance of students at Boston’s charter, pilot, and traditional schools.25 This research finds consistently positive effects for the city’s charter schools on student achievement in all MCAS subjects at both the middle and high school levels. Currently, the state places several limits on the number and location of charter schools. Nationally, the Secretary of Education is targeting federal stimulus money toward states that embrace education reform, including removing the cap on charter schools. If Massachusetts raises or eliminates the cap on charter schools, this change could lead to new charter schools in a dozen communities, such as Boston, Holyoke, and Fall River, that are currently at the limit. In addition, the state should consider allowing effective charter schools serving high-poverty students to operate additional schools and thus allow for greater efficiencies and economies of scale. At the same time, the state should also be more aggressive about closing charter schools that are not working."

A couple of days later, Scott Lehigh followed up with praise in his Globe column.

I also commented at Gotham Schools supporting lifting the cap. My comment is copied below:

"Lift the cap with the following caveats:

1) Charter schools that are underperforming in relationship to their home district should be closed at the end of their charter. Not enough weak charter schools are closed down. Weak charter schools are a financial drain on the system and they hurt kids.

2) Charter schools that are significantly outperforming their home districts should be allowed to replicate. If your school has 70% low income kids and is outperforming the wealthiest districts in the state, you’re doing something right and should give more kids the opportunity.

3) Charter schools with new ideas or models should be allowed; new schools that mooch off older models (especially unsuccessful ones) should not be authorized. This promotes innovation.

4) Districts that don’t want more charter schools can minimize expansion of new charters (though not the replicas), by adopting the practices of charter schools that work. That forces failing schools to try to learn from their neighborhood charter schools that are currently kicking their rears. I still can’t figure out why district schools aren’t visiting my school to learn from what we do here…and why they won’t let us visit their schools that are successful.

5) The cap should be lifted with priority in districts with the greatest need.

Just some random thoughts…"

#4 is my personal addition to the current dialogue that's going on in the charter school community about how to get the cap lifted.