Edward Brooke Charter School in WSJ

There's a piece in today's Wall Street Journal about charter schools, the high demand for them, and the political challenges in expanding them. Two Boston charter schools are mentioned: Edward W. Brooke and Uphams Corner. Edward Brooke principals Jon Clark and Kimberly Steadman are quoted discussing the heartbreak of parents, including Mr. Clark, whose children are not picked in the lottery.

Katherine Merseth on Uphams Corner

There's a letter to the editor in today's Globe from Professor Katherine Merseth. Professor Merseth, of Harvard's Graduate School of Education, recently performed did a study of successful Massachusetts charter schools. She discusses her research here.

Uphams Corner and the Challenge Index

I've been thinking a bit about Mike Mayo's piece in the Globe last Sunday, which is linked below.

In it, he writes: "Today, our special-education population hovers around 40 percent. Low-income families represent 93 percent of our population. These levels are far beyond what the governor has proposed, far beyond what the Boston Public Schools serves. Is this failure? Was this "brand" a mistake? We didn't set out to specialize in serving these populations; it just turned out that way."

Mr. Mayo is correct that his school has a difficult population to teach. This year, Uphams Corner has the highest Challenge Index score of any charter middle or middle/high school in Boston. (Numbers courtesy of the DOE).

And yet, it hasn't always been that way. In the early years of the school, Uphams Corner's had a high CI, but one that is comparable to other charter schools in the city. The UCCS population has been getting more and more challenging every year.



Why is that? Mike Mayo seems to think it's because his school attracted "Challege Index" parents. That's one way a percentage can increase. My guess is that it "didn't just turn out that way." My guess is that many non-"Challenge Index" parents (the ones who have a better chance of navigating school choice), fled as soon as they realized how unsuccessful UCCS was. Remember, Uphams had issues retaining teachers and kids, scoring well on tests, and maintaining orderly clasrooms. And of course, once this process started, I'm sure it became a vicious cycle.

Mike Mayo Responds

Mike Mayo, founder of Uphams Corner, reflected on the school in an Op-Ed in today's Globe. No time to comment now, but here's the link. More to follow later.

Uphams Corner Charter School Closed

The MA BOE voted to close Uphams Corner Charter School yesterday. While this is clearly sad for the kids, teachers and administrators who were making a go of it, this was long overdue. Teacher and student turnover was high and student performance was exceptionally low. It was time to free up these seats for other schools, and the BOE did just that.

While I wish that the cap on charter school seats in urban districts was not so low (currently 9%), I appreciate the fact that MA has a high bar for charter school quality and is not afraid to shut down charters that aren't working. If only the same could be said for the Boston Public Schools.