Charter School Dropouts: Accountability Reform

“To be successful with kids that come to you at 19 reading at a fifth-grade reading level, there are things you have to do differently,” said Ernie Silva to an audience at the Missouri Charter Public School Association (MCPSA) Conference on October 2.

Silva’s words reflect his experience with what he refers to as “reengaged students.” According to Silva, these students, who are between the ages of 16 and 22, require a school model that is structured differently from the system that currently exists. One component of that model is a change in accountability measures.

Students in public charter schools are currently held accountable for learning the same information as students in public schools. This includes charter schools that exclusively serve high school dropouts or at-risk students. Since schools are all judged by the same criteria, schools that actually benefit impoverished communities are forced to close because of academic underperformance.

DeLaSalle Charter School is the only remaining alternative high school in Missouri. In reality, there are a number of alternative high schools across the state, but students who attend these schools, in separate buildings, are often counted in the overall school district’s scores instead of judged separately. This is unfair, as alternative charter schools like DeLaSalle cannot so easily mask the performance of at-risk students because they only serve at-risk students.

In August, proponents of DeLaSalle were worried about the charter’s unsatisfactory state standardized test scores. But do End of Course (EOC) exams that measure one grade level’s worth of learning measure what a student at an alternative high school knows?

Not really. As Silva pointed out, a student at 19 who tests at a fifth-grade reading level requires something different. Such a student may go from a fifth-grade reading level to a ninth-grade reading level in one year, but a test that measures the student at an 11th-grade reading level would not capture this growth.

This is, yet again, another one-size-doesn’t-fit-all lesson for education. One accountability system does not fit all schools. For schools that serve dropouts and at-risk students, an accountability model that puts more of an emphasis on academic growth is a much better fit.