Charter Schools Are Highly Effective in Missouri

In 2023, the Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford University released its third National Charter School Study. It compares the effectiveness of charter schools to traditional public schools in 29 states, plus Washington D.C, and New York City. The study shows that Missouri’s charter schools are among the most effective in the nation.

The report focuses mostly on documenting charter school performance overall across the 29 states and two cities. Some of the more notable findings from the full sample include:

• On average, charter schools are producing more test-score growth than traditional public schools. The CREDO research team estimates that the extra growth is equivalent to six additional days of instruction annually in math, and 16 extra days of instruction in reading.
• The performance of charter schools is improving over time. The CREDO researchers track improvement by comparing their findings in the 2023 report to findings from their older, similar reports from 2009 and 2013.
• High-poverty students benefit from attending a charter school more than their low-poverty peers.
• Though charter schools outperform traditional public schools overall, virtual charter schools perform worse than other charter schools, and worse than traditional public schools.

On the last point, the CREDO dataset covers the years 2014 to 2019, so these virtual charter schools were virtual before it became (unfortunately) fashionable. The finding that virtual charter schools are ineffective tracks with evidence from the pandemic era showing that schools that spent more time in virtual learning had especially poor performance. The CREDO report makes it clear that charter schools are not special in this regard.

In terms of Missouri-specific findings, the report shows:

• Charter schools nationally are doing well, but Missouri charter schools are doing even better. Our charter schools are among the most effective in the country in terms of improving academic achievement relative to their traditional public-school alternatives. For example, in reading, Missouri’s charter schools are the fifth-most effective among the 29 states covered by the report.
• Mirroring the national trend, the effectiveness of Missouri charter schools is improving over time.

This is just a quick summary of a very dense and thorough report, so I encourage interested readers to take a closer look themselves. The CREDO report provides compelling evidence of the value of charter schools in Missouri. I hope our legislators enact policies that make it easier for charter operators to improve outcomes for Missouri children.