Of Missouri’s four largest cities—Kansas City, St. Louis, Springfield, and Columbia—Springfield will soon be the only one without charter schools. Charter schools are already thriving in Kansas City, and St. Louis and thanks to recent legislation Columbia will have its first charter schools up and running as early as 2026.

Springfield is missing out.

Charter schools are public schools that are exempt from some of the rules and regulations that apply to traditional public schools. In most Missouri counties, including Greene County, charter schools are not allowed to operate unless they are sponsored by the local school board—a requirement that effectively bans them. Senate Bill 727, signed into law in 2024, changed this requirement in Boone County, where Columbia is located. We need similar legislation in Greene County.

Why? There are several reasons—including that charter schools are popular with families—but the most important reason is that charter schools are more effective than traditional public schools. Academic studies consistently show students who attend charter schools outperform their peers in traditional public schools on state exams and are more likely to attend college. In some cases, the performance differences are substantial. A recent national study by the Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford University found that charter schools deliver additional academic growth equivalent to 6 extra days of instruction in math each year, and 16 extra days in reading, compared to traditional public schools. This same study shows that Missouri has some of the most effective charter schools in the country.

Charter school impacts are largest in areas where the local neighborhood schools are underperforming. Does Springfield have any low-performing neighborhood schools? Unfortunately, it sure does. At Westport Elementary School in 2024, only 24 percent of 5th-graders scored proficient or higher on the state English Language Arts test, and in math the number was just 14 percent. At Parkview High School, only 16 percent of students who took the Algebra I end-of-course exam scored proficient or above.

Now imagine your child is zoned for one of these schools and unless you move—perhaps not in your budget—this is where he or she will be required to attend. Charter schools give families in this situation new hope. Many charter operators intentionally open schools in neighborhoods where the traditional public schools are the worst—their mission is to provide educational opportunities in these communities that are not otherwise available. In many cities, the top charter schools have long waitlists.

If we want more Springfield children to have access to highly effective schools, permitting charter schools to operate in Greene County is one of the simplest ways to do it.

How can we make this happen? Following Boone County’s playbook, we need a champion for charter schools in the state legislature who will prioritize this issue in the upcoming legislative session. For Boone County, that champion was Caleb Rowden, a longtime charter advocate. Education legislation in Jefferson City is increasingly “omnibus” style, which means multiple different education policies are bundled into one bill. Rowden made sure that permitting charter schools to operate in Boone County, without the requirement that they be sponsored by the local school board, was part of the 2024 omnibus bill.

Will someone step up in a similar manner for Greene County? I sure hope so.

Charter schools are public schools, their students are public school students, and their teachers are public school teachers. They cannot charge tuition, they’re secular, and they’re open to all students (they must admit students by lottery if the number of applicants is greater than the number of available spots). We know charter schools work and that they’re popular with families.

Every year that passes without charter schools operating in Greene County is a missed opportunity for Springfield’s children.

The post Springfield Needs Charter Schools appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Noah Devine, executive director of the Missouri Charter Public Schools Association, about how charter schools in St. Louis are responding after the recent tornado damaged multiple campuses. They discuss the need for flexibility for displaced families, how charter schools are working to reopen quickly, and the broader importance of school choice, especially in times of crisis. Noah also explains why Missouri’s lack of open enrollment makes recovery harder, and shares resources for families navigating this difficult time.

Listen on Spotify

Listen on Apple Podcasts 

Listen on SoundCloud

Transcript: Schools After the Storm with Noah Devine

Download a copy of the transcript here

Susan Pendergrass (00:00)
Today I’m going to be talking to Noah Devine of Missouri Charter Public School Association. You basically represent, to a certain extent, the charter schools across Kansas City and St. Louis. To a certain extent, your organization helps them navigate policy processes, funding processes, and things like that in Missouri. So thanks for joining us.

Noah Devine (00:19)
Thanks for having me on, and yeah, you’re exactly right. We are a membership-based, dues-based organization that supports, represents, and advocates for public charter schools here in the state of Missouri.

Susan Pendergrass (00:30)
Well, like the Show-Me Institute, a few weeks ago, many schools in the St. Louis area were affected by a tornado. We lost the top floor of our building when it came through. I know that I’ve been reading that St. Louis Public Schools have about six buildings that are affected by the tornado. How many charter schools were affected?

Noah Devine (00:50)
Yeah, it was obviously really terrible what happened in St. Louis with that tornado. In total, seven charter school buildings were directly impacted. None of them will be compromised from opening this fall, so that’s a very good thing. Two of them were not able to open the week that it happened or the week immediately after. One of them has an annex that was very badly damaged, and so they’re going to have to rework how they meet the needs of their students. The building impact is very significant. What worries me the most is that they’re doing everything they can to meet the needs of their families and students who were directly impacted. Over the summer and into the fall, I think we’re going to see how things ultimately shake out. I’m quite worried that we’re going to have a large increase in students and families experiencing homelessness, and meeting those families’ needs will be really important.

Susan Pendergrass (01:41)
Why do you imagine that St. Louis Public Schools say six of their buildings can’t be used, but charter schools are going to find a way to use theirs? Do you have any thoughts on that?

Noah Devine (01:53)
Yeah, I honestly don’t know. Some of it could always be just good old-fashioned dumb luck, the location of buildings. I think that’s probably most likely. I do think the buildings that were more directly impacted and were charter schools were in better condition. I don’t know the condition of some of the SLPS buildings, but I think charter schools were able to mitigate things a little more readily.

Susan Pendergrass (02:30)
This is what I was thinking, because we had to scramble to find a place to work. Some of us are in temporary office space. Some people are working from home, and it really does affect people. I assume there are many students whose own homes were affected. It’s summer now, but we’re trying to figure out what to do in the fall. St. Louis Public Schools has said that the kids in these six schools are all being reassigned to new schools.

Wouldn’t it make sense, given that this is an emergency—an act of God type of situation—that families could be given flexibility over where their kids go? If they’re displaced, they might want their kids to stay with the same teacher and group of friends, or they might want to go somewhere closer to where they are displaced or where their job is. It seems to me this is the time for flexibility. What do you think?

Noah Devine (03:27)
Could not agree more. Setting aside the natural disaster of a tornado, we fundamentally believe, as all of our schools do, that the decision of where to send your kid—whether it be homeschool, private school, charter public school, district school, magnet school, whatever—is the decision of a family. In a time like this, we need to enact provisions, not dissimilar from what we did during COVID, to make sure families have what they need.

If a family in North St. Louis lost everything, let’s not upset the apple cart. If they want to stay at that school, we have to make sure they can get there. McKinney-Vento is the federal classification for students who are homeless. If you lost your home and are temporarily living with someone else, you meet that designation and can stay at your school. We’re working with charter schools and DESE to ensure that’s clearly communicated. But that designation comes with a cost, usually transportation.

We need help to meet that need. Big picture, we should always be trying to meet the needs of families with choice in mind. During emergencies, it’s even more necessary to push through red tape and ensure we aren’t telling families that, on top of everything else, they now have to move schools.

Susan Pendergrass (05:36)
Do you know if the governor has indicated he’s open to an emergency executive order to ensure St. Louis families have maximum flexibility?

Noah Devine (05:47)
I don’t want to speak for the governor’s office or DESE. But I’ve been extremely impressed with how they’ve moved to get direct support to families in St. Louis. During special session a couple of weeks ago, a huge pot of money was allocated to meet those needs. I’m confident they’ll do everything they can within the law. That said, Missouri does not have open enrollment, which limits flexibility. It’s come close many times, but hasn’t passed.

Susan Pendergrass (06:56)
In times of crisis, like pandemics or tornadoes, the need for flexibility becomes very apparent. You and I followed legislation last year that would have allowed students from outside the city to enroll in a charter school. It made so much sense and still couldn’t get across the finish line.

Noah Devine (07:47)
Yeah.

Susan Pendergrass (07:48)
Families often face personal emergencies too. A child being bullied, a move to live with grandparents—these are real. Charter school leaders want to keep kids where they belong. We just haven’t found the right words to convince enough people.

Noah Devine (08:21)
I couldn’t agree more. First and foremost, our thoughts are with the families impacted. But this is when policy limitations become very real. Missouri is surrounded by states that allow more enrollment flexibility. We shouldn’t lock families into bad situations, whether the crisis is natural or personal. We need to continue pushing for change.

Susan Pendergrass (10:04)
In Kansas City, many top-notch charter schools have strong reputations. If families live on the Kansas side, they can cross the river and choose from any school. Kansas has one of the strongest open enrollment laws in the country. Missouri should follow that example. Not every school is right for every child. And families shouldn’t have to move to find a better fit.

Noah Devine (11:04)
Exactly. I read an article recently about this. People often assume open enrollment would destroy public education. It won’t. Families pick different colleges for their kids based on interests and needs. Why shouldn’t the same logic apply to K-12?

Susan Pendergrass (11:58)
Pell Grants follow students to the college of their choice. It works. But in K-12, it’s somehow controversial. I was asked yesterday on the radio about some charter schools closing in Kansas City and St. Louis.

Noah Devine (12:26)
Great question. First, we can’t underestimate the impact of school closures on families. It’s very real and unfortunate. But charter schools are designed to be more accountable. If families leave or the school isn’t performing, it should close. That’s how accountability works.

We are in a period of declining enrollment nationwide. All public schools will have to make tough choices. The charter system allows closures based on whether families want to go there and whether the school is serving them well. That’s how it should work.

Susan Pendergrass (14:30)
Mm-hmm.

Noah Devine (14:45)
When you lead a charter school, you have to earn it. Every student is there by choice. That makes charter schools unique. Missouri ranks among the top five states in charter school performance, according to CREDO at Stanford. We should take that seriously.

Susan Pendergrass (15:36)
This reminds me of the Unsafe School Choice Option under federal law. If a school is deemed persistently dangerous, students have the right to transfer. Missouri has never labeled a school that way, even though the data suggests otherwise. But charter schools already give families that power. If parents feel unsafe, they can simply pull their child out.

Noah Devine (16:37)
Exactly.

Susan Pendergrass (16:50)
That’s how it should be in all public schools. If parents in St. Louis want to know what resources are available for displaced children or schools, where should they go?

Noah Devine (17:26)
Start with our website, mocharterschools.org. We have a resource page for families affected by the tornado. Also, we work with Show Me Mo Schools, which runs a common application system. Their site is schoolappstl.org. And finally, DESE’s website has guidance and updates, though it could use improvement.

Susan Pendergrass (18:12)
Good luck with that. Thanks again, Noah.

Noah Devine (18:20)
Thanks, and take care.

Produced by Show-Me Opportunity

The post Schools After the Storm with Noah Devine appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

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.

The post Charter Schools Are Highly Effective in Missouri appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Macke is the founder and director of the Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford University.

Listen on Apple Podcasts

Listen on SoundCloud

The post Podcast: Let’s Redesign High School with Stanford’s Macke Raymond appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The study examined student’s academic growth on the state assessment in math and English for the 2014–15, 2015–16 and 2016–17 school years. CREDO compared traditional public school students in Kansas City to Kansas City charter school students, and then compared both of those groups to the state average.

In order to compare student growth, CREDO uses a “virtual twin” method, taking into account seven student characteristics such as previous academic achievement and income level. CREDO matches each charter student with several traditional public school students who are similar on the seven characteristics and averages the test scores of these students to create each charter student’s virtual twin. The traditional public school virtual twin for each charter school student differ in only one way— what type of school they attend.

Using this model, Credo found that Kansas City charter school students had more academic growth in both math and English than their traditional public school student twins in every year studied. And by the 2016–17 school year, charter school students had more growth than the state average in both subjects.

Although the results of the research are measured in standard deviations, the researchers converted these to days of learning. A typical school year has about 180 days. CREDO found that during the 2016–17 school year, Kansas City charter students received nearly 60 additional days of learning in math than Kansas City traditional public school students and about 30 more days than the state average. Charter school students also showed more growth in English, receiving about 90 extra days of learning compared to the traditional public school students and more than 30 extra days compared to the state average.

When CREDO researchers analyzed student subgroups, they found that Black, Hispanic, English language learner students, special education students and students in poverty all had more days of learning in charter schools than traditional public schools in both math and English. Notably, special education students in charter schools had more than 120 extra days of learning in English and over 90 extra days in math in one school year than special education students in traditional public schools.

While the evidence that charter schools are capable of producing great academic results continues to mount, Missouri remains steadfast in refusing to expand educational opportunity for students. Why doesn’t Missouri want to give kids all across the state the option to attend these high-performing schools?

The post Charter Schools Are Working in Kansas City appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford University released a recent study on Indianapolis charter school performance. The study tracked academic growth from the 2013-14 to the 2016-17 school years, comparing the average growth in reading and math in Indianapolis charter school students to traditional public school students.

In order to compare school performance between charter schools and traditional public schools, CREDO creates a “virtual twin” for each charter student that is a combination of similar public school students. This method considers seven characteristics (including ethnicity and income status) of a charter school student, and finds students from traditional public schools who share the same characteristics. The test scores of all the similar traditional public school students are averaged to create a growth score for the virtual twin, which is then compared to the charter student.

The CREDO study found that charter school students in Indianapolis experienced significantly more academic growth in both reading and math than traditional public school students. In the 2016-17 school year, Indianapolis charter school students gained 29 extra days of reading and 4 extra days of math compared to the state average (180 days of learning a school year). Traditional public schools were behind the state average in both subjects; 48 days behind in reading and 96 days behind in math. The difference between Indianapolis charter school students and traditional public school students is striking. Charter school students learned 100 more days of math and 77 more days of reading than the traditional public school students. That’s 20 extra weeks of math and over 15 weeks in reading for charter school students.

Charter schools also produced better results than the city’s traditional public schools for specific student groups. This held true for all the student groups the study measured: Black and Hispanic students, low-income students, English language learners and special education students.

Charter schools are helping Indianapolis students access a quality education. Why wouldn’t Missouri want the same?

The post Charter Schools Outperform in Indianapolis appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

On average, charter schools improve test scores in English Language Arts and Mathematics at a higher rate than comparable traditional public schools. There is variation, though. Notably, the authors of the report found charter schools that belong to a network, (known as a charter management organization, or CMO), tend to perform higher than independent charter schools.  Missouri’s charter schools didn’t fit this trend, as non-CMO schools performed relatively well. Nevertheless, the findings of this report have some important implications for Missouri.

Currently, there are relatively few large, successful charter management organizations operating in our state. There are a few reasons why this is so: 

Limited Locations

For many years, charter schools could only open in Saint Louis and Kansas City.  For a network of schools to thrive, it needs to be able to enroll a large number of students. The limited markets of Saint Louis and Kansas City make it difficult for this to happen.

Limited Enrollments

Charter schools can now operate in unaccredited school districts, but they still face problems with enrollment. Missouri’s charter school law does not allow students to enroll in charter schools across district boundaries, and Missouri has relatively small school districts. A charter must attract a large percentage of students in a small school district in order to be viable. This has prevented charters from opening in the perennially struggling school districts of Normandy and Riverview Gardens, as well as other places. 

Making it easier for charters to open statewide and allowing them to recruit students from across district boundaries might entice more charter operators to open schools in other districts or on the borders of Saint Louis and Kansas City. Current law makes it difficult for charters to operate outside of the two cities.

Pension Barriers

An added difficulty is Missouri’s teacher pension system. Currently, there are three separate systems which do not have reciprocity between them, meaning that years of service do not carry from one system to another. Charter networks may wish to move teachers or administrators between schools, but if this means moving between pension systems, those individuals would lose money.

Funding Parity

Charters in Missouri do not receive local tax support for facilities and debt. An analysis by researchers at the University of Arkansas shows that charters in Missouri receive approximately 26 percent less funding that their district counterparts. This is a difference of more than $4,600 per pupil. Many states are trying to attract high quality CMOs and can offer them more support than Missouri can.

If Missouri wants to improve educational outcomes for students, the legislature should enact polices that make the Show-Me State more attractive to CMOs. For starters, the legislature could address the problems listed here by removing geographic limitations, opening enrollment policies, reforming pension policy, and improving funding parity. 

The post We Need to Make Missouri More Attractive to Charter Management Organizations appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

For instance, Tubbs suggests charter schools in Missouri do not have to administer state tests. This is simply not true. Charters administer the same exams to students as the traditional public schools do. You can view exam data on the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s website. They show that 70 percent of students at City Garden Montessori in Saint Louis scored proficient or advanced on the third grade English Language Arts Assessment in 2014, while just 64.9 percent did so at Joplin’s highest-scoring elementary school, Kelsey Norman. If you look at all the data, you’ll see charter schools in Saint Louis and Kansas City outperforming many Joplin schools.

Of course, not all charter schools are models of success; but neither are all district schools. Contrary to the claim of Tubbs, however, we do have reliable data and the effectiveness of charter schools has been measured. A 2013 study by the Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford University showed that Missouri charter school students learned significantly more than their peers in nearby public schools in both reading and math.

Tubbs’s letter also misrepresents how school funding for charter schools works. She states that charter school students will take funds away from the district schools, and that part is true. Anytime a student leaves a district, the district will lose money. If a student moves from Joplin to Carthage, the Joplin School District would lose the same amount of money. Tubbs then goes on to say, “However, that public school district must continue to maintain facilities (pay the utility bills, fix the plumbing) and provide support services (bus transportation) for the remaining students.” But she does not mention that all of the funds used for facilities, maintenance, and debt service remain in the school district. Charters do not have access to these funds.

Tubbs also states that “non-public charter schools are not required to take all applicants.” First off, there is no such thing as a “non-public charter school.” Charter schools are public schools. They are free and open to anyone who lives within the attendance boundaries. They must take all students who apply, unless they are oversubscribed. Then they must hold a lottery.

Tubbs’s letter is filled with inaccuracies that are constantly repeated as if they were true. It’s time to put a stop to arguing with these “alternative facts.” We can have a debate as to whether charter schools are right for Joplin, Missouri, or the rest of the state, but we should do it with the truth in mind.

The post Attacking Charter Schools with “Alternative Facts” appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

We all love to have enemies; not real enemies, just the kind that make us feel better about ourselves. For example, sports are more enjoyable when our team goes up against their rival—think KU vs. Mizzou or Chiefs vs. Broncos. In politics, it’s the same. We rejoice when our candidate or party defeats the opponent. There is something about having enemies that gives us the sense that our side is superior and that our cause is just. Lambasting someone else as the enemy is an easy way to secure support for one’s cause, and this is exactly the tact taken by those who oppose the expansion of charter schools—charter schools must be stopped or they will destroy public education.

Missouri’s current controversy surrounding charter schools stems from the legislature’s attempt to “fix” the interdistrict school choice bill, which allows students to transfer from unaccredited school districts to accredited ones. Lawmakers inserted a provision into the transfer fix that would allow for the further expansion of charter schools in Saint Louis and Jackson counties. In response, the editorial board of the Kansas City Star wrote, “This wrongheaded idea should never have gotten as far as it has.” You see, the editorial board sees charter schools as a punitive measure—as the enemy.

The truth of the matter, however, is that charter schools are not the enemy of public education; they are but a means for ensuring every child has access to a quality public education. Along with members of the educational establishment, the Star’s editorial board has bought into the “us versus them,” charter versus school district mentality. Those who support quality educational options for every student should reject this notion.

Charter schools are free public schools that serve primarily disadvantaged students who lack the ability to move to better school districts or to pay for private school tuition. Charter schools are not a cure-all. Just as there are good and bad district schools, there are good and bad charter schools. The beauty of charter schools is that they allow bad schools to close and they allow new, innovative schools to take root. Studies, including the “National Charter School Study 2013” by researchers from Stanford University’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes, consistently show that charter schools are improving over time as higher-performing schools become more established and weaker schools close. Most importantly, charters offer parents trapped in failing schools an alternative.

There should be no “us versus them” when it comes to the type of school a student in Missouri chooses to attend. Whether a child is in a traditional public school, a public magnet school, a public charter school, or even a private school, the only thing that matters is whether that child is receiving a quality education. Indeed, we should be hawkish at fighting against failing schools in any sector.

There may never be room under one tent for Chiefs and Broncos fans. There is, however, room in the big tent for all those who support quality educational options for every student.

James V. Shuls is an assistant professor of educational leadership and policy studies at the University of Missouri–St. Louis and a fellow at the Show-Me Institute.

The post Charter Schools Are Not the Enemy appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Each plan attempts to come across as fresh by sprinkling in new ideas. However, the intent of these plans is a simple rehash of an old idea — stop school choice.

The CSD position paper boldly states that “St. Louis area superintendents urge the state to move beyond providing choice options.” They claim that school choice doesn’t work. “In the private sector, choice does create competition in the marketplace. It works there. But is [Sic] does not work in public schools, at least not in Missouri.”

Can choice and competition improve nearly every aspect of our lives except for education? The evidence would suggest otherwise (and yes, there is evidence that choice is working in Missouri).

The Friedman Foundation published a report detailing the studies on private school choice programs. They reported that 11 of 12 “gold standard” studies of voucher programs find positive benefits for all or some students. They also reported that choice and competition have a positive impact on the traditional public schools. At least that was the case in 22 of the 23 studies that examined the issue. Not a single study has found that students are worse off when schools face competition.

Is it possible that choice and competition work in education in other states, but not in Missouri? Not likely.

In fact, a study by the Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford University found that Missouri charter schools produced significantly larger learning gains than the nearby public schools.

MASA and the CSD ignore the evidence because they want to stop school choice. Thus, their plans are simply a guise for the same policies that brought us to our current predicament. We don’t need more of the same. Kids need choices and schools need competition.

The post Missouri School Leaders Wrong On School Choice appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The coming year should be a banner year for charter schools throughout the state. With the closure of the Imagine schools and the steady improvement of existing charter schools, I expect to see significant gains in overall charter performance in 2013.

For the first time in Missouri, the performance of charter schools surpassed the performance of the nearby school districts in math and language arts. As you can see from the graphs below, charter schools continue to show steady improvement in both subjects.

This steady improvement should not come as a shock for two reasons.

1. We have known for years that Missouri charter schools are producing significantly larger learning gains than the urban districts. Just a couple months ago, the Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford University released a report indicating that students in Missouri charter schools learn approximately three weeks more material in reading and an extra month’s worth of material in math than their counterparts in the surrounding district schools.

2. Not only are Missouri charter schools producing larger learning gains, the bad charter schools are closing. That is the beauty of charter schools — when a school doesn’t perform, it closes.

This was a banner year for charter schools in Missouri. No predictions for next year, but I certainly hope the progress will continue.

Percent of Students Scoring Proficient or Advanced: English Language Arts

Percent of Students Scoring Proficient or Advanced: Mathematics

(These graphs were completed using student achievement data at the district level from the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE).)

The post Banner Year For Charter Schools appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The CREDO study updates a 2009 study of charter schools in 16 states, which included Missouri, and expands the study to now include 27 states. These states enroll more than 95 percent of all charter school students.

School choice critics often cited the 2009 study because charter schools performed slightly worse, on average, than their traditional school counterparts. In the updated analysis, charter schools in the original 16 states improved significantly relative to district schools. Now, the average charter school in those states outperforms the traditional public school in reading and has closed the gap but still performs worse in math.

The primary reason for the improvement of charter schools was the closure of low-performing schools. Using statistical methods, the researchers converted student achievement gains into days of learning. Charter schools that closed since the 2009 study “posted an average of 72 fewer days of learning in reading and 80 fewer days of learning in math before closure.”

In the 27-state analysis, the results are even more positive for charter schools. “Overall, students attending charter schools have eight additional days of learning in reading and similar learning gains in math compared to their peers attending traditional public schools.”

Missouri charter schools performed particularly well in comparison to district schools. On average, students in Missouri charter schools learned significantly more in reading and math. These gains translate to nearly three weeks more learning in reading and more than a month of extra learning in math.

Before I paint too rosy of a picture, the results were not positive across the board. Just like district-run public schools, there is tremendous variation in Missouri and across the nation. The beauty of charter schools, as we have seen, is that the low-performing ones close.

The post New Study: Missouri Charter Schools Outperform Districts appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

These schools are not perfect — far from it, in some cases — but, for most of these students and parents, the system works relatively well. There is a well-known correlation between academic achievement and socioeconomic status, and students from higher-income families outperform lower-income students on practically every measure. This disparity is also reflected in the achievement gap between white and minority students. Tino Sanandaji, a Ph.D. student in public policy at the University of Chicago, recently compared the scores of non-Hispanic white American students with those of non-immigrant Europeans on the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) test, and found that the American students performed admirably. White Americans scored seventh out of 28 countries, beating students from Denmark, Sweden, and France, as well as an average of 15 European Union countries.

On the other hand, our educational system routinely fails poor and minority students — those least able to choose a different school by moving to another district. Although the racial achievement gap has narrowed somewhat in recent years, at age 17, black and Hispanic students still score about 10 percent worse on average than white students on the reading portion of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). There a number of proven ways we can expand choice and improve academic achievement for those students.

Missouri has already experienced some success with charter schools. According to a 2009 study by the Center for Research on Education Outcomes at Stanford University, students attending charter schools in Missouri show more improvement in both mathematics and reading than similar students in traditional public schools, and this remains true when looking only at black and Hispanic students. Unfortunately, state statute limits the existence of charter schools to the cities of Saint Louis and Kansas City. If that restriction were removed, the gains of charter schools could be expanded to students in other struggling districts.

Furthermore, we could provide parents and students with more options in existing public school districts simply by restructuring how the schools are funded. Under a weighted-student-formula program (also known as “backpack funding”), students can attend any school within the district, and the schools are funded based upon the number of students they attract — with more dollars devoted to students who typically require more resources to educate (e.g., those with disabilities). Schools are then allowed more autonomy to experiment and compete for students — and for the money attached to them. In California, the cities of San Francisco and Oakland both implemented backpack funding and saw large gains in student achievement across ethnic and socioeconomic lines. San Francisco is now the top performing large urban school district in California. There is no reason, outside of political intransigence, that the Saint Louis and Kansas City school districts could not enact the same reforms.

It would be difficult to design an educational system worse for the disadvantaged than one that assigns students to schools based on the housing that their parents can afford. Although our best schools, public and private, are the product of parental choice, poor and minority students are frequently stuck in monopolistic urban school districts. School choice is not a panacea for this problem, but giving parents the power to choose is a necessary step toward ensuring a quality education for all of Missouri’s students.

John Payne is a research assistant for the Show-Me Institute, an independent think tank promoting free-market solutions for Missouri public policy.

The post Real School Choice Options Would Help to Narrow Educational Achievement Gap appeared first on Show-Me Institute.