Charter Schools ARE Public Schools

This is family policy matter program is produced by the North Carolina family policy Council of profamily research and education organization dedicated to strengthening and preserving the family and up from the studio here is John Rustin, Pres. North Carolina family policy Council this week for family policy matters. It is our pleasure to have Nina Reese with us on the program's president and CEO of the national alliance for public charter schools. One of the leading organizations advancing the charter school movement across our nation. Previously, she served as the first deputy undersecretary for innovation and improvement at the US Department of Education and before that as senior education policy analyst with our friends at the Heritage foundation is with us today to discuss how North Carolina fared in the national alliance for public charter schools annual report, measuring up to the model.

A ranking of state charter schools will be talking about how are charter schools performed and where she sees room for improvement in North Carolina.

Welcome to the program.

It's great to have you with us on family policy matters.

Thank you for having me as we begin, and for the benefit of our listeners. Would you please define public charter schools and explain a little bit about how they differ from what we have known as traditional public schools are public school, they are governed by the University not paid their regulation accountable for raping them greater ability to meet the goal afforded around who they can hire and how they construct curricula for accountability in higher and holding up to that terms of the contract signed and if they don't have to be close but I would probably boy is not able to family open really quickly there 43 states right now that have charter schools on everyone.

It is not different from the other to some extent finding what it is and how it works is a little bit challenging to make life different and each popularizer operates or antigens are charter schools differently that I am large. After being around for five years now. I will have demonstrated their ability to close the achievement gap. Achievement of especially low income English learners and ability to live track record that may not be in definitely on the right track so important. You have just stated there's a lot of diversity among charter schools across the country in the states that have them melt North Carolina has had charter schools in place since our law passed in 1996. Charter schools are there in North Carolina.

Nina and how many students attend public charter schools in North Carolina hundred 28 charter 2013 2014 school year you had 128 in your state serving little over 58,020 time report which was just the beginning of week I ranked 14th out of 43 so I know if I'm in the middle. It had a lot of better than a lot of other law number will will and we don't want to get into the room for improvement a little bit later.

During our conversation, North Carolina's numbers. As for as the number total schools.

We have a number of students with the potential schools compared to other states that jurisdiction. Number of charter schools right now.

Your health is not very large district that they met the second largest in the country would have a large number 2 ^ one another when it comes by much of the activity happens at the local level report cited what the law that not respect ranking point event in North Carolina that you've made some changes to your lot now you have far more charter schools in the state, but create a lot of what you have to make sure you holding them accountable to make sure that you are giving them enough funding to be able to perform with quality and funding side of the ledger right now is not very strong in North Carolina. Yes, you are able to open charters but being able to operate them with additional fat probably is actually quite difficult, especially if you're trying to lie behind academic quality versus quantity is an important thing for us to keep in mind because even school choice proponents and so may often think that it's ideal to have more more more. And while we want to provide opportunities for me or the quality of the schools is so critically important in the accountability that you talked about is a real key component of that to make sure that the quality is keeping up with the quality melt.

Nina, your charter school report uses 20 components to measure and compare stakeholder school walls. Obviously, we don't have time today to talk about all 20 of those to give you an opportunity to provide a brief rundown of the components that you consider to be most important for charter school's weight differently so I would say that the hallmark of a strong lives whether there on the number charters you can open that rank well in our rubric. I don't have very strict Mention.

Washington DC has a Allows you to their number 28 year potentially think that Massachusetts have very strict Not only on the numbers they can open on how much money contract from the traditional them what charter schools are the funding really doesn't follow the charter of their choice.

So the text of Far more restrictive and one that we try to we have been trying to eliminate being able to open a variety of charter school so that you are not just confined to a certain type of model, but open to blended learning stem education. I need were attracted to the chartering space is very important in light of this has to do with the regulatory climate in the state quite, quite frankly, not at all, so that jurisdiction in which the charter can operate jurisdiction aboard is not in favor charter school and then there's no capability to act any friends that I would say that I that that this is probably not a welcoming having multiple authorizer. This is where not hear a lot of thought behind week we try to make sure that every law authorizer that it would not able to get approved by one for whatever reason you have a chance to appeal or go to another had to get approved and in North Carolina it is only one path to getting authorizer the charter school, which we need to change. You don't want wanted to have monopoly over that this type of thing that usually make up that quality or are a component that makes for its strong charter school law and in their 20 of the site going on the list, but those are the main ones that would really review that you deem to be most important. I do want to go back and visit one of the issues that you talked about, which was charter school Smile noted with your lot. I had 100 charter school In place for a number of years and then finally in 2011 the North Toronto Gen. assembly removed the cap on the number charter schools in our state, but from your perspective, what is the existence or lack of a Important and Impactful on Charter School Development. I Know That We Saw Not Only a Limitation on the Sheer Number of New Applications That Could Be Filed Based on the Number of Slots That Will Remaining, but It Also Seemed to Have an Impact on the Interest of Potential Charter School Applicants so Poor That Are Not Working to Pursue It If There Were Limited to a Very Limited Number of Slots Available to Question What You Meant, They Will Not Quickly and the Other Warming Wound One More Family That They Want to Replicate Are Not Able to Create Long White People.

The Family That Would Kind of Mentioned. Every Time We Have Open Article in a State That Generated More Interest in Creating What Has Been Lately with a High-Performing so That More Partners We Create, the Longer I Wait, and We Need to Be Able to Chemically Address the Issue and Lifting One Way to Do That. Thank You for That. No Use of the North Carolina Length in This Year's Report Number 14 Compared to Prior Years and I Know That You Had Recommendations about How North Carolina Might Be Able to Improvement. Can You Talk about Those Things. Wilberforce Area Were Most up to Point and That Was Partially Because of Changes You Made to the Renewal Process and Adding What the Process Which Is Something That We like.

In Order to Really Move up to the Rank and Point We Were Involved in the Carolina Lacks Last Year That We Were Not Successful at Passing the Legislation That We Were Aiming to Pass with Unit One Equity and Top of the Reason Why You're Not Able to Scale Your Programs.

There Is Not Enough Money on the Table You Don't Have the Same Amount of Money Following Charter Schools That Are Currently Following Traditional School Addressing Issue Itself Pneumatically or I Would Also Say That Earlier Having Other Authorizer Able to Never Want to Be Beholden on and Authorizing Could Be Great If the Government Whatever Reason, You End up with Someone like Charter School, Then You End up Leaving the Pipeline Altogether so Important to Have Another Body Authorizing Those Two Things Will Dramatically Improve Your Score on Our Model Enjoyed Growing Public Support Nationwide and Fortunately Including Support from Lawmakers, but There Are Still Very Vocal and Sometimes Powerful Critics of Public Charter Schools, Especially within the Public School Establishment in Your Opinion, What Is the Top Move That We Face about Public Charter Schools Which You Feel Really Needs to Be Debarked. The Public Nature of the Appointment Where There Confusion with the Public for Charter Schools. They Don't Know That Our Opposition Job Finding What Charter School and Pointing Aspect of Chartering, Which May Not Squarely Traditional Model so That It Public, Redefining the Word Public That It Understand That You Can Be Public in the Government Entity Other Than the Holistic, Making Sure That Everyone Understand Open Enrollment and If You Have Something Happening at the General Steps That Were Open to All We Have To Step out. If We Don't Have Enough Room in Our Small We Have To Conduct the Lottery Randomly, so the Public Nature to Me Important Thing That the Opposition about Is This Notion of High Public-Private Argument.

Corporations Are Taking over the Chartering Though I Respect Again That It That the Greatest Myth of the Percent of the Country. I Governed by Operators on Governed by Charter Management, Patient That Have Created One in 20 Charter in a State or in the Region, Though They're Not Really My Corporate Takeover You're Thinking about Starbucks and Walmart.

Talking about That Did Well in Open Another School Next Door and Whatnot That 20% of Them Are Governed by Nonprofit and Better Better Aiming and Their Footprint, Primarily Because They're Doing a Good Job, and 12% of Them Are Operated by For-Profit Operators Also Include Online Time for This Week to Give You an Opportunity to Little Listeners Know Where They Can Go to Get a Copy of Your New Report Measuring up to the Model and Also to Learn More about the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools so You Think Are Public Charters.org Website Can Also Follow Us on Twitter at Charter Line Will Be a Lease with That.

I Want to Thank You so Much for Being with Us on Family Policy Matters and for Your Great Work Promoting Public Charter Schools across Our Nation and for Supporting School Choice and We Encourage Our Listeners to Take Advantage of the Resources That You Have Available and Again Thanks Much for All That You Do Family Policy Matters. Information and Analysis, Future of the North Carolina Family Policy Council Join Us Weekly for Discussion on Policy Issues Affecting the Family. If You Have Questions or Comments, Please Contact 919807081 or Visit Our Website and See Family Doctor Watching