Georgia charter schools do no better than traditional public schools

Let's look at Georgia's non-unionized public schools. So far as I know, Georgia does not have teachers' unions. But there's still no reason to believe charter schools in Georgia would be any more magic than in Chicago.

According to CREDO at Stanford University, which has done state-by-state charter school studies, they find CHARTER SCHOOLS IN GEORGIA PERFORM SIGNIFICANTLY BELOW THEIR TRADITIONAL PUBLIC SCHOOL PEERS IN MATH: No Difference Found in Reading Performance. That's their press release. Here's the detailed study.

So if someone has a charter school idea that they think will perform better than public schools, they can talk to their local school board about that, and maybe that local board will agree. There's no need to authorize an unelected Atlanta board to force that charter school on us.

Vote No on the charter school amendment in November.

-jsq

Comments

[Don Thieme]

This is not part of common knowledge, unfortunately. The advocates for this takeover of local school systems are able to campaign in favor of it. Teachers and school boards have been blocked by legal maneuvers from campaigning against it.

[Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange]

You can help make it common knowledge. And the state can't stop the rest of us from distributing the joint resolution of the Lowndes and Valdosta school boards, which gets at the main point: the amendment isn't really about charter schools, which any local school board already can approve; it's about giving an unelected Atlanta committee power to force us to accept charter schools and pay extra for them out of our local tax dollars while squeezing public schools even more than they have been for the past decade.
http://lake.typepad.com/on-the-lake-front/2012/10/joint-resolution-in-support-of-quality-public-education-lowndes-and-valdosta-boards-of-education.html
-jsq

[Karen Noll]

The Stanford study also found that multiple authorizers ".... Significantly lower growth in academic learning in their students, on the order of -.08 standard evictions.". (p. 4) Currently we have the local boards of education that authorize charter schools at a very high rate, 94%. If the charter is not approved by the local board then they can appeal to the Dept of Ed. For approval. So, by adding another authorizer in the form of the UNCONSTITUTIONAL charter school commission you simply reduce the academic learning of the students! This is not about education this amendment is about the money earned by some to keep power! Our constitution states that we have an obligation to provide free quality education to all Georgians. We have no obligation to line the pockets of the rich with our tax dollars!