Reason Foundation

New at Reason: Looking Back at the Last Year in Education Reform and School Choice

Posted on April 29, 2013, 9:00am | Leonard Gilroy

The rollout of Reason Foundation's Annual Privatization Report 2013 continues today with the release of the Education section—authored by Reason's Katie Furtick and Lisa Snell—which provides an overview of the latest on school choice, charter schools, student-based budgeting and more. Topics include:

• 2012 School Choice Roundup In the States
• School Choice Performance in 2012
• Charter School Market Share for 2012
• Charter Schools Nationally Recognized in 2012
• Public Opinion of School Choice in 2012
• High-Achieving Charter Schools Serve Diverse Demands of their Communities
• Weighted Student Formula in the States

» Annual Privatization Report 2013: Education
» Complete Annual Privatization Report 2013

Chicago Schools to Implement Student-Based Budgeting and Principal Autonomy

Posted on March 18, 2013, 4:45pm | Katie Furtick

In the 2013-2014 school year, the third largest school district in the country - Chicago Public Schools (CPS) - will join other districts across the country in moving from funding institutions to funding students. Student-based budgeting - also known as weighted student formula or backpacking - is a more equitable, decentralized method of funding schools where money follows the child and principals are given more autonomy over their school's budget.

For the past six years CPS implemented a pilot program on student-based budgeting covering 40 schools city-wide. CPS CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett and Chicago Mayor Rham Emanuel have recognized the success of the program and champion full implementation of student-based budgeting.

But, not everyone is a fan of student-based budgeting.

Earlier this week, Chicago Teachers Union Vice President Jesse Sharkey released a statement warning about the dangers of Chicago Public School's (CPS) decision to move away from the outdated and complex school funding formulas currently in place, and toward the simpler and more equitable per-pupil school funding.

Sharkey argues that the per-pupil funding would promote discrimination among veteran teachers by incentivizing principals to hire less expensive novice teachers, and that there are oversight concerns over principals having more autonomy over their budgets.

There is little evidence from other districts that have implemented student-based funding that principals routinely discriminate against veteran teachers. On the other hand, the current school funding formula actually discriminates against a more vulnerable demographic - students.

Under the current funding formula CPS provides a regular classroom teacher for every 28 students in K-3^rd grade, and for every 31 students in 4^th grade and higher. Also for every 750 students the district provides an assistant principal, an art or music teacher, and a librarian or gym teacher. The district simply averages salaries across schools and reports school-level resources based on a district average. In reality, schools which have more senior staff get more dollars.

Seniority and personnel costs may result in vastly different per-pupil spending from one school to another even with similar students at each school. A US Department of Education study based on the school-level reporting requirement of the ARRA stimulus funds, found that more than 40 percent of schools that receive federal money to serve disadvantaged students through Title I spent less state and local money on teachers and other personnel than schools that don't receive federal money at the same grade level in the same district. The federal analysis identified 300 Chicago public schools that were receiving less money than the average non-Title I school. These schools had an average of 89 percent poverty and these low-spending Title I schools in Chicago had average per-pupil expenditures that were 13 percent below the average for non-Title I schools ($3,780 vs. $4,329).

Student-based budgeting is an efficient and transparent way to remedy funding inequities for the most disadvantaged students by funding schools with actual dollars rather than staffing positions. Baltimore Public Schools, for example, has made great strides in terms of within-district equity from one school to another since implementing their own form of student-based budgeting in the 2008-09 school year - Fair Student Funding.

In 2008, only 52 percent of Baltimore public schools were within 10 percent of the district's median per-pupil expenditure. By 2012, 81 percent of the district schools were within 10 percent of the median-funded school. In fact, in an analysis by Education Resource Strategies, Baltimore was shown to have the highest percentage of schools within 10 percent of the median per-pupil spending when compared with several similar districts.

Not only is student-based budgeting a more equitable way of funding students, it provides a more transparent and stable way to fund schools. Rather than have many complicated budgeting formulas for different schools, student-based budgeting applies one simple formulas across all schools. Also, by allowing money to follow students rather than set enrollment numbers there is more stability in funding. Under the current CPS formula, if a school falls short on the number of students enrolled in a given year by even one student it creates a fiscal cliff where the school could lose a teacher or two. Many times principals have had to cut back on supplies and equipment to avoid losing their staff, which can be disruptive to students.

Student-based budgeting is not unique to Chicago Public Schools. Over 30 school systems across the country have shifted to funding their schools through a type of student-based budgeting. Principals at these schools have successfully managed their school budgets after being given the flexibility they need to make the decisions that are best for their schools and their students.

Under student-based budgeting, CPS principals will gain autonomy over 50 percent of school budgets which will be directed to core instruction including hiring teachers, support personal, supplies, and additional instructional programs. The remaining 50 percent of the schools budget will continue to be allocated through the old funding formula for non-core instruction funding, including supplemental general state aid money for special education, magnet schools, International Baccalaureate, limited English proficiency programs, STEM, bilingual students, and Title I. Once principals complete their budgets, they must submit and get them approved by the district financial offices.

As stated by CPS CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett, "Great schools are led by strong leaders. They set high standards and they know how to best support their students. They should have the autonomy to decide how to direct their resources toward the most important people in any school - their students."

CPS administrators and teachers must make their students their first priority. By implementing student-based budgeting, CPS is making a good start at increasing equity, spending transparency from one school to another, and ultimately student performance as principals have more control over using their resources to drive improvements in instruction and achievement.

Innovators in Action: Transforming Education in Douglas County, Colorado

Posted on August 29, 2012, 11:00am | Harris Kenny

Everybody’s talking about education reform and it’s easy to understand why. America’s education system is outdated and broken. While national leaders opine on the subject, a groundbreaking transformation is underway at the local level in Douglas County, Colorado. Douglas County is a short drive south of Denver, but its education community (including students, parents, teachers and administrators) is stealing the spotlight from Colorado’s capital city.

There are no simple answers to reforming the education system, so I sat down with Douglas County School District Superintendent Dr. Elizabeth Fagen to discuss in detail what's happening on the ground in her district. This interview is the latest in Reason Foundation's Innovators in Action 2012 series, highlights from the interview include:

• The first-ever district-led school choice program, known as the Choice Scholarship Pilot Program, for 500 students in the 2011-12 school year;
• The subsequent legal battle with the American Civil Liberties Union over the Choice Scholarship Pilot Program;
• The district's decision to not sign an exclusive bargaining agreement with a teacher's union that would represent the entire district;
• The broader twenty-seven strategy approach to reforming the education system, including things like performance-based pay and principal empowerment; and much more.

Simply put, this interview is a must-read -- check it out online here.

[Note to readers: In previous years, we have published Innovators in Action in an annual report format, the last edition having been released in early 2010. The publication has been on a temporary hiatus since then, but we have resumed publication in a slightly different format. In order to deliver timely content to our readers on a more frequent schedule, we're publishing one Innovators article per month on reason.org. Other articles featured in the Innovators in Action 2012 series are available here.]

With School Choice Everyone Wins: Including Kids Taking Care of Their Sick Mothers.

Posted on June 14, 2012, 2:49pm | Lisa Snell

Keven Teasley from the GEO Foundation in Indianapolis, which incubates high-quality charter schools and then supports their growth, sends word of their positive outcomes for charter school students and one student's story makes the compelling case for why we need school choice instead of  a one-size-fits all education. Kevin writes:

We are also celebrating the overwhelming community response to our new charter, Gary Middle College.  We planned to open this fall with 100 students but have received more than 225 applications.  We will be expanding our enrollment to 125 and planning to enroll more next year.  One young scholar applied because she can't go to a traditional school.  She needs to take care of her mother during the day because her father works during the day.  She can go to school at night--when GMC is open--while her father takes care of her mother.  

The GEO Foundation is an example of the kind of third party organiations that compete with school districts to govern and develop schools when the money is decentralized and follows students. The GEO Foundation is setting a high standard for charter schools in Indiana and shows that competition and choice can hep students and teachers but can also lead to competition between the best models for school governanace and human capitol development. Some more good news from GEO Foundation includes:

In Colorado Springs, we are partnering with Peter Hilts, former principal of the Classical Academy, one of the state's largest, oldest and BEST charter schools.  Peter is helping us bring Core Knowledge to Pikes Peak Prep, and lead the enrollment growth at the school.  With Peter's assistance, the school just received a donation of 8 2-classroom portables that will help the school double its enrollment over the next few years. 

Pikes Peak Prep received a "Governor's Award" from the Colorado Department of Education this year for its academic excellence, too.    

In Gary, we are celebrating having the only "A" charter school in all of Gary, Indiana. The school also boasts a 100% graduation rate and is the highest performing charter school in Gary.  The school is 94% poverty and received a $1.25 million renewable three-year grant this year to help grow and improve the high school opportunities.

The more we decentralize the funding at every level of school finance, the more organizations like the GEO Foundation have the opportunity to take on the status quo of school governance.

Chicago Teaches 30 Percent Raise or STRIKE Ultimatum

Posted on June 13, 2012, 6:34pm | Lisa Snell

Ignoring the economic crisis and the political reality facing teachers and unions this week more than 90 percent of Chicago teachers voted to authorize a strike if they cannot reach an agreement with the school board and Mayor Rahm Emanuel by the fall.

The Chicago teachers are demanding close to a 30 percent pay raise and class size capped at 23 students. As Allysia Finley pointed out in the Wall Street Journal: 

The union is demanding a 30% raise over the next two years and class sizes capped at 23 students. Mr. Emanuel wants to give teachers a 2% raise next year and establish a merit pay pilot program. The unions say they're entitled to more money since the district is requiring teachers to work 90 more minutes a day and 10 more days a year. A new law—which the state legislature passed almost unanimously last year—allows the district to impose such changes unilaterally.

The average Chicago teacher makes $76,450, nearly 30% more than the typical private sector worker in Cook County—and teachers work two months less a year. Their last five-year contract called for 4% annual raises. However, the district rescinded teachers' raises last year because its deficit ballooned to $700 million. Its deficit is projected to grow to more than $1 billion in the next two years due to soaring pension costs. Teachers can retire at age 60 with an annuity equal to 75% of their highest average salary, meaning that teachers earn more in retirement than most Chicagoans do on the job.

And Lindsey Burke at the Heritage Foundation describes just why the teachers believe they deserve the 30 percent raise:

The union argues that Mayor Rahm Emanuel (D) wants to extend the school day, and that the requested salary increase would compensate them for extending the school day from 5.5 hours—among the nation’s shortest school days—to 7.5 hours. Chicago Public Schools states that under the extended school day:

On average teachers will provide 5.5 hours of instruction (an increase of 54 minutes), receive a 45-minute duty-free lunch and 60-minute prep period and supervise the passing period. They will also be required to be on-site for 10 minutes before and after school.

The HORROR Never Stops. Oh for a 7.5 hour day, 10 months a year.

The Chicago teacher hard-line seems ill advised given where popular opinion about teachers unions is these days. The Wisconsin recall outcome notwithstanding, a new poll by Harvard's Program on Education Policy and Governance and the journal Education Next found that the share of the public with a positive view of union impact on local schools has dropped by seven percentage points in the past year. Among teachers, the decline was an even more remarkable 16 points.

And it’s not just public opinion; union membership has been falling at an alarming pace. According to the Education Intelligence Agency:

You have to go all the way back to 1999-2000 to find an NEA budget with membership projections as low as the ones for 2013-14. NEA is planning for a cumulative loss of 346,000 full-time equivalent active, working members from its high-water mark just three years ago. That would be a drop of almost 15 percent.

While there is still a good chance a strike will be averted, the Chicago teachers willingness to threaten a strike as the main negotiating chip for demands that far exceed the compensation and pensions of the average Chicago worker, will not be the strategy they need to bolster the public employee union image nationwide. All indicators point to the fact that regular people, who make less money and have far less attractive benefits, are tired of paying more  to support unsustainable compensation and benefits for teachers. 

Federal Public School Food Police Fine Utah School $15k for Leaving Vending Machine Plugged in During Lunch.

Posted on May 17, 2012, 1:05pm | Lisa Snell

As "The Blaze" reports: 

A Utah high school is learning the hard way that the government is serious about nudging students away from food it doesn't want them to consume. Davis High School in the Salt Lake City area is having to fork over a whopping $15,000 in fines to the Feds because it accidentally sold soda through a vending machine during lunch.

Federal law requires the school to turn off its soda machines during the lunch period, which is 47 minutes a day. And Davis High school did turn off the machines in the lunch room. However, the school didn't realize that there was another machine in the school bookstore that wasn't being turned off. And when the food police realized it, the school was hit with a $0.75 fine per student for the duration of the offense. 

And this is especially unfair because all the evidence suggests that soda and snack bans in schools don't work. As the Washington Post and many others have reported:

Jennifer Van Hook and Claire Altman looked at a sample of 20,000 students who began kindergarten in 1998, and checked in on their height and weight in fifth and eighth grade. They couldn't find any significant link between higher obesity rates and schools that allowed vending machines selling snacks and soda. "The results suggest that the sale of competitive foods [which compete with traditional school foods, such as soda and snacks] in school is unassociated with weight gain among middle school children," they write.

Policies that limit the availability of candy bars, chips and soda have become popular in recent years; 23 states place some kind of restriction on what foods can be sold in schools. Why does this study find that such policies don't necessarily reduce childhood obesity? A lot of factors could be at play. Students that don't have access to soda in schools tend to increase their consumption of sugary drinks at home, a 2011 study in the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine found.

In addition, it turns out that like everyone else school kids are good at developing black markets when soda and snacks are banned. As this article explains: LA school district lunch program spawns thriving junk food black market. 

Green Dot Charter Schools Raise Performance for Long-Suffering Locke High School

Posted on May 14, 2012, 4:10pm | Lisa Snell

Reason first told the story of the struggle of Locke high school parents and teachers to have their school run by Green Dot charter schools in the Drew Carey piece: Education Revolt in Watts.

Now there is good news out of Locke high school. Students are doing much better on multiple indicators under Green Dot management. As this new UCLA study reports:

Students at historically low-performing Locke High School in South Los Angeles, which recently was transformed into five smaller charter schools, are now performing better than their traditional-school peers in a number of key academic areas, according to a multi-year study conducted by the National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing at UCLA (CRESST). 

CRESST's evaluation, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, looked at two groups of ninth graders who started in 2007 and 2008 - just after the charter-school group Green Dot Public Schools assumed operational control of Locke from the Los Angeles Unified School district and initiated a series of major curriculum and faculty changes. The UCLA researchers followed the students for three years. 

The study found that the Green Dot Locke students were more likely to stay in school, to take and pass important college preparatory classes, and to score higher on the state high school exit exam on their first attempt than students at demographically similar high schools in the LAUSD. The study authors called the transformation of Locke "an impressive success story" and found that the charter had achieved "consistent, positive effects on a range of student outcomes." The UCLA CRESST evaluation is ongoing. 

The full UCLA report is here.

And Fast Company has an extensive story on the news and other positive results at Locke:

Rather than centrally manage every school, each Green Dot charter is run like a startup: the staff is given broad discretionary powers over finance, faculty are given the reins to innovate with new curriculum, and the union contract is performance-based rather than a guarantee of minimum work requirements. To maintain its unusual level of collaboration, a Green Dot overhaul physically splits schools into autonomous units of around 500 students (in some cases, by using chicken wire for temporary walls).

A UCLA-Gates Foundation study released today shows that Green Dot's prescription is paying off, with 25% higher graduation rates (80% vs. 55%) and 35% higher college readiness (48% vs. 13%). Green Dot even managed to bring sanity to one of LA's worst schools, Locke, where rival gangs maintained control over bathrooms and students regularly set hanging artwork on fire.

Green Dot was able to achieve these positive results without cherry picking students and they were able to have better outcomes while enrolling students in more challenging classes. 

And as Dr. Jay P. Greene recently argued when we look at gold standard randomized studies charter school benefits are proven by the best evidence.

24 High-Performing Los Angeles Unified Schools Plan to Become Charter Schools

Posted on May 14, 2012, 3:35pm | Lisa Snell

In "The School District is Dead, Long Live the Schools," I wrote about the emerging trend of high-performing traditional schools converting to charters schools  to get more flexibility and control of their financial resources. This growing trend is distinct from the traditional trajectory of charter schools that have developed to serve students in poor performing public schools. Los Angeles Unified is embracing this trend. As the Los Angeles Times reports:

Two dozen high-performing Los Angeles schools are seeking to become charter campuses in search of more money and increased flexibility.

The list reads like an honor roll of academic excellence. Every school has surpassed the state's target score of 800 on the Academic Performance Index, which is based on standardized tests.

Although many of the schools considered the move in hopes of greater funding, campus officials said they also began to see the benefits of increased freedom over such things as curriculum, testing and schedules. "Finance is one key factor but not the only one," said Jose Cole-Gutierrez, who directs the charter school division of the L.A. Unified School District.

The interesting twist is that Los Angeles Unified appears to be encouraging these schools to become charters. This again begs the questions are central offices and school districts going to become obsolete?  Why not have all charter districts like New Orleans? As I said in the earlier Reason piece:

The bottom line is that charter schools give school leaders, teachers, and parents much more control over staffing and finances while also freeing them from the economic consequences of belonging to a district that has been in financial distress for decades. A school district may become financially bankrupt, but individual schools can live on through the charter school process. It raises the question: As a nation, should we continue to support large school districts at the expense of individual schools and students?

Philadelphia Schools to Follow New Orleans Market Education Lead Without a Hurricane?

Posted on April 25, 2012, 11:44am | Lisa Snell

Philadelphia plans to revolutionize its school system by closing schools, moving to an all-charter or autonomous school district, ditching the central office, and privatizing school services with outside vendors.

As the Philadelphia Inquirer reports:

So, at the SRC's direction, Chief Recovery Officer Thomas Knudsen on Tuesday announced a plan that would essentially blow up the district and start with a new structure.

The plan - subject to public comment and SRC approval - would close 40 schools next year and 64 by 2017, move thousands more students to charters, and dismantle the central office in favor of "achievement networks" that would compete to run groups of 25 schools and would sign performance-based contracts. . . .

Forget the command-and-control district structure. It's archaic and it doesn't work, officials said.

Instead of orders coming from a large central office that runs 249 schools, much of the power would be concentrated in the new achievement networks.

Those would represent "a breaking-apart of the district," Knudsen said. They would be "a group of people who choose to do business with the SRC and the central office to run" from 20 to 25 schools organized either by geography or by some other theme.

Successful principals or district staff could apply to run an achievement network. So could charter organizations, or universities, or a combination of those groups.

Principals would answer to the achievement networks, although they would remain district employees. The achievement networks would have contracts with the SRC, and would have to meet performance goals or risk being replaced.

The achievement network structure "creates an entrepreneurial approach, a flexibility, a nimbleness, a willingness to experiment," Knudsen said.

The current academic divisions - formerly called regions, clusters, and districts - will be gone as of this summer. Pilot achievement networks will be in place this fall, with a formal rollout in 2014.

Schools would have much more autonomy, with the ability to choose their own curriculums.

Though there is some precedent for this kind of work - officials pointed to the decentralization in New York City public schools - Ramos noted that what Philadelphia is proposing "is different from what many other places are doing."

The central office, already half the size it was a year ago, will shrink further, from over 1,000 employees a few years ago to about 200 in the new model. 

This model has been working well in New Orleans where more than 80 percent of students are in charter schools without a central office and in several other districts that have decentralized control to the parents and the schools. Philadelphia is moving toward the sea change in school governance and school funding that is happening across the United States.  More than 30 "school funding portability" funding systems are funding students through a student-based budgeting mechanism in cities like New York, Baltimore, Denver, Hartford and Cincinnati. In 2011, Rochester, Newark and Boston have moved to full weighted student formula systems where the money follows the child. Los Angeles Unified is moving from 100 pilot schools being funded based on per-pupil basis to all 800 schools funded based on where the student enrolls. In Louisiana, 7 school districts are piloting a student-based budgeting system, including the largest school district in the state, Jefferson Parish, with 50,000 students. New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Indiana have all recently changed their statewide school funding systems to a state formula where the money is attached to the child. These kind of systems support a level playing field for charters and district schools and do not give schools a residential advantage. 

There are many interesting details of the plan at the Philadelphia Inquirer so read all about it here.

New Orleans is Already Demonstrating What will be Possible When We Open Up School Markets

Posted on April 19, 2012, 1:44pm | Lisa Snell

As Fast Company reports not only is New Orleans the most market-oriented education system in the United States but it is becoming an open-source platform to test and nurture new innovative education ideas from teachers that are attracting large investments from venture capitalists.

"If you're an edtech entrepreneur who wants to pilot an idea, you have the most efficient and smartest market in the country here," says Matt Candler, CEO of 4.0 Schools. That's because instead of a centralized bureaucracy, there are more than 40 schools making independent decisions on both hiring and procurement. Organizations like KIPP, Teach for America, and the Gates Foundation have established beachheads, drawing top teachers and fresh blood from all over the country. These are intersecting with a nascent startup scene dubbed "Silicon Bayou" to produce a hothouse of ideas to change education: for-profit and nonprofit, from school redesigns to apps, often from younger, female entrepreneurs.

This is why Neerav Kingsland the chief strategy officer of New Schools for New Orleans has the most important message ever for everyone who works in the public school system. In "An Open Letter to Urban Superintendents in the United States of America" he writes:

In the following letter I aim to convince you of this: the single most important reform strategy you can undertake is to increase charter school quality and market share in your city--with the ultimate aim of turning your district into a charter school district.

In other words: rid yourself of the notion that your current opinions on curriculum, teacher evaluation, technology, or anything else will be the foundation for dramatic gains in student achievement. If history tells us anything, they will not be.

Read the whole thing to learn so much more about why we should be replicating New Orleans in cities across America.

Caine Monroy: The New Poster Child for School Choice in America

Posted on April 19, 2012, 1:29pm | Lisa Snell

The New York Times chronicles the compelling story of Caine Monroy an inspiration to kids and adults alike:

On an industrial street lined with auto repair shops, there are few signs that this is the home of an Internet sensation. But slow down at the end of the block, just off the freeway in eastern Los Angeles, where a 9-year-old boy has created a makeshift arcade in his father's auto parts store with balls, cardboard boxes and tape.

A few days ago, few people had heard of Caine Monroy, who worked for hours last summer in the store making simple games out of discarded boxes from the junkyard. Now, eager children, television crews and curious supporters stop by almost incessantly, captivated by an 11-minute film featuring Caine that has been viewed more than five million times on the Internet in the last 10 days. His college fund has ballooned to more than $170,000, driven by donations to a Web site created by the filmmaker.

Caine Monroy could also be the new poster child for school choice in America. While his story gives us all hope about what is still possible in America with entrepreneurial spirit, there is also a school choice angle--in that now Caine and his father can afford a private school or tutor to help Caine who struggles with reading. How many other kids like Caine Monroy are bright kids out there in our world and are going to schools that are not meeting their basic academic needs? Most will not be saved by a viral video.

Why Condoleezza Rice, Joel Klein, and the Council on Foreign Relations are Wrong About Common Core and National Standards and Why these Standards will Stifle School Choice in America

Posted on March 23, 2012, 2:41pm | Lisa Snell

In a new Reason commentary, I argue that Condoleezza Rice, Joel Klein and the Council of Foreign Relations are wrong about national standards and that they will impede school choice in America.

While the embrace of school choice by the commission is encouraging, adopting common core and national standards is actually counterproductive to competitive education efforts. Why embrace competition and then set an arbitrary national ceiling for academic standards that is sure to stifle or slow at least some of the academic innovation that would arise out of more competition in K-12 schools?

I explore this contradiction in the Council on Foreign Relations report and the evidence for school choice and against national standards.

In Louisiana the education money will REALLY follow the child.

Posted on February 28, 2012, 12:37pm | Lisa Snell

This is pretty significant. In many voucher programs there may be separate funding or appropriations for the program from the state, but in Louisiana the state board just voted to allow the state funding formula to follow the child to a private school. This means that the program could actually save money if private tuition is less than the public school cost and that schools will feel real competition as the money is attached to the backs of children. Since Louisiana has a robust charter sector and is working to allow student-based budgeting where the money follows the child to public schools, Louisiana is on the road to becoming a state model for education funding, where the money would be attached to children and the state would allow the parent to select between any public, private, or nonprofit school.

As reported in the Times Picayune:

Louisiana's new superintendent of education, John White, took a first step Monday toward opening the spigot of state and local tax dollars to expand the use of private school vouchers statewide. Gov. Bobby Jindal is pushing to expand a small pilot voucher program that's already up and running in New Orleans, hoping to offer aid to pay private or parochial tuition for low-income families across the state.

But the governor's office hadn't spelled out exactly how the state will pay for it. Money for the pilot program, running about $9.5 million this year, was approved as a special appropriation in the state Legislature.

But that may change beginning next school year. White, who took over at the state Department of Education last month with Jindal's backing, got approval from the state school board Monday to start paying for the vouchers in New Orleans by drawing from the same pool of money set aside for public schools.And that means if Jindal's proposal to expand the voucher program gains traction at the legislative session this spring, funding for it will already be in place.

Join Reason Foundation for National School Choice Week 2012 in New Orleans on Saturday, January 21

Posted on January 11, 2012, 1:17pm | Lisa Snell

You're invited to join Reason Foundation and other advocates of School Choice at the official kickoff event for National School Choice Week 2012 in New Orleans on Saturday, January 21, 2012.

First, the details:

Saturday, January 21, 2012

Lakefront Arena at the University of New Orleans

6801 Franklin Avenue, New Orleans, LA 70122

10:30 AM to 12:30 PM

RSVP online at http://www.schoolchoiceweek.com/official_kickoff

It's going to be a huge party, with musical performances by The Temptations and Ellis Marsalis , and thousands of likeminded students, parents, teachers, and community activists who are celebrating school choice across the country. In addition to these legendary entertainers, you'll hear from elected officials, celebrities, and students, parents, and teachers who will share how school choice has given them a chance at a quality education. In fact, if you represent a school choice organization, National School Choice Week will even provide you with a free table on our concourse to distribute materials on-site.

Reason Foundation is an integral planning partner for National School Choice Week (January 22-28, 2012), and we're so excited to invite you to attend this huge party and help raise awareness about school choice. And this is just the first party of the week! Between January 22-28, thousands of Americans will come together at seminars, rallies, schools, movies, and other places to shine a spotlight on the need for effective education options for children. 

Please RSVP online at http://www.schoolchoiceweek.com/official_kickoff and remember to invite your friends and family. Everyone is welcome to this massive celebration of school choice!

Charter Schools more like Vouchers: New Jersey Edition

Posted on November 16, 2011, 12:37pm | Lisa Snell

^{Legislation signed by Gov. Chris Christie will allow private schools in struggling districts to become charter schools. In this case it works just like vouchers where the money follows the child to the private school that the parent chooses.} 

^{Under the legislation (A2806/S1858), high-performing private schools can apply to the state education commissioner to make the change. Because charter schools receive public funding, parochial schools making the transition will be barred from religious instruction or displaying religious symbols.}

^{Christie said the law will help "ensure that more students are stepping into classrooms that will give them a better education and a brighter future." But he said the Democratic-controlled Legislature continues to stall other pieces of his education agenda, including school vouchers and merit pay for teachers.}

^{"These reforms must be taken up now; we cannot ask children in failing schools to wait any longer while these reforms sit untouched in Trenton," Christie said.}

Charter School Market Share: D.C. Edition

Posted on November 7, 2011, 12:18pm | Lisa Snell

According to the Washington Post, Washington DC charters may soon be the majority school system like New Orleans.  Charter students are gaining... #winning

October count came in at 46,191--that's down 419 students, about six-tenths of a percent-- from last fall's 46,515. That was when the District received a 1.6 percent bump over 2009.

The city's public charter schools continued their robust growth. The Public Charter School Board reported unaudited enrollment at 32,009--an 8.2 percent boost over last October's 29,557.

School District is Dead, Long Live the Schools: Oakland Edition

Posted on November 4, 2011, 12:57pm | Lisa Snell

In a new piece at Reason.com on the Oakland charter school revolution I tell the story of how charter schools are not just for low-performing schools anymore. Successful public schools want the charter advantage too:

The majority of charter schools have started in urban areas with long histories of trapping kids in failing schools and reflect the story line told in the documentary Waiting For Superman, where desperate disadvantaged children vie for their spot in the local charter school. In addition, there has been a larger trend towards low-performing schools being restructured as charter schools, as in the Detroit proposal to convert 41 schools to charters to offer kids higher-quality education and save the school district money. And New Orleans, where 80 percent of kids are now enrolled in charter schools, stands alone as a city that successfully built a charter school Mecca out of the ruins of disaster where the money now follows the kids to any school in the city. In all of these cases the charter school growth has the "hostile takeover" flavor of kids fleeing a failing public school system.

Ascend and Learning Without Limits flip that trend. These high-quality public schools want the charter advantage for themselves. They want relief from collective bargaining, from central office mandates, and most significantly from the huge school district debts that leave less money for the students. And these Oakland schools are not alone. For example, in March 2011, the Los Angeles school board approved the charter petition of El Camino Real high school, which holds the national record for U.S. Academic Decathlon championships and maintains top test scores in the district. This reflects an ongoing trend of Los Angeles schools opting for freedom from district regulations by shifting to charter status. In fact, at 80,000 students, Los Angeles boasts the most charter students of any district in the nation. After the school board vote, former Superintendent Ramon Cortines told the Associated Press that he expects the conversion trend to continue and foresees the day when the district's enrollment of 650,000 will plummet to 400,000.

A Sea Change for School Funding in America

Posted on October 21, 2011, 12:49pm | Lisa Snell

In the United States, we are in a great transition period, moving from funding institutions to funding students. K-12 education funding, across multiple sectors, is moving closer to how we fund higher education in the United States. We are moving away from a system funded by local resources and driven by residential assignment to a system where funding is driven by parental choice and put in the child's rhetorical "backpack."

At Learning Matters an affiliate of PBS Newshour, I make the case in an online debate on school funding  that "money should follow students." I reprise the my point in the debate below, but go to read the debate to see what other education experts have to say.

In 2011, there are now 26 school voucher and tax credit programs in 15 states with close to $1 billion in school funding following students to schools. There are more than 2 million students enrolled in charter schools with more than 100 cities with 10 percent or more charter-school market share. In New Orleans, for example, 80 percent of students are enrolled in charter schools with money attached to the student and following the student to the school of choice.

Taking this even one step further, with the growth of digital learning and the need to customize education at all levels, we are beginning to see examples where not only will school funding follow students to the school, but to multiple education-service providers. In Utah, for example, the Statewide Online Education Program allows high school students to select courses from multiple high-quality course options and multiple course providers, while still being enrolled in their public high school. The money follows the kids to the course selection. In April 2011, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed into law Arizona Empowerment Accounts. Empowerment Accounts allow parents - in this case, parents of special-needs children - to remove their children from the public-school system and receive the money the state would have spent on them in an education savings account. Every quarter, the state deposits up to 90 percent of the base support level of state funding into a parent-controlled ESA. Parents can then use that money to pay for a variety of educational options including private-school tuition, private tutoring, special education services, homeschooling expenses, textbooks, and virtual education, enabling them to customize an education for their child's unique needs.

Traditional public school funding systems at the state and local level are also adapting to a "school funding portability" framework where state and local funding is attached to the students and given directly to the institution in which the child enrolls. More than 30 "school funding portability" funding systems are funding student through a student-based budgeting mechanism in cities like New York, Baltimore, Denver, Hartford and Cincinnati. In 2011, Rochester, Newark and Boston have moved to full weighted student formula systems where the money follows the child. Los Angeles Unified is moving from 100 pilot schools being funded based on per-pupil basis to all 800 schools funded based on where the student enrolls. In Louisiana, 7 school districts are piloting a student-based budgeting system, including the largest school district in the state, Jefferson Parish, with 50,000 students. New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Indiana have all recently changed their statewide school funding systems to a state formula where the money is attached to the child.

As Indiana's Tribune Star reported "Of all the sweeping legislative changes coming to K-12 education, from private-school vouchers to performance-based pay for teachers, the one that may have the most impact is tucked inside the 270-page budget bill. It changes the way schools are funded, following a new formula to divvy up nearly $13 billion in K-12 education dollars. The new formula follows the mantra that "money follows the child." As Representative Ed Clere, who sits on the House Education Committee explained "The new formula is a "sea change" from the past. We're no longer funding schools. We're funding students."

In Louisiana Student-Based Budgeting Logical Extension of Charter School Movement

Posted on October 21, 2011, 12:30pm | Lisa Snell

In light of Saturday's state school board elections in Louisiana, The Pelican Institute's Kevin Mooney makes the case that "strong performing charter schools in the Recovery School District (RSD) make a compelling case for even greater decentralization in Louisiana's education system, according to the proponents of student based budgeting." This is especially true now that 80 percent of students in New Orleans are enrolled in charter schools where the "money follows the child" and student outcomes are moving in positive directions on multiple indicators from test scores to graduation rates. The Reason Foundation has been involved in a two year project to help the "money to follow every child" in Louisiana to the school in which they enroll.

As the Pelican Institute reports:  

Last November, the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) began studying the new budgetary concept at the behest of the state's Streamlining Commission.  Under current policy, state money is allocated to each school district and the district officials determine how much money each school receives. But there is a better way to maximize resources and direct money into the classroom, Lisa Snell, the director of Education and Child Welfare at the California-based Reason Foundation, said.

"We've learned from the charter school movement that decentralization has its advantages," Snell explained. "One of the problems we see at the federal, level and district level is that there are a lot of rules about how to spend money and principals are held accountable for student achievement. But the principals have very little input how resources are directed in specific instances. They should have more autonomy over how resources are aligned toward their school's instructional goals."

The idea behind student based budgeting (SBB) is for school dollars to be dispersed on a per-pupil basis and to follow individual students into schools where the principals determine how the money is best spent. Snell made the case for SBB last year before a BESE task force. She was joined by three other presenters from across the country who have successfully implemented the new budgetary method in their districts.

Matt Hill, an administrative officer for the Los Angeles Unified School District, told task force members that assigning financial resources directly to schools had allowed for each school to have greater flexibility to make specific decisions in spending, which in turn improved student performance. Jason Willis, a former budget director with the Oakland Unified School District, said some tasks are better suited to "economies of scale" at the central office, but most duties associated with "enhancements to learning" were better dealt with at the school level.

BESE has authorized a pilot program set to go into full effect next year that includes at least six different parishes: Jefferson, Sabine, Terrebonne, Assumption, Lafourche and Iberville. Officials with St. John the Baptist indicated earlier this year that they may not take part in the pilot after initially signing up, but the parish has not officially withdrawn, Penny Dastugue, the BESE president said. She anticipates the pilot program will yield useful information for school officials over the next several months.

"This is a voluntary way for districts to explore new concepts and new practices," Dastugue said. "The idea here is to empower local school leaders and to shift the decision-making over to the local schools where there is a firm understanding of student needs."

School districts that have embraced SBB throughout the country find that it translates into greater transparency, heightened flexibility and greater equity, Dastugue noted. She also said that the overall success of the charter school program suggests that SBB can be made to work in a larger scale.
"A one size fits all approach does not work," she said. "We need to be student specific and let principals address the individual needs of their schools. In a way, we already have a successful for student based budgeting with our charter schools."

Read the whole story here.

Universal Charter Schools in New Orleans

Posted on October 17, 2011, 12:46pm | Lisa Snell

My favorite report of the year is out. Instead of universal preschool, how about universal charter schools in New Orleans and many other cities with increasing market share. Charter schools can hardly be accused of creaming or discrimination when every student is enrolled in a charter school. 

A record number of school districts—six—have at least 30 percent of their public school students enrolled in public charter schools, according to an annual report released Monday by the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools (NAPCS) entitled A Growing Movement: American’s Largest Charter School Communities – Sixth Annual Edition. In addition, an all-time high of 18 school districts have more than 20 percent of their public school students enrolled in charter schools.

“This report demonstrates that in areas where families have a choice, a growing number of them are choosing public charter schools over the traditional public schools available to them,” said Ursula Wright, interim president and CEO of the NAPCS. “Consequently, the public education landscape is shifting in many major cities.”

Exceptional findings from the report include:

• Six school districts now have more than 30 percent of their public school students enrolled in public charter schools: New Orleans, Washington D.C., Detroit, Kansas City (Missouri), Flint, and Gary.
• 18 school districts have more than 20 percent of their public school students enrolled in charter schools
• An astounding 70 percent of public school students in New Orleans attended public charter schools in the 2010-2011 school year. Charter schools are the highest performing sector of public schools in the city.
• Los Angeles again tops the list of districts with the highest number of public charter school students enrolled with 79,385 students. To provide a sense of scale, the number of students enrolled in public charter schools in Los Angeles, alone, would place the city’s charter schools in the top 45 of the 100 largest school districts in the United States.
• Nearly 100 school districts now have at least 10 percent of public school students in charter schools.

"We estimate that there are now more than 2 million students in public charter schools across the country," said Wright. "And with hundreds of thousands more students across the country hoping for an additional seat in a charter school, we expect our share of the public school landscape to continue to rise in the coming years."

The "Top 10" highest percentages of public charter school students are in these 12 districts: New Orleans Public School System, La. (70 percent), District of Columbia Public Schools, (39 percent), Detroit Public Schools, Mich. (37 percent), Kansas City, Mo. (35 percent), Flint City School District, Mich. (32 percent), Gary Community School Corporation, Ind. (30 percent), St. Louis Public Schools, Mo. (29 percent), Dayton Public Schools, Ohio (27 percent), Youngstown City Schools, Ohio (24 percent), Albany City School District, NY (23 percent), Cleveland Municipal School District, Ohio (23 percent) and Toledo Public Schools, Ohio (23 percent).

The "Top 10" districts serving the highest number of public charter school students are: Los Angeles Unified School District, Calif. (79,385), Detroit Public Schools, Mich. (45,073), the School District of Philadelphia, Pa. (40,322), New York City Department of Education, N.Y. (38,743), Chicago Public Schools, Ill. (37,909), Houston Independent School District, Tex. (37,499), Miami-Dade County Public Schools. Fla. (35,380), District of Columbia Public Schools (29,366), New Orleans Public School System, La. (27,728) and Broward County Public Schools, Fla. (24,150).

The "Top 10" districts that experienced the highest annual growth in the percentage of public charter school students are: Orange County Public Schools, Fla. (42 percent), Memphis City Schools, Tenn. (41 percent), New York City Department of Education, N.Y. (29 percent), Mesa Public Schools, Ariz. (27 percent), Baltimore City Public Schools, Md. (26 percent), New Orleans Public Schools, La. (23 percent), Alpine School District, Utah (22 percent), San Antonio Independent School District, Tex, (21 percent), Indianapolis Public Schools, Ind. (20 percent), Los Angeles Unified School District, Calif. (19 percent) and the School District of Philadelphia, Pa. (19 percent).

Download a copy of the report A Growing Movement: America's Largest Charter School Communities - Sixth Annual Edition athttp://www.publiccharters.org/publication/?id=613. The report uses 2010-2011 school-year enrollment figures.

Los Angeles Charters Pwned District Schools

Posted on September 2, 2011, 10:50am | Lisa Snell

In Los Angeles,  Charters pwned district schools. The LA school board voted to exclude charter schools from the public school choice competition and give first priority to in-district schools. This is especially depressing given how much better charters are doing overall and how much better the charters that won the first round of public school choice are doing compared to the in-district providers.

The California Charter Schools Assoication keeps score and charter schools in Los Angeles are winning.

Los Angeles charter schools made the largest difference for the most disadvantaged kids.

• Both LAUSD and charter schools have seen their median API scores increase in the past four years. Charters have seen bigger cumulative gains than the district over that period at the elementary and high school levels.
• Median charter school API scores are higher than the district's for several key subgroups including: African Americans (23 point difference), Latinos (30 point difference), English Language Learners (20 point difference) and Socioeconomically Disadvantaged Students (22 point difference). See more detailed charts below.
• The difference between district and charter performance is particularly notable for Socioeconomically Disadvantaged and Latino students in charter high schools. Students from those subgroups had median API scores that were over 100 points higher than their counterparts at non-charters. English Learners at charter middle schools also had median API scores over 100 points higher than their non-charter counterparts.

Most Market-Oriented Education City in America Still Rocking Kids World

Posted on August 12, 2011, 3:03pm | Lisa Snell

The good news out of New Orleans, where close to 80 percent of students are now in charter schools, just keeps coming. As the Times-Picayune reports:

New Orleans public schools are improving test scores more rapidly than the state as a whole among three critical groups: African-American students, low-income students and special education students. . . .

For the first time since Louisiana began keeping track, a higher percentage of African-American students in New Orleans schools scored at or above grade level on the state's high-stakes test than those statewide: 53 percent in New Orleans compared to 51 percent in the state as a whole. That's a milestone, especially considering that four years ago only 32 percent of African-American public school students in New Orleans could make that claim, compared to 43 percent statewide.

The Price Tag for Schools for the Deaf

Posted on August 1, 2011, 12:37pm | Lisa Snell

I weigh in at The New York Times, Room for Debate, on whether we should maintain separate schools for the deaf to the price tag of $87K per kid, and propose that special needs scholarships would be cheaper and offer parents more choice.

California has two schools for the deaf, in Fremont and Riverside, costing $35 million per school (not including capital costs). Combined, they educate close to 800 students a year. This puts the per-pupil cost at more than $87,000 a year - at the expense of other students statewide, including the more than 12,000 deaf or hard-of-hearing students who do not attend the California schools for the deaf.
Unfortunately, even with all of these concentrated resources, the academic outcomes for deaf students enrolled at these separate schools are dismal. According to the California Department of Education 2010 STAR testing results, 0 percent of third-graders were proficient in English language arts at the Riverside school, and 72 percent were far below basic proficiency. By 11th grade, 90 percent of the students at the Riverside school are far below basic proficiency in English language arts.

A much more sustainable financial model, especially given huge state budget shortfalls, would be to have the special needs funding follow the child to the instructional model of his or her parents' choice.

Bonus* Lance Izumi from the Pacific Research Institute makes the case for choice as well.

New Orleans: Most Market-Driven School District in Nation Increases Test Scores Again

Posted on May 26, 2011, 3:31pm | Lisa Snell

New Orleans kids continue to improve under the market-driven charter school system. This year 71% of all New Orleans public school students attend charter schools and 77% of students enrolled in grades K-8 attend charter schools. In addition, there is no residential assignment in New Orleans and even in traditional schools which are not charter schools there is open enrollment and the "money follows the kid."

Today NOLA.Com reports on the continuing progress in New Orleans based on the just released test scores: 

The largest gains overall came among the New Orleans schools the state took over after Katrina because of their historic poor performance. Most of those schools are now independent charters overseen by the RSD, which also runs a number of traditional schools.

RSD students, including charter and traditional campuses, posted their fourth-consecutive year of improvement, increasing the proportion of students scoring at grade level or above to 48 percent. That's a 5 percent gain compared to 2010. With that progress, the proportion of RSD students scoring at grade level or better has more than doubled since 2007, from 23 percent to 48 percent.

RSD Superintendent John White said the results show the district is a national model for broader education reform efforts."The New Orleans system of schools works. Period. End of story. And we cannot go back to a system that does not put children's needs first." he said. "These results should close the book on that question."

New Orleans' kids #winning. Let's make choice and "money following the kids" a national model.

California Provides the Case in Point Against National Curriculum

Posted on May 16, 2011, 2:17pm | Lisa Snell

Last week I signed onto a manifesto opposing ongoing federal government efforts to create a national curriculum and testing system with a broad coalition of over 100 educational leaders.

The manifesto, is entitled Closing the Door on Innovation. It argues that current U.S. Department of Education efforts to nationalize curriculum will stifle innovation and freeze into place an unacceptable status quo; end local and state control of schooling; lack a legitimate legal basis; and impose a one-size-fits-all model on America's students.

Congress is now preparing to debate renewal of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the main law authorizing federal aid to K-12 education. Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Education has been quietly funding efforts by two assessment groups to develop a national K-12 curriculum, along with a national testing system that tests every public-school student multiple times each year. This federal initiative will create a national system of academic-content standards, tests, and curriculum.

While I oppose National standards for a variety of reasons, I offer up a personal example from my children's experience in California public schools as to why I am certain that setting a nationwide ceiling for academic standards is a bad idea and will pointlessly limit academic potential and achievement.

While California has many shortcomings in how we educate children, the one bright spot has been the state's high academic standards. On the one hand, California provides a case in point on the folly of equating strong standards and a solid curriculum as the primary path to higher- quality education. It is simply not enough. California has some of the strongest standards, curriculum, and tests in the nation and yet the state is still plagued by poor student performance.  

On the other hand, California's strong standards have provided many children with opportunities that they would not have under the consensus -based common-core standards being proposed for the nation. More specifically, the common core standards do not have the strong preparation for Algebra that is currently the norm in California.

Algebra is where the debate over a national standards, curriculum, and tests gets personal for my family. Both of my children have been fortunate to have completed Algebra during middle school. During my children's elementary school years Algebraic concepts were an important element of the school curriculum. In other words, because of California's strong emphasis on Algebra in middle school, they introduced Algebraic functions at a much earlier age as part of a normal elementary school math curriculum. Every state test, even in third grade, had test questions based on Algebraic functions.  By the time California kids reach middle school Algebra is expected and familiar.

This year my daughter is doing very well in a 7^th grade honors Algebra class.  By the time she reaches high school she will start with Algebra 2. If a national math curriculum based on common core were currently the new norm, it is doubtful that California middle schools would regularly offer 7^th grade honors Algebra classes. My children have not been the only beneficiaries of California's strong math standards.

In a San Francisco Chronicle opinion piece "National standards would harm math curriculum," Ze'ev Wurman and Bill Evers explain the real gains California students have made because of the states tougher math standards:

Over the past decade and a half, California's Latino student population has almost doubled from 30 percent to over 50 percent, many of them facing special learning challenges. Yet the number of students taking algebra by eighth grade has jumped from 16 percent to 60 percent, while the success rate has jumped from 39 percent to 48 percent since 2002. In 2002, only a third of high school students took Algebra 2 by grade 11; now more than half take it, and with increasing success rates.

More importantly, between 2003 and 2009 the number of African American students successfully taking Algebra 1 by grade 8 more than tripled from 1,700 to 5,400; the jump among Hispanic students was from 10,000 to 45,000; and for students from low-income households, from 12,000 to 49,000. Algebra 2 in high school shows similar results. Finally, since 1997, California State University freshman enrollment has doubled from 25,000 to 50,000, while remediation rates in mathematics have dropped from 54 percent to 37 percent.

While there are many reasons to be skeptical of the claims made for the advantages of a national curriculum, California students have made real progress in math because of California's tougher standards. It seems unconscionable to subvert this progress because of a lower federal standard.