Charter schools are not better funded

The false and misleading assertions of Gina Arlotto regard- ing the District’s public charter schools [“Charting an alternative course for schools,” Sept. 9] should not go unchallenged.

Her idea that D.C. public charter schools receive more taxpayer funds than do the city-run schools is obvious nonsense.

These unique public schools are run independently of the city government and as such must finance their own administrative costs: The fact that there is no “central office” for charters doesn’t mean these costs are zero. Of course, charters can elect to spend less on administration and invest more in education — that is one of the benefits of school autonomy — but that does not mean charters receive more city money than city-run schools.

In fact, D.C.'s city-run schools receive considerably more taxpayer money per student than do the city’s public charter schools, despite the fact that D.C. law stipulates that students in charters and non-charter public schools should be funded equally.

In addition to the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula, which provides an equal number of dollars per student in each type of school, D.C.’s city-run schools receive $5,829 per student for capital costs — more than double the $2,800 that charters receive in facility funds from the city government.

Moreover, D.C.’s public charter schools receive a facilities allowance because, unlike D.C.’s city-run schools, they do not begin their life with a public school building but must rent or buy one with their own money. In fact, city-run schools receive twice as much per-student school building funds as charters, despite having school buildings provided for them. Far from constituting “additional funding” beyond the reach of traditional public schools, the facilities allowance charters use to buy or lease buildings inadequately addresses the superior public funding of the city-run schools.

Despite the more plentiful public funding enjoyed by traditional public schools, charters have built an enviable track record for their students. Economically disadvantaged middle and high school students in D.C. public charter schools are nearly twice as likely to be proficient in reading and math as their peers in the more generously publicly funded city-run schools.

D.C. parents have flocked to charters over the 13 years they have existed, increasing the share of students in charters from zero to 36 percent. Superior results, achieved with inferior per-student public funding, took them there.

Robert Cane
Executive Director, Friends of Choice in Urban Schools (FOCUS)