Charting an alternative course for schools

In February, President Barack Obama grabbed headlines with his visit to Capital City Public Charter School at 3047 15th St. in Columbia Heights.

“This kind of innovative school — the outstanding work that’s being done here by the entire staff, and the parents who are so active and involved — is an example of how all our schools should be,” Obama said.

It was a ringing endorsement, and charter school advocates claimed another victory in the movement’s ongoing efforts to reform the city’s educational offerings.

D.C.’s charters first emerged in the mid-1990s, when the city was pumping resources into its public education system but failed to see results. At the time — according to literature distributed by the Public Charter School Board — the city spent $3,000 more than the national average per student, and teacher- student ratios were the fourth low- est of any state.

And yet, D.C.’s SAT scores and graduation rates ranked 49th out of 51 in the nation. Politicians used the word “crisis” to describe the school system, and they wondered whether charters could give stu- dents the lift they needed.

In 1988, American Federation of Teachers president Albert Shanker championed the idea of charter schools — free, publicly funded, independent institutions — as an alternative to the traditional public school system.

And in November 1995, Rep. Steve Gunderson, R-Wis., attached a piece of legislation to the D.C. appropriations bill that allowed groups to start charter schools. Both houses passed the bill, and President Bill Clinton signed it into law. The same year, the D.C. Council passed a law that outlined two chartering authorities.

The D.C. School Reform Act of 1995, which was amended in 1996, empowered the existing D.C. Board of Education and a new enti- ty called the Public Charter School Board to accept charter applications and create mechanisms for oversee- ing the new institutions.

When it emerged in 1997, the D.C. Public Charter School Board was only the second independent charter authorizer in the nation, and advocates say the board’s independ- ence has been a boon to the city’s charter movement.

“You have one of the better laws in the nation,” said Josephine Baker, a founding member of the board who now serves as its executive director.

On top of that, added charter board chair Tom Nida, “You’ve got ... adequate funding.”

D.C. charters receive the same per-pupil funding as D.C. Public Schools, plus funds to cover expenses associated with facilities. And because D.C. allows 15-year terms for charters, Nida said, the schools are able to spend less time reapplying for charters and more time educating children.

For years, advocates have been urging parents to take a chance on the charter schools, and, increasing- ly, families are.

There are now nearly 60 charter schools in Washington, offering an array of programs and specialties. In the 2008-09 school year, charters educated 25,568 students.

Washington Latin Public Charter School, which is spread over two 16th Street campuses, provides a classical education and teaches Latin starting in the fifth grade.

The William E. Doar Public Charter School, with campuses in both Northeast and Northwest, integrates academics with the arts.

And E.L. Haynes in Petworth prides itself on offering a mixture of the best practices at charter schools across the country.

In 2008, the Archdiocese of Washington, faced with financial strains, transformed seven Catholic schools into charter schools. Three of them — Immaculate Conception, Nativity Catholic Academy, and St. Gabriel — are in Northwest.

“Keeping the children first and giving them the best education possible has always been the Archdiocese’s goal,” said Archdiocese spokesperson Kathy Dempsey. “Since the Archdiocese wasn’t able to continue operating all of our inner-city schools, we identified another solution — qual- ity charter schools, albeit without the Catholic foundation.”

She said the move was a good one: “Our remaining District schools are thriving, and Center City Public Charter Schools are succeeding.”

But D.C.’s charter experiment is controversial.

Capitol Hill resident Gina Arlotto, a co-founder of the group Save Our Schools, said she understands why parents, teachers and administrators gravitate toward the independent institutions. “I think there were a lot of well-intentioned people who were as frustrated as I was on a daily basis,” she said.

But, she argues, charters are not as inclusive as they appear. After all, only a portion of parents choose to apply, and students who fail to succeed in charters often end up in the traditional public school system.

Plus, she noted, charters’ facility funds can be used for operating expenses once their rental costs have been met. She said this additional funding, combined with the absence of a central office to support, means that charter schools receive more city money than their D.C. Public Schools counterparts.

Charter advocates, meanwhile, state that the opposite is true. Charters are at a disadvantage, they say, because they don’t start out with buildings. On top of that, they say, the city often declines to lease its closed school buildings to charters.

“As a result of the city govern- ment’s actions, many charters are housed in often-inadequate ware- house, retail or office space and church annexes and basements. Many lack basic school facilities such as playgrounds, playing fields, auditoriums and cafeterias,” said Barnaby Towns, a spokesperson for Friends of Choice in Urban Schools.

Arlotto said she would be less critical of charter schools if students were far outperforming their D.C. Public Schools counterparts. But that isn’t the case, she said: “For what we give them ... I don’t think we’ve seen enough improvement in their test scores.”

In 2009, 49 percent of D.C. Public Schools elementary students tested proficient in math and read- ing, while 41 percent of secondary school students were proficient in reading and 40 percent in math.

In charter schools in 2009, 46 percent of elementary students test- ed proficient in reading and 42 per- cent were proficient in math. In secondary school, 53 percent were proficient in reading, and 57 per- cent in math.

Towns said the higher second-ary school scores show that “the longer D.C. kids stay in charter schools, the better they do.”

Furthermore, Towns said, “African-American and economically disadvantaged students in secondary schools are nearly twice as likely to be proficient in reading and math as their counterparts in DCPS.” The high school graduation rate of D.C. public charter schools is higher than that of the neighborhood public schools, he added, and 85 percent of D.C. public charter students go to college.

But charter board chair Nida said charters still have plenty of room for improvement. “We have learned a lot of lessons over the last10 years that we’ll be applying,” he said.

For example, he said, the charter board is rolling out an enhanced accountability system this fall. He said he would also like to see more training for charter school board members.

The stakes are high, and board members should be as prepared as possible, Nida said. “What you’re creating is essentially a start-up business with a nonprofit board and public funding,” he said.

Finally, Nida said, it’s time for the charter school community to forge a stronger partnership with D.C. Public Schools, which is in the midst of its own reform move- ment. If charters are going to increase their enrollment dramatically, “we’re going to have to realize the pressure that puts on DCPS,” he said.

And the city, Nida said, will have to recognize charters’ growing needs and make the appropriate resources available, particularly in terms of facilities.

“The biggest challenge I have seen is just to try to have a more integrated approach between the changes going on at DCPS and at charter schools,” he said.