Wednesday, January 19, 2011

 
New York's Charter School Law Ranks #5 in Nation

The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools today released its 2nd annual survey of state charter school laws and ranked New York State's the fifth best of the 41 laws on the books (40 states plus D.C.).

The Alliance's survey is particularly interesting following the bevy of changes enacted in 2010 by a number of states to compete for the Obama administration's Race to the Top funding which encouraged states to raise caps on the number of charter schools and expand charter opportunities. While amendments to charter school laws were not universal improvements, most changes were viewed as positive according to the Alliance's Vice President, Todd Ziebarth, the report's author. Importantly, better charter school laws not only mean more charter schools, but higher quality schools.

New York State's Charter Law Jumped in Rank
New York raised its charter school cap from 200 to 460, which was the primary reason for the state's charter statute to increase its national ranking from 8th to 5th place, and also was a huge factor in the state winning a full $700 million Race to the Top grant from the U.S. Department of Education. Florida and Massachusetts also moved up in the Alliance's ranking system.

New York State's legislature, for all the criticism leveled at it, deserves tremendous credit for allowing more charter schools even as it were under tremendous pressure by the teacher unions to do otherwise. New York's actions further stand out when you consider that ten states still are without a charter school law, and at least nine states have charter caps that are "severely constraining" the growth and availability of this public school reform option, according to the Alliance.

New York City Cap within the Cap
New York's charter law amendments also illustrate the Alliance's larger point that not every change came up wine and roses; for example, for-profit management companies are now banned from contracting with charter schools to manage day-to-day operations. In addition, while New York's cap on charter schools, on paper, was lifted substantially, a new cap within the cap was imposed for New York City, which is allowed another 114 charters out of the additional 260 authorized - fewer than half (44%) of the total. In effect, these amendments, like the original charter law itself, was the product of legislative sausage-making.

Since exactly three-quarters of the state's authorized charters schools are located (or will be opened ) in New York City, this City-wide cap is more restrictive, and will be reached much sooner than the overall cap. How soon is anyone's guess.

New York City presently has 147 charter schools authorized (125 in operation, 22 thus far approved to open). This trend is primarily due to the support of charter schools by Mayor Michael Bloomberg and his first schools Chancellor, the recently departed Joel Klein. Not only did they approve new charters, but they provided district-owned space to house them. This support attracted a number of charter operators to open new schools.

If this pace of new charters continued, another 114 charter schools in New York City could occur in a few short years (7 thus far have been approved, with 107 remaining). However, Mayor Bloomberg has fewer than three years remaining in his third term, facility space will be harder to obtain, funding is diminishing as the state and city face education spending cuts, and charter operators (e.g., charter management organizations) do not have unlimited capacity.

Suffice it is to say that the charter cap will not be on the floor of the state legislature any time soon. In the meantime, New York's law remains one of the most effective and workable in the nation, as the National Alliance documents, and the implementation of that law and oversight of charter schools remains strong in the state. Taken together, these factors mean more quality public educational opportunities for New York's children.

Peter Murphy
for The Chalkboard
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posted by Andrea Rogers at PermaLink 2:24 PM