Some Confusion About Dems' Thinking on Charter Schools

Type_webhead_here IIn a recent sit-down with the Editorial staff of this newspaper, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe was asked for his thoughts on education.

McAuliffe heaped praise on Gov. Tim Kaine's efforts to expand pre-kindergarten. He advocated smaller class sizes in kindergarten through the third grade. Spending more money on the front end, he said, would save money in later years. He noted that teacher salaries in Virginia lag behind the national average, and suggested higher pay -- along with assurances of teacher quality.

Asked about charter schools, McAuliffe replied, "We don't want to drain money out of the public schools." The danger of charter schools is that "the public schools get left without anything."

He better not let Barack Obama hear him say that. In his Tuesday night speech to Congress, Obama also addressed education. "We know that our schools don't just need more resources," the president said. "They need more reform. That is why this budget creates new incentives for teacher performance; pathways for advancement, and rewards for success. We'll invest in innovative programs that are already helping schools meet high standards and close achievement gaps. And we will expand our commitment to charter schools." (Emphasis added.)

DOES OBAMA know something about charter schools McAuliffe does not? That's hard to believe. McAuliffe, a former head of the Democratic National Committee -- and a patently smart guy -- surely must have at least a basic grasp of the concept.

The basic concept certainly is not hard to grasp: Charter schools are public schools. They remain under the control of the public school administration and the public school board. As the National Education Association defines them, "Charter schools are publicly funded elementary or secondary schools that have been freed from some of the rules, regulations, and statutes that apply to other public schools, in exchange for some type of accountability for producing certain results, which are set forth in each charter school's charter."

While not all do, some charter schools succeed famously. Those run by the Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP), which operates 66 charter schools in 19 states and D.C., have made headlines across the country. As an article in American School Board Journal noted last year, "KIPP is incredibly decentralized. It has no common curriculum, no common hiring policy, and no common school calendar. About the only thing KIPP schools have in common is their academic success . . . .KIPP, like all charter schools, are public schools and receive a majority of their funding from the same revenue streams as local districts and adhere to the same state and federal accountability measures as well."

Confusion surrounding charter schools might arise because their advocates also tend to favor school vouchers and tuition tax credits. Those mechanisms let public-school students and money flow to the private education market -- much as Virginia's publicly funded tuition-assistance grants help families underwrite the cost of a private college education, and Kaine's pre-K initiative would use public money to send children to private pre-schools.

Voucher critics say they drain money from the public schools. In actuality, they rarely would. Take Washington, D.C.'s Opportunity Scholarship Program. It provides families up to $7,500 to send their children to the school of their choice. But the per-pupil expenditure in the D.C. school system is about $16,000. So even assuming that the voucher funding comes out of the regular education budget rather than in addition to it, one voucher removing one student leaves the District's public schools with a net financial gain of more than $8,000.

BUT AGAIN, that's irrelevant to the discussion about charter schools. Or at least it should be. Certain interests, however, might want to encourage the confusion.

The education establishment has viewed charter schools with a jaundiced eye. The NEA is skeptical. The Virginia School Boards Association and the Virginia Association of School Superintendents resisted passage of even a milquetoast charter law in the commonwealth a decade ago. And charter schools, which often pay teachers better than other public schools, represent a threat to the power of teachers' unions. In New York, for example, only 18 of 115 charter schools statewide are unionized.

The education platforms of Virginia's three Democratic candidates for governor sound almost robotically uniform. All three say (1) expand pre-K, (2) pay teachers more, and (3) improve access to higher ed. (Creigh Deeds, however, supports charters.) Maybe McAuliffe thinks denouncing charter schools might earn him the approbation of some VEA trenchermen. Obama doesn't need the teachers' unions any more -- but the Democratic gubernatorial contenders still do.

My thoughts do not aim for your assent -- just place them alongside your own reflections for a while.

--Robert Nozick.

Contact A. Barton Hinkle at (804) 649-6627 or bhinkle@timesdispatch.com.