The charter school sector in the United States encompasses forty-two states and the District of Columbia, with 6,400 charter schools serving 2.5 million students. More than 1,000 authorizers oversee these schools, working under state laws that seek to balance school autonomy and accountability for results. This report, conducted by the National Association of Charter School Authorizers (NACSA), evaluates the quality of those laws. NACSA has identified eight policies that facilitate the development of effective charters, including performance management and replication, default closures, and authorizer sanctions. States are awarded points—on a thirty- or twenty-seven-point scale, depending on the group—based on the strength each of these policies in their charter schools laws. NACSA divided the states into three groups, according to their charter-authorizing landscapes, and then assigned ranks within. They include: (1) seventeen district-authorizing states, (2) five states with many authorizers, and (3) twenty-one states with few authorizers. South Carolina topped the first list with a score of twenty-five out of thirty. Last place here (and in the nation) is Kansas, with zero, for which the report blamed the state’s “dead” charter law; though legal, the schools do not have autonomous governing boards or alternative authorizers. In the second group, Indiana led with eighteen points out of a possible twenty-seven. And despite being the newest charter state, Washington earned not only the best marks in the final group, but the best in the nation—a perfect thirty out of thirty. Speaking of perfection, NACSA unfortunately does not achieve it; a few of its grades are more than a little baffling. New York and the District of Columbia, in particular, get surprisingly low marks even though their authorizers are legendary for their commitment to quality. But on the whole, it’s a worthy effort. Be sure to check out the report.
SOURCE: “On The Road to Better Accountability: An Analysis of State Charter School Policies,” National Association of Charter School Authorizers (December 2014).
