Abstract:
Charter schools have been increasingly sponsored as a means for supporting innovation in public schools; valued as an advantageous and growing element of the educational sector. Charter schools are tuition-free and viewed as an alternative option to public schools as they are not governed by the same state laws and regulations as public schools. The authors reported that using Meta-Analysis methods demonstrated that the effects and performances of charter schools are similar to traditional public schools. Depending on the locations, grades and subjects, a percentage of charter school children would score better on tests than their public school counterparts. However, there were no negative effects on reading scores of elementary and middle school children. For traditional public schools, inappropriate statistical models challenged the validity of the reports, making the results questionable. Policymakers, educators, and parents are advised to proceed with caution in relying on this report (Readon, 2009).
Critics report that the increasing numbers of charter schools (4578) have caused both an intellectual drain along with resources drain on the children attending public schools. The data from student-level details used to study the academic performance of students who remain in the public schools showed that in both math and reading the lowest performing students in public schools benefited from charter school education (Winters, Marcus A, 2009).
Using a longitudinal database of student test scores this report looks at the causal effect on public school students due to competition from charter schools. The statistical data suggests that math test scores were not impacted but that there was a small impact on language scores. However, the report does not prove that increasing competition on public schools are the reasons for the difference in student scores (McEwan, Patrick J, 2009). This paper answers the following question about or discusses the following aspects of charter school in New York City: What are the differences between charter schools and traditional public schools? What kinds of achievements do charter schools maintain? What kinds of benefits are children are getting from charter schools? What kinds of students enroll in charter schools? What are charter schools test scores in comparison to public schools? The paper also provides recommendations for best practices and future research models.
Introduction:
Charter schooling is a high-profile topic in educational policy that provides high-quality, systematic evidence to prove the advantageous benefits of the comparatively rare educational method. Critics of the system suggest that charter schools diminish the effectiveness of traditional public schools by depriving them of both the financial and human resources that they need to provide their students with a high quality education (Readon, 2009). Defined. charter schools privately owned educational facilities that operate as their own school district. Freedom from the restrictions inherent in large public institutions and from collective-bargaining agreements with teachers allows charter schools to experiment with new curriculum and policies to an extent that traditional public schools have never been able to (Winters, Marcus A, 2009). Charter schools are receiving more independence from state laws and regulations than do traditional public schools. Also, unlike traditional public schools, their authorities can shut down charters if they do not perform well or to expectations. Charter schools have more freedom to experiment with alternative curricula and pedagogical methods and different ways of hiring and training teachers (Betts and Tang, 2011).
Charter schools have grown rapidly and they have siphoned a considerable number of students from the traditional public school system. In 2002, there were seventeen charter schools operating in New York City. Today, 100 New York City charter schools educate about 24,000 people—or about 2 percent of the city’s children. About 50,000 students are currently on waiting lists to enroll in New York charter schools (Winters, Marcus A, 2009).
Charter school educational curriculums are significant factors in contributing to a student’s academic success. Charter schools increase student achievement by roughly 0.04 standard deviations per year in grades k-3. One report claimed that the average charter school student gains 0.12 and 0.09 standard deviation in math and English each year in grades 4 through 8, which is similar to what he or she would have gained each year in a traditional public school. Also, another report finds that charter schools increase students’ science and social studies test scores as opposed to their elementary school counterparts (Reardon, Sean F 2009). According to Winters, (2009) analysis of student level data provided by the New York City Department of Education, which runs the nation’s public school system, reveals that students benefit academically when their public school is exposed to competition from a charter. For every 1 percent of public school students who leaves for a charter school, their reading proficiency increases by about 0.02 standard deviations. This paper addresses the following questions and issues:
1.What are the differences between charter school and traditional public schools?
2.What kinds of achievement charter school have?
3.What kind of benefit children are getting from charter school?
4.What kinds of students enroll in charter school?
5.How are Charter schools test scores?
Methods:
In order to answer these questions, the following database was searched: EBSCOHOST. The following keywords were used for this search: charter school in New York city, academic achievement, achievement ratio, school effectiveness, mathematical tests competition, statistical analysis, language test scores, enrollment etc. the following articles were selected for review:
1.Betts, Julian R.; Tang, Y. Emily (2011-Oct). Center on Reinventing Public Education.
“The Effect of Charter Schools on Student Achievement: A Meta-Analysis of the Literature.”
2. McEwan, Patrick J. Education and the Public Interest Center (2009-Nov-17). Review of "Everyone Wins: How Charter Schools Benefit All New York City Public School Students."
3. Reardon, Sean F (2009-Nov-12). Education and the Public Interest Center. Review of
"How New York City's Charter Schools Affect Achievement.”
4. Winters, Marcus A. (2009, October). “ Center for Civic Innovation. Everyone Wins: How Charter Schools Benefit All New York City Public School Students. Civic Report No.60.”
5. Winters, Marcus A. (2011, 26 August). “Measuring the Effect of Charter Schools on
Public School Student Achievement in an Urban Environment: Evidence from New York City.”
Literature review:
According to Winters (2009), New York State introduced the concept of charter schools with the Charter Schools Act of 1998 during the governorship of Republican George Pataki. In 2001, when the first ten New York charter schools opened their doors, state law was forced to set the cap on the number of charter schools at 100. As a result of high demand for this new system, the state quickly reached this cap. In 2007, the cap was raised to 200 charter schools under Democratic governor Eliot Spitzer. Charter schools must reauthorize every five years by the same object that chartered them.
Enrollment and Lottery System:
Winters (2009), says that all New York children benefit from the existence of charter schools, even those “left behind” in traditional public school environments. He also says that every year, the majority of NYC charter schools have more applications than available seats and by law they must fill these spots by lottery. About 50,000 students are currently on waiting lists to enroll in a New York City charter school.
According to Readon (2009), students who enroll in New York charter schools are disproportionately non-Hispanic, African American and poor, relative to students in New York City’s public school. Readon also says that we cannot attribute differences in their achievement to the success of charter school curriculums relative to traditional pubic schools if charter and traditional public school students have such different backgrounds.
Achievement Statistical Data:
Hoxby, Murka, and Kang reported in the article “Everyone wins: How Charter schools benefit all New York City public school students. Civic report no. 60 stated that students attending New York City charter schools performed better in math, English and Language Arts, than they have performed had they remained in their assigned public school. According to Betts and Tang (2011) charter schools both outperform and underperform relative to traditional public schools.
Data:
Note: Summary statistics using students included in the ELA analysis. Summary statistics in other analyses are similar but not identical (Winters, 2009).
Results:
According to Winters, (2009) the following 2 tables in math and language arts finds a positive relationship between the competition that the student’s public school faces from charter school comparative academic proficiency.
On the other hand, McEwan, Patrick J, article’s a report finds “evidence that increase in the competition that traditional New York City public school faces from charter schools for students leads to an increase in the ELA proficiency of students who remain in public schools. Competition from charter schools also benefits students with very low prior math proficiency (McEwan, 2009). Charter schools argue that competition from their schools can be expected to improve traditional public schools completely because competition threatens their budgets (Winters, 2009).
Tang says that if we had to rank the effects by student racial/ethnic group, it would seem that from the most positive to the most negative results, the ranking would be: black students, followed by Hispanic, Native American, and finally white students.
According to Reardon, (2009) the basis of insufficient reports sits at, depending on the year of lottery, between 9% and 21% of charter school applicants in the study who participates in lotteries are not able to be matched to the New York City Department of Education data. That means the test scores are unavailable for those students.
In conclusion, the positive relationship between competition from charter school and traditional public school student proficiency is described by changes in peer quality rather than just improvements in public efficiency. An important factor to consider is that there is no specific evidence that student achievement has been harmed by increased charter school competition. Elementary charter schools appear to be outperforming traditional schools. There are many positive results found in elementary and middle school studies. Not only would this database serve a public purpose, but it also would allow for more nuanced meta-analyses of characteristics of charter schools that are truly making a positive or negative difference for student achievement.
References
Betts, Julian R.; Tang, Y. Emily (2011-Oct). Center on Reinventing Public Education.
The Effect of Charter Schools on Student Achievement: A Meta-Analysis of the Literature. Retrieve from: http://eric.ed.gov.rpa.laguardia.edu:2048/?id=ED526353
McEwan, Patrick J. Education and the Public Interest Center (2009-Nov-17). Review of
"Everyone Wins: How Charter Schools Benefit All New York City Public School Students". Retrieve from:
http://eric.ed.gov.rpa.laguardia.edu:2048/?id=ED530089
Reardon, Sean F ( 2009-Nov-12).Education and the Public Interest Center. Review of
"How New York City's Charter Schools Affect Achievement”. Retrieve from: http://eric.ed.gov.rpa.laguardia.edu:2048/?id=ED530095
Winters, Marcus A. (2009, October) Center for Civic Innovation. Everyone Wins: How
Charter Schools Benefit All New York City Public School Students. Civic Report No. 60. Retrieve from: http://eric.ed.gov.rpa.laguardia.edu:2048/?id=ED509529
Winters, Marcus A. (2011, 26 August). Measuring the Effect of Charter Schools on
Public School Student Achievement in an Urban Environment: Evidence from New York City. Retrieve from: http://dx.doi.org.rpa.laguardia.edu:2048/10.1016/j.econedurev.2011.08.014
