Free Market Schools

Does free-market competition between neighborhood and charter schools increase student achievement? The Jeffco Board Majority has increased funding for charter schools and has made it known that they want many more charter schools in Jeffco to raise achievement.

Until now, charter schools in Jeffco were “grassroots” or “organic” charters. They were started by parents of children in the charter school. They were run by parent-elected boards. These parents have a vested interest in their children and their community.

Now, the Jeffco Board Majority has approved one charter started by a politician/business man with a charter board not elected by parents (Golden View Classical Academy).

https://www.goldenviewclassical.org

New development growth within Jefferson County is expected to bring 5000 more students into Jeffco, yet the Board Majority refuse to build schools for these children. In May, 2015 the board approved $15 million to fund a school costing $25 million in Northwest Arvada.

https://arvadapress.com/stories/North-Arvada-wonders-Where-are-the-seats,188468

Two new charters are being proposed for this same area, Doral Academy and DaVinci Prep. Neither of these schools are “grassroots” charter schools. Many think the board is artificially creating demand for these schools by not building neighborhood schools in these neighborhoods.

https://www.doralcolorado.org/index.html

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Doral-Academy-of-Colorado/1613127668920621?sk=timeline&ref=page_internal

https://www.facebook.com/Davincipreparvada?fref=ts

Community meetings are being held for these charters claiming they will be “high-performing” charter schools.

We test the idea that charter schools have higher achievement than neighborhood schools in the 10 largest suburban districts in Colorado on the Front Range. There are 591 schools with enrollment of nearly 400,000 children in the database. All data are publicly available for download on the Colorado Department of Education website.

https://www.cde.state.co.us/schoolview

Poverty is the strongest predictor of the performance scores of a school. See our companion video, “Demographics Matter.”

To compare schools, you can predict nothing if you do not account for demographic differences. See our companion video, “Apples to Apples.”

Students in special education also score very low compared to students not in special education. These students are included in the aggregated score for a school. When the percentage of students in special education increases, the aggregated score drops. We compare, “Apples to Apples,” charters and neighborhood schools with similar percentages of children in poverty and special education. Charters perform as well or worse than neighborhood schools. In fact, neighborhood schools with high numbers of special education students perform similar to charters with low numbers of special education students.

The idea that there are “high-performing” charter schools is a MYTH. These “high-performing” charters all have less than 3% children in special education while the average for Colorado and the 10 districts in this video is %10. The secret to having a high-performing charter is to admit low numbers of children in poverty and special education. Charters do not increase achievement of neighborhood schools.

If charters do not increase achievement, why would the Board Majority shift so many resources for charters and create artificial demand by not building neighborhood schools? What is going on? Who benefits? It has to do with people and businesses making MONEY.

Free Market Schools

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