So what's the deal with Charter schools?

Ditto. We don't make a LOT less, but we do make less. I would much rather have the work environment I do and make a little less.

We don't have longer work hours or extra duties compared to public schools. Our administration is very respectful of our time.

 

I'm wondering, if I want to know how many students withe IEP's (Percentage-wise) attend our local charter school, do yuo think this info is public, and I can find it somewhere?

 

Is it wrong that I like the idea that we have lots of charter schools around my area because I feel like this would help my chances of still being able to be hired if for any reason I HAD to leave my current school. I know for sure that there is a big difference between the charter schools in my area.

I worked at a private school for a little bit and the pay there was definitely the lowest around. The work environment was good but my pay literally doubled after I took a job at a magnet school.

 

That information is readily available and easily accessible in CA. Every school publishes a school accountability report card that includes this information. I'm sure it varies by state, though.

 

I live in NC. Many of the charter schools in the area are public charters. I can tell you that many public school teachers here resent them, the schools, not the teachers there. These charters are not subject to the same rules we are in public schools. Testing is not the Sword of Damocles it is on us in the regular public schools. Charters say they accept everyone, but their ability to exclude students based on behavior or academic issues lowers their percentage of more...challenging students. What we get a lot of is students starting at a charter for the first part of the year. Our budgets are determine by the state based on the number of students in attendance. We start with a set number of kids, and a budget determined to provide a certain amount of money per child. Starting a couple of months later we start getting kids from the charters. Some are kids who were kicked out of the charter. Some are EC kids and the parents do not feel their needs are being met there. Others are AIG kids, the high flyers, whose parent think they were more challenged in the local school. Now we have many more kids without the benefit of money apportioned to them. Anything we do for the kids now has to be done with less and less money per pupil making it harder, and sometimes impossible to accomplish. I teach in a small school, population of around 600 pupils. In the last two months in my grade alone we have received nine transfer students.

 

The same thing happens in my area. It's not quite as bad in my current district, because there are no large charters nearby. However, in my previous district there was a big charter down the street. That school would regularly get 60 or so new students from the charter after the October count for funding. I was teaching 3rd there and my class alone went from 19 to 24 in one week! One of my most challenging students academically and behaviorally always wore polo shirts from various charters he had been kicked out of- he had like 4-5 different ones! I realize this is not the same in every area- I know in my hometown, charters often get the most challenging students because they have to recruit anyone and everyone just to try and stay open- but it is what happens here.

 

At the bolded, I took an online class with students all over and one person from the Michigan area (I believe) said the same thing. The Charters would have all of these students at the beginning of the school year and report the enrollment up until the cut off time to report enrollment....after that they would start kicking students out, generally behavior problems and/or low academically.....BUT......they would receive the money on the enrollment number they reported before kicking students out.

 

This is the main issue I have with charters. They're scamming the public.

I'd like to add that in my experience, charters provide little to no bussing. So the students that attend by definition have to have more involved parents. Parents that must actually drive their kids to school. And kids of parents that are willing to get up and do that each morning are leaps and bounds ahead of the kids whose mother may or may not be passed out drunk in the morning. Who refuses to buy groceries, much less look over homework.

 

The responses on here are why I don't like to post about working at a charter on these boards. In the minds of many people on these boards, charters=evil, and I am evil (or maybe just an idiot) because I teach at one. Honestly, I don't really care what people think about charters; I am very happy teaching where I do. I ended up in charters because most districts in my state had laid off everyone with less than 7 or 8 years of experience. Districts just weren't hiring new teachers when I graduated. Even now, it is RARE to find a teacher younger than late 30s in a public school due to the lack of hiring. Anyway, it worked out well for me - I stay because I love teaching in a charter.

Charters are NOT all the same, for the record. States have varying levels of regulation and accountability. In CA, charters have been around for almost 15 years and have managed to coexist with public schools.

 

My issue isn't about the individual charter schools. My issue is where they get their funding. If they were privately funded then I'd have no issue with them at all. But since they siphon money away from MY school and MY CHILDRENS' schools, I do.

 

I work at a Charter School. I love it at my school and I love the staff members there .

 

But see, I don't understand this perspective. The vast majority of charters in CA are under a district umbrella. In terms of funding, they end up functioning like another district school (except in terms of the freedom to allocate funds). Funding in CA is all based on ADA (average daily attendance). Neither charter I've worked in has brought down the enrollment of other schools in the area. The neighborhood schools around me still have 30+ kids in a class (it's CA, this is the norm) and haven't had to go through layoffs because a charter exists.

Perhaps in other regions, things are different. But here, the district actually has to give approval for a charter's creation. In some cases, the charter goes through the state agency, but that's less common.

If they were privately funded, they would be private schools. I have heard of for profit charters (I guess those are "privately funded"), but CA doesn't have those.

 

I don't think you understand her complaint.......the fact is that the Charters are funded and go by enrollment/body count and get money based on that number....the public schools the same way....so Charter A reports 500 kids and gets funded on 500 kids...PUblic school A reports 800 kids and gets fudning on 800 kids.......BUT Charter A then kicks 50-100 kids out and they end up at Public school A who gets no funding for the extra 50-100 kids but Charter A has excess money now with less kids.

The above is what most take issue with.

 

Yellowdaisies, please do not think that I am talking about teachers in charter schools. I am addressing scammy practices by the boards of many of the public charter schools in my area. There are some really great charters out there, and I always support other professional colleagues.

 

This isn't true in my state, and based on yellowdaisies saying that funding in her state is based on average daily attendance, I would imagine it's the same in her state as well.

The schools are funded based on the number of students present every single minute of every single day in my school. So, if 10 students leave a charter and go to a public school, the charter school reports 10 fewer students on their average daily attendance, and the public school reports 10 more students. The charter school then loses money, and the public school gains money.

Perhaps this is different in other states, but the scenario you described would not happen in my state.

 

I get that. I'm not trying to say anything against anyone in particular on this board, just a general feeling of frustration that I have, I guess.

This exactly. It seems that the problem stems from certain states' funding practices, not from the charters themselves. My former charter would never kick ANYONE out (even VERY severe behavior problems who probably should have been in a different environment like an EBD school) because they didn't want to lose ADA.

That's the problem with blanket statements about charters. State policies really dictate how they're run and what certain, poorly managed charters can get away with.

 

I truly believe that some people really are better suited for teaching at a charter. I never would have guessed that I'm one of them, but I definitely am.

 

I work in California, it is happening in the district I work for. The charters require applications which lowers the children who apply, they convince children who are struggling that the school is not a "good fit" and encouraging to move to a new school (back to public), there is obvious embezzling going on and the way the state has the ed code worded because they have aimed for children who score well the priority is test scores and the embezzling is a minor detail so they can't shut it down, then there are ones who are open for a year or two and then gone, then there are ones who overwork the staff and have rapid transition, then there are the ones in a district with a huge amount of unduplicated pupils and have tiny percentages of those students, then there are ones who work hard to not have special ed children or do them a serious disservice if they do have them. There are charter schools that might be very nice with fine staff at them; however the minimal control over the charter schools allows people to use the children as a way to make money and segregate the schools while draining money from the rest of the public school system.

 

Who's making money? I've never worked for a charter where anyone is making money. Admin makes about what area admin makes (slightly less I think), teachers make about what area teachers make. Maybe things are different in the corporate type of charters where there is a CEO or something like that, but most charters are not money making operations.

 

Are your charters "owned" by your local government like your public schools (not for profit)? if not then those behind the scenes of the charter schools are making money investors et al NOT the admin, staff, teachers etc at those schools.

 

While some charters are raking in big bucks, that's not what is typical around here. When I speak about money issues, it isn't about teachers living in huge mansions and admin taking monthly cruises. It is more of an issue of allocation of funds. Because of the scamming they do, their per-pupil funding is much higher than that of the public schools. And the public schools have the more expensive (sped) students, so the allocations are even more skewed.

 

^^^^

Very true indeed.

 

As far as I know, nearly every single charter in my state is a non profit. I don't think CA allows for profit charters. I am 100% certain that the two I've worked for are not for profit charters, and 99% sure that those I know about are, also. I know this is biased (because it comes from the California Charter School Association), but this link explains charters in California.

When I mentioned teachers and admin, I meant that there is no one above them to get money. We don't have investors or CEOs or anything like that. Maybe other states allow "scamming," but I haven't seen it here, or at least not with my particular schools.

My last charter actually had more SpEd students than the surrounding public schools.

I'm probably going to bow out of this thread, but my point remains - different states run charters differently, and even within states, charters are all different. Blanket statements don't work.

 

http://www.calcharters.org/understanding/faqs/

The majority of charter schools are operated by non-profit public benefit corporations. Many others are not incorporated but run by their school districts. There are a small number that are run by limited liability corporations.

 

If this is all true then why do so many parents fight to get their kids into these schools?