The claim that charter schools cause financial harm to school districts is a major element in the debate around charter schools in California. Critics allege that enrollment in charter schools drains resources from school districts, forcing them to make cuts to staff and services and eventually contributing to fiscal distress. The charge that…

Much attention has been focused on the costs charter school enrollment imposes on school districts. Getting an honest answer to this question is important for school districts so that they may adjust their expenditures appropriately. However, as Ladd and Singleton, the authors of a North Carolina study attempting to quantify those costs point out,…

In this article, the authors study charter growth in a single region as a case study: the Bay Area, which includes San Francisco and the cities, suburbs, and rural areas that surround it. California is one of the nation's leading charter school states, and charters have boomed in the Bay Area in particular. The area also is in the midst of a…

The current debate about charter schools' effects on school district finances hinges on enrollment loss. Critics claim that the surge in charter enrollment in California since 2000 has driven enrollment loss statewide--cutting districts' income more than their costs, especially in cities where many students attend charter schools. State officials…

In cities where public charter schools serve a large share of students, the costs of ongoing sector divisions and hostility across district and charter lines fall squarely on students and families. Exercising choice and accessing good schools in "high-choice cities" can be difficult for many families, especially some of the most…

Through research and policy analysis, the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) seeks ways to make public education more effective, especially for America's disadvantaged students. CRPE helps redesign governance, oversight, and dynamic education delivery systems to make it possible for great educators to do their best work with students…

This is the executive summary for the report, "Seizing the Opportunity: Educating Students with Disabilities in Charter Schools." Only about 20 percent of students with disabilities score at proficient levels on state assessments. Fewer than 70 percent earn a high school diploma within four years. Charter schools, which operate with…

Since the first charter school law was passed in 1991, the relationship between charter schools and districts has been rife with conflict. To no one's surprise, districts have fiercely resisted competition from public schools of choice, especially when that competition grows beyond just a small number of schools and poses a real threat to the…

The Center on Reinventing Public Education has long focused on making school choice work. Parents of children with disabilities face greater barriers to choosing schools for their children. This brief is the first installment in a series of reports examining how parents of children with disabilities experience the process of choosing schools. The…

Since the first charter school law passed in 1991, U.S. charter schools have enjoyed steady and relatively rapid growth, now serving more than three million students nationally. In more than 58 cities, charter schools represent more than 20 percent of all public school enrollment. In seven cities, charter schools enroll more than 40 percent of…

This literature review compares the current knowledge about the characteristics of effective charter schools to findings from the broader body of effective school research. We find that lists of effectiveness characteristics from the charter and traditional literatures are well aligned: good schools seem to look the same, regardless of governance…

The challenge of serving students with disabilities is familiar to both practitioners and policymakers, especially when it comes to education reform. Charter schools are often viewed as institutions that fail to serve students with disabilities well, or in the same proportions as district-run schools. Sometimes this is true, but it oversimplifies…

The Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) designed the portfolio model based on the idea that we should move away from a "school system" to, instead, "a system of schools." In essence: school boards should focus on overseeing a "portfolio" of distinctive schools rather than directly running a set of…

Online charter schools, charter schools that primarily utilize remote online instruction, have been both popular and controversial. As of October 2015, fully online charter schools operate in 26 (soon to be 27) states and enrolled approximately 200,000 students in the 2013-14 school year, comprising over 8 percent of all public charter school…

When the pandemic forced schools to move online, no one was prepared. It was a true crisis, but out of crisis often comes innovation and discovery. That is exactly what a fall 2020 nationally representative survey from the American School District Panel, a collaboration between RAND, CRPE, Chiefs for Change, and Kitamba, found. A RAND report…