2022 turned out to be a dynamic year for charter schools, as many state lawmakers recognized the fact parents want more schooling options that fit their children's unique needs. In total, close to 50% of states with charter school laws gained at least one legislative win. Read for more details on how the charter school movement strengthened in the…

In this study, the authors draw on 58 interviews with state policy makers and experts in five states to examine how state policy makers and education leaders think about school choice policy and how issues of equity show up in state-level discourse and action. The findings from these interviews suggest that more could be done to advance equity in…

This brief describes a new method for states to determine how well their charter school facility needs are being met with state policies, both at present and in the future as the number of charter schools increases. The brief also illustrates how this new approach, called a Charter Facility Index, can be used in practice, with three state…

The Office of English Language Acquisition (OELA) has synthesized key data on English learners (ELs) into two-page sheets on a variety of subjects. The topics for this report on English learners in charter schools include: (1) Number of Charter Schools, by State, Including DC: SY 2015-16; (2) Percentage of Charter School Students Who Are ELs, by…

Finding funds to build and renovate facilities is a major hurdle for public charter schools because most state laws do not provide charter schools with the full amount of state and local funding that other public schools receive. Although an increasing number of states are passing laws to address charter school facility funding gaps, inequities…

Charter schools began in the 1990s as an experimental alternative to public schools. Today they are a multi-billion dollar sector composed of both nonprofit and for-profit corporations that embrace the philosophy of the marketplace. Supporters of charters see school failure as a natural feature of the model. They argue that schools do not fail at…

The COVID-19 pandemic has drastically changed the way that families and policymakers view K-12 education. Learning loss is having an outsized impact on students who were furthest from opportunity before the pandemic. And families are increasingly looking for new educational options for their children. For decades, access to educational options…

Charter schools now educate nearly 3 million students in 43 states and the District of Columbia--more than 6 percent of the total K-12 public-school enrollment. Yet some 25 years after the first charter school opened in Minnesota, the merits of charters still incite debate among educators and the public. What is not often debated is that charter…

The Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) has been studying the four-day school week since 2015. Since then, the phenomenon of the four-day school week has spread into non-rural areas and interest appears to be growing. Given these apparent changes, the author wanted to know more about recent trends in the initiative. As districts continue…

There were a number of historic public charter school policy wins across the country in 2017. Kentucky became the 44th state (along with the District of Columbia) to enact a charter school law. Colorado and Florida provided charter school students with unprecedented access to locally raised dollars for facilities. Tennessee and Texas created new…

Despite the myriad of challenges that families, students, teachers and policymakers faced in 2021, the momentum to transform education did not waver. New opportunities for students unfolded in more than a dozen states through expanded private and public school choice. An additional 1.7 million students gained eligibility for private choice alone,…

Teacher evaluation systems introduced by states and school systems in the past several years have focused attention on improving the performance of public school teachers, but they have been cost- and time-intensive, placing a significant burden on states' and districts' resources. In Tennessee, for example, trained evaluators conducted nearly…

To innovate for the future and improve equity, while also protecting foundational and proven principles that support high-quality education, ExcelinEd is committing to 5 goals over 5 years to impact 5 million students. Those goals hold the key to impactful and far-reaching changes in education, with the power to transform schools, students' lives,…

In partnership with the National Charter School Resource Center (NCSRC), the National Association for Charter School Authorizers (NACSA) has been conducting authorizer assessments over the past six years. However, the correlation between high-quality authorization practices and charter school impact has largely been unexplored. This report uses a…

Charter schools represent an increasingly important form of school choice in the United States. Charter schools are public schools, with a difference. Compared to traditional public schools, they are exempted from some of the state laws and regulations that govern traditional public schools. In this way, parents come to have a greater number of…