In the ever-shifting world of school choice, what began as a homegrown charter-school network's small experiment in microschooling stands out as unique -- and as a uniquely promising model for replication. Gem Prep, a network of seven brick-and-mortar K-12 charter schools in Idaho, anchored by a longstanding and high-performing online school,…

Policies that expand school choice aim to empower parents by giving them the opportunity to choose the school that best fits their child. Publicly funded school choice has increased considerably in recent years, helped by a variety of initiatives, including public charter schools, transfer options for students under the No Child Left Behind Act…

In most of the U.S., the process for assigning children to public schools is straightforward: take a student's home address, determine which school serves that address, and assign the student accordingly. However, states and cities are increasingly providing families with school choices. A key question facing policymakers is exactly how to place…

This article describes the results of a California state law established in 2010 that created "Districts of Choice." The District of Choice law was meant to encourage districts to compete for students by offering innovative programs and this-school-fits-my-child options that parents wanted. This designation meant that children from any…

One year ago, the "Wall Street Journal" dubbed 2011 "the year of school choice," opining that "this year is shaping up as the best for reformers in a very long time." School-choice laws took great strides in 2011, both in the number of programs that succeeded across states and also in the size and scope of the adopted…

In this paper the authors identify some of the key findings from the sixth annual "Education Next"-PEPG Survey, a nationally representative sample of U.S. citizens interviewed during April and May of 2012. Highlights include: (1) the Republican tilt of the education views of independents; (2) the especially high marks that Hispanics give their…