The Wisconsin Department for Public Instruction (DPI) is required to submit this report to the Legislature regarding the status of existing charter schools, the number of petitions for new charter schools, and the action taken by school boards and the DPI on petitions for new charter schools. This report offers the results of the charter school…

The Wisconsin Department for Public Instruction (DPI) is required to submit this report to the Legislature regarding the status of existing charter schools, the number of petitions for new charter schools, and the action taken by school boards and the DPI on petitions for new charter schools. This report offers the results of the charter school…

The Wisconsin Department for Public Instruction (DPI) is required to submit this report to the Legislature regarding the status of existing charter schools, the number of petitions for new charter schools, and the action taken by school boards and the DPI on petitions for new charter schools. This report offers the results of new charter school…

Approximately 650,000 military dependent children in the U.S. face various challenges that may affect their schooling, according to Department of Defense (DOD). The Government Accountability Office (GAO) was asked to examine the schooling options available to school-age dependents of active-duty servicemembers. This report describes: (1) available…

American public schools today are perhaps more linguistically and culturally diverse than at any other point in American history. Nearly one in ten U.S. students is currently classified as an English learner (EL). This report explores the intersection between ELs and charter schools and provides ideas for helping policymakers use charters as…

Indiana is at the national forefront on private school choice. With the broadest eligibility guidelines among the country's 22 other school voucher programs, Indiana's Choice Scholarship Program has seen enrollment more than double each year since being enacted in 2011. Today, when compared with voucher programs in 12 other states, Indiana has the…

Communities across the country are grappling with different approaches to improving their schools. Introducing or expanding charter schools is one of the approaches that states and school districts have considered or implemented. Charter schools serve more than 5 percent of public school students nationwide and make up close to 7 percent of all…

The question of how information is used by parents in selecting schools is a central issue in school choice debates, where advocates and opponents frequently intermingle theory (often economic), ideological beliefs, and empirical evidence in constructing arguments about the potential of this reform. We employ a nomination strategy to analyze…

This guide, first in a series of four volumes, is designed to give information to parents and other decision makers on costs and benefits of different kinds of choices of schools that children might attend. Four sections present digests of information based on research and evaluation studies. Section 1 introduces the format and purpose of the…

This guide, second in a series of four volumes, offers a method of surveying parents' attitudes about choosing schools for their children and provides a survey instrument used over a period of 5 years in four Massachusetts urban school districts. Section 1 introduces the basic research questions pursued in the survey. Section 2, "The Parent…

This volume of profiles, third in a series of guides on parent choice and schooling, provides short descriptions about the range of exemplary parent information strategies from 21 school districts in 11 states across the nation. The profiles were chosen to be representative of efforts public school districts make to inform parents about available…

This fourth and final guide in a series of volumes addresses parents who desire assistance in selecting the appropriate school for their child. The guide provides narratives and "real life" descriptions of actual occurrences in schools that advertise themselves as emphasizing a particular style or philosophy of teaching or curricular…

This study compared 26 students identified as gifted and talented who transferred to nonresident schools through Minnesota's Open Enrollment program with 60 transfer students not so identified. Academic and educational concerns were the main reasons gifted students chose to transfer. Few members of minority groups chose to transfer. Parental…

Parental choice represents a promising approach to school improvement; it eliminates the excessive regulation, inefficient operation, and ineffective service that characterize the public monopolies that American schools and school systems have become. However, school reformers should bear in mind the following key points: (1) school performance…

The current debate on educational choice concerns whether locally centralized school systems of the kind that predominate in the public school sector are responsive to and can accommodate the diversity of educational consumers' preferences. Section I analyzes policy options and illustrates how policymakers, by examining a range of solutions to the…