In recent years, public charter schools in Connecticut and around the United States have proven that students living in poverty are capable of high achievement. President Obama said in a July 2009 interview, "Charters, which are within the public school system, force the kind of experimentation and innovation that helps to drive excellence in every other aspect of life." Now the Obama administration has made the quality of a state's charter school law a key criterion to win the $4 billion at stake in the federal "Race to the Top" grant competition. The administration has also signaled that it will place a similar emphasis on spurring the growth of high-performing charter schools as part of the upcoming reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (formerly known as No Child Left Behind). But misconceptions still remain about what a charter school is and what components a charter school law needs to be competitive. What does a good charter law look like, both across the country and in Connecticut? Forty states currently allow public charter schools by law, and each state law is different. Connecticut is home to thousands of students who attend charter schools, many of whom are low-income. But Connecticut lags far behind other states in creating policy to support these students. To bring more great schools to Connecticut and address its most pressing social problem, the state needs to get its charter policies right. This brief explains what its charter policies look like now and what needs to change. (Contains 16 footnotes.)