Since the first charter school law passed in Minnesota in 1991, over 40 states and the District of Columbia have passed laws allowing the publicly funded, privately managed, and semiautonomous schools of choice. Ever since the first charter school opened in Minnesota in 1992, the battle for fair funding has raged across the land. On the one hand, advocates of charters -- independently run, nonprofit public schools -- use research and other evidence to show how charters significantly boost the achievement of students. On the other, they have pressed hard to eliminate the massive disparities in the funding that charter students receive when compared with their district-operated peers serving similar children. As a literature review, this report aims to present facts and research from multiple sources about the impact of charter schools on student achievement, school funding, and issues related to the de facto segregation after "Brown v. Board of Education."