Charter Schools Are Public Schools of Choice

January 4, 2010

In Curt Ankerburg’s Dec. 27 article, he argues that Madrone Trail Public Charter School should pay rent because it is "equivalent to a private school" and it has minimal oversight by 549c. This premise is misleading and factually incorrect.

Under the Oregon Charter School legislation, a charter school is legally considered a public school by the federal and state government as well as the Oregon School Boards Association. This is a legal fact, not a debate, opinion or supposition.

Over and beyond this, charter schools are fundamentally different than private schools in many significant ways. For example:

•The major revenue source for charter schools is federal and state funding.
•Charter schools cannot pick and choose students. Enrollment is open to any student residing in the state. If there are more applicants than spaces available, enrollment is determined by a lottery.
•Charter schools may not charge tuition.
•There are literally pages of governmental ordinances applying to charter school operation in the areas of record keeping, open meeting laws, instructional hours, insurance, health and safety measures, civil rights, etc.
•Charter schools must follow separation of church and state guidelines.
•Students in charter schools are required to participate in state assessment tests.
•All teachers must be "highly qualified" according to the N o Child Left Behind legislation. For a kindergarten-through-eighth grade school, this means all the teachers must pass the state test for teaching multiple subjects. Fifty percent of the teachers must have the Oregon teaching credential and the other 50 percent must have a bachelor’s degree and be registered with the Teacher Standards and Practices Commission. In addition, we expect that faculty members have exposure to and/or training in Waldorf pedagogy.

Unlike a private school, Madrone Trail operates under a charter contract detailing its duties and responsibilities toward 549c, i.e, Madrone Trail students must perform at or above the district average in the state achievement tests. In this and other significant ways, Madrone Trail does "answer" to 549c and thus its constituency base. The MTPCS board’s responsibility is to make sure the charter school stays true to its mission.

This mission — to provide a Waldorf-inspired school of choice — is an educational opportunity the 549c board decided to offer based on evidence of a strong demand from the constituency base; hence the charter school reflects the desire of the community.

Within Oregon, at least nine charter schools (more than 10 percent of the total statewide) receive a free facility from their sponsoring districts. In addition, the Race to the Top program, part of The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, is a competitive grant providing incentives to states based on educational reform goals, among them, support and expansion of the charter school movement through increasing the number of charter schools, equity in funding and access to facilities and facility finances.

As founding board members of Madrone Trail we are immeasurably grateful to 549c for its approval of our school. So far, Madrone Trail has collected more than 300 signatures from the wider community, more than 80 of those from members of the Chamber of Commerce, supporting our proposal for the use of the West Side building. We are confident the above factors and the public support we garnered will provide the 549c board with the feedback and framework needed to make a decision that advances our mutual mission of putting children first.

Regardless of the governance of these educational institutions, the students attending charter schools deserve their fair share of public educational resources; they are not second-class citizens or free riders.