RJA 13b: Visual Aids–

1) Map by National Alliance for Public Charter schools that provides a look at how many charter schools exist in the United States and per state for the school year 2009-2010. It also provides a timeline for the inception of charter schools since 1991.

2)  Chart by Layman, 2006 that graphs the public school enrollment and charter school enrollment for the D.C. School Districts from 1996 to 2006. The graph shows that as the charter school numbers increase the traditional public school enrollment numbers decrease.

3) The table from Charter Schools Finding, 2010 that is from the CREDO study on how charter schools are stacking up to public schools in 15 states based on their standardized test scores in reading and writing.

4) The Graph from the KIPP foundation (a charter school in low income districts) study that shows how well KIPP is stacking up to the national average for students who graduate high school and college as apposed to those in traditional public schools.

RJA 13a: APA-Style Annotated Bibliography, Part 2–

Winerip, M. (2006, Mar 22). Nytimes. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/22/education/22education.html?pagewanted=all

The author Michael Winerip has been a reporter for New York Times for over 30 years. He has been a staff writer, investigative reporter, and national political correspondent. He is also won the Pulitzer Prize Award for an article on a man that pushed a woman to her death on a subway. This article is about how public education is reliant on the companies that make standardized tests. The author takes a look at how overextended and under regulated the testing industry is. He talks about how the states are needing to “dumb down” their tests because it is more expensive to grade essay tests than to grade multiple choice exams. This is because they need to meet federal requirements but the federal government is not doing its part to pay the costs of the tests. This forces the schools to have to use cheaper alternative methods in their testing. He argues that it is more useful to evaluate a child based on evaluating information rather than recalling facts. Connecticut has filed law suite against the Federal government claiming that they are not doing their part to pay for the costs of the No Child Left Behind Act in order for schools to maintain their testing standards and most states are just succumbing to the financial constraint and switching to a testing standard that is less telling of it’s students actual learning progress. 

Kohn, A. (2000, September 27). Alfiekohn.org. Retrieved from http://www.alfiekohn.org/teaching/edweek/staiv.htm

Author Alfie Kohn is a speaker and an author. He has authored 12 books and speaks publicly at national education seminars and staff development seminars about topics relating to behavior, education, and parenting. In this article Kohn reviews what he terms “indisputable facts” about standardized testing. He talks about our children today being subjected to more testing than any other generation in Americas history and that few other countries use multiple choice testing. He explains that “noninstructional factors explain most of the variances in test scores” between states. These include number of parents living at home, parents' educational background, type of community, and poverty rate. He points out a study by the Journal of Educational Psychology that measured “superficial thinking.” It showed that students who were actually engaged and in learning did poorer on tests than those students who exhibited the superficial learning approach and just copied down answers or guessed. He points out that virtually all professionals in the field condemn the giving tests to children under the age of 8 or 9 years old and they do not believe on basing important decisions off of test scores alone. He points out that schools are cutting back in arts and activities that promote moral learning in an effort to raise funds in order to keep up with and pass tests. He also points out that many of the best teachers are leaving the profession due to the high stakes of good test scores in the current climate. He drives home his main point that “failure is not an option….looks good on bumper stickers….or for politician” but it that “…high-stakes testing marks a major retreat from fairness, from accuracy, from quality, and from equity." He points out that the corporations looking to profit from the testing industry are selling test prep material to schools who are from high influential communities and can afford the material. Lower income districts are not able to afford the best teachers and the latest material and are falling behind on their scores. His main point is that the people being left out the most are the ones that can’t afford it and that  it would make more sense to equally finance schools in both low income and affluent neighborhoods to ensure they are all able to equally meet the growing demands and needs. 

(n.d.). Public vs charter schools. Retrieved from http://www.differencebetween.net/miscellaneous/career-education/difference-between-public-and-charter-schools/

This article does not list an author. It is published by differencebetween.net. This website gives you information that allows you to differentiate between two similar topics. This article is talking about the main differences between public school and charter schools. The article points out that the main differences can be found in five areas. One is that they are both publicly funded but charter schools also receive funds from other sources and sponsors. Another difference can be seen in that a charter school has a lot more autonomy but still held to government standards. Attendance is mandatory in public schools but students have to enroll and be accepted into charter schools. Public schools are stable and remain in operation for years while charter schools are held to stringent accountability and review by government standard tests and are at risk of being closed down if they do not meet the standards. Lastly public schools are established by the government and charter schools can be established by private entities. The helpful part of this article is to help me categorize some main talking points and objectives that could explain some of the key components and reasons that charter schools are seeing a higher number of college graduates than traditional public schools.   

Dwyer, L. (2011, April 29). [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://www.good.is/posts/kipp-s-graduation-rate-stats-spark-charter-school-debate

Liz Dwyer is a blogger on the Good website. She talks about a recent report released by KIPP, an charter school organization. She gives many links and provides the information about her sources. The article looks at a study that KIPP did with their first graduating charter school class in New York and Houston. The two schools KIPP low income student body surpassed the national average for high school and college graduation rates. KIPP charter schools have a longer day and their teachers are required to carry cell phones and be available to students after hours. It points out that a lo t of the success of charter schools may revolve around highly motivated parents because they are required to sign a contract and give time to the school. The author voices her opinion that certainly politicians will use studies like the one done by KIPP in order to justify funneling money away from public schools. This article is good for me because it provides me with good statistics, numbers, and fact based opinions on how charter schools are doing and why they may be doing so well. It also provides me with the sources used.  

RJA 12b: APA-Style Annotated Bibliography, Part 1

Booker, K., Sass, T. R., Gill, B., & Zimmer, R. (2010). The unknown world of charter high schools. Education next, 10(2), Retrieved from http://educationnext.org/the-unknown-world-of-charter-high-schools/

Although I could not find any information about the authors of this article, it is a peer reviewed journal from Stanford and Harvard College. The article looks at long term achievements and the effects that charter school attendance has on high school graduation and college completion. They use data from Chicago and Florida charter and public schools to conduct their study. Their research found evidence that attending charter schools had significant positive effects on students. The study found that that students attending charter schools as apposed to traditional public schools were more likely to graduate high school and attend college. The information in this study is valuable because it is looking at the long term results of the effects educational choices are having on students as apposed to the short term results of standardized test results.

Abdul-Alim, J. (2011, July 29). Charter schools and college access. Retrieved from http://diverseeducation.com/article/16142/

Jamaal Abdul-Alim is a freelance journalist. His research covers a variety of topics for several different journals. In this article Abdul-Alim researched the subject of charter school access and college graduation rates of a Washington D.C. based charter school known as SEED. Abdul-Alim takes a look at the admission process for SEED charter school. Families are accepted into the charter school based on a lottery system. This lottery system is designed to give all families an equal opportunity to attend the charter school. Abdul-Alim shows statistics from SEED and RAND Corporation that show a trends in the number of students enrolling in and graduating from four year universities after leaving charter schools. His research shows a significant increase in college graduation for those students who attended charter schools as opposed to their public school counterparts. The argument is made in this article that it’s not about the test scores but the real measure of success for charter schools is their ability to prepare children to be successful in completing a four year college degree. 

Chen, G. (2009, July 10). Public school review. Retrieved from http://www.publicschoolreview.com/articles/123

Author Grace Chen is a public school educator, activist for reforming traditional public schools, education researcher, and writer. This article talks about the battle of charter schools verse public schools. It brings to light that most charter schools are not outperforming public schools in the area of standardized testing in Math and Reading. The article then goes onto state there is an exception to these scores with lower income families and English learner families in charter schools. These students are outperforming their public school counterparts. The article goes on to say that the charter schools were originally designed for these lower income families but that charter schools are underserving the lower income families because they are unable to meet the needs of special needs or at risk children and because attending a charter school has to be by choice. They argue that the very families that would benefit from charter schools are the same families that are drug addicts and abusers and unlikely to take the time or attention in registering nor researching a better schooling option for their children. This article takes a good look at the objections to charter schools and where they are lacking.