Student discipline issues in charter schools have received a burst of attention recently. The December issue of the Atlantic features an article called “How Strict is Too Strict”that looks at the lessons to be learned from New Orleans charter high schools and the strict disciplinary practices they follow.
The mission of The Center for Learner Equity (The Center for Learner Equity) is to advocate for students with diverse learning needs to ensure that if they are interested in attending charter schools, they are able to access and thrive in schools designed to enable all students to succeed.
In a recent blog post Parker Baxter of the National Association of Charter School Authorizers (NACSA) made two good points. First, he called out the importance of the new state-by-state report on the health of the charter school movement that was released last week by the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools NAPCS).
Charter schools, similar to traditional public schools, will continue to struggle to provide FAPE absent adequate funding. Senator Harkin introduced the IDEA Full Funding Act earlier this week and The Center for Learner Equitysubmitted the following letter supporting the legislation.
Beginning today in Newark, New Jersey, educators from most of the city’s charter schools are taking part in a two-day training designed to address the needs of students with disabilities in these schools.
Earlier this month, Teach for America convened 1,000 of its core members and alumni in the hills outside of Las Vegas for a Teach for America Educators Conference. The two-day event engaged attendees in discussions, forums, workshops, panels, plenaries, and Ed Talks focused on the most relevant, timely topics in education reform.
When serving students with disabilities in charter schools, there is no shortage of consistently challenging issues to contend with. One of the trickiest is how to fund it. In some states, like Pennsylvania, charter schools receive a flat payment of state and local funds for each student with disabilities.
The Center for Learner Equity supports this opportunity to focus public attention on the value of charter schools and the benefits they offer to families, including students with disabilities, in 42 states and the District of Columbia.
The recent New York state budget may have largely settled the tug of war between Mayor de Blasio and co-locating charter schools that has been playing out in New York over the last month or so, but an unpleasant and lingering issue still needs to be addressed – the disingenuous way that students with disabilities were dragged into the fight.
We commend Andrea Gabor for raising an important issue: children with disabilities’ equal access to charter schools. As New York and other states work to grow the charter sector as part of larger education reform efforts focused on improving the quality of public education, we must ensure that charter schools are open to all students.
