Nick's Story: How a charter school changed everything for my son

Henry Ford once said, "People can have the Model T in any color, so long as it's black." Not long ago, this same lack of choices prevailed in public education, but not any more. Charter schools are providing additional choices with positive results for many children including our son.

Nick was sinking in the depths of traditional public school complacency. He didn't have special education needs, was not a behavioral problem but was not advancing. In the third grade he began hating school. His father and I read with him nightly, helped with homework and yet Nick was below grade level in reading.

Bullying had become an issue for him at school; fifth grade boys were pushing our third grader and his buddies around. Nick became increasingly depressed. Our voiced concerns were met with blank stares and feeble reassurances from the teacher that Nick was an average student who was doing fine. I met with the principal regarding our playground concerns only to be told Nick needed to be more "assertive." It was apparent the bullying would not be stopped and his reading issues would not be addressed.

Having been on my local school board, I knew, all too well, that the district administration would do little to resolve the problems our son was experiencing, viewing them as too insignificant. While insignificant to the school district organization as a whole, these problems were devastating for Nick. The devastation was made more than clear when our young son told us, "I kept asking grown-ups at school for help but no one would help me." Hearing that from Nick was like a knife in our hearts. Fortunately, in Arizona, parents have public charter schools so we had additional options and choices.

We placed him in D.W. Higgins Institute, a public charter school. Testing revealed he was six months below grade level in his reading. At the end of the school year, Nick had advanced over two grade levels - in six months! You can imagine how pleased we were to see our third grader reading at the fifth grade, fourth-month level. Because disrespectful behavior between students is not tolerated at Higgins, Nick's sunny personality returned. But there is more to this story.

Last May, as Nick's fourth grade year came to a close, we received his Stanford 9 scores; the results were incredible. Nick scored the equivalent of "Post High School" on Reading Comprehension, Editing, Composing and Language. While we realize that a test is a "snap shot in time" and just one piece in the puzzle of a child's education, the numbers on this test validate what we see at home.

Nick's work ethic is excellent now. He reads for pleasure and takes responsibility for his learning and homework. He's happy and his self-esteem is high because he is becoming competent. He loves school. This certainly is, emotionally, a different child than the one who scribbled "my life stinks" on a piece of paper days before we pulled him from the neighborhood school.

Because the charter school movement gave us, as parents, the ability to choose our son's school, Nick is soaring. Charter schools have empowered parents to become fully responsible for their children's individual educational needs by providing additional choices. Eventually, even the Ford Motor Company realized the great value of offering choices to meet customer's individual needs: my "mocha" colored Ford minivan is proof.

Onnie Shekerjian of Tempe, Arizona, is the mother of three. Over the last 14 years, she has served on over three dozen public education committees, boards and commissions at the state, district and school level. In 1995, she co-founded Arizona Parents Association for Children's Education (APACE), a parent advocacy organization. Shekerjian also facilitates the site council at her daughters' high school, coordinates the APACE hotline and is vice president of the Arizona State Board for Charter Schools.