Much of what she writes about her inspiration is common among many charter school founders – social justice concern for children in the throes of poverty who can make it if only given a chance, despair over bureaucratic mandates that impede true student growth and an annoyance with union rules that handcuff teachers to doing less or keep teachers who work at sub-par levels in contact with students for way too long. Yet, Kenny holds a unique approach to the type of school she wants to open, one that puts people and culture first. Her belief, based on research and reading, particularly Peter Drucker’s Management Challenges for the 21st Century, is that building a culture where people enjoy work and empowering teachers to take ownership of their jobs will result in top outcomes for students. Like many education leaders, Kenny understands how critical it is to have a quality teacher in every classroom. But, rather than script teachers to get a top performance, she wants to give them the freedom, along with accountability, to make their own decisions. It goes without saying that she also puts a lot of time and energy into hiring the right teachers. Her standard? – “Would I want my own kids to have this teacher?”

Kenny does not shy away from testing as a form of accountability. Instead she embraces the conundrum of testing – holding her school accountable for “knocking the ball out of the park on state tests” while comprehending that the “most important things educators impart to students can’t be measured by standardized exams.” She rallies her teachers with a cheer that they do not have to teach to the test…they must teach above it. At Harlem Village Academies, it seems work.

Born to Rise is the type of book that trumpets the need for a paradigm shift in how we approach student learning and school design. Most poignant in Kenny’s testimony, though, is her lack of a call to replicate. “We will never fix education in America by trying to figure out the single best product design, then imposing it on teachers and mandating their compliance…Instead, we need to figure out how to cultivate the passion and talent of teachers.” Agreed. But, if we are not yet producing teachers with the right stuff, it wouldn’t hurt to look around and borrow from what is working elsewhere, just as Kenny herself did by giving each classroom a college name instead of a number, which she said she borrowed from KIPP charter schools.

Kenny’s innovative model is based as much on business techniques as on a specific curriculum or classroom management protocol. Her management platform is based on Drucker’s theories, which describe the nation’s move from an industrial age, manual worker type of productivity requiring a boss to spell out precise specifications, to today’s economic dependence on knowledge workers, including teachers, who require clear goals and autonomy to produce goods and services. Throughout she demonstrates her constant reflection and ability to fix what is not working, certainly a far cry from the typical public school.

Musician John Legend, a Harlem Village Academies board member, speaks often of educational equity and how a good education differentiated him from many of his friends. He wrote Harlem Village Academies’ school song, which Kenny says embodies the “shared belief that all children, not just a privileged few, are born to greatness.”

Roots in the soil of Harlem town
Growing toward the open sky
We are the seeds of hope and love,
Excellence and pride…
Deep in the heart of every child
Planted in every mind
Lies the desire to reach the clouds
We were born to rise…

Not any more.  Nevada’s Green Valley High School came in a respectful 13^th place out of thousands.  But, that pretty top score made the school principal go slack jaw. How could that be?  The first major error is in the simple calculation of how many students are enrolled.  U.S. N&W noted 477.  Jeff Horn, the school’s principal, says think again.  It’s more like 2,788.  And the data went downhill from there.

So what happened?  A consultant programmer, paid by a federal grant to input data that eventually is sent to the U.S. Department of Education’s Common Core of Data, input the wrong numbers for Green Valley High.  The consultant’s contract ended and the individual moved on to Texas.  Human error, albeit costly, is not unexpected.  Safeguards to ensure accurate data fell apart at the federal level and never were in existence at the state level due to not having “a bunch of people sitting around a table, adding up the numbers, making sure things are right,” according to the state’s Education Department director of assessment.  “It’s an automated process.” Automated or not, it failed.

Clearly, this is not the only error in federal data.  Pacific Palisades High School, a very affluent and high-achieving California school, is considered to be a dropout factory thanks to NCES data errors.  These types of errors are unequivocally major obstacles to improve education in all schools for all kids.  The reform movement rests on the base of accountability, assuming the data involved is accurate.  Once the base crumbles at the hand of factual errors, so do key bricks of reform – status of schools, achievement levels of students, teacher evaluations.

This is not a problem that plagues one level of government.  All indicators suggest that fault can be found at all levels.  Government leaders must make the provision of accurate data in a timely fashion a top priority.  If we can’t get the data collection right, the chances of achieving real accountability are about as likely as finding the proverbial needle in a haystack.

Why is this woman protesting the creation of new options for parents – as some of those parents look on – when she most likely doesn’t live in a bad school zone and clearly doesn’t have a clue as to the plight of people who do?

Crusading for universal pre-school is all fine and dandy, but who works in her ideal universally-funded pre-school and where do those pre-schoolers attend school as they age? These are the issues with which most parents are concerned. Is the quality of staff guiding our children first rate? Are they accountable for performance? Are they well educated? Will the children enter schools that are personalized and aware that if they don’t succeed in doing do they can loose the funding the students represent?

Get with the real picture. Put down your sign and visit a few schools. Or not.

“It could hardly get more clear: The performance of the public schools has become so bad that even a bipartisan, middle-of-the road panel says the low educational attainment of our younger generations threatens American security.” READ MORE…

If only it were that easy.

The reality is that these chiefs – regardless of their interests, their power and their ideological leanings – cannot do any better than those in power before NCLB was enacted unless the incentives for change — and the consequences — are no longer voluntary.

True, we have witnessed a sea change with respect to state education policy at the hands of great Governors and school chiefs over time, only to then watch helplessly as it all turned around at the conclusion of a disappointing election cycle. NCLB was intended to finally shake up a system seemingly impervious to change in all but a few pockets of the country. It wasn’t a perfect law. No law is. It relied upon people of varied interests to respond to the challenge and the consequences clearly set forth.

Because of NCLB, we have learned more each year about the dismal state of education through data that, for the first time, was publicly available and disaggregated for all to see.

For decades, student achievement was masked behind the averaged results of a school – results that really meant very little. Good schools had money. Bad schools were impoverished. That’s what the public — and the policymakers — thought. NCLB data-demands unearthed real achievement data — and helped us to throw away the excuses that created a persistent achievement gap.

But instead of responding to the challenge (as we learned more and more each year about the dismal state of education) school districts and Supers began to fight back. They claimed they were being forced into a cookie cutter mode of education (which we’d been in for decades already) and we, the public, bought it. They said they had to teach to the test — teachers, school boards, Republicans and Democrats alike adopted this sentimental favorite turn of phrase to bend public opinion against the pressure to deliver results coming from DC.

And instead of holding the line, we now have states that really believe they could do better if they just had flexibility? Flexibility without a performance requirement? Flexibility without any consequence for failure?

It’s the ultimate ego trip. “I can do it better.”

History suggests otherwise.

Only 20 or so of the 41 states (and the District of Columbia) that provide a home to charter schools truly have the components necessary to provide the educational justice that was and is the driving force behind these schools’ creation. We know this because we’ve been studying this very issue since 1993 and have produced at an almost annual rate a comprehensive report assessing, year to year, the strength and execution of every state charter law. The Center for Education Reform’s research and analysis is based not just on reading and re-reading each law and regulation, but also on a personal, hands-on involvement with schools throughout the country, firsthand accounts and continuous discussion with both parents and leaders affected by the law, as well as with legislators who often don’t realize that a law’s plans and its implementation can vary greatly.

CER’s research and rankings – cited for over a decade by media and political leaders alike – are solid, accepted, and show that when states have great laws, they will have great schools.

If only it were so easy to ensure sound policy be adopted and grown.

On the road to educating lawmakers and promulgating strong charter laws (no simple task with legislator turnover, not to mention their susceptibility to daily outside pressure), another group has decided that a second analysis of existing laws is necessary (regardless of whether or not it might cause confusion, deter policymakers from doing the hard work required, or clash with existing best practices). And so, the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools (NAPCS) has released a new law report, one which scores of education pioneers denounce as damaging. As a pioneer in the area of substantive and structural change in education reform since 1993, the task falls to CER to take on the unpleasant – but extremely important – task of publicly criticizing our respected colleagues for their counterproductive work.

One needs only to look closely at the law NAPCS considers number one in the country – Maine – to quickly see our point. Please don’t misunderstand, we love Maine. In fact, we’ve rooted for and supported local citizens there for years as they worked to enact a law. It took more than a decade of disappointments, but this year, they passed a law that even its ardent sponsors acknowledge is modest and in need of improvement. Still, it’s a start. But a leader to be duplicated around the country? Is the creation of yet another layer of bureaucracy to create new schools built on top of an existing bureaucracy long resistant to their existence the right answer? Or limiting charter growth by the state board (the authorizer more likely to say yes to a charter application than a local board) to 10 schools in 10 years (and not even this year)? Is this the best model we have?

How about the District of Columbia (ranked 1st by CER, 11th by NAPCS)? Almost universally regarded as a great law that limits the imposition of work rules; allows school leaders the freedom they deserve and the accountability they embrace; provides facilities assistance and a nearly equitable funding stream; and puts trust in an authorizing and accountability system that removes the entrenched bias of traditional school administrators. Just as importantly fostered community support unparalleled elsewhere.

And Arkansas (32nd in our analysis, 17th according to NAPCS), a state that has only one authorizer (the state board of education with prior school board’s approval), a cap on the number of schools that can open, inequitable funding making it difficult for charters to operate, and little freedoms for the school and their teachers. Arkansas’ law doesn’t just need some tweaks, it needs a serious overhaul before it can be considered in the top 50 percent of charter laws.

We believe that in order for our children to be best served, there must be the ability to start as many (quantity) excellent (quality) charter schools in a reasonable period of time. We live in a nation that still sees fewer than 45 percent of its students able to complete grade-level work! We are part of a global economy that suffers daily from its educational decline and malaise! So whether you live in Maine or Delaware, 10 schools in 10 years managed by the very same people who have denied reform again and again is not exactly a recipe for success.

Organizations with missions designed to advance certain critical education reforms should understand and respect their obligation and role as leaders when developing and releasing data that can affect public policy. Leadership is not exercised through the creation of formulas and their application to an activity solely to support their creation. Leaders have vision. Leaders are imaginative. Leaders are ambitious.

None of the aforementioned adjectives can be applied to NAPCS’s charter law ranking. It would be akin to the traditional way of doing business promoted by the school districts that charters were created to challenge.

Processes and formulas don’t make good laws. More importantly, they don’t make good schools.

Charter schools are public schools that operate on performance-based accountability, are open by choice, and are free to operate with the kind of flexibility many educators would (and do) trade their iron-clad union contracts for. Charters must meet all rules and regulations with respect to standards, testing, civil rights, health and safety. That’s why more than 5,700 exist today, serving nearly two million children. And surveys show they are helping a disproportionate number of poor and minority students achieve at levels not experienced (and not expected) at their conventional public schools.

Charter school success is not borne of formulas, but it does need critical components to find success. First, a charter can only truly be successful if it is created under a law that ensures the school has a chance of being given proper consideration and, once approved, can operate with flexibility and autonomy in exchange for results.

Second, a charter can only be successful if there are consequences in place for both success and failure. This means there must be strong entities in place charged with ensuring their progress and enforcing their performance contract.

That is educational justice – the availability of a range of great schools to which students and their families are not confined by virtue of social status, money, zip code or race.

And no matter which way you slice it, the NAPCS report and rankings defy this very clear, critical principle of education reform.

Since 1992, 15 percent, or 1,036, of the approximately 6,700 charter schools ever opened have been closed for five primary reasons – financial (41.7 percent), mismanagement (24 percent), academic (18.6 percent), district obstacles (6.3 percent) and facilities (4.6 percent). There are 500 additional charter schools that have been consolidated back into the district or received a charter but were unable to open.

This level of analysis and transparency is critical for the public to understand that poorly performing or problematic charter schools are being closed. And that charter schools are working. Knowing what happens to charter schools that fail is critical, but one must be careful in making assumptions with data that does away with the full context.

Huffington Posts’ Joy Resmovits took the initiative to explore and report on the number of academic closures within the full universe of charters ever opened to make the case that charter schools are rarely closed for academic performance. However, this type of analysis takes the report findings out of context and maligns the high-level of accountability currently in place.

Our report found that the majority of charter schools close for financial or operational deficiencies and do so within the first five years of the school’s existence. Academic closures usually take longer because it takes the whole charter term to gather enough sound data and make proper comparisons.

This is a good sign. One cannot expect charter schools that face financial or mismanagement issues to achieve high levels of academic success. These issues present themselves much sooner and give authorizers the tools to close schools long before we can see what happens academically. In essence, authorizers can nip it in the bud.

The correlation between strong charter school laws, accountability and effective charter schools cannot be emphasized enough. Independent authorizers have full control over how they evaluate charter schools and have their own staff and funding streams. This enables them to create streamlined, effective tools to manage their portfolio of charter schools and close those that are not living up to their contract.

These facts reveal not only that charters are successful, but also that accountability for results is alive and well in a way that is unique to these public schools.

As long as I’ve been at the helm of CER, I’ve been proud to stand alongside individuals within the organization and without who don’t let people stray too far from what their positions and obligations are all about. We’ve taken on Democrats and Republicans alike, including presidents. We’ve called out the Blob, and we’ve challenged those who are allies or friends. We’ve called out non-profits and for-profits. We’ve both praised and torn apart the media.

My personal responsibility is to those who turn to us for help and those who support us to do so. They run the gamut from $10 donors to big foundations. They fund many of the same people we support and some that we criticize. I’ve often repeated to my kids that old but true saying, “Integrity is doing the right thing even when no one is looking.” So it gets to me, in particular, when people conduct themselves poorly because they think no one is watching, particularly public officials.

Take New Jersey’s Commissioner of Education, whom I’ve been proud in the past to stand by when he called or asked for help in numerous positions he’s held. Yet lately, he’s stood by a flawed charter review process and has decided to turn personal on the business issue at hand. After reading Newswire’s critique of his department’s stepping aside to allow the Garden State Virtual Charter to take a dive, one example of the many charters denied authorization despite a quality application, Christopher Cerf fired off an angry missive to me (not the first) accusing me of “shilling” for the charter. Shilling? Standing up for what is best for the kids of his state, even if it means taking on a friend, is more like it. Glad to hear, though, that Cerf is an avid reader of Newswire, but must we really conduct ourselves like this?

Not to be outdone by Cerf, the press secretary for Pennsylvania Speaker of the House Sam Smith berated my assistant on the phone the other day after he read our press statement which takes he and his colleagues to task for failing to live up to promises — verbal and well-documented — that if the Senate passed school choice legislation they would gladly take it up before the end of the session. Yet Steve Miskin called to tell me it wasn’t true. Becoming angry upon learning I was not in the office, he said, “This is the speaker’s office. I need to speak with her. She is a liar.”

Nice behavior for public officials, who are tasked with putting the people they represent first. Look folks, if you don’t believe what you read and hear, prove it. If we’re wrong, show us. Until then, Santa Claus is not coming to town to deliver you, or anyone else that behaves badly all year, any gifts.

Let me count the ways:

1) Alex Molnar — used as an expert. Has been a known ideological opponent of reform since I was in college. Literally. Crazy man. Has no academic standing.

2) Gary Miron — a little better and sometimes a fairly good researcher, but who’s devoted a lifetime to studying for-profit companies, always with a slant as to how they hurt charter schools. Not much credibility here, either.

3) Jack Wagner — PA State Auditor, who wants to be governor some day with the support of the teachers union. Has been saying for years that having charter schools funded from same pool as other public schools is unfair. Strike 3

4) Lawyer for school districts used as a source

5) By page 5 (online), we still haven’t heard from someone with a different point of view. Now the NEA is being used as a source for policy and data.

6) CREDO — Yep, that study. Too bad there’s no corollary provided. More on that here and here.

6) Reagan. Had to bring him up. PR guy for local Ohio choice group used to work in that Administration. Clearly this is all the former president’s fault!

And this reporter won a Pulitzer Prize? Obviously, it’s not just the education system that’s been dumbed down!

For the facts on online learning, check out the Center for Education Reform’s Digital Learning Toolkit.

For another analysis on the story, visit this post on Getting Smart.

And to naysayers that say charters don’t work, that they don’t close and that they are not accountable, I’d like to know what you call this.

It’s so good that not only can you see superior gains in charters versus traditional public schools (Sorry, Macke!) but there is a tier of schools under review that the data — using child by child performance scores — suggests either needs to buck up or be closed, something this independent, superior authorizer is willing to do.

A model to be sure for other states, and a proud moment for DC. Kudos, DCPCSB and charter school leaders!