Find a School or Make a Virtual Visit during National Charter Schools Week, 2013

CER Press Release
Washington, D.C.
May 6, 2013

Thanks to partnerships with thousands of local and state organizations supporting or managing charter schools, The Center for Education Reform (CER) has, for 15 years, provided citizens and parents with access to a comprehensive directory of charter schools.

A glimpse of this data makes clear the breadth and depth of the purpose of National Charter Schools Week, the 6,200 schools which together are creating more and better learning opportunities for students and families. The directory provides an important point of access and objective information to the public. When viewed along side the Center’s Parent Power Index (PPI), a state by state ranking of how well the states perform in ensuring parents have the resources necessary to best educate their children, the directory can be a powerful tool to guide parents seeking to have or improve the educational landscape for their community.

“We’ve based our 20 years of experience on the simple notion that Information is Power. The more and better educated we all are about what is currently available to citizens, the more we can do to grow expanded equity and access for kids,” said Center for Education Reform President Jeanne Allen.

In addition to the Center’s charter school directory, CER has partnered with Noodle.org, the nation’s largest search engine of schools, services and support for families seeking education solutions from birth through adulthood.

The annual National Charter Schools Week runs this year from May 5-11. Nationwide and in states, organizations are providing an unprecedented number of tools and services to help increase understanding and awareness and challenge many myths and false assumptions that often characterize many state and local debates.

Additional local and state organizations also celebrating National

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Vol. 14, No. 19

FREEDOM TO LEARN. This week the nation celebrates National Charter Schools Week, with a Presidential proclamation that trumpets charters as “incubators of innovation… give educators the freedom to cultivate new teaching models” and more. In today’s global economy, the prerequisite for the U.S. to be competitive is a world-class education system. And, charters are leading the way to securing a quality education for all children. Here’s a round-up of the latest headway made by charter schools and their advocates:

• BASIS Tucson, a high-achieving charter school located in Tucson, Arizona, is ranked number one charter school in U.S. News & World Report’s 2012 rankings of high schools. But, the charter goes one step further securing the number six rank of all high schools nationwide! Even better news: BASIS Tucson is bringing its high-octane, high-quality learning to Washington D.C. this September.

• Massachusetts education officials are lifting a temporary moratorium on proposals to open charter schools in several cities across the state, including Boston. Mitchell Chester, Massachusetts commissioner of elementary and secondary education, points to fever-pitched demand as the reason. Case-in-point, the Boston Globereports that in Boston, the wait list at charters ranges from 550 to 2,647 students!

• Legislation that would allow higher education institutions to become charter school authorizers is heading to South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, who indicates she will sign the bill.

• The prestigious Frank Newman Award for State Innovation, presented by the Education Commission of the States, this year goes to New Hampshire for its success in moving beyond the time-worn Carnegie units, exemplified in the state’s Great Bay eLearning Charter School, which along with several other schools was named as part of the state’s Circle of Excellence. The Great Bay charter boasts high-quality learning in a 21st-century environment.

• Cherokee Charter Academy was host to Georgia Governor Nathan Deal as he signed

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Week to Highlight Charter Schools’ Transformative Effects

CER Press Release
Washington, D.C.
May 7, 2012

Across the nation, schools, policy leaders, parents and communities are gathering to celebrate National Charter Schools Week. This public school reform has had more impact on revolutionizing public education than any other single effort in history.

“Charters cause a transformative effect on children, families, communities and state policy,” said Jeanne Allen, president of The Center for Education Reform. “Because of their impact, not only are they propelling student achievement forward for the 2 million children in them, but charter schools are also causing traditional education to act and react in dramatic ways.”

From Los Angeles to Chicago and Michigan to Florida, charter schools are the cause of new blended learning opportunities becoming more mainstream in conventional public schools. Union contract reforms got their start from charter schools showing how teacher freedom and flexibility improves student achievement. Parental choice has expanded through numerous sectors because charter schools demonstrated that choice empowers parents and improves all other schools.

Throughout its 20 year long history, charter schools have proven to those who once said poverty was an excuse for failure that everyone can learn if given the right environment that personalizes the learning process.

Despite the impact, the public remains largely unaware of the importance of this revolutionary reform effort and how it works. The fact that charter schools are public schools, free from much bureaucracy and permitted to innovate is not common knowledge. Charter Schools Week is devoted to growing awareness of this important reform.

Several resources are available to help create better understanding: