Public Impact

  • Home
  • Who We Are
  • What We Do
  • Media
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Subscribe
Innovation. Excellence. Service. Impact.
  • Opportunity Culture
  • Teachers & Principals
    • Teacher Leadership
    • Recruit, Select, and Keep Education Talent
    • Competencies of High Performers
    • Evaluating Teacher and Leader Performance
    • Teacher and Leader Compensation
    • Professional Development for Educators
  • Turnarounds
    • Turnarounds Within Schools
    • Restarts by Charter Operators
    • Innovation Zones
  • Funding
    • School Funding
  • Charters
    • Charter School Authorizing
    • Scaling Up Quality
    • Restarts in Failing Schools
    • High Market Share Cities
    • State and Federal Charter School Policy
    • Help for Charter Schools
    • Serving Students with Highest Needs
  • More Topics
    • Big Ideas for Education
    • Entrepreneurship in K-12
    • Parents and Community
    • Philanthropy in Education
    • Special Populations
    • Technology in Schools
    • Assessment and Data

The “High-Stakes” Study Design

This study focuses on the government-side of charter school accountability: the agencies that sponsor schools and how they come to make final decisions on a charter school’s future. The study was designed to examine 50 “decisions” made by authorizing agencies – renewals, revocations, and nonrenewals. These 50 cases were selected out of a collected pool of 506 “decisions.”

Our first step was to collect charter school decisions from states with charter school laws or existing charter schools. These decisions were put into a database and sorted by state, authorizer-type, and decision-type. We then selected 50 cases with alternates matched for each case. These fifty cases were chosen to reflect the ratio of decision-types and authorizer-types found in the population of 506 cases.

Once the cases were selected, we contacted our prospective “respondents” for interviews. Interviewees received a copy of a set protocol prior to the interview for their own review and to assemble any relevant documents we requested. The study was designed to collect information on the decision-process through three respondent-types: a knowledgeable representative of the authorizing agency, a school official, and a third-party with knowledge of the decision. Click to view the interview protocols in their entirety. From the start our Advisory Board recognized that obtaining information or interviews about closure cases would be more difficult than with renewals. We therefore took two precautionary steps: 1) we slightly over sampled revocations and nonrenewals to ensure a balance of decision-types and 2) the basis for a case to move forward was – at bare minimum – an interview with an authorizer involved with the decision. In addition to interviews, we collected documents from the authorizing agencies pertaining to the decision.

These documents included, but were not limited to: copies of the original charter, renewal applications, authorizing agency board minutes, correspondence between authorizers and schools, and any policies regarding decision-processes. We also looked for press articles in local newspapers for an understanding of how the school was situated in the community.

With all of the data collected we began a process of statistical analysis as well as a close examination of the “stories” behind each case. Our final analysis incorporates a balanced examination of what the numbers reveal along with the patterns and trends of charter school accountability.

To go back to one of the following click below:

  • “High-Stakes”: Findings from a National Study of Life-or-Death Decisions by Charter School Authorizers”
  • “Starting Fresh: A New Strategy to Dealing with Chronically Low-Performing Schools”

Additional Resources

As charter schools are a fairly new reform effort on the American education scene, other agencies and organizations are beginning to look at questions of accountability and, in particular, the threat or occurrence of charter school closures. One such study recently released by The Center for Education Reform, “Charter School Closures: the Opportunity for Accountability,” lists charter school closures, consolidations, and charter schools which never opened. Visit www.edreform.com for further information.

For additional information on authorizer practices and policies regarding charter school decision-making processes visit www.qualitycharters.org, the website of the National Association of Charter School Authorizers.

We welcome any responses to the components of this two-year project. Please contact Public Impact with any questions or comments.

Public Impact®

Public Impact, LLC
Chapel Hill, NC
919-240-7955

Public Impact encourages the free use, reproduction, and distribution of our materials, but we require attribution. If you adapt the materials, you must include on every page “Adapted from PublicImpact.com; Copyright Public Impact” in the font size specified here.

Materials may not be sold, leased, licensed, or otherwise distributed for compensation. See our Terms of Use page or contact us for more information.

Public Impact is certified as a living wage employer by Orange County Living Wage.

Search

Subscribe

Sign Up for E-News!
 


 
Read Back Issues of our
E-Newsletter

 
Subscribe to our blog with RSS

Follow

New from Public Impact

Employment Opportunities—Coordinators
Public Impact is seeking candidates for coordinators to provide support for logistics, sales and strategy, and our talent and DEI teams.

Learning in Real Time—How Charter Schools Served Students During Covid-19 Closures
Profiles highlight how charter schools were able to respond quickly to school closures during the pandemic and continue to serve their students well.

Building an Effective Staff—Profiles of Leaders of Color
Three-part series looks at how being a person of color affected the ways in which successful charter school leaders built schools where students, families, and staff learn, grow, and thrive.

Engaging Families—Profiles of Leaders of Color
Three-part series looks at how being a person of color affected the ways in which successful charter school leaders built schools where students, families, and staff learn, grow, and thrive.

Building a Strong School Culture—Profiles of Leaders of Color
Three-part series looks at how being a person of color affected the ways in which successful charter school leaders built schools where students, families, and staff learn, grow, and thrive.

The Impact of School Restarts—Lessons from Four Indianapolis Schools
Report analyzes how enrollment, demographic, and student performance data changed following the restarts of four charter schools in Indianapolis, IN.

Learning from Project L.I.F.T.—Legacy of a Public-Private School Turnaround Initiative
Report examines successes, challenges, and lessons from a private-public district turnaround initiative.

Public Impact, LLC | 919-240-7955 | Terms of Use | © Public Impact 2000-2021 | Wordpress website design by LeGa Design Group