Good evening Ivory, I want to first thank you for your post. As an educator in the public
school system for the last fifteen years, the question of charter schools has come up many times
between co-workers as well as from parents of students. I have had students transfer into my
class over the years from charter schools and they have been woeful behind all my other students
and then I have had some transfer in that are far ahead. I also had to complete one of my
observations for my undergraduate program at a charter school that was sponsored by my
university, and it was an eye-opening experience, as the approach to education was much laxer
then I was used to.
One study that I found was done by Uttermark et al. (2024), which set about to examine
the effect that charter schools had on traditional schools. They examined the quality of traditional
schools in three Florida counties against themselves after charter schools were opened within the
communities that they serviced to see if the educational performance level rose as a result of the
charter school. They found that charter schools have no meaningful impact on traditional schools
and that the competition hypothesis posit by some researchers could not be substantiated with
their findings. Proverbs 1:7 states, “The.fear.of.the.Lord.is.the.beginning.of.knowledge:
but.fools.despise.wisdom.and.instruction” (King James Bible, 1769/2024), which demonstrates
that as a society, we must recognize the value of education, regardless if it is coming from a
charter school or a traditional format. Thanks again for your post and God bless.
References
King James Bible. (2024). King James Bible Online. https://www.kingjamesbibleonlinelorg/
(Original work published 1769).
Uttermark, M. J., Mackie, K. R., Weissert, C. S., & Artiles, A. (2024). The boundaries of
competition: Examining charter schools’ impact on traditional schools. Educational
Policy, 38(1), 3-30. https://doi.org/10.1177/08959048221142049
