Inside the United States
States with (red) and without (black) charter
schools
In
1991,
Minnesota adopted charter school legislation to expand a
longstanding program of public school choice and to stimulate
broader system improvements. Since then, the charter concept has
spread to 40 states and DC. State laws follow varied sets of key
organizing principles based on
the Citizens League's recommendations for
Minnesota,
American Federation of Teachers guidelines, and/or federal
charter-school legislation (U.S. Department of Education).
Principles govern sponsorship, number of schools, regulatory
waivers, degree of fiscal/legal autonomy, and performance
expectations.
Current laws have been characterized as either strong or weak.
Strong-law states mandate considerable autonomy from local
labor-management agreements, allow multiple charter-granting
agencies, and allocate a level of funding consistent with the
statewide per pupil average. Arizona's
1994 law is the strongest, with multiple charter-granting
agencies, freedom from local labor contracts, and large numbers of
charters permitted.
40
U.S. states have Charter-school
laws. The vast majority of charter schools (more than 70
percent) are found in states with the strongest laws:
Arizona,
California,
Colorado,
Massachusetts,
Michigan,
Minnesota, and
North Carolina.[5]
Despite the map, Washington has yet to pass a law to create
charter schools.
In the aftermath of
Hurricane Katrina, over half of the
New Orleans schools that are re-opening are doing so as Charter
schools.[6]
Outside the United States
New Zealand
Well before American charter schools,
New Zealand went far further in granting power to individual
schools by abolishing all regional school boards and making each
public school independent, with local parent and teacher involvement
in decision making.[7]
Although not called charter schools, each school does have a charter
under which it operates with a board of trusteesand has a high
degree of autonomy. The main difference, though, is that since all
schools have the same status, individual schools don't all have the
uniqueness typical of a charter school.
While since 1989 there is also provision for
Designated Special Character schools, so far only two have been
created. (These are not to be confused with 'state integrated'
schools -- mostly Catholic[8],
and formerly private -- that are 'integrated' into the public school
system, while retaining their proprietor -- which are required to
have a 'special character' in their integration agreement with the
Crown that would be preserved by the school's continuance[9].)
England and Wales
The
United Kingdom established
grant-maintained schools in
England and
Wales in
1988. They allowed individual schools that were independent of
the local school authority. When they were abolished in
1998, most turned into
foundation schools, which are under their local district
authority but still have a high degree of autonomy.
Alberta
Calgary Girls' School was granted a charter in 2003. As of 2005
it was one of only a dozen in
Alberta, the only
Canadian province to allow charter schools.
About three years after their introduction in the U.S., the
Canadian province of
Alberta allowed charter schools beginning in
1994. Two years later, ABC Charter Public School (now Westmount
Charter School) formed.
Alberta charter schools have much in common with their U.S.
counterparts. As of 2005 there are only about a dozen charter
schools in the province, compared with over 50 school boards, with
the largest one alone having over 200 schools. The idea of charter
schools initially sparked great debate and is still controversial,
but has had limited impact. No other province in Canada has yet
followed Alberta's lead.
Overall, charter schools have had much less support outside the
U.S., although many of the choices provided by charter schools have
long existed elsewhere under different names.
A short documentary about Alberta charter schools can be seen on
the Society for Quality Education website.
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