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Strategies
August 26, 2022
Charter schools

Charter schools

Strategy overview

  • Leveraging autonomy to improve student outcomes: Charter schools are publicly funded schools that operate separately from district-run public schools. Charters can be run by a wide range of organizations and seek to leverage their autonomy to improve student outcomes. While there is nothing exclusive to the charter model that makes them successful, the increased autonomy and higher-likelihood of school-level decision-making authority can make it easier for them to implement practices and programmatic changes that support improved student outcomes like increased time on task, longer school days, frequent teacher feedback, and culturally-specific curricula. Unlike district-operated schools, charter schools in most states must demonstrate that they have achieved student, financial, and operational outcomes, including on state assessments, to maintain funding and continue operations.

  • Lottery-based admission for all students: Charter schools are public schools of choice; they cannot charge tuition, and families elect to attend a particular charter school. In some cases, there are more applicants than available seats. In this situation, state laws require charter operators to hold a randomized lottery to determine admission. Charter schools cannot selectively enroll students and must serve any student that a district-operated school would, including English Language Learners and students with disabilities.

  • Developing and refining innovative curricula: While there is significant variance across charter schools, high-performing schools often develop their own curricula and teacher training programs. This curricula frequently is tailored to the needs and cultural context of the community in which the school operates and may choose a topical focus such as career-technical, language immersion, or a STEM emphasis. Charter schools also create their own criteria and systems for hiring and evaluating teachers: Teachers in charter schools are required to meet all licensure requirements in state policy; some state policies allow for different pathways and requirements for teachers teaching in charter schools including having a college degree. In most cases, teachers at charter schools are non-unionized.

  • Publicly supervised and funded, independently managed: Charter schools receive accreditation and access public funds (often as part of a state funding formula on a per-student basis) via an authorization process that is dictated by state law. While they are typically independently managed by a board of directors, a range of institutions, including public school districts in some states, may manage them. Charters are authorized in forty-five states and the District of Columbia. A range of institutions may serve as authorizers–entities that approve, monitor, and oversee school performance–as determined by state policy; in most states, local school districts are able to be authorizers. In some many other states a range of institutions are able to be authorizers including Departments of Education, universities, municipalities, and statewide independent boards. Charters typically submit a plan and are evaluated for renewal every five years. Authorizers play a critical role in holding charter schools accountable for implementing their plan with fidelity and achieving the student, financial, and operational outcomes they set forth. Charters that fail to reach their goals may not receive authorization renewal.

  • Independent administrative services: Unlike district-operated schools, charter schools are responsible not only for students’ experience in the classroom, but also for the aspects of administration typically handled centrally by a district or Department of Education such as real estate management, capital financing, insurance, procurement, and legal services. Many charter schools choose to appoint board members with expertise in these areas.

  • Networks of charter schools: Charter schools may be a part of charter management organizations (CMOs), nonprofit entities that provide services to a network of charter schools and can allow them to access similar economies of scale available to district-operated schools for administrative, such as a lawyer, or educational, like reading specialist, services. Experts note that CMOs can be very successful at replicating models that work, but are also less likely to have locally-tailored curricula and can be prone to recreating the centralized decision-making present in district-operated schools. Education management organizations (EMOs), which are for profit entities providing services similar to CMOs, represent a small proportion of charter schools and are only allowed in a few states. However, experts call into question the educational outcomes that are associated with EMO-managed schools.

Multiple systematic reviews and meta-analyses of rigorous evaluations show that charter schools can be associated with significant improvements in math, reading, and science achievement.

  • A 2023 research summary of 40 lottery-based evaluations found that charter school attendance improves academic achievement in math and english language arts and four-year college enrollment, though sparse evidence exists on behavioral and health outcomes, as well as college persistence.

  • A 2023 rigorous study utilizing student matching design of student success in 31 states found that students enrolled in public charter schools advanced their learning in math and reading when compared to students at district-operated schools.

  • A 2018 meta-analysis of charter schools found that they improved student outcomes in math and reading relative to district-operated schools. However, findings were not consistent across grade levels.

  • A 2017 systematic review of 'No Excuses' charter schools — characterized by consistent discipline, more instructional time, and increased parental involvement — found that these schools improved math and literacy outcomes compared to district-operated schools.

  • A 2018 systematic review found that KIPP schools had positive effects on math (12 percentile points improvement) and English language arts (8 percentile points improvement) and potentially positive effects on science and social studies achievement.

Experts emphasize three caveats regarding the body of evidence surrounding charter schools. First, lottery-based studies, the most rigorous research design available to pinpoint how charter schools causally affect student learning, come from only 14 states, despite charter schools operating in 45 states. Furthermore, the majority of the lottery-based studies evaluated outcomes from school years between 2000-2015, with relatively few studies of more recent years having been published. Anecdotally, some experts have noted that more recent years have yielded innovations in charter school models, including, but not limited to, a greater focus on new ways of engaging underrepresented students, which have not yet been represented in the evidence base. However, several research organizations aim to fill this gap.

Finally, given the nature of randomized lottery study designs, schools must be oversubscribed in order to conduct this type of rigorous evaluation. As such, it is reasonable to consider that the charter schools that have been subject to rigorous lottery-based evaluation may be the best, most in-demand schools versus being representative of the average high-quality charter school. Some broader evaluations of charter schools show few differences in academic achievement between charter and district-operated schools.

Before making investments in charter schools, city and county leaders should ensure this strategy addresses local needs.

The Urban Institute and Mathematica have developed indicator frameworks to help local leaders assess conditions related to upward mobility, identify barriers, and guide investments to address these challenges. These indicator frameworks can serve as a starting point for self-assessment, not as a comprehensive evaluation, and should be complemented by other forms of local knowledge.

The Urban Institute's Upward Mobility Framework identifies a set of key local conditions that shape communities’ ability to advance upward mobility and racial equity. Local leaders can use the Upward Mobility Framework to better understand the factors that improve upward mobility and prioritize areas of focus. Data reports for cities and counties can be created here.

Several indicators in the Upward Mobility Framework may be improved with investments in high-quality charter schools. To measure these indicators and determine if investments in this strategy could help, examine the following:

Mathematica's Education-to-Workforce (E-W) Indicator Framework helps local leaders identify the data that matter most in helping students and young adults succeed. Local leaders can use the E-W framework to better understand education and workforce conditions in their communities and to identify strategies that can improve outcomes in these areas.

Several indicators in the E-W Framework may be improved with investments in high-quality charter schools. To measure these indicators and determine if investments in this strategy could help, examine the following:

  • 6th grade on track: Percentage of students in grade 6 with passing grades in English language arts and math, attendance of 90 percent or higher, and no in- or out-of-school suspensions or expulsions.

  • 8th grade on track: Percentage of students in grade 8 with a GPA of 2.5 or higher, no Ds or Fs in English language arts or math, attendance of 96 percent or higher, and no in- or out-of-school suspensions or expulsions.

  • 9th grade on track: Percentage of students in grade 9 with a GPA of 3.0 or higher, no Ds or Fs in English language arts or math, attendance of 96 percent or higher, and no in- or out-of-school suspensions or expulsions.

  • Math and reading proficiency in grade 3: Percentage of students in grade 3 who meet grade-level standards in reading/English language arts and math as measured by state standardized tests.

  • Math and reading proficiency in grade 8: Percentage of students in grade 8 who meet grade-level standards in reading/English language arts and math as measured by state standardized tests.

  • Math and reading proficiency in high school: Percentage of tested students who meet grade-level standards in reading/English language arts and math, as measured by state standardized tests.


Rigorous research on charter schools has not yet yielded empirical evidence around specific design components that make for a high quality school. Experts suggest that successful charter schools have many of the same characteristics as successful district-run public schools–however a key opportunity that charter schools provide is the ability to make mid-course changes quickly, and to identify and replicate what is working. The below design components represent consensus opinion among charter school experts, but are not attributable to empirical evidence:

  • Decentralized decision-making that allows for school- and classroom-level flexibility: A unique attribute of charter schools is that they allow teachers and charter school administrators the opportunity to adapt their classroom and educational approach to the needs of their students. This may include selecting culturally-responsive curricula, setting school norms and expectations that fit the circumstances, opting for smaller class sizes and longer school days, and allocating budgets and staff in a manner that fits their needs. Importantly, the focus should be on catering design decisions to the specific school, community, and students, while enabling known success factors, like increased time-on-task and instructional time.

  • Accountability mechanisms via a strong authorizer and board of directors: Experts note that a strong authorization ecosystem is critical to ensuring that charter schools deliver on the goals they set forth. This includes well-constructed state legislation that enables schools the freedom to innovate while instilling intentional guard rails as well as processes to monitor implementation. Typically, after a school receives authorization, the authorizer may engage in frequent check-ins with new schools for 12-18 months prior to a school opening to ensure they are meeting standards and require frequent testing and reporting thereafter.

  • Emphasis on family and community voice: One method of ensuring a school meets the needs of families is to instill processes that systematically seek feedback from parents and families, and ideally allow parents a quantifiable amount of input and decision-making ability around school strategy, curriculum selection or other key decisions. Some schools may opt to include a parent or family member on the board of directors.

  • Teachers who reflect the community and are given frequent feedback: Experts note the importance of employing certified teachers who come from similar backgrounds as students and understand the cultural context of the community. Additionally, high-quality schools tend to emphasize professional development for teachers and employ a data-driven approach to provide teacher feedback.

  • Strategic selection of board of directors: High-performing schools may also strategically utilize their board of directors to bring necessary operational expertise, such as financial acumen, data, legal, real estate, or education policy expertise, or otherwise. They may also opt to institutionalize the importance of the student and family voice by including a board seat for a student or parent.

  • Emphasize harm reduction: Charter schools have historically served proportionally more students of color and low income students than district-operated schools. Many exist in marginalized communities that have experienced severe disinvestment by their local municipalities and school districts, and therefore families look to charter schools to seek better education options for their children. Furthermore, a theme of public discourse has included a critique of exclusionary and inequitable disciplinary practices employed by some high profile charter schools, popularized in the media as being connected to "no excuses" models. While the prevalence of these practices nor the field’s evolution away from them has been quantified, schools should be conscious of the rhetoric. As such, it is imperative that charter schools take seriously a harm reduction lens and ensure they act on feedback gleaned from families. This may include implementing trauma-informed practices.

  • Offer accommodations to enable parent and family engagement: Engagement processes should be designed in a manner that takes into account the logistical circumstances of working parents. This may include varied meeting times, virtual and in-person options, providing childcare during meetings, offering stipends, providing language translators, or otherwise.

  • Proactive community outreach and transparent application systems: Amidst a multitude of education options, families may struggle to understand school choices available to them. Schools should make an intentional effort to proactively reach out to families to provide holistic, accessible information about school options. Experts also suggest that nearby schools, including both charter and district-operated schools, make an effort to align application requirements and timelines to facilitate easy application and decision processes for families. Some places, like Denver, Newark, and Indianapolis, among others, use a unified enrollment system to make school enrollment as easy as possible.

  • Plan to flexibly scale up support services: By law, charter schools, like any other publicly funded school, must provide adequate services to meet the needs of students with individualized education plans, students with disabilities, English language learners, and all other students. Charter schools, especially single site charter schools, may face challenges compared to district-operated schools in accessing support services that are frequently centrally managed by a district. As such, charter schools should bake into their operational plans a method for employing services as needed, through methods like partnerships with nearby schools, social service contracting agencies, charter management organizations, among other methods.

  • Charter School Authorizers: Authorization institutions should be empowered by state law to set high standards, keep schools accountable on their performance, support growth and replication when strong results occur, and work to redress or decommission schools that do not meet standards. Charter school administrators should forge a strong relationship with authorizers to ensure standards, as well as goals laid out in a school’s educational, financial, and operational plans are met, bolstering long term sustainability of the school.

  • Families and parents: In many communities, families and parents serve as the catalyst for creating expanded education options through charter schools. They provide critical input to identifying the needs of the community and establishing a positive school community.

  • Teachers: Teachers are critical to carrying out the mission of a charter school. It is crucial that they buy into the educational philosophy adopted by the school and are invested in raising issues to ensure student and family needs are met.

  • School leaders and administrators: School administrators play an essential role in charter school operations. In addition to day-to-day management responsibilities of the school staff, they may liaise with authorizers and the board, carry out budgeting and financial management tasks, conduct long-term planning around capital investments, lead decision-making around curriculum, carry out parent and family engagement processes, and more.

  • Administrative services experts: The expertise of lawyers, real estate agents, financial managers, and procurement professionals is a necessary component of operationalizing a high-performing school. Some charter schools elect to include board of director seats dedicated to individuals with these expertise.

  • School districts: Local school districts can be essential partners in establishing family-centric communication and enrollment practices. Charter school and district administrators may collaborate on outreach, aligning timelines, and more.

  • Charter school organizations: A large ecosystem of organizations, like the National Association of Charter School Authorizers, the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, and LISC’s Charter School Financing group, exist with the mission of supporting high-quality charter schools. They provide technical assistance and other resources to current and prospective schools.

  • Develop a strong financial management system: Unlike district-operated schools, charter schools are responsible for managing their own cash flow, budgets, and capital expenditures. Charter school leaders should hire staff with financial expertise that can establish sustainable financial management practices and plan for necessary capital expenditure projects, such as upgrades to facilities or equipment.

  • Evaluate school facilities, supply, transportation, and food services needs: In most cases, charter schools must procure facilities, transportation, food services, and basic supplies (like desks and chairs) — all of which are critical to student access and success. During the planning phase, it is important to establish reliable, high-quality systems for securing essential supplies and services.

  • Leverage data systems for improvement and accountability: Charter schools should be held to strict accountability standards by their authorizer and must be able to clearly demonstrate a positive impact on student achievement. Hire dedicated staff and invest in data management tools to evaluate and refine curricula, teacher and student progress, school climate, and more. The resulting analysis should be used to communicate success to the charter authorizer, families, government leaders, funders, and the general public.

  • Foster public sector collaboration: Charter schools and district-run public schools have opportunities to build mutually beneficial relationships. They could, and do in some places, identify opportunities for staff collaboration, establishing mentorship programs, co-host community events, and engage in collective professional development workshops. In some places like New York City, District-Charter Collaboratives exist to provide a formal avenue for this type of collaboration.

  • Engage with families: Because charter schools have a high degree of autonomy, leaders have a significant opportunity to incorporate feedback from family and community members into school decision-making. Charter schools should proactively solicit input from the community on a wide range of school operations and offerings, from curriculum to enrichment activities. Families can also help inform the school’s efforts to create a high level of cultural responsiveness in classrooms and other programming.

  • Charter school performance frameworks: Multiple organizations publish comprehensive frameworks for evaluating charter school performance that emphasize indicators of academic quality including student achievement, progress over time, engagement, and institutional health measures:

  • Student and family engagement and belonging: Student and family satisfaction surveys can provide both quantitative and qualitative feedback about the health of a school community. Furthermore, parent engagement process participation rates may be an additional indicator of family satisfaction.

  • Student demographics: Particularly for charter schools that are designed to serve a geographic area, effectiveness at reaching and appealing to all families by comparing school demographics to that of the surrounding community can be evaluated. This comparison can shine a light on communities who need more tailored outreach or have needs that are not being served by the current school approach.

  • Teacher and student retention: A school’s ability to retain both high-quality staff and all students may illustrate the health of the school community as well as employment satisfaction, among teachers, and educational satisfaction, among students and families.

  • Financial health: A healthy financial profile is a significant indicator of a charter school’s ability to sustain ongoing operations.

Evidence-based examples

Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP)
Charter school network focusing on high performance in attendance, homework, support for parents, and professional development for teachers
Elementary and middle school success
Proven
SEED School
SEED charter schools are public, urban, boarding schools.
High school graduation Post-secondary enrollment and graduation
Strong

Contributors

Dr. Sarah Cohodes

Dr. Cohodes is an Associate Professor of Public Policy at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. She holds a Ph.D. in Public Policy from Harvard University. Her research uses quantitative causal inference methods to evaluate policies and programs that are intended to increase access to high-quality education. She has authored numerous papers on school choice and charter schools.

Talia Gerstle

Talia Gerstle is the Senior Policy and Communications Manager at MIT Blueprint Labs, responsible for overseeing Blueprint’s policy partnerships, disseminating research findings to policymakers, and leading the School Access and Quality Fellowship. Blueprint Labs’ Charter School Research Collaborative brings together practitioners, policymakers, and researchers to fund research on charter schools that is rigorous, actionable, and efficient.

Yvonne Nolan

Yvonne Nolan serves as Vice President of the Charter School Financing (CSF) team at LISC, where she manages the charter school portfolio and strategic partnerships. Yvonne also leads LISC’s research and policy contributions to the charter sector, including LISC’s online platform, SchoolBuild: From Idea to Construction. Yvonne previously worked as Director of Operations at Achievement First Public Charter Schools in Brooklyn, NY.

Dr. Karega Rausch

Dr. Rausch is the President and CEO of the National Association of Charter School Authorizers. Previously, he was the Education & Charter Schools Director with the Indianapolis Mayor’s Office and the Board Chair of the Indiana Charter Schools Board (Indiana’s statewide authorizer).

Karega has authored numerous publications on charter school authorizing, racial/ethnic disproportionality in school discipline, and special education reform.

Learn more:
US Dept of Education: National Charter School resource center National Alliance for Public Charter Schools: Charter law database LISC: SchoolBuild: From Idea to Construction New York City Charter School Center: Charter Management Organization Organization Guide