When the experiment with charter schools began 30 years ago, their future was hardly guaranteed. Today, there are more than 7,500 charter schools serving 3.3 million students in 45 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and Guam. Along with that growth has come growing pains that are testing the original systematic role of authorizers to approve or deny petitions, provide oversight, review annual reports, and decide whether to renew petitions.
“[T]imes have changed, and best practices in charter school authorizing are evolving,” writes Alex Medler in a recent article for the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. Medler is executive director of the Colorado Association of Charter School Authorizers (CACSA) , CCAP’s Colorado counterpart organization, and he also chairs the governing council of the newly formed National Network for District Authorizing (NN4DA), which was launched in partnership with CCAP and the Florida Association of Charter School Authorizers (FACSA).
Medler’s article provides highlights of an NN4DA podcast he did recently on the changing role of authorizers with Corey Loomis, who leads charter school initiatives for California’s Riverside County Office of Education, and Andy Franko, the superintendent of non-traditional public schools in Colorado’s District 49.
Both of these agencies have changed the relationship between authorizers and charter schools to be a more proactive one, by providing professional development and resources to catch problems before they occur and may force charter schools to close.
D49 started a leadership institute for charter school leaders, many of whom have not held administrative positions before. “There really aren’t a lot of resources, especially free resources for charter school leaders to develop leadership skills,” explained Franko, “and they’re oftentimes folks who are in the position already and thinking about how to develop skills that they didn’t even know they needed to have.”
In Riverside County, Loomis created a program known as Beyond Compliance that also provides professional development, including in-depth training in social-emotional learning, special education, and English language development. Additionally, Riverside is building a network of charter school governing boards in the county. Loomis says a larger goal is to build a more trusting relationship with charter schools.
“It’s all based on our core values as a charter unit, which are trust and transparency and positive relationships, and I can’t stress enough just the transparency,” said Loomis. “Charter schools know everything we’re up to, to the point that we’ve developed a comprehensive handbook … that tells the why and the what and how we do what we do.”
Both authorizers understand that there still are boundaries authorizers must respect in what is primarily an oversight role. Franko says they do this by holding to a belief that “we need to be invited. Oftentimes we feel that we should jump into the school and get into the situation with them, but really, we need to be invited in to be able to participate with our schools.” Happily, he adds, they are frequently invited.
They offer words of advice to other authorizers rethinking their role. “Stay connected, get engaged, build the relationship, it’s worth it because the kids are worth it,” says Franko. There will still be “unpleasant conversations,” notes Loomis, but if you have a trusting and honest relationship, the charter schools will hopefully “better understand you and your character and your values.”
