Archived Information

About This Report

The National Study of Charter Schools (the Study) is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education as authorized by the 1994 Amendments to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The Study is a four-year research program to document and analyze the charter school movement.

The Study's Focus. The Study addresses three major research questions:

• How have charter schools been implemented?

• Under what conditions, if any, have they improved student achievement?

• What impact have they had on public education?

Drawing from research evidence, the Study also asks broad policy questions:

• What models of education have charter schools developed that can be used by other public schools?

• What lessons can be learned from the charter school experience for public education, and what implications should be drawn for state and national policy?

• How might charter schools evolve in the coming decade?

The Study's Research Approach.The Study's research consists of (1) annual phone surveys of all charter schools; (2) repeated field visits to a sample of charter schools and their surrounding districts; (3) the administration of student achievement tests over time at a sample of charter schools; (4) the collection of existing student assessments for a sample of charter schools and for other public schools at district and state levels; (5) analyses across states of charter laws, state agency rulings and procedures, court rulings, and education policy; and (6) case studies of how charter school policies and local practices have worked and affected public education in five states.

This Report, the third annual report from the Study, presents interim findings that focus on describing how charter schools are being implemented. Subsequent reports will address all of the questions listed above. This Report in particular provides concise summaries of data that describe selected characteristics of charter schools in comparison, wherever possible, to other public schools.

The Report's Organization. Section A begins with an overview of the charter movement. It describes the growth of charter schools, with particular attention paid to the differences across the charter states in terms of the number of charter schools and when they became operational. Since charter school legislation is unique to each state, we summarize key characteristics of the charter laws by state.

Section B summarizes basic characteristics of charter schools compared to other public schools. The characteristics covered in this Report are school size, grade level configuration, percentages of certificated teachers, and student to computer ratio.

Section C focuses on student demographic features of charter schools compared to other public schools. This Report briefly describes the racial/ethnic composition of the schools, and the percentages of students that are low income, have disabilities, or have limited proficiency in English.

Section D reviews data on several issues that are central to understanding how charter schools may operate differently from other public schools. These issues include the reasons why charter schools were started, challenges they have encountered during implementation, the autonomy they have for making critical decisions, and the way in which they may be held accountable.

The Report's Data. The findings presented in this Report rely on three waves of telephone surveys to all cooperating charter schools that were open to children during the 1997-1998 school year, visits to 91 field sites across the country, and extensive analysis of state charter laws.

In the first year of a school's involvement in the study, a school administrator was asked to respond to a new charter school telephone survey. In each subsequent year, they were asked to respond to a follow-up telephone survey. For the first wave of data collection (Spring, 1996), 252 charter schools had opened prior to or during the 1995-1996 school year. These schools were asked to respond to the new school survey in 1996 and follow-up surveys in 1997 and 1998. For the second wave of data collection (Spring, 1997), 178 additional charter schools had opened and were asked to respond to the new school survey in 1997 and the follow-up survey in 1988. For the third wave of data collection (Spring, 1998), 284 additional charter schools had opened and were asked to respond to the new school survey in 1998. Response rates for surveys ranged from 78 to 91 percent.

In general, this Report relies on the most recent information available but also draws from a range of years (1996-1998). Where possible, 1998 data are used. If we did not have data from a 1998 survey, the information is taken from previous surveys, either the 1997 or the 1996 surveys.

In some cases we asked for information only on selected surveys. When we report on data gathered only on a selected survey, we refer to a subsample of schools. Responses for questions asked only on the 1998 follow-up survey represent 79 percent of available charter schools (294 schools of a possible 373 responded). Responses for questions asked on both the 1997 and 1998 follow-up surveys represent 87 percent of available charter schools (326 schools of a possible 373 responded). Responses for questions asked either on the 1997 new school survey or on a follow-up survey represent 97 percent of available charter schools (361 schools of a possible 373 responded).

It should be noted that for tables that present data by state, we have omitted states with three or fewer charter schools open to protect school confidentiality. In addition, data from states that have fewer than 10 charter schools may not be meaningful. It is also the case that some individual school data may be incomplete if specific survey items were not answered. All figures and tables report the total number of responses on which the findings are based.

For some tables, data other than the telephone survey were gathered. To estimate charter school enrollment, we supplemented our telephone survey data with information from other sources. We drew on state sources in Alaska, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New Mexico, and Pennsylvania to include 1997-1998 enrollment data for 59 missing schools in those states. Where information was still unavailable for schools in those states, and in Georgia and Texas, we were able to use enrollment information from the 1996-1997 Common Core of Data Survey, Early Release Files, published by the National Center for Education Statistics. The number of charter schools represented by these data is 678, which is 94 percent of our estimate of the 717 charter schools in operation during 1997-98.

Some tables in this Report provide comparison information about all public schools in the 24 states with operating charter schools¹. [For the purposes of the remainder of this Report, we refer to the District of Columbia as a "state."] Public school data come from the U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data Survey 1996-97 Early Release Files. These data refer to all public schools (including charter schools) in the 24 charter states. For public school information on racial demographics, 789 schools or 1.6 percent of all public schools reported racial information that was considered invalid because it did not match the total enrollment information, data is calculated on the basis of 49,316 public schools. In all cases we drew on the best comparative data available.

Number of Charter Schools In The National Telephone Survey

	# schools for new charter school survey			# schools for first follow-up survey			# schools for second follow-up survey
	Year	Asked	Answered	Year	Asked	Answered	Year	Asked	Answered
Schools opened prior to or during the 1995-1996 school year	1996	252	230	1997	228	178	1998	224	175
Additional schools opened as of the 1996-1997 school year	1997	178	153	1998	149	118	X	X	X
Additional schools opened as of the 1997-1998 School year	1998	284	246	X	X	X	X	X	X
Total as of September, 1998		7172	6293		377	296			175

¹ This definition excludes from the Study some charter-like schools. We have opted to exclude single state-sponsored specialty schools (e.g., state schools for the arts, or schools for low-incidence special education students) even if they operate pursuant to the terms of a state-granted or charter-like contract. We have also excluded some states that do not have formal charter legislation but have policies that create schools that share some charter-like characteristics (Oregon and Puerto Rico).

² This number includes three schools that were open prior to or during the 1995-1996 school year, but which were not reported as open at the time our survey was conducted. These three schools were therefore not asked to respond to the survey.

³This number includes ten schools that were closed as of the 1997-1998 school year, 6 from the first wave of data and 4 from the second wave of data.

[Executive Summary]

[A. States and Charter Schools]