Charter Schools

Americans are hard wired to wait for the silver bullet. The magical thing that will save us from ruin.

The first enduring settlement of white people on American shores would have died of starvation in Jamestown were it not for their silver bullet--the tobacco plants that gave them the ability to trade.

Polio seemed unstoppable until Dr. Salk discovered his vaccine.

The needless bloodshed at the end of World War II seemed destined to last forever, until the arrival of the biggest silver bullet ever--the atomic bomb.

So it is little wonder that we, as a nation, are willing to sit back...endure the inequities and the pollution...the deficit and the scourge that is NASCAR. Certainly, when we really need it, someone will come up with the next silver bullet.

In education, no one is happy with the state of our schools. Somehow, the more SUVs and smartphones we give them, the further behind our dear children fall. The endemic 'blame government' psychosis predictably turns its sights on the public schools, where diabolical administrators and terrorist union teachers undermine all that is good in our young people. No reasonable parent would send his darling to a public school if a private option were affordable.

And from that premise we have seen birth of the all-saving charter school. It is free from unneeded government intervention, it has thrown off the shackles of union memberships and annoying laws. The charter schools are free to be who they can be...and now, we're beginning to understand who that is.

Granted, for years different studies have produced different findings. When the survey is underwritten by one side or the other, the results are almost always predictable.

But the most recent and most objective field work, conducted by Stanford University in conjunction with charter school associations, gives the private alternatives a failing grade. Only 17 percent of charter schools have students performing better than their public school counterparts...and 37% are significantly worse.

These grades are posted despite the fact that the charter schools are far less likely to support the national average of special education and ESL programs...and many refuse to reveal how their 'lotteries' for choosing students are conducted. The suspicion, of course, is that these institutions will turn away those who socially or academically seem to threaten their teaching environments and results--an advantage which no public school system enjoys.

It may well be that parents and educators have to wait for another form of magic bullet.

This one seems to be badly missing the mark.