Charter Choice

My daughter goes to a charter school.  I had no idea what this was until I found one, and am still unclear on how it all works.  I do know that as we approached kindergarten and the need to enroll her in school, I began that early quest that all parents of young children dread.  

Tampa offers school choice.  Meaning if you do not like your neighborhood school, due to poor academics or inconvenient location or whatever, you can request a transfer to a different school.  Choices are honored if the requested school has openings.  We also have magnet programs, specialized programs within the neighborhood schools that your kid can be transferred to if they show a particular interest or aptitude. i.e. engineering, performing arts, technology, health sciences, etc. Then I discovered Charter schools.  These schools are chartered by a private board, taking operational control outside of the district, similar to a private school, but with public funding.  !?!?!  Basically, my kid gets a fantastic private school type education, but I don't pay extra for it. Before you jump on the "how can that be?" train - realize this is a state that offers vouchers to people to pull their kids out of failing public schools, to assuage the cost of private school.  A lot of these private schools are parochial - hmmm government funds to educate kids in religious schools - separation of church and state is my favorite constitutional right, don't like it being messed with.

Today I got some education about the whole charter thing.  Our school gets funds per child, like every other school in Hillsborough county.  Our school then pays 5% of these funds back to the county to pay for services - I'm not sure what services, school nurse was mentioned, but I know that our school nurse does not get paid by the county.  Our schools fiscal accountability includes MONTHLY reports to the state.  The district is not in anyway required to audit their allocation of services to charter schools.  We do not get bussing, or any of the other district services that I can think of, but we have excellent teachers, great programs, and beautiful facilities.  To make up the difference between what the state gives and what our school offers is made up in grants, donations, and massive use of parental slave labor.  Today I gained an appreciation for the hard work that all of our administration, faculty, board and behind the scenes volunteers do to keep our school running.

Across the board Florida is in a very tight budget crunch, we have been pegged as the next state to follow California into bankruptcy.  With previous administrations pulling money away from public education (i.e vouchers) and the limited understanding by the public of the viability of charter schools as part of the PUBLIC education process, I am concerned that we will lose this incredible educational gem that we have.

I encourage anyone that reads this to call or write their legislators and encourage them to continue to fund education as their highest priority.