Inside Charter Schools : The Paradox of Radical Decentralization

by Fuller, Bruce

• ISBN13: 9780674003255
• ISBN10: 067400325X
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-01-29
• Publisher: Harvard Univ Pr

Summary

Deepening disaffection with conventional public schools has inspired flight to private schools, home schooling, and new alternatives, such as charter schools. Barely a decade old, the charter school movement has attracted a colorful band of supporters, from presidential candidates, to ethnic activists, to the religious Right. At present there are about 1,700 charter schools, with total enrollment estimated to reach one million early in the century. Yet, until now, little has been known about the inner workings of these small, inventive schools that rely on public money but are largely independent of local school boards. Inside Charter Schools takes readers into six strikingly different schools, from an evangelical home-schooling charter in California to a back-to-basics charter in a black neighborhood in Lansing, Michigan. With a keen eye for human aspirations and dilemmas, the authors provide incisive analysis of the challenges and problems facing this young movement. Do charter schools really spur innovation, or do they simply exacerbate tribal forms of American pluralism? Inside Charter Schools provides shrewd and illuminating studies of the struggles and achievements of these new schools, and offers practical lessons for educators, scholars, policymakers, and parents.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	ix
Introduction: Growing Charter Schools, Decentering the State	1	(11)
Bruce Fuller
The Public Square, Big or Small? Charter Schools in Political Context	12	(54)
Bruce Fuller
We Hold on to Our Kids, We Hold on Tight: Tandem Charters in Michigan	66	(32)
Patty Yancey
An Empowering Spirit Is Not Enough: A Latino Charter School Struggles over Leadership	98	(26)
Edward Wexler
Luis A. Huerta
Selling Air: New England Parents Spark a New Revolution	124	(20)
Kate Zernike
Diversity and Inequality: Montera Charter High School	144	(33)
Amy Stuart Wells
Jennifer Jellison Holme
Ash Vasudeva
Losing Public Accountability: A Home Schooling Charter	177	(26)
Luis A. Huerta
Teachers as Communitarians: A Charter School Cooperative in Minnesota	203	(27)
Eric Rofes
Breaking Away or Pulling Together? Making Decentralization Work	230	(27)
Bruce Fuller
Notes	257	(18)
Contributors	275	(2)
Index	277