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Brittany Brockner and Ryan Ciocca united in marriage

Y-Walk Wednesday’s are returning

<p>The new <a href="https://www.timesleader.com/news/660032/new-legislative-report-wb-area-has-areas-highest-charter-school-enrollment" target="_blank">report </a>released this week on the impact of charter schools should be clarion call telling state legislators it is past time for a serious and honest reworking of the state&#8217;s charter school law.</p><p>Originally designed as public schools free of many state regulations, the charter system has strayed too far from the idea&#8217;s best intentions. The new report, issued by the Pennsylvania Legislative Budget and Finance Committee, spells out recurring problems and sensible solutions.</p><p>For starters, the funding system for charter schools needs an overhaul, to assure that they are getting the money they need, but not money in excess. The analysis noted in particular that charter schools tend to get far more money for special education services than they report actually spending. Wither those tax dollars?</p><p>The state must also pick up a bigger share of charter costs, particularly cyber charter schools, which are authorized by the state, not a local district, yet siphon local district money.</p><p>The report points out that brick-and-mortar charters are, at least in theory, authorized by a single district (the one in which they geographically reside), but that students from other districts can and do attend. This means other districts which did not authorize the charter school end up sending money to it. In such situations, the charter school should be required to become a &#8220;regional charter school.&#8221;</p><p>There is a lot more in the report, including a call for more transparency for the charter system, which often funnels taxpayer dollars to private companies that need not provide a public accounting of just where all that money goes.</p><p>But the real issue regarding charter schools is, or at least should be, clearly defining what we want out of them.</p><p>The original proposal was to let school districts &#8220;charter&#8221; a different kind of school that could try new ideas, spurring innovation and tackling thorny local problems in collaboration with that district. When something a charter school tried worked well, it would take that finding back to the district, which in turn could try it on a larger scale.</p><p>Note the use of the word &#8220;collaboration.&#8221; Somewhere along the line, the charter idea was distorted into &#8220;competition.&#8221; The charter schools are supposed to make traditional public schools better by forcing them to compete in achieving academic success.</p><p>Charter schools also became a profitable business, as corporations found ways to take a piece of the public education financing pie, either by setting up charter schools directly, or by contracting as &#8220;managers&#8221; with a charter school board of directors.</p><p>If Harrisburg <em>does</em> act on the report&#8217;s recommendations &#8212; and it should &#8212; it presents an opportunity to pivot away from the increasingly knee-jerk notion of competition and toward collaboration.</p><p>Competition can work, but it can also leave students in the losing schools permanently behind. Collaboration can help assure all students really benefit from the system.</p><p style="text-align: right;"><em> &#8212; Times Leader</em></p><style>
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Our view: Charter school rules need to be reworked