History of IDEA
Jeannie Oakes, Founder and Former Director
Youth Voice in School Finance
NEW REPORT: Los Angeles' road to A-G for all
Without Dollars and Sense Powerpoint
Past Educational Opportunity Reports
School competition also produces losers
- 01-20-2011
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Blog by Walt Gardner/Education Week
Forcing schools to compete among themselves is supposed to benefit students. The argument at first seems reasonable enough. If a school can't count on enrolling students because it is the only game in town, then it will either improve or go out of business. The trouble is that in practice competition has not proved to be the panacea it is cracked up to be. Two hard lessons emerge in this regard from California. In Sept. 2004, the California Charter Academy, the largest chain of publicly-financed but privately-run charter schools collapsed because of financial mismanagement ("Collapse of 60 Charter Schools Leaves Californians Scrambling"). The fiasco left 6,000 students stranded in 60 sites across the state just as the fall semester began, and left taxpayers stuck with a $100 million loss. (more…)
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