CANEC Conference / The Big Issue, the debate that will change the future of the Charter Movement:

• CANEC stands for California Network of Educational Charters. It has provided leadership and connection within a very diverse and varied movement over the last 10 years.
• When Gary Hart wrote and the Legislature authorized the law that created charter schools it didd so on this premise: The State would grant increased flexibility (teach the way you want to teach with less rules and regulation and more control over revenue at the site level) IN RETURN FOR increased accountability for improved student achievement. For Alianza it means that we can have our 2 Way program and sidestep 227 requirements, but our student achievement must be higher, we must outperform in academic performance our regular school neighbors. That is the obligation we took on when we became a Charter School. It is important that all understand the playing field we are on.
• After 10 years the movement has matured but it is still a very diverse group. There are charter schools serving every conceivable constituency.
• The two organizations that have provided the leadership and on whom the charrter school depend greatly are CANEC and CSDC (Charter School Development.... headed by Erick Premack and Laurie Gardner.) CSDC provides a lot of technical support, how-to manuals to set up and run a charter school. CANEC has provided networking, advocacy and communication. Dave Patterson is on CANEC's staff and keeps legislators informed about Charters. He keeps CANEC members informed about the policitics and legislation that affect us. Both are sustained by service or membership fees (50%, a guess not subtantiated only by an off the cuff response from someone on the board) and foundation grants (50%).
• Education in California is decided by legislation that is passed in Sacramento. There are certain groups that come to "the table" to influence that legislation, and they are there by virtue of representing a large constituency of voters and access to lots of money. These groups might include the teacher unions, the administrators organization, the classified employees union, legions of deep pocket lobbyists, etc. There is another entity, the State Board of Education (President Reed Hastings), at that table. There is also the Governor's office (Secretary of Ed. Kerry Mazzoni) The CDE (Superintnedent O'Connell) is also there. Charter Schools don't have a seat at this table. As a result, because there are a couple of charter schools that have engaged in criminal, negligent and/or just have not met the achievement accountability criteria, that has served as ammo for those at the table that, for whatever reason, don't like charters and want to get rid off them.
• There is a movement afoot to challenge the status quo and this movemment is best exemplified by an organization that reed Hastings helped start called EdVoice. (check them out: http://www.edvoice.org/edvoice/index.html) Look at the list of members.
• My interpretation: This movement sees charter schools as the primary vehicle to change education. Public Schools are entrenched and unwilling/unable to change and provide a quality education to California's children. This is because the special interests involved (unions and education "bureaucrats") will not take actions that will seriously change the status quo. These "neocons" cross traditional Dem/Rep party lines with a focus on changing the status quo. And if Charters can't accomplish their goals, then vouchers will. (Vouchers were probably put on the back burner because they have not been successful at the polls.)
• So here we are in 2003, the CA charter movement is 10 years old and the Funders (John Walton, Poisner (sp?)), and others on whom CANEC and CSDC depend are of the opinion that the Charter Movement has not coalesced into the change instrument that will advance their agenda. The legislature over the last few years has enacted more laws to increase the strings and hoops that charters have to jump through. The flexibility is being constricted. In order to change that trend and turn it around, two things are happening:
  • 1) The funders have told CANEC that unless they reform themselves into an organization that will serve as an instrument that will bring order and advance the orignal premise (flexibility for accountability) and thereby eliminate the chaos of the charter movement in its current state, that the funders will take their funds elsewhwere...
  • 2) Concurrently and I do not believe coincidentally, EdVoice through Assemblwoman Reyes (D/Fresno), has introduced AB 1137 which says that a charter must have a API Similar School Decile Rank of 4, or lose their charter.
• What they are offering are the resources (money and political mojo) to put Charters at the table with the big boys and be a player rather than flotsam in their wake....
• A point that was made was the idea that the "train has left the station" when it comes to accountability. For instance, when we wrote our charter, the STAR/API was yet to be implemented. Now accountability is the API and only the API.
• This issue dominated the conference and has the charter leadership engaged in much tumultuous debate. There is a concern that the funders are fronting the EdVoice agenda and that the "heart and soul" of the charter movement is at risk of being co-opted. At the same time their was a despairing almost depressed sense that there is no choice but to jump in.
• Jumping in would mean that CANEC and CSDC would merge, that their would be some kind of direct link to EdVoice, and that Political Advocacy would become a primary thrust of the new organization. It would also mean that the intent of 1137 would be realized, that in order to be a charter you would be held accountable for increased academic achievement or lose your charter.
• Judy and I had the opportunity to have lunch with Mark Kushner who is the chair of the Advisory Commission on Charter Schools who are looking at these issues. He was very interested in our case and open to ideas on how to expand the scope of accountability. We need to develop some ideas on clear, quantifiable, valid measures that could be considered.