Bureaucracy, no matter how well intentioned, stifles creativity and suppresses parental choice.
Click here to read the article in Education Next.
The Weak Predictive Power of Test Scores
The school choice tent is much bigger than it used to be. Politicians and policy wonks across the ideological spectrum have embraced the principle that parents should get to choose their children’s schools and local districts should not have a monopoly on school supply.
But within this big tent there are big arguments about the best way to promote school quality. Some want all schools to take the same tough tests and all low-performing schools (those that fail to show individual student growth over time) to be shut down (or, in a voucher system, to be kicked out of the program). Others want to let the market work to promote quality and resist policies that amount to second-guessing parents.
Continue reading here.
Our coalition leads the fight for parental choice!
Parents Can Still Choose Schools After Open Enrollment Ends
By James Widgerson
The deadline for Wisconsin parents who want to enroll their children in public schools outside their home district was supposed to be Friday. But if parents missed the open-enrollment period they don’t necessarily have to panic thanks to what the Department of Public Instruction calls the “alternative application procedure.”
Continue reading here.
Alabama Approves Rule Allowing Home-School Students to Play Sports
Alabama did it right. When it passed legislation allowing home-schooled students to participate in extracurriculars, it included students in virtual charter schools too. Wisconsin needs to follow suit. Home-schooled students currently can participate, but not our kids. We're looking for legislative champions to lead the fight for our kids next session. We'll keep you posted.
You can read the article about Alabama's victory here.
Wisconsin's First Online Public Charter School Focused on Career and Technical Education
Interesting new school to open this fall. Wonderful what can happen when lawmakers give parents options! Check it out here.
Advocate says education reform will aid upward economic mobility
By Amelia Hamilton
A solid educational base is key to upward economic mobility and opportunity in 21st century America. That was the theme of Thomas B. Fordham Institute’s presentation and discussion Tuesday titled Education for Upward Mobility: The Reform Conservative’s Education Agenda.
You can read more about this here.
Using Traditional School Methods to Assess Online Charters Is 'Apples to Oranges' Exercise
Check out this letter to the editor in Education Week.
Every Child Matters
Those of us who proudly proclaim #ITrustParents know every child matters. Click here to watch a great commercial from the American Federation for Children.
Test. Test. Test. To what end?
What started the movement to evaluate teacher performance by test scores?
For the last several decades, as far back as the 1970s, researchers have been estimating teachers’ impact on their students’ standardized test scores, and have found substantial variation among teachers. The students of some teachers consistently made more growth on tests than the students of other teachers did. They also generally found that teachers’ ability to raise test scores was only modestly correlated with concrete characteristics, such as experience and education.
Continue reading this article from The 74 here.
Active Learners
Originally, we were going to post this to show the rapid rise in technology and make a point about how online education harnesses that potential. Supposedly, this image juxtaposes photos of the last two times a new Pope was announced. But, virtual school administrators, teachers and enrollees know that just because something is on the internet doesn't make it factual. Our students don't sit idly by as passive learners in front of a screen. They're active learners, understand the scientific method and are intellectually curious. So, like them, we kept digging to get at the truth. Here's the rest of the story about these photos... https://www.washingtonpost.com/…/aaf1067a-8cf9-11e2-9f54-f3…