Public Schools Are Better Than Charter Schools

Introduction

Are charter school more effective than public?

As the world continues to change and people’s beliefs continue to evolve, the schooling system has been the one thing that has remained constant throughout history and that is not a good thing. Charter schools are more advanced public schools that prioritize the students and identifying what they’d like to learn and how children’s learning needs differ from one another. Not only are charter schools more catered toward the student populous, they are designed to give students more time in the classroom working with the curriculum and trying to boost student achievement. Public schools in essence are primitive and have become outdated; public schools have been designed to just have the

children graduate as soon as possible and teach them the basics without giving them a chance to express themselves. Not only do they not focus on children expressing themselves, charter schools are more efficient in promoting a hands-on learning experience. Although charter schools value innovation, they are not more efficient in educating students than public schools.
For a parent deciding what school to send his or her child to carries severe importance because the schools that a child is sent to can and will determine how a child’s future is. Charter schools, like stated above, are an alternative to public schools that value creativity and innovation along with the traditional education given at the public schools. Teachers have the ability to explore new teaching methods and have full responsibility of the courses that they offer. This is why charter school education is becoming more and more important; it is giving children opportunities to discover themselves and learn what they want to do with their lives not just sit and learn the basics which they learn throughout all of school until they get to college where they are asked to pick a major.
Literature Review
Prior to discussing why charter schools are not more efficient, a great debate exists as to whether or not charter schools should receive government funding. Preston Green discusses in his article government funding to charter schools. To begin he starts by showing that on average public charter schools receive less money per student than public schools. Funding cost are to be found through a uniform formula and yet charter schools receive less money per student. To continue, charter schools are independently operated and as such should not receive government funding. Since they only have to adhere to the basic curriculum requirements of the state like any school, and do not have to follow strict rules set upon them by government regulation and school boards they should not be publicly funded as they are more like a private school in terms of the way it is operated. In Green’s article, he discusses multiple cases against state boards of education that state that “charter schools were unconstitutionally funded private schools because they were not under the control of the qualified voters of the school district.” Charter schools do not have to adhere to the guidelines of public school and as a result should not be considered one.
Although charter school should be treated more like private schools and not public schools in terms of government funding, charter schools are not more efficient in terms of educating students. Timothy Gronbery discusses in his article how efficient charter schools are in comparison to public schools. He first begins by discussing how charter schools similar to public schools are accredited based on their statewide testing scores. One of the reasons as to why charter schools are less efficient are because of the students that attend said charter schools. In Gronbery’s article, he says that charter schools served a student population that was disproportionately minority and low income. This study that pertains to Gronbery’s article is solely based in Texas but it is possible that the problem with the inefficiency of charter is not the school itself but rather the people that are in the schools. Another conclusion drawn by the study is that the lack of competition between charters could possibly be the problem in terms of testing against other charter schools and comparing them. This study once again however, is limited to Texas and does not take in all of the United States. The one thing concluded from the study is that charter schools “are not systematically more efficient than traditional public schools.”
In addition, charter schools are inefficient in terms of who is in said charter school, but also the teachers that are in the charter school.

Amelia DeGory exemplifies the difficulty and stress that teachers are often faced with. She says that they in a sense burn out due to the longer hours and higher levels of stress that come with teaching at a charter school. Just because innovation and creativity is better for the future, it can be hard for teachers to deviate from the norms that they learned in teaching school and it is difficult to not conform to the one size fits all type teaching method that they have become accustomed to. DeGory found that there is little continuity for staff and teachers at charter schools than at public schools. When teachers are burned out, it leads to an unwelcome learning atmosphere and the one thing that drew the students toward the charter, the innovation and the creative atmosphere, could possibly be gone. It is very difficult for teachers to have to and be willing to help every individual student and stay long hours after the school day has concluded to help the students that needs said help. Public schools however, conform to a systematic approach to teaching and have not deviated from that due to both government and school board regulation. Although public school do not promote creativity it is beneficial in terms of teacher ability to teach for many years and have the same attitude and energy from the first day that they teach to the

final years of teaching. As a result, public schools are more efficient in creating a more welcoming learning environment in terms of teacher’s energy and well-being.
Furthermore, in a study done in Michigan detailed in the article by Yongmei Ni, he found that there is no real difference between the testing scores between charter schools and public schools. Schools are continuously competing for students to maximize educational revenue and as students migrate to charter schools, public schools are losing students causing “revenue decline, program cuts, [and] lower educational efficiency”. As a result, public schools are being negatively affected by incoming charter schools and yet are not generally having positive effects on student achievement.
Some charter schools are not like the others and are creating more division than inclusion for all. An article by Diane Ravitch, begins by saying that the schooling in other countries that have far superior schooling systems have strong public-school systems and not charter schools. She continues by saying that charter schools have begun to compete with public schools and undermine them. Charter schools in some areas are corrupted by profit chasers and often these charter schools have a lottery or selective processes to get into the charter school. It is increasing racial tension between charter schools and sending the wrong message to those that attend the schools. Some charter schools are considered “elite private schools” though funded by public dollars. It is sad that the concept of public charter schools are being corrupted by money hungry individuals.
Summary
To conclude, charter schools have both positives and negatives, but as they stand now, charter schools are not as efficient as their public-school counter parts. This, however, does not mean that it will remain this way forever. Changing the way schooling is done will be necessary for the future as the schooling system has been the same for hundreds of years.
As it stands now, charter schools promote innovation and creativity as well as an individualized teaching approach.

This does not conform to the general school board and government regulations that are present within most public-school systems. As a result, charter schools should not receive the government funding that they do because it is taking away funding to regular public schools. And if they are to receive funding, it due to the uniform formula present to decide how much funding a school gets, then they should receive the same amount of funding as a public school. This is a huge discrepancy as schools that want to promote innovation need the necessary funds in order to do so properly. Along with the funding issue, there exist a huge discrepancy as to who attends a charter school. A study done in Gronbery’s article states that there might not be a problem with the charter school itself but rather the students that are attending the charter school. In general, charter schools in Texas serve a student population that is minority and low income. In most cases, this result in lower testing scores and since schools are judged based on their statewide testing scores, then the conclusion that can be drawn is that if charter schools were to serve an equal proportion of high income and low income families with various backgrounds, then testing scores could be closer for public and charter

schools.
To continue, though charter schools desire an innovative and creative environment for the students, it creates a very difficult and time consuming environment for the teachers. This results in the teacher being burned out. When a teacher is burned out, the creativity and innovation that once enveloped the classroom in charter schools disappears causing students to suffer as an indirect result. In public schools, however, the teachers have a cut and dry way of teaching, one style fits all. This leads to less burn outs and a more effective way of teaching.
The final argument as to why charter schools are less efficient lies in the exception to the ones stated above. Some charter schools are extremely selective and have become more about adults’ profit chasing instead of creating a positive learning environment for children. When these “elite private schools”, charter schools, are being corrupted, it takes away from the main purpose of the charter school, which was to have students in an environment of creativity and innovation both for the student and the teachers. When this is gone and replaced by greed, it ends up hurting the students more than helping them.
In the end, students will either attend a public school, private school, or charter schools. The idea to better the education system is there, but because schools on how they desire to teach students, some students have an advantage over others. To get rid of this disadvantage for some students, it is possible to combine the three types of schooling and gather the innovative ideas of all three and bring them together to improve the U.S educational system. When this is done, find out where the U.S would then rank in comparison to other nations because as it stands now, the U.S educational system is primitive and needs to be changed.