Tuesday, August 28, 2012

LA Times: Charter Schools Drawing from Private Schools

There's an interesting piece in the LA Times today, explaining that charter schools are drawing a significant chunk of their pupils from private schools, not from public schools. 

(Article link)

The article mentions that there may be some positives- for example, if the private school crowd puts pressure on Districts to innovate, that's not a bad thing. 

However, the article also notes that this change has placed a $1.8B additional burden on public education.  Yes, people who send their kids to private schools also pay taxes.  However, I don't think that is what the voters had in mind when they supported the charter school movement. 

And in case you don't think this is happening here, read the last quote in the Bloomberg article from last year:
During a break, Arash Baratloo, a Google Inc. software engineer and Bullis parent, said he considered the $5,000 donation requested every year by Bullis to be “money well spent.” He previously sent his child to a private school where tuition was about $25,000 a year.

Interesting reading...