[Note: This foundation, now affiliated with the Manhattan Institute, was formerly affiliated with the Hudson Institute. [GOALS 2000] Chester Finn's state network the Education Excellence Network is based at Fordham. Fordham's publications are written as positive spins on the charter school movement.]

• To view other Fordham reports and articles about charter schools, click here.

• Charter Schools In Action is currently available wherever good books are sold.

"The charter school movement is one of the most promising reforms to hit public education in a long time, and no one is better prepared to explain its significance than Finn, Manno, and Vanourek. These scholars have been studying the ins and outs and ups and downs of charter schools from the beginning, documenting the successes and limitations of the charter model for policymakers in Congress and in statehouses across the country. Now they are doing the same for the general public with this informative, insightful, and inspiring book. I would encourage anyone who cares about the future of our public schools to read it."

Bill Clinton wants to triple the number of charter schools by the year 2010. George W. Bush wants to set aside $3 billion of federal money to support facilities for them. The public consistently says that education is one of the most important issues facing the country. And charter schools have emerged as one of the liveliest and most promising strategies for solving the problems of American education. Yet most people are unfamiliar with the whole concept.

CHARTER SCHOOLS IN ACTION: Renewing Public Education offers the explanation that they've been waiting for. Indeed, it provides the most comprehensive examination to date of the charter movement. Published by Princeton University Press (March, 2000; 280 pages; $27.95; cloth), this important new book by Chester E. Finn, Jr., Bruno V. Manno and Gregg Vanourek answers the vital questions: What exactly are charter schools? Why have they garnered bipartisan political support? How are they succeeding? Where are they failing? What challenges do they face? Are they the answer to America's education crisis?

The first charter school opened in 1992. Today, barely seven years later, nearly 1,700 charter schools are serving 350,000 students in 32 states and the District of Columbia. Washington, D.C. alone has 28 charter schools enrolling a remarkable ten percent of the District's children. From Phoenix to Boston, San Diego to Detroit, determined parents, teachers and community groups are reshaping American education in a way that utilizes the dynamism and responsiveness of the free market while maintaining the publicly funded, universal access to public education that Americans crave. The authors visited over 100 schools, conducted hundreds of interviews and surveyed scores of parents, teachers and students.

CHARTER SCHOOLS IN ACTION is a fact-filled, hard hitting, engaging and accessible examination of the history, problems, successes, innovations and future of the charter movement. It also addresses, in an even-handed and constructive manner, objections to charter schools and the opposition they face on several fronts, including resistance from local school boards and teachers' unions. The authors' insights about the many problems facing these schools are among the book's many important contributions.

CHARTER SCHOOLS IN ACTION argues that, by making their policies, practices, problems and accomplishments transparent, charter schools can successfully be held accountable for the education they provide without resorting to heavy-handed regulation. Indeed, charter schools are more accountable than schools in the current system. If a school is failing, eliminate it. If it pleases no families, nobody need attend it. Such options don't exist in the traditional school model.

Finn, Manno and Vanourek also show how charter schools are at the center of-and help to restore-vital communities, encouraging parental involvement and responding to a community's priorities.

The book's final chapter examines a city in the not-so-distant future where every public school is a charter school. It provides an imaginative, insightful and engaging window onto a better future for American schoolchildren.

CHARTER SCHOOLS IN ACTION will frame the discussion of the charter phenomenon for years to come, and the issues it examines will only become more relevant as the number of these schools increases. This is almost sure to happen; and Chester Finn, Bruno Manno and Gregg Vanourek find that charter schools are well on their way to renewing American public education.

The Thomas B. Fordham Foundation is affiliated with the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research.

Allen, you'll remember, found himself in 1997 with the need to go to the polls for public financing of a football stadium. Faced with a bit of unpopular corporate welfare, Allen came up with a unique approach to getting his way in the electoral arena: He threw so much money at the proposition--some $12 million, over a hundred times the bankroll of the opposition--that there was no way he could lose.

Still, he almost did lose, and so for his second foray into electioneering he has chosen an issue with no organized opposition. Yet. I-729, the charter schools initiative, has been largely financed thus far by Allen and his family, with a pledge of an additional $2 million coming last month.

There are no spending or contribution limits in initiative campaigns, and one gets the sense that Allen is willing to spend as much money as it takes--it is, after all, nearly meaningless sums of money in the context of his stupefying wealth. Two million is about 1/20,000th of Allen's net worth--the equivalent of a candy bar if you're poor, a dinner out if you're comfortably middle class. It is, in other words, nothing.

Like the stadium campaign, Allen has chosen an issue for which he potentially stands to make his investment back. Allen has large financial interest in two education-related companies, including Edison Schools, which runs private charter schools. He has invested in about a half-dozen other education companies.

His spokespeople claim that Edison and the other properties are a minor part of Allen's portfolio and simply reflect his ongoing interest in education, as with his contributions to I-729. But the same thing could have been said about the football stadium campaign and Allen's ongoing interest in sports--a deal on which Allen made millions from the increased value of the Seahawks football franchise as soon as the initiative passed. (Currently, Allen's Edison Schools can't profit from I- 729, but that could easily change.)

…The problem is that unlimited spending gives a person with the ability and inclination to spend it an inordinate advantage. In this state, we have two people with unlimited ability, but only one, Allen, who has chosen to throw public elections his way. Allen still has to win the election, but his odds are overwhelming given extensive mailings and television ads with virtually no ability by opponents to reply. It's a slap in the face to democracy. One dollar, one vote is a lousy system when one side has personal interest and unlimited dollars.

In this case, the charter schools initiative will need Allen's money. I-729 is not polling particularly well; a poll in July by Stuart Elway of all the state's initiatives gave I-729 the second-lowest ranking among all of them, with only 47 percent supporting the initiative compared to 41 percent against. Initiatives tend to do well in the polls early on, before opponents have had a chance to get their message out; the statistical dead heat for I-729, prior to the existence of any organized opposition, would ordinarily mean the initiative is in trouble. But with Allen's money, any opponents will have a much harder task.

Thirty-six states have some form of charter schools, and I-729 is a relatively mild proposal, less radical than the charter schools initiative that failed (without Allen's support) in 1996. Under I-729, up to 80 charter schools would be allowed in the state in the next four years, with the stipulation that the schools be sponsored by school districts or state universities. They would be operated by nonprofit organizations with their own boards of directors…

…I-729 is a cautious step in the right direction. But Allen's involvement raises a couple of red flags. First, the stipulation that charter schools be publicly run can be overturned by this year's probable Republican legislature in Olympia--as easily, say, as a state legislature can ignore the public will in financing a stadium when a really rich guy, who can break political careers, wants it…

And, of course, with Allen… the danger is that the cruel and expensive hoax of wiring classrooms for computer learning is all too easy a money suck having nothing to do with improving a child's education.

Charter schools can also be seen as a step toward Allen's dream of remote-control education by terminals--a dangerous trend that leads to ignorant and antisocial students. But that's a rant for another time. For the moment, it's enough to note that a man who apparently can't ever get enough--money or power--is buying another statewide election.

Issaquah's Restructuring Advisory Committee [RAC] had made the decision to implement the Student for the Future survey.

The RAC was a relatively new concept in school district management. A deal had been struck between the WA Business Roundtable, the teacher's union [WEA], other education stakeholders (PTA, the associations for principals, school administrators, and school boards), creating ERI [Education Renewal Institute 1993]. Issaquah became one of four pilot projects in Washington state to implement school reform. And the cost was high despite many failures.

“ERI has raised and spent $1.4 million…Almost all of ERI's support has come from the Roundtable member companies…Compare this modest but promising effort with two other reform programs. In Michigan a reform effort with $10 million a year, mostly Kellogg money, is working with only 20 schools –– not districts. After three years the claim three of the 20 have done something significant. The Coalition of Essential Schools, led by Theodore Sizer [CES is based at Brown University. RAND's Paul Hill identified CES a “distinguished” curriculum for school reform] and funded by national foundations and corporations, is working in 150 schools across the country. After 6-8 years, they estimate they are getting significant results in about 20 of them.” [Educational Renewal Institute, February 1994, emphasis added]

ERI and Issaquah’s restructuring committee, RAC, were one-in-the-same: ERI/RAC

One of the four ERI pilot projects was Pasco, WA. The Roundtable consistently referred to Pasco as a “best practices” model for education reform during the legislative sessions considering the GOALS 2000 legislation in Washington. However, it came to light that no measurable improvements had occurred. Nevertheless, Larry Nyland, the former superintendent of Pasco was hired as a full time educational ‘expert’ consultant to the Governor's education task force––GCERF––considering GOALS 2000. The Roundtable brought other GOALS 2000 strategists to the state at that time:

Larry Nyland, Education Consultant (now on faculty Seattle Pacific University [SPU])

[Formerly with Carnegie for the Advancement of Teaching and the National Alliance for Restructuring Education/NARE GOALS 2000 NASDC design team]

David Hornbeck, Co-Director of NARE and Senior Education Consultant, National Business Roundtable

[Formerly with Carnegie for the Advancement of Teaching and the Pew forum on Education Reform]

*NARE was a winner of the GOALS New American Schools design teams; a case where the strategists for the contest won the contest. The NARE design team submitted a proposal to the Pew Charitable Trust: “We are asking the Pew Charitable Trusts to provide us with $1 million per year for the next three years…”

The Center for the Study of Social Policy, Washington D.C. [human services are tied to the GOALS 2000 education outcomes through GOALS 2000]

National Center on Education and the Economy [former name: Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching]

Learning and Research Development Center, New Standards Project, University of Pittsburgh - Lauren Resnick & Robert Glaser

[their work served as the new performance-based assessment model for GOALS 2000 testing for outcomes]

Harvard University Project on Effective Services [human services are tied to the GOALS 2000 education outcomes]

Any one visiting the Issaqua RAC/ERI meetings would make an amazing discovery. The sole parent-member of the Restructuring Committee––Phil Bussey––was also the Chairman of the Restructuring Committee. This was indeed a very unusual circumstance. Add to this that Mr. Bussey was/is the WA Business Roundtable's President and the Roundtable’s lead education policy man for all of Washington State––registered as the paid Business Roundtable lobbyist to the Washington state of Washington. He was hardly just a concerned parent. The Issaquah Restructuring Committee was part of Bussey’s full-time job! This is how GOALS 2000 is being introduced at the community level; the federal plan is being integrated at the local level by the National Business Roundtable's state representatives. Shadow Mr. Bussey and you have a window on GOALS 2000 for Washington state. Travel to another state, find their Business Roundtable rep. and the pattern is repeated many times over.

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