Improve … or close
It’s simple. Public charter schools that fail their students–year after year–face the threat of closure. This is a key difference between charters and district schools. This week, CBS 17 shared a profile of Healthy Start Academy, a Durham charter school, that was close to closing several years ago. The school’s performance has been improving since the arrival of a new principal, Alex Quigley, in 2017.
What helps spur charters’ improvement? It’s the pressure to perform and the freedom of families to choose. Charters understand the rules of engagement from the beginning:
“… Going in we know what the rules are,” said Dave Machado, the Director of the Office of Charter Schools. “Our schools said they could do a better job, and if they’re not doing a better job, they don’t necessarily deserve taxpayer dollars.”
Read the article on CBS 17 here.
