While a Democratic administration in Washington, D.C., is sending almost $7 million to boost charter schools in Washington state, one of the largest Democratic Party constituencies in the Evergreen State is doing everything it can to keep charters out.
In September, the U.S. Department of Education awarded $6.9 million to support the development and growth of new charter schools in Washington.
BACK TO COURT: After the Washington Supreme Court struck down the state’s charter school law, which was approved by voters in a 2012 referendum, the legislature enacted another one. Now that law is being challenged in court.
At the same time, the Washington Education Association, the state teachers union, led public school parents and other organizations in filing a lawsuit claiming a recently enacted charter school law does not fix a funding problem that led the state Supreme Court to strike down the previous charter statute.
In the first case, a Washington Supreme Court ruling found the state’s voter-approved charter school law unconstitutional. So legislators wrote a new measure to change the funding source for charters. The schools no longer have access to local-levy funding; instead, they receive money from a program funded by state lottery revenue.
In August, King County Superior Court Justice John H. Chun granted 12 families the right to intervene in the latest lawsuit threatening the state’s public charter schools. The judge also granted six schools and the Washington State Charter Schools Association permission to intervene.
“We are in a really strong position,” Maggie Meyers, director of communications of the Washington State Charter Schools Association told Watchdog.org. “We have the utmost confidence in the strength of our law.”
In addition to Washington’s eight existing charter schools, three more are set to open in the fall of 2017.
“We’re beginning to see really strong community response and demand,” said Meyers, adding that most of the existing charter schools have waiting lists. “We have great demand for our existing schools and for the schools about to open. Parents are lining up for these options and demanding these options. They are saying the status quo is not working for them.”
Jami Lund, senior policy analyst at the Freedom Foundation, told Watchdog.org the intense pushback from charter school opponents has taken a toll on parents looking for better options for their kids.
“Last session, the legislature changed the funding source to satisfy the ruling of the State Supreme Court, so children’s schooling was not disrupted this year,” said Lund. “However, the uncertainty resulted in no new schools being authorized to open this fall, so families seeking options in some areas will have to wait another year.”
Meyers said the results speak for themselves: State test results after their first year indicate that the existing charter schools outperformed district schools and state averages in some cases.
“We know after one year that these schools are working,” said Meyers. “They are closing equity and opportunity gaps for low-income students. So why would we limit these options for families that are finally receiving the education their families need?”
Teachers union and their allies say the answer to that question is clear — because charter schools take funding away from what they say are already underfunded traditional public schools.
“Instead of passing unconstitutional charter school laws, we believe the Legislature should focus on its paramount duty – fully funding K-12 basic education for all of our state’s 1.1 million students, no matter where they live,” Kim Mead, president of the Washington Education Association, said in a news release announcing the lawsuit challenging the new charter funding plan.
The Freedom Foundation’s Lund agrees that the case is about money, but not in the way the union argues.
“WEA cannot stomach the possibility that some child might get an education without the WEA taking $1,000 from their teacher,” he said.
Meyers said the dozen families intervening in the case is a “powerful show of parent advocacy and of parental voice.”
“They are saying we are going to stand up to this frivolous lawsuit and they are saying they are not scared and they are going to fight to make sure their kids can stay in these schools and that families have access to them in the future,” said Meyers. “The movement continues to grow as this lawsuit serves as a distraction. But the movement continues to grow.”