Breaking The Standard

Certain charter schools in Mid-West have recently adopted a new form of evaluating education. Besides not teaching to a test, charter schools also emphasize parent involvement and a 10 to 1 student teacher ratio. In my mind, there is little to argue about. However, the Minnesota School Board insists that charter school students are not testing as well as their public school counterparts.

I say, OF COURSE THEY ARENT! The whole idea behind a charter school is to not teach to a test, so therefore, their learning isn’t necessarily visible in the state mandated tests. In order to appease the Education Associations (both state and national), many Minnesota charter schools administer tests purchased from the Northwest Evaluation Association, a non-for-profit organization specializing in student evaluations that adjust to each students learning style that also provide teachers (rather than just administrators and school boards) with in depth data on when, where, and how to improve in the classroom.

Charter schools are making waves in the way that we evaluate children and the data is here to prove it. We just need to make sure we are looking at the appropriate data that actually applies.

The data below shows the percentage of charter schools in the Mid West that have actually tested better than their counterparts.