A new long-term study questions the role of charter schools as the "magic bullet" in improving student achievement. The study, co-authored by Duke University professor Helen Ladd and University of Connecticut professor Robert Bifulco and released Aug. 19, found that students in North Carolina charter schools are making smaller academic gains than they would have made in traditional public schools.

These findings come on the heels of the AFT's report of U.S. Department of Education statistics showing that children in charter schools are not performing as well on National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) math and reading tests as their counterparts in traditional public schools.

"Parents often expect charter schools to provide a stronger academic experience for their children than traditional public schools, but that is typically not the case," said Ladd, a professor of public policy studies and economics at the Sanford Institute of Public Policy's Center for Child and Family Policy at Duke. "Our study finds that charter school students perform less well on average in charter schools than they would have in traditional public schools and the negative effects of attending a charter school are large."

Ladd and Bifulco's study compared achievement gains for nearly 6,000 students in grades 4-8 while they were in North Carolina charter schools from 1996-2002 with gains of those same students while they were in public schools.

Significantly, restructuring as a charter school has been held out as a solution for struggling public schools and is one of the sanctions for schools that persistently fail to make adequate yearly progress (AYP) under the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). For details, go to http://www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu/news/newsindex.html. [Trish Gorman, Center for Child and Family Policy]

August 24, 2004