PRIVATE MANAGER OF CHARTER SCHOOLS FALLS SHORT
Mosaica Education, Inc. Studied in New AFT Report

Washington, D.C.— Charter schools operated by Mosaica Education, Inc. performed below district averages in nine out of 11 sites studied in a new research report from the American Federation of Teachers. With rare exceptions, Mosaica schools ranked below average at all schools and grade levels examined. All of these schools had been managed by Mosaica for at least two years. The report found no evidence of overall improvement in school performance over time.

The AFT report is the first comprehensive effort to assess academic performance in public schools managed by Mosaica, one of the leading companies providing education and management services to schools. It is the seventh in a series of AFT reports on student achievement in privately managed public schools. This topic has added currency in light of the provision in the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, which allows school districts to turn over schools designated low-performing to private managers. Mosaica has sought to take over low-performing schools in the past, although the company currently manages only charter schools.

Mosaica offers a 200-day school year and a class day that runs 7.5 hours (compared to the U.S. average of 185 days and just under seven hours). The company uses both off-the-shelf curricula and its own curriculum based on the seven intelligences defined by psychologist Howard Gardner. It also emphasizes technology and promises a ratio of one computer for every three students.

“It may sound to districts and parents as though Mosaica offers more,” said F. Howard Nelson, author of the AFT report. “But, while there are a variety of ways Mosaica schools differ from other district schools, the starkest difference appears to be the company’s failure to keep pace academically.

“Once again, we see that private management of schools is not a panacea,” Nelson continued. “Over and over, data show that private companies typically fall short of comparable public schools in terms of student achievement.”

The AFT report examined schools operated by Mosaica in Colorado, Delaware, Michigan, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. The complete report is available at http://www.aft.org/topics/charters/downloads/Mosaica2003.pdf.

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The AFT represents more than 1.3 million pre-K through 12th-grade teachers, paraprofessionals and other school support employees, higher education faculty, nurses and other healthcare workers, and state and local government employees.