Fans of charter schools are undertaking a challenge this year that is so difficult it makes the labors of Hercules look like a cake walk.
They’ve filed an initiative to legalize charter schools but pretty much need a miracle to get the measure in front of voters this November.
The paperwork arrived at the Secretary of State’s Office last week, which is deep into the 11th hour in the process. With no hiccups and no legal challenges, supporters might be able to collect their first signature of a registered voter around June 11. Throw in a bump and add a week.
Regardless, they face a deadline of July 6 to turn in 241,153 valid signatures of registered voters to secure a place on the ballot. Election officials suggest submitting at least 300,000 to cover invalid and duplicate signatures. This means they must get at least 10,000 voters a day to sign their petitions or they’ll fail.
If they pull it off and make the ballot, then comes the harder part of convincing a wary electorate a little privatization — or some may prefer to call it nonprofitization — of public education will be good for everyone.
Voters keep rejecting the idea of allowing their tax dollars to pay for schools run by a private nonprofit group even if it is done under the terms of a tightly written and strictly enforced charter.
For example, in 2004, the Legislature passed and Gov. Gary Locke signed a charter school law only to watch voters repeal it.
And in 2000, when voters overwhelmingly approved initiatives calling for smaller class sizes and regular teacher pay hikes, they defeated a measure aimed at letting school districts and universities oversee charter schools. (Statewide, 51.8 percent opposed the measure, although it passed in Snohomish County.)
Those behind this year’s initiative are confident their timing is right, and probably their best argument is the simple one: Allowing charter schools will give parents one more option for helping their children learn.
Parents are frustrated, business leaders are griping and politicians are wringing their hands over the uneven performance of students in Washington schools. Teachers are trying just about everything to boost academic achievement — online education, innovative schools, etc. — and the result is the cost per student rises while the graduation rates fall.
With charter schools firmly embedded in the lexicon of education reform and becoming part of the foundation of public education in this country — they exist in 41 states — allowing them in Washington is far from earth shattering.
To the longstanding argument that there’s little proof they educate students better than in existing schools, their reply is simple too, albeit a bit snarky: Can they do any worse?
The biggest problem for supporters is the same as it’s always been: voters’ concern with letting public money flow into private pockets.
Opponents’ goal will be to create reasonable doubt that managers of a private nonprofit can actually use those tax dollars to produce quantifiably better results among students.
While the initiative is thick with benchmarks that students and operators of charter schools must meet each year, the argument over the flow of tax dollars has been impossible to get around.
It’s going to be a Herculean effort and charter school fans know it.
Political reporter Jerry Cornfield’s blog, The Petri Dish, is at www.heraldnet.com. Contact him at 360-352-8623 or jcornfield@heraldnet.com.
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