Today's GoLocalProv covers an "issue brief" on charter schools released by the RI Campaign for Achievement Now (RI-CAN) and they reached out to me for comment.

You should take a few minutes to read the RI-CAN report, Putting Achievement First. While most of the claims are couched in careful language ("charter schools...can help initiate meaningful conversations," "can model innovative practices," etc.), one sentence, on page 9 of the report sticks out:

Public charter schools are tuition-free public schools. They do not increase a state's education costs because they are funded based on the number of students enrolled, otherwise known as per-pupil funding.

I may just be a simple blogger, without a 501(c)3 organization that advocates at the State House, but this is just plain wrong, and I said so to GoLocalProv. Charters are almost certain to increase the state's overall spend on education, as well as drain funds from cash-strapped districts. Here's how GoLocalProv quoted me:

McDaid said it's unlikely that a sufficient number of students would transfer to a charter to justify cutting a teaching position. "They make the argument that it 'raises the boats.' The issue for me is the concrete impact of removing the funding for the students from the rest of the district," McDaid said. "They can't cut that number of teachers. They can't recoup that $8,000."

While I absolutely support improving student achievement — and long-time readers will know that I'm a big fan of innovation — I just don't see charters as the magic bullet supporters claim.

If you want to see the research I was citing from Education Week, you can see this study at ed.gov which shows ambiguous results for charters, or this one from Stanford University which found similar achievement compared to traditional schools, or even this study, conducted by a charter operator, Knowlede Is Power Program (KIPP), which found that some subgroups did better at charters, but again, with a mixed overall result.

Full disclosure: I am married to a teacher who works in Massachusetts.