It is clear why the California School Boards Assiciation opposes the idea. It hopes to constrain competition with traditional public schools. San Diego has decided that charters are here to stay, and if it hopes to compete, it must focus on running traditional schools better. But why should we believe that multiple chartering authorities prompt a "race to the top" for quality, when in every other sphere of policy they generally start a race to the bottom?   more »

What the informed public is reading about our market this morning. Will the take-away be: "this may be a useful program, I hope it gets cleaned up" or "if the states like it, it must be ok, so what's the problem" or "if the education bureacracy likes it, it must be a boondogle" or "it must another example of private sector corruption in that Bush Administration (so let's throw the baby out with the bathwater)." Will education industry associations say or do anything to push the informed reader towards the first conclusion? Surely the Times would give them an opportunity to comment on this long running story. (One additional polint: it speaks volumes about our industry when a cabinet Secretary can get away with "no comment" about multiple investigations into the efforts by officials in her department to steer contracts away from certain providers and to others they happen to favor - based entirely on their own judgment of efficacy.)   more »