(From The New York Post, June 9, 2009)
By YOAV GONEN
The state cap on charter schools may hurt its chances of getting hundreds of millions in federal stimulus dollars, the nation’s top education official revealed yesterday.
New York has applied for a slice of the $5 billion pot, but Education Secretary Arne Duncan said the state, despite receiving high marks in other areas, has two strikes against it:
* It limits itself to 200 charter schools.
* It prohibits evaluating teachers based on their students’ test scores.
New York has authorized 140 of its 200 charter schools to date, according to state officials, which suggests the cap may be reached within the next two years.
“If you’re bumping up against caps, that’s a problem,” Duncan said.
But New York is not alone in this. Only 40 states even allow charter schools to operate, and 26 of them have capped their number.
“There’s still a little bit of wiggle room,” said Joe Williams, of the political-action committee Democrats for Education Reform. “But it’s something New York is going to have to figure out quickly.”
Earlier yesterday, Duncan said school districts should judge teachers based on their students’ performance, although not solely by using standardized test results.
He singled out California, New York and Wisconsin as states that have put up an unnecessary “firewall between student and teacher data.”
Last year, at the urging of the United Federation of Teachers, New York legislators passed a law forbidding districts from factoring student test scores into teacher-tenure decisions.
The law is set to expire next year.
“To somehow suggest we should not link student achievement to teacher effectiveness is like suggesting we judge sports teams without looking at the box score,” Duncan said.