AUSTIN – Today’s issuance of the last school charters allowed under current law makes it essential that the Texas Legislature repeal its cap on charter schools.
“Restrictions imposed by the Texas Legislature now deny tens of thousands of students the opportunity to enroll in their preferred public school,” said Brooke Dollens Terry, education policy analyst at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. “The Legislature should get rid of its arbitrary cap on charter schools and provide parents with more public school options for their children.”
The Texas Legislature has capped the number of open-enrollment charters at 215, of which 209 entities had active charters. After two charter operators voluntarily consolidated under another charter to free up two additional slots, the State Board of Education issued the final eight charters at its meeting today. Yesterday, Sen. Dan Patrick filed legislation (SB 308) that would repeal the charter school cap.
In August, the Foundation released a report, “Calculating the Demand for Charter Schools,” which compiled the first-ever, Texas-specific waiting list for charter school enrollment. The report concluded that while 89,156 students attended 355 open-enrollment charter school campuses during the 2007-08 academic year, at least 16,810 children were on waiting lists to attend a charter school – including 7,415 in the Houston area; 5,896 in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex; and 2,110 in the Rio Grande Valley.
“If we value free markets and competition, we should allow as many public schools to open as students will attend,” Terry said. “And by the tens of thousands, Texas public school students and their parents want an alternative to their government-assigned campus.”
Terry emphasized that charter schools are public schools that predominantly serve students who are behind academically upon entering the charter school. Sixty percent of charter school students come from low-income families, and 81 percent are ethnic minorities.
“Many of these parents understand that traditional public schools have failed their children,” she said. “Rather than writing these students off, we need to encourage new options that meet these students where they are so that they can receive the education they’ll need to be productive citizens.”
The Texas Public Policy Foundation is a non-profit, free-market research institute based in Austin.
Brooke Dollens Terry is an education policy analyst at the Texas Public Policy Foundation.
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