I.-1 22-1949 Public Comment on All Non-Agenda Items Within the Subject Matter Jurisdiction of the Charter Matters Committee - Up To 30 Minutes - August 18, 2022.
Going forward, I would like to see emphasis and accountability on student retention as part of the charter school "quality" metric. For too long, charter schools have boosted their performance metrics and grad rates (for marketing purposes) by shedding students. They don't backfill, resulting in misleading, inflated performance numbers such as grad rates (100%!), which they use to "sell" their school. It's disingenuous, and charter high schools like AIMs historically have had attrition rates from 35-40%, which would be unacceptable in traditional public schools. Other charters do a better job at retention. In addition, Aspire has a habit of shedding 20-25% of their kindergarteners after the first year. https://www.ed-data.org/school/Alameda/Oakland-Unified/Aspire-Berkley-Maynard-Academy None of this should be allowed, it needs to be called out for what is it, and at the bare minimum there should be some kind of transparency around attrition data for a more informed choice.
Going forward, I would like to see emphasis and accountability on student retention as part of the charter school "quality" metric. For too long, charter schools have boosted their performance metrics and grad rates (for marketing purposes) by shedding students. They don't backfill, resulting in misleading, inflated performance numbers such as grad rates (100%!), which they use to "sell" their school. It's disingenuous, and charter high schools like AIMs historically have had attrition rates from 35-40%, which would be unacceptable in traditional public schools. Other charters do a better job at retention. In addition, Aspire has a habit of shedding 20-25% of their kindergarteners after the first year. https://www.ed-data.org/school/Alameda/Oakland-Unified/Aspire-Berkley-Maynard-Academy None of this should be allowed, it needs to be called out for what is it, and at the bare minimum there should be some kind of transparency around attrition data for a more informed choice.