Choice and charter schools feel squeeze

Tomorrow morning's Journal Sentinel has a letter from the president of the Downtown Montessori Academy, defending charter schools and protesting the WEAC (Wisconsin Education Association Council) attacks on them. Full disclosure: for my connection to Downtown Montessori, click here. An earlier post discusses the article referred to in the letter.

A squeeze is likely soon on choice and charter school enrollment:

1. Choice (voucher) schools: State law limits the number of choice seats to 15% of MPS enrollment, or about 15,000 students, a cap that is expected to be hit in the next year. The governor vetoed proposals to raise the cap, leading to the spread of lawn signs asking him to allow the cap to be raised. It is as yet unclear how seats will be allocated to schools once the cap is reached--or how students will be selected.

2. MPS Charter Schools: About six years ago, then-superintendent Alan Brown signed an agreement (called a "memorandum of understanding" or mou) with the MTEA (the Milwaukee teachers' union) to cap enrollment at non-MPS organizations, including charter schools, at 8% of MPS' or about 8,000 students. A justification for the mou was that the MTEA had an injunction against such contracts, but this was overturned shortly afterwards. The mou was not approved by the school board. The number of students in charters and other contracted programs will soon bump up against this cap.

3. Other Charter Programs: Charters issued by the Milwaukee common council and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee are not directly affected by these caps, but their number has been small and they have recently been a particular target of the state union. It is unclear whether the new mayor or a majority of the council will favor new charters, particularly if MPS is unable to continue issuing them.

This is likely to be a continuing saga.