Next week’s Economist magazine has an article on charter schools. The article is published online just before signatures are due for the public charter school initiative in Washington (I-1240). Dick has written on the initiative and charter schools here, here, and here.

As Dick mentioned, state Rep. Eric Pettigrew has said,

Forty-one other states have public charter schools and many are ranked higher in student performance than Washington schools. States with the strongest charter school laws are getting the best results. It makes no sense for Washington to continue to ban charter schools as an option to improve educational outcomes for students in our state.

The Economist article looks at various studies of charter school performance (many such are of “dubious quality”) and notes the opinion of the Center for Research on Education Outcomes at Stanford University that “variation in quality can be traced to the governing legislation behind the schools.” There is variation among charters just as there is among traditional public schools. But, “if charter schools go downhill they can usually be closed more easily than traditional schools.”

All told, “Charter schools have been successful because they offer freedom to shape the school to the pupils, rather than the other way round.”