A Look into New Jersey’s Popular and Controversial Option for Alternative Public Education
Earlier this month, over a million students in New Jersey packed up their book bags for the first time since the beginning of summer recess and headed back to school. Approximately 49,000 of those students will be attending class at a public charter school. Since this year marks the 20th Anniversary of New Jersey’s Charter School Act of 1995, now is a good time to take a look at the current state of public charter schools in the Garden State.
Slow but Steady Growth
This month, two new charter schools opened their doors for the first time in New Jersey. The International Academy of Atlantic City Charter School, which is managed by Sabis Educational, enrolled over 200 K-3 students from Atlantic City and Pleasantville. The Bridgeton Charter School, which is approved to expand to grades K-4, opened with about 100 students enrolled in their K-1 classes.
This brings the total number of charter schools currently operating in New Jersey to 89.
On Deck for Next Year
In the spring of 2015, the New Jersey Department of Education (NJDOE) gave phase 1 approval to nine applications for new charter schools while denying 14. Those 9 applications are currently going through the second phase of the approval process, and phase 2 approvals should be announced before the end of the year. Schools that are granted approval could open as early as September 2016.
New Faces of Charter School Advocacy
In the spring of 2015, the New Jersey Charter Schools Association (NJCSA) tapped a new President and CEO to lead the organization. Nicole Cole, a prominent lawyer/lobbyist formerly with Princeton Public Affairs Group, is now the head of the state’s most powerful charter organization. The NJCSA also added former state senator, former assembly speaker and former mayor of Bayonne Joe Doria to its Board of Trustees. Doria has the distinction of being one of the original authors of the 1995 charter school act and brings a significant amount of political clout to the Association.
New Jersey’s own Shavar Jefferies, a popular civil rights attorney who ran for mayor of Newark in 2013, was recently chosen to lead Democrats for Education Reform. DFER, one of the national leaders in education reform advocacy, has a new, dynamic leader with Jersey-style political skills.
Charter Opposition Continues
Despite the fact that public charters make up only a fraction (89 of 2,505 or 2.1%) of public schools in New Jersey, organized opposition remains consistent.
For example, there are several active bills in the state legislature that attempt to curtail the expansion of public charter schools – including S2287 and A4357, which seek to establish a 3-year moratorium on the opening of new charter schools. The bills don’t seem to be gaining traction, but that’s not stopping parents of charter students and charter advocates from taking to the streets to oppose these measures.
And they are doing the same in Paterson, home to 4 charter schools, where the local school district passed a non-binding resolution to place a similar ban on charter expansion
The Latest in Newark
Newark is New Jersey’s largest city (by population), is the state’s largest employment center, is home to the state’s largest newspaper (The Star-Ledger) and is represented in Trenton by a powerful contingent of influential legislators. For these reasons, and others, Newark is widely considered to be one of New Jersey’s most important cities.
As important as Newark is to the state, charter schools are as important to the public educational system in Newark. Charter schools have flourished in Newark on a different scale and pace than anywhere else in New Jersey. Currently, the city’s 20 charter schools educate about 40 percent of all public school students in the city.
Since charters have such a substantial footprint in Newark, and because Newark plays such an influential role in New Jersey, policy changes that affect Newark’s charters, and the political momentum behind them, tend to have statewide implications.
In 1995, the state assumed control over Newark’s public school system, citing systemic academic and financial failure. Last year, the state leveraged that administrative control to implement One Newark, one of the most aggressive and comprehensive reorganizations of a large school district in history. Under the plan, underutilized schools were closed, and the concept of neighborhood schools was eliminated and replaced by a citywide lottery that gave parents more choices over the schools their children attended.
In June 2015, Cami Anderson, the controversial Superintendent appointed by Governor Christie, stepped down from her position. Former New Jersey Department of Education Commissioner Chris Cerf is Anderson’s replacement and seems to be off to a solid start – even according to some of his harshest critics.
Also in June, Governor Christie and Mayor Baraka announced that the process to give back control of Newark’s schools to the local districts was underway, but details on the process and the timeline remain vague.
Looking Ahead
At the start of this new academic year, we can look forward to a few important events that could significantly impact the status of public charter schools in New Jersey:
- The results of the first year of PARCC testing: The state Department of Education is expected to release the results of the first year of PARCC testing in New Jersey in early 2016. Like the standardized testing before it, PARCC will be used as the basis for comparison of academic performance between school districts, and between charters and traditional public schools.
- The Chris Cerf in experiment in Newark: Can the new superintendent mend some of the broken relationship fences in politically volatile Newark? The One Newark Program will continue to be implemented, and the process to give back administrative control of the Newark school system to the local district has already begun. Superintendent Cerf will be trying to stay the course policy-wise, while using a more inclusive approach to the local community than his predecessor did. With so much going on with regard to education policy in New Jersey’s largest city this year, all eyes will continue to be on Newark.
- The lame duck session: As is the tradition in New Jersey, the months between Election Day and the last day of the legislative session in mid-January are the busiest time of the year in Trenton. Outgoing members of the state assembly will have the opportunity to leverage their lame duck status to provide the votes needed to revive stalled legislation and to advance new legislation. There will be considerable attention paid to education policy this year, and it will be interesting to see which policy-makers see this as a chance to make changes to policies that affect public charter schools.