Charter schools currently play a “niche” role in New Hampshire public education.  The majority serve at-risk kids who probably would not graduate from high school without special help.  However, we are in the midst of a policy discussion about continuing role of charters in the State.  While there appears to be a widely-shared consensus supporting a continued role for charters the fill specific educational gaps in New Hampshire, some advocate for an expanded role.

There is on-going debate about the performance of charter schools, but a fair summary seems to be that some out-perform traditional public schools but most don’t.  Prof. Michael Marder, of the University of Texas at Austin takes a commonsense approach, comparing standardized test results among charters and traditional public schools.  

First, here is a review comparing the performance of the many Texas charter schools (the red dots) with that of traditional public schools in Texas.  On the SAT, for instance,  most charters do significantly less well than the traditional public schools.  Click on the graph to see a two minute video showing the same comparison using several different test results.

Prof. Marder’s team uses the same approach to review the results in Florida, California, New Jersey and New York.  The results are similar.  Click the graph.