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They also do not charge tuition. The amount your child's school spends per child would follow them to whatever charter school they attended. The academies charge tuition. Though they have financial aid, they, theoretically, are not open to all students. Some kids may be unable to attend because of lack of funding. Charters must allow all child who wish to attend. I know about the issues at some school with "skimming". Maine's charter law had protections against that. If there are more applicants than spaces there would be a lottery.
Charter schools also are sponsored by an educational authority in the state. A school board, the state DOE, a college or university could sponsor a charter school. That charter would then be accountable to that board, based on student progress.
Ultimately charters are about choice and freedom. Giving a choice to parents, regardless of cost. Freedom for a school to experiment outside the constraints of the government system.
The schools that you mentioned are great schools. They should not be ignored. We should be giving them more attention. In the Race to the Top however they wont cut the mustard. Now those differences I mentioned may seem small, but they are important. The US DOE is asking for X. We wont be able to sell them a Y with a \ duct tapped on it as an X. Regardless of whether anyone thinks charter schools are what Maine needs or not, in Race to the Top you either have a charter school law or you don't. We don't so that's it. We're less than a Kentucky. We'll be lucky to be a finalist.
Can we just stop wasting energy on this and move on to something more meaningful?
That said, I respectfully disagree. These academies do operate as public schools. They have waivers, implicit or explicit, because they were in existence before the implementation of public education laws. They were allowed to keep their town-centered boards and maintain some vague autonomy for that reason, too.
Also, they charge tuition to towns, just as public schools do, and that tuition is whatever the student's sending town pays the available public school, an amount set by the state by a Byzantine school funding formula. Families who live in towns without "school choice" used to have to show that their children could garner education that is unavailable in the contracted public schools and the town would pay tuition to nearly any other school. I don't know if that is still available. If it is, these schools are in fact available to all children because without exception, they offer classes local public schools do not.
As for accountability, the facts of higher college admission, SAT scores, AP offerings and scores, and graduation rates have to be solid evidence of these schools' concern for measurable results.
Like you, I am loathe to call a duck a cat. However, the differences you outline seem not just small, but infinitesimal, and I continue to wonder in whose interest it is to keep them from disappearing altogether.
Now that is divorce from my opinion of our academy system as it relates to charters. In fact we ought to expand the academy system, though I don't know if new schools would be grandfathered into having waivers. I'm sure legislation could be implemented that would allow it.
To address your last point, I don't think charters are in any danger of disappearing. Most states have them, to varying degrees of success. They will continue expanding, too fast in my opinion. I would not be surprised if within 20 years time most schools have adopted a charter or academy like autonomy from the state. Seems to be a popular reform with a lot of people from my generation.
Frankly, if the academy system is so similar to charters, why not just have a charter bill?
Lastly, I meant Maine's Race to the Top efforts are a waste of energy, not conversing with people here. I like doing that :)
I agree about legislation designing charter schools in the image of our successful academy system. How hard could that be?
What I worry about is that it is the for-profit charters have been stymying progress toward that end. I have no proof, just a sense that they are the only ones who would benefit from writing that legislation themselves and disregarding, or worse, hamstringing, a successful system already in place.
See you @ Obamathon?! I'll be wearing a red trenchcoat.
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