MSA699-Final Johannes Cawood(b).pdf

7/24/2019 MSA699-Final Johannes Cawood(b).pdf

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Running Head: PERCEPTIONS OF CHARTER SCHOOLS BY TRADITIONAL DISTRICTS

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A Quantitative Analysis of the Perceptions of Traditional School Board Members in Michigan

Towards Charter Schools

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of Requirements for the Degree of

Master of Science in Administration

(Concentration in Public Administration)

MSA699 Capstone Project

Johannes Cawood

Project Instructor: Dr. Reginald Carter

Central Michigan University

December, 2015


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PERCEPTIONS OF CHARTER SCHOOLS BY TRADITIONAL DISTRICTS

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TABLE OF CONTENTSPage

CHAPTER1. DEFINITION OF THE PROBLEM............................................................................................1

Background Information..............................................................................................1

Problem Statement ..............................................................................................................2Research Objective .............................................................................................................4Research Questions..4Assumptions ................................................................................................4Limitations and Delimitations .........................................................................5

2. LITERATURE REVIEW............................................................................................................6Introduction..6History of Charter Schools...6Current Regulatory Climate ............6Perceptions of Charter Schools .9Department of Education Study.12

3. METHODOLOGY1 7Study Design 17Survey .......17Alignment of Survey ..18Scope and Limitations18

4. DATA ANALYSIS 20Introduction 20Sorting the Data .20Data Analysis.....21Perceptions and Decisions.22Actions Taken Due to Competition ...31Alignment and Comaparison with Ricardelli, Cummins, and Steedman Survey.34

5. SUMMARY, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS.44Results 44Conclusions45Recomdations. 47

REFERENCES CITED .................................................................................................................49


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CHAPTER IDefinition of the Problem

Background Information

In the United States, there has been a significant change in the nature of the organization

of public schools. While once public elementary and secondary schools were local government

creations of the state and were restricted to a geographic area with a voter population; the states

have created charter schools which are not restricted to a geographic area with a voter population

and are created indirectly. The start of the Charter school movement can be traced to Ray Budde

who while at the University of Massachusetts when he proposed a new way for school districts to

reorganize and eliminate middle layers of administration (Kolderei, 205). The first legislatively

authorized charter school in the United States was The City Academy in St. Paul, Minnesota in

1992(Sautter, 1993).

In the following years since Minnesota created legislation to allow the creation of charter

schools, forty two other states have followed with enrollment in charter schools standing at 2.3

million students (National Center for Education Statistics, 2015) Michigan, like Minnesota was

an early adopter of charter school legislation. In Mach of 1994, voters in Michigan passed

Proposal A which changed the funding of public schools in the state (Dawsey, 2014). There are

currently 301 charter schools now in the State of Michigan (State of Michigan Department of

Education, 2015).

Because of the advent of charter schools and school of choice, changes wer made to the way

schools were funded. Public schools went from a system where they were primarily funded by

local ad valorem taxes to a system where ad valorem taxes were first directed to the state and


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then redistributed to the public schools based on enrollment and historical funding levels. The

exception to this was that local schools maintained the right to levy taxes with voter approval for

building construction and renovation. Charter schools in Michigan receive no money from the

state or local governmental units for the use of buildings.

The per pupil funding model created by this legislation now meant that traditional schools could

create schools of choice and that non-profit entities could apply for a charter from an authorizing

body to operate a school. In Michigan, authorizing body is restricted to Public Universities,

community colleges, intermediate school districts, and traditional school districts (MCL

380.502). While advocates of charter schools cite innovation of curriculum and operation in

support of charters, critiques of charter schools cite uneven success rates and the diversion of

state money into private companies that are often contracted to run the school program and

money lost due to rental expenses of buildings and equipment which in some opinions may be

excessive (Dixon, 2014)

Problem Statement

The conflict between Charter and Traditional Schools in Michigan has been a polarizing

factor in Michigan Educational Politics restricting cooperation between the two state entity

groups. At least part of this conflict stems from view that charter schools are diverting resources

away from public schools as parents choose to enroll their children in a charter school rather than

the local traditional public school (State of Michigan Board of Education, 2015)

The charter school debate has centered on the fundamental concept of accountability and

the differences between charter and traditional districts. The first is the way in which charter

schools and traditional schools are held accountable for the fiscal and academic performance of

the school. Traditional public schools have boards that are elected and the voters are expected to


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hold school board members accountable for the performance of the school. Charter school boards

on the other hand are appointed by the authorizing body and are responsible for ensuring that the

school is academically and fiscally sound (MCL 380.502). Charter school opponents have

charged that charter schools are not held accountable for poor academic performance. Charter

school proponents however suggest that charter schools are held accountable because the charter

school has clear benchmarks set by the authorizing body which can revoke the charter schools

contract at any time if those performance goals are not met. Furthermore, charter school

advocates say that the competition brought by charter schools means that traditional schools are

held accountable by market forces because dissatisfied parents can easily change from a

traditional school to a charter school. These two competing ideas of accountability highlight the

differences in accountability the state has placed on Charter schools and traditional schools.

Accountability of schools has long been a debated issue. Garn and Cobb looked at three

models of accountability of schools (Garn and Cobb, 2001) They stated that

Garn and Cobb noted that this was a theoretical difference. In practice, state charter laws vary. In

the case of Michigan, charter schools are required to adhere to the same rules and regulations as

traditional district schools. While critics would point to the fact that charter schools do not

contribute to the state retirement fund, this is a function of the schools not directly employing

Those that say charter schools are more accountable evidence the strong

competitive component (market accountability). Compare this form ofaccountability with district public schools which have predominantly relied onbureaucratic and (to an increasing but lesser degree) performance forms ofaccountability. Charter schools are bound by a written contract with a sponsoringagency, and the covenant is simple-achieve specific goals in a set time period,while attracting and maintain pupil enrollment, in exchange for a blanket waiverfrom bureaucratic reporting.


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any staff and rather using a third party vendor called an educational service provider (ESP) who

runs the day to day operations and employs the staff.

Differences in accountability structure, competition over resources, and political

posturing have created a hostile environment towards charter schools. In January of 2015, the

Saginaw School board rejected an offer from a charter schools to purchase a building for $3.5

million dollars and to instead use a state grant of $2.5 million dollars to demolish the building.

After months of negotiations and public outcry, the Saginaw School board reversed its action and

sold the building to Francis Reh Charter School (Johnson, 2015). This example highlights the

fundamental question of how do School Board members view charter schools and how has that

impacted their decisions.

Research Objective

The objective of this thesis is to determine the perceptions of charter schools among

current school board members of traditional public school districts. The purpose is to learn if the

presence of charter schools has affected school board members decision making process to

pursue more innovative means of providing education as well as to establish a baseline of

perceptions school board members have towards charter schools.

Research Questions

The research attempts to understand the following question.

How School Board Members perceptions of competitive marketplace pressures are associated

with the presence of a charter school in their district has it impacted their districts decisions?

Assumptions

There are three main assumptions made while conducting this survey.


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The first is that the selected list of e-mails will be representative of the population. The

emails that were used were gathered directly from the school districts official website by paid

workers whose work has been checked by the author. Paid workers were directed to find the

websites of all traditional districts in Michigan using a list of schools available from the

Michigan Department of Education and record directly from that website the e-mail addresses of

the board members.

The second assumption is that school board members are knowledgeable about the

existence of charter schools, the existence of charter schools in their district, and have a

perception about charter schools.

The third assumption is that Traditional School Board members are knowledgeable about

the operations of the district at an oversight level.

Limitations and Delimitations

There are limitations to the outreach available to connect directly with Traditional School

Board members who do not have their e-mail address publicly available on their districts

website. A board members e-mail address may not have been made publicly available for one of

two main reasons. Firstly, that the district does not have a website which was found to be the

case in a small minority of cases. The second reason is that the board chose not to disclose the

email addresses of board members. This was much more frequent and there appears that a

distinction between rural and urban schools may be connected to such a decision. To counter

such limits, the number of board members is very large and those who do not respond to the

questioner within 1 week will be contacted a second time.

Another potential limiting factor is that board members may fear that any answers given

could be made public. To counter this, participants were informed that their individual responses


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will not be made public and no data will be made publicly available that would be personally

identifiable.


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CHAPTER IILiterature Review

Introduction

The purpose of this literature review is to provide important historical context regarding

Charter schools and their relationship with traditional school districts. In additions, the literature

review will focus on the market theory of the charter school movement, the political perspectives

that have risen both in support and in opposition to market theory in education, and a review of

the current regulatory climate that allows for the creation of charter schools. Finally, the

literature review will look at the results of other surveys of perceptions about charter schools and

how those perceptions impacted the decision making process.

History of Charter Schools

The genesis of the charter school movement as recognized by Riccardelli, Cummins, and

Steedman, can be traced back to a 1974 presentation by Ray Budde who advocated that

Traditional districts create Charter Schoolswithin their existing district to allow parents a

choice in deciding their childs education (2014). Also according to Riccardelli, Cummins, and

Steedman, this built on existing market theory of education that Milton Friedman put forth

(2014). Since 1992, charter school legislation has expanded to all but 11 states.

Current Regulatory Climate

Current regulation of charter schools can be divided into two categories of Federal

regulation and State regulation. To be all encompassing of the differing regulations that exist, the

scope of this section will be limited to the funding and structural creation of charter schools in

Michigan.


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Creation of Charter Schools in Michigan. The legislation governing the creation of

charter schools is Public Act 451 Part 6 A. For all intents and purposes, the following is a

summary of that act.

Section 380.501defines a public school academy, a charter school, as a public school

recognized under the state constitution of the purposes of carrying out governmental functions of

the state. In addition, this section defines anAuthorizing bodythat is able to issue a contract, a

charter, as a public k through 12 school, an intermediate school, the board of a Community

College, or the governing body of a Sate Public University.

Section 380.502refers to the organization of the public school academy as a corporation

organized under the nonprofit corporations act. All public schools academies are directed by a

not-for-profit corporation. Additionally, the section places a maximum percentage that

authorizers may charge for providing oversight services of the academy at 3%. This section also

defines management companies which may be either for profit or nonprofit entities that provide

educational services rather than the public school academy directly providing those services.

Section 506a requires that if the academy chooses to provide medical, dental, or vision

benefits to their employees, they must be in compliance with the States Health Benefit Act.

Section 380.507 outlines the powers and responsibilities of the Authorizing body. The

Authorizing body is responsible for establishing selection criteria for choosing proposals to

create a charter school, issuing the charter contract, and developing a system of accountability

that requires the charter school to meet those requirements. To accomplish this, the Authorizing

body is given broad powers to oversee the charter school and to revoke the charter for failing to

show academic progress, comply with applicable law, meet generally acceptable accounting

principles, or violating a term in the contract. However, the decision of an authorizing body to


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revoke a charter is not subject to any review by a court or state agency. The section also requires

the Superintendent of Instruction to close any charter school that has for four years been in the

States bottom 5% of performing schools.

Perceptions of Charter Schools

The literature on the perceptions of charters schools can be divided into providers and

end users. A provider would be anyone whose primary function is to provide educational

services such as Teachers, Principals, Superintendents, and the School Board. Conversely, end

users would be those who benefit from those services to include Students, Guardians, and the

Public as a whole. This thesis is more concerned with the perceptions among providers of

educational services and how these perceptions influence decision making.

Teachers.

In a study done by Bomotti, Ginsberg, and Cobb in 1999, they compared the perceptions

of 100 teachers in the charter school and tradition school systems each in a comparative study

conducted by Colorado State University (1999). They compared teachers perceptions of

empowerment, school climate, and working conditions. Their conclusions found that Charter

school teachers in general find more professional freedom within their classroom and experience

more freedom to teachand in general felt more empowered than their Traditional counterparts.

Much of this empowerment seemed to be linked to the smaller class sizes and more involved

parents found at charter schools. Noticeably, there was no statistical difference in the area of

school governance or curriculum content. In the area of School climate, Charter school teachers

scored significantly higher particularly in the area of academic focus. However, in the element of

shared responsibility, both groups of teachers scored similarly with no significant differences.

The authors attributed this to the high degree of commitment on within both groups. Finally, the


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authors looked at working conditions and found mirror images. While teachers in Charter school

teachers valued their smaller classrooms and greater academic freedom, they reported lower

satisfaction in regards to support including the facilities, technology, and pay. Conversely,

Traditional school teachers were much more satisfied in this area however reported lower

satisfaction in academic freedom, larger classroom sizes, and uninvolved parents. In aggregate,

despite being mirrored images, both groups reported a similar level of satisfaction.

Principals.

In 2011 Marisa Cannata ran a study on the perceptions of Traditional, Magnet, and

private schools for the National Center on School Choice. The brief included principals from 110

traditional schools, 22 magnet schools, and 15 private schools. Her findings were that principals

perceived little competition from Charter schools a finding that was supported in that she also

found that principals did not change the way they allocated their time based on competition from

charter schools. There was however one exception. Principals at traditional schools who had

been at a school longer either as a teacher or assistant principal were more likely to report a

negative effect on their ability to secure financial resources. There was one limiting factor

however and that was that on average the closest charter school was nine miles away. The author

suggested that a sample where charter schools were more closer to the traditional school may

reveal a greater influence. This limiting factor is not insignifigant as it has been previously

shown that 9 miles is approximately the outer limit most parents are willing to travel for their

childs school.

Superintendents.

In a study conducted by Ricciardelli, Cummins, and Steedman, they surveyed and

conducted interviews with Superintendents in Massachusetts to learn discover how they perceive


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charter schools have affected competition in their district (2014). Their findings found that 31%

of respondents reported that charter schools have had a major or moderate impact on student

enrollment at their traditional public school. 41% reported that charter schools have had a major

or moderate impact on their districts budget. When looking a saliency of the responses, while on

6% of respondents reported the impact on enrollment as major, 22% reported the impact as being

major as when it applied to the budget. This may be because minor changes in enrollment have a

magnified effect on a school budget as fixed costs cannot be reduced as easily with changes in

enrollment (Liepa, 2014). Their findings also found that the impact Superintendents perceived

was far stronger when district enrollment in charter schools was higher than 2%.

Superintendents also perceived that their districts priorities and credibilitywas also affected as

enrollment increased though this affect appears more linear than the effect on the districts

budget.

Table 2-1

In response to competitive pressures Superintendents launched a number of initiatives. The

single greatest initiative was the use of marketing at 24%. The second largest response, 23%, was

that no initiatives were launched to compete with charter schools. The second largest response

came mostly from schools where enrollment represented 0% to 2% of the districts enrollment.

Surprisingly, one of the consistently least used initiatives was the design of specialized

programs.


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Table 2-1

Interview responses.

Riccadelli, Cummins, and Steedman supplemented their survey responses with interviews

with Superintendents to gain a more in depth response to survey answers. While superintendents

recognized that Charter schools do put pressure on the district, many cited other competitive

pressures and opportunities. The researchers broke these into three distinct categories of inter-

district choice, private schools, and regional vocational schools. While this thesis is most focused

on the perceptions of Charter schools, it is important to recognize the entire ecosystem of

competition that charter school legislation has created.

I nter-distr ict choice. Like Michigan, Massachusetts allows traditional districts to open

their schools to the enrollment of persons living outside the district. Not all districts have chosen

to do this. One of the reasons cited for not to participate as a receiving district was to maintain

local autonomy. Of those districts that have choosen to become receiving districts, their main

motivation was financial. One superintendent who was more against charter schools admitted

that they essentially use the charter school model in their school of choice programs to fill empty

seats while another superintendent stated that it actually allowed for the expansion of staff and

program choices.

Private schools. Another source of competition was the private schools available in the

local area. One superintendent reported that he lost many of his brightest and athletic students to


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these programs though the students who tended to go there were legacy families whose families

had traditionally sent their children to private schools. Also, a superintendent noted that private

schools often have specialized programs that the district does not have. Also noted by one

Superintendent was the changing economic conditions in their district specifically brought about

by the recent economic downturn which saw a flow of students from private schools into the

traditional district.

Technical/Vocational schools. One of the more compelling sources of competition was

the regional vocational or technical centers which exist as a state school which accepts students

from multiple districts. One Superintendent pointed out that the marketing of the vocational

schools was very aggressive and created a similar marketing plan aimed at middle schoolers to

highlight the opportunities at the traditional districts High School. Another Superintendent

complained about a perceived un-fair competitive advantage that vocational schools have over

traditional schools, and incidentally charter schools as well, in that they can be selective in their

enrollment and do not have to make the same accommodations for high cost students that

traditional and charter schools would have to make. One Superintendent went so far as deciding

to stop providing transportation to the regional vocational center.

Department of Education Study

In a study conducted by the Department of Education in 2001, they looked at the effects

Charter schools and legislation had on Traditional districts throughout the United States. The

study found that all schools in the study were affected by the presence of charter schools in the

areas of budget, operations, or educational offerings. Some school leaders found these effects to

be negative and some found these effects to be positive which highlights both the challenges and

opportunities Charter schools and school of choice legislation create from the perspective of


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Traditional school districts. The study was based on the perceptions of School leaders and

included both quantitative and qualitative gathering of information across five States with

diverse charter legislation. It is important to note that School leaders often referred to District

Superintendents.

Table 2-3

Budget.

Of the district schools that were surveyed just under half reported that Charter schools

had negatively impacted their budget while just under half reported a no effect. A small

percentage, 8%, reported a positive impact on their budget and was related to reduce pressures to

build facilities in areas of increasing enrollment. A significant dimension to if a district school

reported a negative impact on budgeting had to relate to the size of the district. Larger districts

were much less likely to report a negative impact than smaller district schools. Enrollment

trends, which are not related to district size, also predicted whether a district reported a negative

impact on the districts budget. 100% of districts reporting declining enrollment cited charter

schools as negatively impacting the district budget. Only schools who reported increasing

enrollment reported a positive impact on the districts budget.

In response to budgetary pressures, traditional schools were forced to make tough

decisions about the use of resources. 25% of schools reported operating underutilized or closed


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schools, 16% laid off teachers, and 1 in 10 schools reduced their central offices in response.

Other budget decisions were that 8% increased class sizes. By far the most popular choice in

respects to directly affecting the budget was the increase in marketing and public relations. A full

40% of schools choose to go this route. This is less surprising however given that a successful

marketing campaign should bring in far more revenue than the campaign costs.

Operations.

Of the schools in the study, over 90% reported that they made changes in their district in

regards to operations as a result of pressures from charter schools. The largest change involved

tracking of students. It appears that the first response by traditional schools was to find out why

students were either coming to or leaving the district. This is likely why 63% of schools also

reported an increase in the workload of central office workloads. In addition to increased

tracking, 27% reported changing their central office services to improve quality and speed of

service including expanding bus routes.

Outside the central office, districts made changes to their accountability structures

including increased tracking and comparing of test scores in 70% of districts. Along with

increased accountability, 12% of districts promoted more decentralized decision making. The

study found that In one in five districts in the sample (20 percent), district administrators

described charter schools as a lever for districts to increase accountability for student

achievement in district schools. In addition to laying off teachers, many districts found that the

natural attrition rate allowed them to decrease teaching staff without having to lay teachers off.

Districts responded by increasing administrative roles teachers had to fill or adopted team

teaching models. 6% of schools reported changing their hiring practices to include stakeholders

in the decision making process.


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Educational Of ferings.

As a way to compete with charter schools, nearly half of the schools in the study decided

to increase their educational offerings. According to the study, the most common expansion was

to offer extended day or full day kindergarten. In nearly half of the schools that made changes to

their program, this was the only change made to their offerings. Of the remaining half, most

schools created similar schools that were being offered at charter schools. In this way, the direct

response by districts schools was to compete directly in a category of education once the charter

school had shown a market for such offerings. In four districts, superintendents took advantage

of charter school laws that allow them to create charter schools in collaboration with parents and

business leaders.

Summary.

In summary, all districts reported making changes to their district in response to charter

schools. Some districts reported that these changes were negative including laying off teachers,

closing schools, and increasing class sizes. Other schools made more positive changes aimed at

making their district more attractive to students such as offering new programs, creating new

schools, or expanding existing services. At least one district made a paradigm shift to thinking of

parents as customers. Which path a district took was largely a result of the operating

environment including state charter laws, funding models, and enrollment trends. Based on the

study, their findings suggest that Michigans charter law increases the likely perception that

charter schools negatively impact the districts budget, increases the likelihood that the district

will offer new programs. Michigans charter school laws which allow entities other than district

schools to offer charters also meant that authorizing fees went to entities other than district


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schools which can reduce the negative impact charter schools have on a district. Enrollment

trends increase the likelihood of districts to conduct staff layoff, operate or close under capacity

schools, change staffing agreements, and increase marketing and communication efforts.

Declining enrollment also meant that district schools were more likely to view charter schools as

a challenge rather than an opportunity. Given Michigans enrollment trends as a state, the charter

laws, and funding model, this study would suggest that the environment would favor a negative

view of charter schools by district leaders with interviewees attributing cutbacks and fiscal

challenges to charter schools.


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CHAPTER IIIMethodology

A review of the literature reveals that much study has been committed to the perceptions

of districts schools by district leaders and teachers. However, the term district leader has most

often been used a as a stand in for district superintendent. The researcher could find no studies

related to the perception of charter schools by the school boards. It was unknown if the

perceptions of district boards will mirror that of the superintendent or if they will diverge given

that board members are elected and therefore have a much wider set of constituents outside of

the school itself to include tax payers, businesses, and other social groups. Any divergence may

highlight the differing roles between the two groups. While Superintendents are responsible for

operational decisions, it is the school board who is charged with oversight of the district as well

as for setting district wide policy.

Study Design

This study closely matches the study conducted by Ricciardelli, Cummins, and Steedman

with permission to use their survey as a basis. While Ricciardelli, Cummins, and Steedman used

a mixed methods approach using both quantitative and qualitative methods, this research did not

interview respondents and a quantitative approach was used to closely replicating their use of

Creswells quantitative approachmaintaining the integrity of the instrumentation while using a

different population to survey. It should be noted that some qualitative data was collected by the

survey, but this was not used to measure differences between the two surveys.

Survey

According to Creswell, the first steps in designing a survey are identifying the intent of

the survey, why a survey was chosen to collect data, the type of survey, and the data collection


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tools that will be used (Creswell, 2014). In the case of this survey, the purpose of the survey is to

identify the perceptions of school board members and how they relate to the decisions their

district has made in a competitive marketplace. A survey tool was selected as the most useful

mechanism for gathering data quickly and economically and will be cross-sectional to reflect the

current environment and reduce the introduction of new variables as well as economy of time.

The data collection tool that was used is an internet survey for the collection of data that will

both be cost effective, economic in regard to time, and congruent with the methods of the survey

conducted by Ricciardelli et all.

Alignment of the survey tool

To ensure that the populations are comparable, the demographics will be compared as

well as the answers respondents give.

Scope and Limitations

The scope of this survey is limited to the perceptions of School Board Members of

traditional school board members in Michigan. While thirty one states do have charter school

legislation, it is important to note that there is significant variation among the different states as

to how charter schools are created, how the effect the funding of traditional school districts, and

what formal, if any relationship the charter is required to have with the local district.

Furthermore, as with all web based surveys, there are a number of selection errors that can occur

(Bethlehem, 2010). Specifically, sampling errors may occur as not all schools list the e-mail

addresses of their board members. Finally, there may be issues of over sampling since as much

of the population as possible received a link to the survey. Specifically, there were school

districts in the population which do not have any charter schools in theirss or a neighboring

district that poses a threat of competition. To mitigate this risk of over sampling, respondents


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were asked if a charter school is in their district and their answers were segregated for the

comparison of the two surveys.


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CHAPTER IVData Analysis

Introduction

The survey was conducted over a period of time from December 15th, 2015 to January 4th,

2016. This period of time is allowed for 3 weeks for Board members to respond to the questions

during a traditional break in the school calendar. 327 Board members responded to the invitation

with 3 choosing to decline to participate. 39 respondents were screened out for not finishing any

questions beyond demographics. This left a total of 285 respondents, of which 205 had charter

schools in their district though 5 did not complete the whole survey. Overall, the response rate to

the survey, including those who indicated they did not have a charter in their district, was 20%.

Because of the relatively large number of invitations that were sent, the survey gathered data

from 10% of all school board members in the state from somewhere between 26% and 50% of

all traditional school districts in the state.

Sorting the data

The original survey conducted by Ricciardelli et all utilized online survey tools by

Qualtrics. However, this survey tool was not available to the researcher due to costs associated

with the survey tool. The researcher therefore utilized Survey Monkey which is similar to the

Qualtrics platform, with some notable differences. These differences manifested in options

available to the researcher in the technical design of the data collection. This resulted in three

questions having to be manually sorted and aligned to allow for easy comparison.

The first question that required manual manipulation was question 4 which asks if there is

a charter school district which district residents can access. The question provides for 3 answers

as follows; Yes, No, and a text box other. Many participants clicked no and wrote no, or none

in the text box. For these answers, the no, or none answers in the text box were deleted as they


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were duplicative. The same strategy was also done on questions 6 and 12 which were both

matrix questions. If the participant wrote anything other than No, N/A, or none the response

was not altered. No material responses were changed. This was done simply to ease calculations

and to better identify patterns in the data.

Data Analysis

The data collected can be broken into two categories. The first category of questions

gather demographic based information. The second category collects information about the

decisions and actions Districts have taken. Questions 1, 2, 3, and 4 collect demographic

information while the remaining questions collect information regarding perceptions and actions

taken by the district. The research of Ricciardelli et all found that these demographics played a

role in how Districts allocated resources to compete with charter schools.

Demographic of Participants

Respondents were given the option to choose Rural, Semi-Rural, and Urban as a multiple

choice question. The question did not provide a definition of the terms given. 278 participants

answered this question. 143 [51%] responded Rural, 105 [37%] as Semi-Rural, and 30 [11%] as

Urban. Only one respondent indicated that their school was Rural also responded that enrollment

in the District was above 10,000. As the table below shows, Respondents of Rural schools tended

to have smaller enrollments while Respondents from Semi-Urban and Urban schools tended to

be larger. It should be noted that this is representative of the respondents and not of the Districts

as there are duplicative answers from 2 or more Board members from the same school

responding. This could not be eliminated as not all respondents provided their district entity.

However trends should be close to that of Districts provided duplicative response rates are

similar across categories.


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Table4-1

Respondentswhoindicatedthepresenceofacharterschool(N=278)


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response. The researcher decided to bifurcate the data set based on if the respondent indicated

there was a charter school in their district in respect to how the respondent perceives charter

schools have impacted their school and the reasons why for questions 5 through 9. This data set

consists of 205 respondents. However, for question 10 the researcher decided it was best to look

at all respondents as while some districts may not currently have competition from a charter

school, there exists the possibility of a charter school emerging in the district in the future.

Perceptions of How Charter Schools have Impacted the District.

Of those respondents that stated that there was a charter school in their districts 90.7%

reported some impact on their student enrollment yet 62% reported that this impact was minimal.

The largest impact that respondents reported was how the charter schools affected the

demographics of the student body with 50% of respondents indicating that charter schools have

had a moderate to major impact in this area. 69 respondents provided a written description of the

major and moderate impacts to their district. 17 respondents mentioned the changing

demographics and all 17 mentioned a common theme that charter schools attract the most

talented and affluent students leaving behind poorer students and students with special needs.

Respondents indicated that the budget was the second largest impact on their district with

40% indicating that charter schools had a major or moderate impact on their budget. This also

proved to be vastly more important in their written descriptions. 43 respondents mention the

budget in their response. The common themes mentioned were that per-pupil funding follows the

student and this has had a disproportionate effect on the district. One respondent wrote If we

lose 6 students, we lose the equivalent of a teachers salary, but we still have the other 20

students in the classroom who need a teacher.This theme was strengthened by the majority of

respondents who spoke of the loss of revenue. Michigan has seen a shift in the number of


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students moving from traditional schools to public schools over the last decade. (Izraeli and

Murphy, 2012)

While many respondents mentioned the loss of revenue, no respondents wrote about the

reduction of expenses with the loss of enrollment. This may indicate that Board members see the

loss of per-pupil funding as a marginal loss of revenue without a corresponding reduction in

expenses. This theme is mirrored in the reposes where 25 respondents who indicated that charter

schools had only a minimal impact on student enrollment; they also indicated charter schools had

a moderate or major impact on the budget with only a few respondents indicating the reciprocal.

One expense was mentioned several times however, and this was the increase expense in

marketing that board members felt they needed to engage in to remain competitive and to protect

their perception in the community. Of those who mentioned marketing, all regarded it as an

expense that provided little value to the student.

Table4-4

No

Impact

Minimal

Impact

Moderate

Impact

Major

Impact

SchoolEnrollment 9% 62% 22% 7%

DistrictBudget 15% 45% 23% 17%

Accesstocommunity

partnerships51% 40% 8% 1%

StudentDemographics 37% 12% 44% 7%

DistrictPriorities 44% 37% 15% 3%

AccesstoExtraCurriculiar

Activitiesand/orRecreational

Facilities

54% 39% 5% 3%

CredibilityorReputationof

District

47% 36% 11% 6%

PerceptionsontheImpactonPublicSchoolDistrictsbyCharterSchool

Presence(N=205)

Perceptions of which Students Enroll in Charter Schools.

As stated before, only 205 respondents indicated that a charter school exists in their

district. We can therefore separate the perceptions of those members who currently compete with


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26

charter schools and those who do not. Of those schools that do compete directly with charter

schools, very few felt that any of the suggested subgroups of students were ExtremelyLikely

to join a charter school. This is despite evidence that charter schools are not taking the highest

achieving students (Zimmer et all, 2012) This likely represents a downward skew in perceptions

of the board members that very few want to acknowledge a class of students as likely to join a

charter school. Recognizing this skew, the data was analyzedbased on Likely vs. Not Likely

At All.

58% of respondents felt that Special Education students were not likely to join a charter

school. Not far behind was Students Qualifying for Free or Reduced Lunch at 42%. This is

congruent with the written responses from the previous question and the theme that charter

schools do not recruit poor or special needs students. More interesting is that there seems to be

two views among Board Members in this respect. Approximately two thirds believe that students

who are poor or with special needs would not be attracted to charter schools, while the other

third seems to hold the opposite opinion. Saliency, or the strength of their response, was much

stronger in those who believe that charter schools would not be attractive. This may represent

two differing perceptions of how attractive charter schools are to these two groups. The first

opinion may be that parents would want to have a larger district which has more resources

available. The other opinion may be that parents may want smaller school which could better

personalize the education experience or grant the parent more access to the administration.

The second theme that is evident is that nearly three quarters of respondents felt that a

charter school was likely to attract Students with High M-Step Scores. This group was

considered most likely to be attracted to a charter school. This is also reinforced by the previous


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written responses where respondents strongly indicated they felt that charter schools attracted the

most talented and affluent students.

Finally, 64% of respondents acknowledge that ELL students may be likely to attend a

charter school. Several wrote in the text box that they experience competition from charter

schools that specialize in foreign language in their district. This was the second most likely class

of students that respondents felt would be likely to attend a charter school. However, saliency of

their responses was much lower than Students with High M-Step Scoresas 50% of

respondents felt students would only minimally be likely to attend.

Table4-5

NotLikelyAtAll MinamallyLikely ModeratlyLikely ExtremelyLikely

ELLStudents 35.8% 51.0% 11.3% 2.0%

StudentswithHighM-

StepScores 25.5% 39.2% 29.9% 5.4%

SpecialEducation

Students 58.0% 7.8% 32.2% 2.0%

StudentsQualifying

forFreeorReduced

Lunch 42.0% 14.1% 39.0% 4.9%

Other 40.6% 31.9% 17.4% 10.1%

RespondentsReportingCharterSchoolPresenceByStudentsEnrollinginCharter

Schools(N=205)

Districts that Do Not Face Charter School Competition.

Districts where respondents indicated that a charter school was not present in their district

had both similarities and differences with their peer group who had a charter school in their

district. Most notably, the trend to skew towards the lower end was more pronounced with the

response Not Likely At All increasing in every class of students while Moderately Likely

and Extremely Likely fell in every class of students. There were two notable differences and

one interesting similarity. The first is that respondents in this category were much less likely to

see Students with High M-Step Scoresas attracted to charter schools. This was the single

largest change with the percentage viewing this category as Not Likely At All increasing by 23


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percentage points. The next largest change was that these respondents were much less likely to

feel that Students Qualifying for Free or Reduced Lunch would be likely to be attracted to

charter schools with this category changing by nearly 20 percentage points. Finally, there was

one similarity that remained the same and that was in regards to Special Education Students.

Respondents were nearly the same as those who face competition, only with less saliency for

those who thought that charter schools would be attractive.

Table4-6

NotLikelyAtAll MinamallyLikely ModeratlyLikely ExtremelyLikely

50.0% 37.8% 10.8% 1.4%

14.2% -13.1% -0.5% -0.6%

48.6% 27.0% 24.3% 0.0%

23.2% -12.2% -5.6% -5.4%

60.8% 32.4% 6.8% 0.0%

2.8% 24.6% -25.4% -2.0%

61.6% 27.4% 8.2% 2.7%

19.7% 13.3% -30.8% -2.1%

54.1% 35.1% 5.4% 5.4%

13.5% 3.3% -12.0% -4.7%Other

RespondentsReportingNoCharterSchoolPresenceByStudentsEnrollinginCharter

Schoolswithdifference[%]withRespondentsReportingCharterSchoolPresence(N=73)

ELLStudents

Studentswith

HighM-Step

Scores

Special

Education

Students

Students

Qualifyingfor

Freeor

ReducedLunch

Perceptions of Why Parents Choose Charter Schools.

While the previous question asked which category respondents felt would be attracted to

a charter school, the following question asked what specific attributes of a charter school would

be attractive to parents. Again, the researcher segregated the sample into those who currently

have a charter school in their district and those who do not. Also as in previous analysis, the data

was appears to be skewed in the majority of categories.


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As was found in previous questions, again the perception that charter schools are Elite

was a highly salient response with 28% of respondents indicating that this was a reason parents

would choose Most of the Time. This was the most salient response in this matrix. Overall,

88% of respondents felt that this was a reason parents would choose a charter school at least

sometimes. A Philosophy or Approach to Education and Class Size were also strongly

perceived as reasons why parents would choose to enroll in a charter school at 80% and 81%

respectively although saliency of these reasons was lower. The strongest response was Having a

Choice or Alternative where 91% of respondents indicated that parents would choose this at

least some of the time. The least likely reason respondents felt parents would choose to leave

was the results in the District, however they were slightly more likely to believe that parents may

leave because of achievement results in the Charter School. This may represent the perception

that parents would not leave the District because the District had acceptable achievement results,

but may leave if a charter school had better results.

When comparing respondents who currently have a charter school in their district with

those who do not, only one large deviation occurred. Respondents who do not have a charter

school in their district are much more inclined to believe that the reason why parents would

choose a charter school is the curriculum design. The percentage who felt this was a reason

parents would most likely choose a charter school in this category was 10 percentage points

higher while those who felt this would rarely be a reason dropped by 19 percentage points. This

corresponded with an 11.6 percent drop in the percentage of respondents who felt the perception

that the charterbeing perceived as elite Most of the Time. It appears that respondents that have

a charter in their district feel that charter schools compete more on a perception of elitism while

those who do not are more likely to believe charters compete on curriculum design.


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Table4-7

Rarely Sometimes OftenMostofthe

Time

ClassSize 19.0% 41.0% 36.0% 4.0%

SchoolSize 26.5% 43.5% 26.5% 3.5%

Curriculum

Design43.0% 24.5% 28.0% 4.5%

Achievement

ResultsinYour

District

47.5% 37.0% 11.0% 4.5%

Achievement

Resultsinthe

CharterDistrict

38.5% 37.5% 20.5% 3.5%

Philosophyor

Approachto

Education

20.0% 42.5% 30.0% 7.5%

Havinga

Choiceor

Alternative

9.0% 36.5% 42.5% 12.0%

LearningTime 39.0% 48.0% 10.0% 3.0%

Geographicor

Distancefrom

Home

41.5% 38.5% 15.0% 5.0%

Parent

Perceptionthat

Charteris

"Elite"

22.0% 32.5% 17.5% 28.0%

RespondentsReportingPreceivedReasonsParentsChooseto

EnrollStudentsinaCharterSchool(N=200)


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Table4-8

Rarely Sometimes OftenMostofthe

Time

26.9% 41.8% 28.4% 3.0%

7.9% 0.8% -7.6% -1.0%

32.8% 47.8% 17.9% 1.5%

6.3% 4.3% -8.6% -2.0%

23.9% 34.3% 26.9% 14.9%

-19.1% 9.8% -1.1% 10.4%

47.8% 28.4% 13.4% 10.4%

0.3% -8.6% 2.4% 5.9%

40.3% 34.3% 13.4% 11.9%

1.8% -3.2% -7.1% 8.4%

25.4% 38.8% 22.4% 13.4%

5.4% -3.7% -7.6% 5.9%

22.4% 34.3% 34.3% 9.0%13.4% -2.2% -8.2% -3.0%

35.8% 43.3% 17.9% 3.0%

-3.2% -4.7% 7.9% 0.0%

46.3% 29.9% 17.9% 6.0%

4.8% -8.6% 2.9% 1.0%

25.4% 29.9% 28.4% 16.4%3.4% -2.6% 10.9% -11.6%

Parent

PerceptionthatCharteris

"Elite"

EnrollStudentsinaCharterSchoolbyRepondentsReportingNo

CharterPresence(N=67)

ClassSize

SchoolSize

Curriculum

Design

AchievementResultsinYour

District

Achievement

Resultsinthe

CharterDistrict

Philosophyor

Approachto

Education

Havinga

Choiceor

Alternative

LearningTime

Geographicor

Distancefrom

Home


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Actions Taken Due to Competition

The previous battery of questions detailed what perceptions board members held. In this

selection of questions, the researcher attempts to identify the specific actions taken by Districts

due to the presence of charter schools or the possibility of charter schools moving to the district.

In the following questions, the sample of respondents with charter schools in their district has

reduced to 200.

Collection of Parent Surveys

One response to competition is to determine why parents would send their child to a

different school. This could involve simple exit surveys to more complex market research. The

first question asked was Does your district collect data from parents about their reasons for

choosing charter schools? Because the question assumes that the district has a charter school in

their district which parents can access, only responses from respondents who indicated the

presence of a charter school were analyzed. In total, 200 respondents met these criteria. The

majority of respondents indicated that their district did not collect data from parents.

Table4-9

Yes

NotYet,

butinthe

works No

Charter

Schools

Present

32.5% 10.0% 57.5%

RespondentsindicatingDatacollectionof

whyParentschooseCharterSchools

(N=200)

In reviewing why a district would not collect data, there emerged at least two

possibilities. The first possibility being that these schools did not face heavy competition from

charter schools. 71% of respondents who indicated that they did not collect data had lost 3% or


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less of their population. While many respondents indicated that the loss of students was

disproportionately adverse to their budget, a loss of 2% or less may be manageable enough not to

increase workloads on staff to track students or hire professional demographers or marketers to

determine why parents choose to send their students elsewhere. However, there still remained

nearly 30% of respondents who experience a loss of 3% or more. Respondents were not asked,

but could have chosen to write a longer answer in the text box. Only two did, but their answers

were complimentary that they have tried and been unsuccessful, or could not obtain the data

from the charter school which matches the second possibility that the data may not be easily

obtained.

Table4-10

Lessthan1% 1%to2% 3%to4% 5%to6% 7%to8% Morethan9%

39.1% 32.2% 11.3% 8.7% 1.7% 7.0%

RespondentsReportingaCharterSchoolintheirDistrictwhichReportednotCollectingExit

Data(N=115)

Of those who do currently collect information from parents the most recurring theme was

that these schools conducted a survey, exit interview, or a phone call was made. By far, the most

common method of outreach was a survey followed by a phone call. However, all responses

indicating how the district determines who is leaving involve students who were previously

enrolled and are leaving the district. None of the respondents indicated the hiring of external help

to identify students who were never part of the district.

Programs or Initiatives.

The next matrix question probed respondents to identify any actions that they undertook

in response to the presence of charter schools. Only respondents who indicated that a charter

school was within their district will be analyzed as few respondents who did not have a charter

school in their district answered this question. The question asks respondents to identify areas

where they have made changes to their district to compete with charter schools. 50.5% of


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respondents indicated they had not taken any action due to charter schools. This left a remaining

99 respondents who indicated the presence of a charter school in their district and took actions

because of the schools presence. The most common practice was the launching of marketing

materials. This represents 81% of these respondents. Of respondents who indicated making

changes, 35.4% only increased their marketing efforts. In total, 68% of respondents who

indicated the presence of a charter school in their district did nothing or only increased their

advertising efforts. However, the remaining respondents indicated a large number of changes

with nearly all of the respondents indicating their district had made multiple changes. The most

often response for this group were changes in curriculum at 79.7%. AP and IB programs were

the most often mentioned with technology integration also being a major theme among this

group. Other strong responses included Capital improvements and Design of new programs at

59.2% and 54.7% respectively. Nearly 72% of these improvements were in addition to increased

marketing campaigns.

Table4-11

New

Curriculum

and

Instruction

Initiatives

Modification

ofSchool

Hoursof

Operation

Launchingof

Marketing

Materialsor

Startegic

Communications

aboutDistrict

Programs

Modificationsto

Work

Conditionsfor

Staff

Capital

Improvements

toBuildingsor

Infrastructure

Designof

Specialized

Programs

Changeof

Pacefor

Initiatives

We

already

Planned

toDo

None

Overall 25.5% 7.0% 40.5% 5.5% 19.0% 17.5% 7.0% 50.5%

Respondents

whoindicated

making

changes

(N=99)

51.5% 14.1% 81.8% 11.1% 38.4% 35.4% 14.1%

Changes

otherthanor

inadditionto

marketing

(N=64)

79.7% 21.9% 71.9% 17.2% 59.4% 54.7% 21.9%

InitiativesRespondentsReportedbecauseofpresenceofCharterSchool(N=200)


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Alignment and Comparison with Ricciardelli, Cummins, Steadman Study

The survey by Ricciardelli, Cummins, and Steadman (RCS Survey) focused only on

those schools that indicated that they have a charter school in their district while this research has

expanded the data analysis to also compare those who do not have a charter school in their

district in respects to the perceptions as to why a parent would enroll in a charter school. In this

section, the researcher focuses only on those respondents who indicated they had a charter school

in their district and completed the survey to compare the population and findings. The first

comparable item is demographics. The largest difference appears to be in populations with

charter schools. The percentage of responses where the district did not have a charter school was

much larger in this survey than in the RCS Survey. This may indicate selection bias or that as a

whole charter schools have not penetrated the State of Michigan to the same extent as in

Massachusetts. According to Dan Fishman, rural areas are underserved by charter schools due to

the density of the population base. (2014)

Table4-12

ComaparisonofThisSurveyandRCSSurvey

RCSSurvey Thissurvey

Numberof

Respondents 69-61withcharterschooloption 285-205withchaterschooloption200completesurveys

SampleSize(N) 61 200

Urban 5outof51 24outof200

When comparing the size of schools, it was found that respondents in this survey were

more evenly distributed in regards to size with a flatter distribution and fatter tails in a

distribution curve.


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Table4-13

SurveyRespondentsofStudentEnrollment

Difference

Enrollmentof

DistrictsN [%] N [%]

lessthan1,500 8 13% 47 24% 10%

1,501to2,500 15 25% 47 24% -1%

2,501to4,000 22 36% 36 18% -18%

4,001to6,000 12 20% 32 16% -4%

6,001to10,000 3 5% 28 14% 9%

10,000ormore 1 2% 10 5% 3%

N:total 61 200

RCSSurvey ThisSurvey

Despite the differences in distribution patterns based on size, the distribution based on the

percentage of students enrolling in charter schools is similar with only single digit differences in

percentage with only one transition point between near the 3% enrollment range.

Table4-14

SurveyRespondentsbyCharterSchoolEnrollment

Difference

%ofStudentsinCharterSchool N [%] N [%]

lessthan1% 22 36% 70 35% -1%

1%to2% 17 28% 69 35% 7%

3%to4% 12 20% 27 14% -6%

5%to6% 5 8% 21 11% 2%

7%to8% 1 2% 4 2% 0%9%ormore 4 7% 9 5% -2%

N:total 61 200

RCSSurvey ThisSurvey

Comparison and Contrast of Perceptions.

Based on the demographic data, the respondents represent similar district characteristics.

However, the samples are not the same. The RCS Survey was of Superintendents, while the

respondents in this survey were Education Board Members. Differences between the findings

may represent differences between the two classes of respondents, or environmental differences

such as financial, social, or legal differences.

What was notable was there appeared to be a shift in saliency between the two groups. In

6 out of the seven groups, there was a rightward shift of more than 10% points with respondents


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in this survey reporting a larger impact from the presence of charter schools. Of particular note

was the shift in how respondents indicated charter schools have impacted student demographics.

What is clear is that respondents in this survey perceived charter schools as having a much

stronger effect on their student body makeup more than Superintendents did in Massachusetts.

Also clear is that concerns about charter schools targeting the most affluent and talented students

from the public school was a recurring theme in this survey. It is unknown if these perceptions

are actual or just perceptual.


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Table4-15

NoImpactMinimal

Impact

Moderate

ImpactMajorImpact

RCSSurvey 26% 43% 25% 6%

ThisSurvey 9% 62% 22% 7%

Difference 17 19

-3% 1%

RCSSurvey 24% 31% 23% 22%

ThisSurvey 15% 45% 23% 17%

Difference 9 14

0% -5%

RCSSurvey 69% 25% 3% 3%


Difference -18% 15% 5% -2%

RCSSurvey 45% 37% 7% 10%


Difference -8% 25 37

-3%

RCSSurvey 55% 25% 13% 6%


Difference 11 12

2% -3%

RCSSurvey 67% 26% 4% 1%


Difference 13 13

1% 2%

RCSSurvey 47% 26% 15% 12%


Difference 0% 10% -4% -6%

SchoolEnrollment

DistrictBudget

Accesstocommunity

partnerships

StudentDemographics

DistrictPriorities

AccesstoExtra

CurriculiarActivitiesand/orRecreational

Facilities

Credibilityor

ReputationofDistrict

PerceptionsontheImpactonPublicSchoolDistrictsbyCharterSchoolPresence(N=205)RCSSurvey(N=61)

One of the findings of the RCS Survey was that there as a connection between the

number of students enrolling in charter schools, and the impact this had on respondents views of

how this effected perceptions of how charter schools have impacted their district. When

comparing the results of the RCS survey with this survey, the researcher found that the same

trends occurred, however the effect was more gradual and in the case of District Priorities

linear than the findings of the RCS Survey. In addition, the perceptions of impact on District


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Priorities or Decisions and Credibility/ Reputation were not as strongly perceived as in the

RSC Survey.

Table4-16

DistrictBudgetDistrict

Priorities

Credibilityor

Reputation

RCSSurvey 33% 10% 15%

ThisSurvey 31% 15% 13%

Difference -2% 5% -2%



Difference 31 -11% 33



Difference -1% 39 25

ReportedModerateorMajorImpact(N=205)RCSSurvey(N=61)

0%-2%

3%-6%

7%-9%

The final comparison with the RCS Survey had to do with reported initiatives

respondents indicated their district had taken in response to charter schools. Again the

respondents between the two surveys showed similarities in trends but a difference in saliency.

Three notable differences occurred. The first was in respect to Curriculum and Instruction

initiatives. While RCS Survey respondents indicated their strongest response when enrollment

loss was between 3% and 6%, respondents in this survey continued a more linear trajectory

having the strongest response at the 7% to 9%+ loss range. The second difference was in respect

to Marketing / Strategic Communications. Respondents in this survey exhibited the same

trend, but had a much stronger response than RCS Survey respondents at the 7% to 9%+ loss

range. The final difference was in respect to Capital Improvements to Buildings or

Infrastructure where respondents to this survey experienced a mirror image of the trend across

the different loss ranges.


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Table4-17

Curriculumand

Instruction

Marketing/

Strategic

Capital

Improvements

Designof

Specialized

RCSSurvey 17% 37% 33% 27%

ThisSurvey 21% 34% 20% 14%

Difference 4% -3% -13% -13%

RCSSurvey 75% 48% 58% 27%

ThisSurvey 26% 56% 14% 22%

Difference 49 8% 44 -5%

RCSSurvey 17% 15% 8% 20%

ThisSurvey 43% 36% 21% 29%

Difference 26% 21 13 9%

InitiativesreportedbyEnrollmentPercentage(N=205)RCSSurvey(N=61)

0%-2%

3%-6%

7%-9%

The final comparison between the two survey results compares the RSC Survey results

found when they compared perceptions of if high achieving students would be likely to leave the

district to perceptions of how charter schools have impacted the budget. Despite both samples

sharing a significant amount of commonality in respect to the percentage of loss of students,

respondents in this survey cluster around minimally likely and minimal impact. However, the

trend line remains the same between the two surveys. Both exhibit the same low counts on polar

extremes such as Minimal Impactand Extremely Likely and vice versa. There appears in the

data in regards to this survey a bulge of nearly 48% of respondents who indicated that the effect

of charter schools only are minimally or moderately affected their budget and only minimally or

moderately are likely to attract high achieving students. This may indicate that charter schools

are impacted less charter schools and charter schools are less likely to attract high achieving

students. Alternatively, this may be selection bias or implicit bias to select moderate of minimum


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responses.

Matrix4-1

ReportofCharterSchoolImpacton

DistrictBudget

NotLikely

atAll

Minimally

Likely

Moderately

Likely

Extremely

Likely

Total

(N)

NoImpact 5 3 1 4 13

MinimalImpact 1 5 8 2 16

ModerateImpact 1 5 3 7 16

MajorImpact 1 0 4 10 15

Total(N) 8 13 16 23 60

RCSSurvey(N=60)

PerceptionofLikelyStudentsWithAdvancedMCAS

ScoresToEnrollinCharterSchools

Matrix4-2

ReportofCharterSchoolImpacton

DistrictBudget

NotLikely

atAll

Minimally

Likely

Moderately

Likely

Extremely

Likely

Total

(N)

NoImpact 13 16 2 0 31

MinimalImpact 29 36 22 4 91

ModerateImpact 4 18 21 3 46

MajorImpact 5 10 16 4 35

Total(N) 51 80 61 11 203

ThisSurvey(N=203)

PerceptionofLikelyStudentsWithAdvancedM-Step


A final comparison of the results was another matrix which compared the perception of

the likelihood of advanced students to enroll in a charter school versus initiatives undertaken by

the district in response to a charter school presence. To enhance any trends, the researcher added

the percentage of districts that had done no initiatives due to charter school presence. The trend


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that emerged in both groups was that as the perceived likelihood that advanced students may

enroll in a charter increased the likelihood of the respondent indicating that one or more

initiatives had been undertaken with the exception of Extremely Likely. This again could be

due to reporting bias. To better understand if this was a reporting bias, the average number of

initiatives per respondent was compared between the two surveys. Two findings emerged. The

first is that the average number of initiatives reported per respondent was much higher in this

survey than the RCS Survey. Furthermore, the trend between perceptions of advanced students

enrolling and the average number of initiatives per respondent increased significantly eliminating

most of the difference.

Matrix4-3

InitiativesinpartInfluencedbythePresenceofaCharterNotLikely

atAll

Minimally

Likely

Moderately

Likely

Extremely

Likely

Total

(N)

NewCurriculum&InstructionInitiatives 0 3 1 8 12

ModificationtoSchoolHoursofOperation 0 0 1 2 3

LaunchingofMarketingMaterialsorStrategicCommunications 0 3 9 15 27

ModificationtoWorkConditions 0 0 1 1 2

CapitalImprovementstoBuildingsorInfrastructure 0 0 3 8 11

DesignofSpecializedPrograms 0 2 3 10 15

ChangeofPaceforAlreadyplannedInitiatives 0 0 4 2 6None 5 5 6 6 22

TotalResponses 5 12 16 21 54

PercentagenotinfluencedbyCharters 100% 42% 38% 29% 41%

PerceptionofLikelyStudentsWithAdvancedMCAS


RCSSurvey(N=60)


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Matrix4-4

InitiativesinpartInfluencedbythePresenceofaCharterNotLikely

atAll

Minimally

Likely

Moderately

Likely

Extremely

Likely

Total

(N)

NewCurriculum&InstructionInitiatives 8 16 22 5 51

ModificationtoSchoolHoursofOperation 0 6 7 1 14

LaunchingofMarketingMaterialsorStrategicCommunications 13 30 17 5 65

ModificationtoWorkConditions 1 4 5 1 11

CapitalImprovementstoBuildingsorInfrastructure 7 12 12 3 34

DesignofSpecializedPrograms 5 11 14 5 35

ChangeofPaceforAlreadyplannedInitiatives 1 6 5 2 14

None 34 38 22 6 100

TotalResponses 51 80 61 11 203

PercentagenotinfluencedbyCharters 67% 48% 36% 55% 49%

PerceptionofLikelyStudentsWithAdvancedM-Step


ThisSurvey(N=203)

Table4-18

NotLikelyat

All

Minimally

Likely

Moderately

Likely

Extremely

Likely Average

RCSSurvey 0.00 0.67 1.38 2.19 1.41

ThisSurvey 1.00 2.08 3.50 3.33 2.10

PerceptionofLikelyofAdvancedStudentstoEnrollinaCharter

comparedwithAveragenumberofInitiativesreportedper

Respondent


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CHAPTER VSUMMARY

The objective of this research was to determine the perceptions of charter schools among

current school board members of traditional public school districts for the purpose to learn if the

presence of charter schools has affected school board members decision making process. The

research attempted to understand the following question.

How School Board Members perceptions of competitive marketplace pressures are associated

with the presence of a charter school in their district has it impacted their districts decisions?

To do this, board members were surveyed electronically to determine their perceptions of

about charter schools and initiatives and actions they instigated in response to the presence of

charter schools. To have a comparable base line, a similar study conducted by Ricciardelli,

Cummins and Steedman was used as a template. With their permission, their survey was

modified for terminology and quantitatively compared to determine similarities and differences.

Results

The number of respondents who fit the criteria for comparison was over 3 times larger

with this survey having 205 respondents which fit the criteria versus 61 in the RCS Survey. The

demographics of the two surveys were similar in key areas of district size and the amount of

competition the respondents reported with only minor variations in demographic reporting.

Perceptions of how respondents perceived the effect of charter schools on their district however

appears to be a tendency for respondents in this survey to migrate toward minimum impact

versus no impact on the majority of attributes a charter school may impact overall as highlighted

in table 4-15 and a tendency to migrate from moderate impact to minimal or no impact when


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enrollment loss are 3% or more as highlighted in table 4-16. This migration effect can again be

seen when comparing matrix 4-1 and 4-2 even though the trend remains the same in both

surveys. This difference in saliency of effect and perceptions was one of the most remarkable

differences found between the two groups. The other difference between the two surveys was the

number of initiatives respondents indicated when they believed that advanced students were

likely to leave their district. Overall, respondents in this survey were much more likely to report

a greater number of initiatives in this regard as seen in Table 4-18.

An exception to the two migration trends was student demographics which were shifted

from minimal impact to moderate impact. There was a large shift in this category from minimum

impact to moderate impact.

Conclusions

Of those respondents in this survey that stated that there was a charter school in their

districts 90.7% reported some impact on their student enrollment yet 62% reported that

this impact was minimal.

The largest impact that respondents in this survey reported was how the charter schools

affected the demographics of the student body with 50% of respondents indicating that

charter schools have had a moderate to major impact in this area.

Respondents in this survey indicated that the budget was the second largest impact on

their district with 40% indicating that charter schools had a major or moderate impact on

their budget. This also proved to be vastly more important in their written descriptions.

Respondents in this survey indicated that semi-urban and urban schools were the most

likely to see completion from charter schools


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Over half of respondents in this survey are not collecting data as to how why students are

going to charter schools despite reporting competition from charter schools. 71% percent

of these respondents indicated that their loss to charter schools is less than 3%

There appears to be two different thoughts among respondents about the likelihood of

Special needs students and poorer students to enroll in a charter school among

respondents in this survey

Respondents in this survey who did not perceive competition from a charter school were

less likely to perceive special needs students and poorer students to enroll in a charter

school but there still appeared to be two differing thoughts among respondents in this

class.

28% of respondents in this survey who reported competing with charter schools thought

that parents choose charter schools Most of the Time because the charter is perceived

as Elite. However, respondents who do not reportcompeting with a charter school

perceive this with less saliency.

50% of respondents who face competition in this survey indicating a charter school

presence made no initiatives due to charter school presence. Another 18% only increased

their marketing efforts. However overall, respondents in this survey are more likely to

create initiatives than those of the comparable survey

Respondents in this survey who stated competition with charter schools tended to report

impacts on their district caused by charter schools towards the center of the 4 point scale.


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Recommendations for Traditional School Board Members

Board members need to understand what charter schools are, how they are funded, and

how they are structured in order to compete in the educational market place both to

counter current competition and to disincentive future competition as well as to foster

collaborative relationships.

Board members should be aware of the specific missions that charter schools in their

district have to both compete and collaborate with charter schools.

Board members should be aware of their bias towards the loss of advanced students to

charter schools and compete for all students.

Recommendations for Public School Academy Board Members

Board members should encourage the administration to reach out to the traditional

districts in their area to introduce the school, its mission, and to investigate possible

collaborations such as purchasing services from the traditional district as well as creating

joint learning experiences for the student populations of both schools.

Board Members should reach out to traditional board members to exchange information,

share ideas, and explain the public nature of public school academies.

Recommendations for ISDs and the State

ISDs play a critical role in providing information to all public schools and should work

to foster a competitive and collaborative environment between both traditional public

schools and charter schools. ISDs can be a channel for information about the movements

of students within the district for both public school academies and traditional districts.

ISDs should reinforce to public school boards that traditional districts and charter

districts are both creations of the State meant to serve the public. A possible conceptual


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analogy could be to consider traditional districts as similar to universities and public

school academies as similar to public community colleges.

Recommendations for Future Research

Future research involving School board members should take mitigating steps against

central tendency bias.


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References

Bethlehem, J. (2010, June 18). Selection Bias in Web Surveys. Retrieved from

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1751-5823.2010.00112.x/abstract

Bomotti, S., Ginsberg, R., & Cobb, B. (1999, July 22). ERIC - Teachers in Charter and

Traditional Schools: A Comparative Study., Education Policy Analysis Archives, 1999.

Retrieved November 1, 2015, from http://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ598401

Cannata, M. (2011, April). ERIC - How Do Principals Respond to Charter School Competition?

Research Brief, National Center on School Choice, Vanderbilt University (NJ1), 2011-

Apr. Retrieved November 1, 2015, from http://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED543580

Creswell, J. W. (2014).Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods

approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

Dawsey, C. P. (2014, April 29). A brief history of Proposal A, or how we got here.Bridge

Magazine. Retrieved from http://bridgemi.com/2014/04/a-brief-history-of-proposal-a-or-

how-we-got-here/

Department of Education. (2001, June). Challenge and Opportunity: The Impact of Charter

Schools on School Districts. Retrieved November 07, 2015, from

http://www2.ed.gov/rschstat/eval/choice/summary.html

Dixon, J. (2014, June 22). Michigan's biggest charter operator charge

Documents

MSA699-Final Johannes Cawood(b).pdf