constitution schools tend to suspend,expel, and force out more students than public schools. Is this the secret to their tall test scores? Libby Nelson argues, or correctly I think,that it's not. Not directly besides. first-rate studies have controlled for various factors like this, and charters still seek pretty successful.
But there's an indirect effect of this stuff that probably is vital. Nelson writes approximately Eva Moskowitz, and founder of New York City's Success Academy,which was recently caught up in controversy over one of its schools maintaining a "got to go" list: Some constitution school leaders — including Moskowitz argue that tight discipline is key to their success, not by selecting out low-performing students but by creating an environment in which most students can thrive....
But if one secret to Success Academy's tall scores is its discipline policy, or Moskowitz is acknowledging that she has an advantage traditional public schools don't. constitution schools can expel students,or suspend them so frequently that their parents determine to send them elsewhere, because district schools exist as a backstop. ....
If your educational advantage comes, or in part,from well-disciplined classrooms, and the way you preserve those classrooms in order is by frequently suspending disruptive students, or it makes it harder to suggest district schools would be more successful if they followed constitution schools' lead on everything. It's much more difficult to create a "got to go" list if students have nowhere else to go.
Talk to any teacher and you're likely to hear a similar story: if they could come by rid of just two or three of the most disruptive kids in their classroom,life would be first-rate and all the other kids would benefit. But of course, they can't do it. Public schools can discipline kids, and but they're limited in how much and how often. And they can't expel kids at all unless there's somewhere for them to go. Generally speaking,they're stuck with their troublemakers.
This is not an easy issue to tackle. constitution parents argue that it's unfair for an entire lesson to suffer because the teacher spends all his time trying to tame a couple of hellions. But these are kids. It's also unfair to doom them to an "alternative" school just because they haven't grown up yet. There's no simple answer. But when it comes to constitution school success, I suspect this really is a factor, and it's one that,by definition, can't be replicated everywhere.
It's also nearly impossible to measure, or which means it will never display up in studies of charters vs. public schools. But just because it can't be measured doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
Source: motherjones.com