NY Times: Half of Chicago Charter Schools Run Deficits

[Hannah Bell]

President Accountability likes to point to both charter schools and the city of Chicago as the future for public education: If that is so, it's going to be a future plagued with financial problems, financial improprieties, debt and scandal:


"Even as the Obama administration promotes charter schools as a way to help raise the academic performance of the nation’s students, half of Chicago’s charter schools have been running deficits in recent years, an analysis of financial and budget documents shows, calling into question their financial viability.

On Monday, Chicago Public Schools released a bare-bones budget that included a cut of about 6 percent in per-pupil financing for charter schools — to $5,771 from $6,117 per pupil for elementary school students and to $7,213 from $7,647 per pupil for high school students. The cuts are a result of shrinking tax revenue and lagging support from the strapped state government. The city’s 71 charter schools, which enrolled 33,000 students last year and expect to enroll another 10,000 in the 2010-11 school year, stand to lose $15 million under the cuts.

It is difficult to compare the cuts with those that are being made at traditional schools because those schools do not receive money on a per-pupil basis, but district officials said they tried to make the amount of cuts comparable to those being made at traditional schools. As a result, charters will become more dependent on private donors to provide the extras — more counselors, smaller classes, longer school days and up-to-date technology — that charter operators say set their schools apart from traditional public schools.

But even though Chicago’s charter schools brought in $21 million in private money from foundations, corporations and wealthy individuals in 2007 — the last year for which complete information is available — half have run an average of $700,000 in deficits in recent years...The data showed that two-thirds of the schools could not cover core expenses, like salaries, facilities and overhead, without private money...

http://perdidostreetschool.blogspot.com/2010/08/ny-times-chicago-charter-schools-run.html

[Bozita]

1. Guaranteed: The for-profit charters will be very, very good for their owners.

[Hannah Bell]

2. "Gee - I wish I could declare myself a 'non-profit,'

then run my business for-profit with little to no outside oversight.

Then I could charge rent and a management fee and take over 60% of the money I am given by the state to run my school just for rent and fees!"

http://perdidostreetschool.blogspot.com/2010/08/ny-times-chicago-charter-schools-run.html

[proud2BlibKansan]

3. k and r