How Good Can Charter Schools Be?

     Charter schools are still controversial.  Some supposedly
fail to provide quality education while others do very well.  The
methods used to evaluate charter schools, and all other schools,
are suspect.  The evaluations consist mainly of bureaucrats
giving tests and calculating scores.

     Suppose we used this method to evaluate grocery stores. 
The stores that received low scores would be forced to close
their doors.  Stores would then focus on how to get good test
scores from bureaucrats, rather than focusing on serving and
pleasing customers.  Under such a  system we should expect that
good stores would often be forced to close while many mediocre
and poor ones remained open for business.

     We use a much better system to evaluate grocery stores
and all other free market businesses.  The customers served by
the grocery stores evaluate the stores.  Each customer either
gives a thumbs up by continuing to buy from the store, or gives
a thumbs down by spending his money elsewhere.

     Stores that poorly serve their customers fail and go out of
business.  Those that well serve their customers thrive and
expand.  A few stores which are great at serving and pleasing
customers expand and serve across the nation and even around
the world.

     Some people object to large businesses.  When there is
freedom in the marketplace the only way a business can grow
large is by pleasing many customers.  Government regulated and
dominated businesses expand by pleasing politicians and
bureaucrats who can never know enough to tell if the business is
well serving its customers.  The politicians and bureaucrats will
always be much more concerned about how much a business
serves them, than about how much it serves its customers.

     I don't doubt that some charter schools serve their
customers better than others do.  It is unbelievable that some
wouldn't be better than others.  This doesn't make charter
schools unique.  Some district schools do a much better job than
others.

     Every kind of enterprise known has its failures.  Many
grocery stores, barber shops, repair shops, bus companies, auto
makers, etc. have failed to well serve their customers.  With free
competition in the marketplace, customers give failures a thumbs
down and vote them off the island.

     One of the biggest problems in achieving quality
education is that, until recently, customers had almost no
opportunities to vote failing government schools off the island. 
The more the schools failed, the more money government tossed
to them   This sounds a lot like rewarding failure.  When we
preserve and reward failure, we should expect more failure.

     Improving charter schools, and all other schools, requires
less government control, not more.  Charter schools have been so
limited that most have waiting lists.  Why would a school work
and spend to improve service when it can fill all of its seats
without improving?  What kind of service would we get from
grocery stores if the stores already had more customers than they
could serve?

     There should be no limit on the number or size of charter
schools, including cyber schools.  Anyone, not just a few
colleges, should be allowed to start a charter school.  In other
words charter schools shouldn't need to have charters.  Unless
charters are available to all, charters are government granted
privileges that limit competition.  Limiting competition limits the
motivation to provide better service.

     Adam Smith published "An Inquiry Into the Nature and 
Causes of the Wealth of Nations" in 1776.  In it he documented
how the nation whose government interferes least with the
economy produces the most wealth.

     One of the biggest parts of a nation's wealth is the
knowledge and skills of its citizens.  A corollary to Smith's
conclusion is, the nation whose government interferes least with
education will produce the greatest wealth of knowledge and
skills.  Charter schools will improve education only if they result
in less government control of education.

aldmccallum@gmail.com
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Copyright 2013
Albert D. McCallum