Gov. Paterson needs to urge the Legislature to take quick action to lift New York’s cap on charter schools in his State of the State message on Wednesday. Even more so, he and the Legislature must resist the efforts of the state and New York City teachers unions to hurt charter schools by inserting “poison pill” amendments into any legislation.
The Jan. 19 deadline for filing New York’s application for federal Race to the Top dollars is fast approaching; federal application reviewers aren’t allowed to consider any legislative actions taken after that date. New York could get from $350 million to $700 million from this highly competitive $4 billion program — crucial funds in the middle of a mounting fiscal crisis.
Even as state political leaders line up to lift the cap, however, the state and city teachers unions are shifting gears. Seeing their inability to stop the lifting, they’re attempting to gut charter schools through the back door. At a weekend press event, the New York City union, the United Federation of Teachers, released a report of its recommendations.
It and the state union, New York State United Teachers, are trying to:
* Cut funding: NYSUT would like to shift the entire cost of charter-school per pupil funding to the state, whereas now a portion of per-pupil aid (federal, state and local) follows the child. Because they know the state has no money for new initiatives, this is a not so subtle attempt to eliminate funding for charter schools over time.
The answer, instead, is to provide charter-school students with funding parity. Right now, when a student switches from a district school to a charter school, his or her per-pupil funding is slashed by about a third — a kind of penalty for choosing a charter school.
* Mandate unionization: All charter schools are now subject to the state’s Taylor Law, which gives teachers, like other public employees, the right to be represented by a union, if they so choose.
In 1998, when the charter-school law was adopted, NYSUT and the UFT attempted to convince the legislature to mandate that all charter-school employees be automatically represented by them, whether the teachers liked it or not. That didn’t fly, and the unions now represent only those charter schools at which a majority of teachers have expressed a desire to be represented by a teacher union.
Out of the 170 new charter schools authorized thus far, 18 charter schools have opted for teachers unions. At three other charter schools that at one point were unionized, teachers later kicked out their union, perhaps influenced by the unions’ anti-charter legislative activities.
The fact that some schools have voted unions in and others have voted unions out suggests that the law, as it is, is fair to all.
The UFT is urging its members to back legislation to give charter-school teachers “the right to organize and bargain collectively.” In reality, they’ve had this right since day one. The UFT now proposes mandating that all charter schools automatically be unionized — regardless of the views of the teachers at the school.
* Install admissions quotas: The UFT is calling for charter schools to serve “all children, especially special education children and English language learners.” Right now, charter schools admit students, regardless of special-education or English language learner status, on a first come, first served basis. If the school is oversubscribed, typical in New York City, students are admitted through an open, random lottery.
Thus, charter schools are open to “all students.”
Interestingly, according to the most recently published data, the UFT’s own charter school serves only 1 percent English language learners and 6 percent students with disabilities, compared to 13 percent for the community district in which the school is located.
If the UFT proposal to set special-education quotas were adopted, the UFT’s own school would be found in violation.
* Other anti-charter ideas: Buried in the UFT report were proposals to eliminate the State University as a chartering entity, apply “prevailing wage” law to charter-school facilities and ban charter schools from hiring professional management companies. The list of anti-charter measures goes on and on.
Paterson and the Legislature should see through this gamesmanship and not risk hundreds of millions of dollars by going along with these stealth measures. The governor must ensure that any bill lifting the cap doesn’t gut charter schools instead of expanding this important option to more children.
Thomas W. Carroll is president of the Foundation for Education Reform & Accountability.