| Charter school bill set for floor debate 04/04/2001 Associated Press AUSTIN – No new charter schools would be approved for two years under a House bill authored by Rep. Jim Dunnam and co-authored by 79 representatives.
The bill set to come up for debate Wednesday also would strengthen the accountability and oversight of charter schools.
"We have to protect the taxpayers' dollars. We have a system that has almost no oversight and we have to give the state time to get oversight on the system," said Dunnam, D-Waco.
"If we want the system to succeed, we have to give the education commissioner the authority to deal with schools that are operating outside the perimeters," he said.
Charter schools receive taxpayer money but operate independently from local school districts. Last year, the state spent $218 million on 193 charter schools.
The proposal would halt the issuance of new charters while the state studies the current schools and works to solve problems ranging from financial mismanagement to academic failure. It would prohibit the expansion of charter schools, set enrollment limits and gives the state education commissioner the authority to oversee the schools.
The bill paints a negative picture of all charter school operators, said Kyev Tatum, president of the Hill Country NAACP and co-founder of a charter school in San Marcos.
"The negative tone of this debate on charter schools is making it extremely difficult for me to open up my school," Tatum said.
Instead of a moratorium, the state should offer charter schools more resources such as proper facilities, he said.
"I believe that if a charter school is not doing the right things, shut it down. But do not let a few bad apples alter this concept of providing public education in an innovative, creative way," Tatum said.
Said Dunnam, "If you are for charter schools then you have to be for cleaning up the bad schools because the bad schools continue monthly to give the good schools a black eye."
Many parents and schools "are very supportive of the efforts of doing some meaningful measures with reforms and regulations that do not interfere with their overall functions," Dunnam said. "I think that's what the bill does."
Backed by then-Gov. George W. Bush, Texas began its charter school experiment in 1995.
There have been success stories, like Houston's KIPP Academy. The Knowledge Is Power Program serves mostly low-income minority students and was recognized during the Republican National Convention as an example of how charters can work well.
But there have been problems as well.
In the past two years, at least seven have closed because of problems ranging from declining attendance to financial mismanagement to embezzlement.
Only 59 percent of charter school students passed a state skills exam in the 1998-99 school year, compared with the state average of 78.4 percent. And this summer, the state education agency gave an "unacceptable" rating to nearly one-fourth of 103 charter schools it studied.
Dunnam's bill also would require teachers to have high school diplomas and charter schools to conduct the same criminal background checks required of traditional public schools.
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