Horace Mann Charter Schools

Why Charter School Advocates Prefer a Ballot Question to Using the Dozens of Charters Still Available in Massachusetts

As I have heard time and again and has continued to be confirmed by various sources as the charter school movement has grown,

charter schools were started with the intention of defanging unions.  Charter schools are able to avoid the requirement of hiring unionized teachers and other professionals because they are not public schools.  So, instead of the establishment of pilot schools or other specialty schools that may accomplish the same stated ends, charter schools are set up and save a pile of money because they do not have to pay their workforce a fair union wage.

To me, this is significant for two reasons.  First, charter schools are not union (with rare exceptions) and replace institutions that would have a union workforce.  So, the establishment and expansion of charter schools results in a reduction in union jobs.  Fewer workers have job security, fewer workers are guaranteed a fair wage, and fewer workers are empowered to negotiate over job conditions with their employers.  Second, the anti-union motivation for charter schools is significant because it means that the stated reasons for charter schools are not the whole story.  When charter school proponents talk about why charter schools are good and why they advocate for them, they do not say that it is because it is a good way to avoid having a union workforce.  Instead, they say that charter schools improve education, close the achievement gap, spur innovation, etc.  If they are hiding the ball on one of the main reasons for charter schools, then the charter school proponents are being disingenuous, and that must call into question the veracity of their stated bases for supporting charter schools.

As I delved into the potential anti-union agenda behind charter schools generally and Question 2 specifically, I discovered something interesting.  Massachusetts has two types of charter schools—commonwealth charter schools and Horace Mann charter schools.  The two different types of charter schools were first established by statute enacted in 2000.  A commonwealth charter school is what people traditionally think of when they think of charter schools—it operates independently of a local school committee and is managed by a board of trustees.  A Horace Mann charter school, by contrast, operates under a charter “approved by the school committee and the local collective bargaining unit,” i.e., the teachers’ union.  Mass. Gen. L. c. 71, sec. 89(c).  (There is also another type of Horace Mann charter school which requires approval from the local school committee but not the union, called a Horace Mann III charter school.)

Significantly, Horace Mann charter schools may not suffer from two of the grave failings of traditional charter schools—not being beholden to local communities’ school committees, the officials who have been elected by the citizens to manage the public schools, and operating completely outside of union protections.  To be sure, Horace Mann charter schools are not likely to have the same union protections as public schools, but unions at least have a seat at the table.

No one talks about this when advocating for Question 2, but there are still plenty of Horace Mann charters available.  According to the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, here are the statistics:

Type	Charters Allowed	Charters Used	Charters Unused	% of Unused Charters
Commonwealth	72	56	16	22%
Horace Mann	48	10	38	79%

Also not spoken of is the fact that Question 2 seeks to expand only charters for commonwealth charter schools.  You would not know this by looking at the ballot question itself, which says that the proposed law would allow the state “to approve up to 12 new charter schools or enrollment expansions in existing charter schools each year.”  Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth website, http://www.sec.state.ma.us/ele/ele16/ballot_questions_16/ballot_questions16.htm.  In fact, the summary of the ballot question includes blatant misinformation, stating that “[n]ew charter schools and enrollment expansions approved under this proposed law would be subject to the same approval standards as other charter schools. . .”  Id.  But that is not true or at least does not tell the whole story.  The new charter schools under Question 2 would be subject to the same standards as commonwealth charter schools but would not be subject to the standards for Horace Mann charter schools (school committee and union approval).  

The only way to determine that Question 2 provides for expansion only of the number of commonwealth charter schools is by tracking down the text of the bill that would be adopted if Question 2 succeeds, which permits approval of “up to 12 additional commonwealth charters. . . per year.”  See http://www.mass.gov/ago/docs/government/2015-petitions/15-31.pdf (emphasis added).

The omission of any discussion whatsoever about this distinction between commonwealth and Horace Mann charter schools speaks volumes.  If proponents of Question 2 simply believed that charter schools were a better way to ensure quality education for the children of Massachusetts, they could effectuate that goal by working to establish more Horace Mann charter schools.  The fact that charter school proponents would rather leave 38 Horace Mann charters unfilled and instead undertake the extreme measure of pushing for a ballot question shows the true motivation underlying these schools.  And that motivation has nothing at all to do with ensuring the best education for children in Massachusetts and has everything to do with drawing money and resources away from the public schools and their unionized educators.