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Democratic Lawmakers Want To Hold Charter Schools To Public School Standards
By: Karen Kasler | Statehouse News Bureau
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Charter schools aren’t held to many of the same requirements that traditional public schools are. Two Democratic lawmakers want to change that with some new bills that they say will assure charter schools meet the same standards as public schools.
Representatives Teresa Fedor of Toledo and John Patterson of Jefferson in northeast Ohio are both former teachers. And Fedor says they’re very concerned about evaluations that are done on all public school teachers but not on their charter school counterparts.
"Only the charter school teachers with 'Race to the Top' funds are being evaluated," Fedor said. "Many of the public do not know that the rest of the charter school teachers in that system are not being evaluated."
The lawmakers also want a committee to study the effectiveness of charter schools and to look into the regulations surrounding them.
The chair of the House Education Committee, Republican Gerald Stebelton of Lancaster, has reportedly said he’s supportive of the concept of evaluations on all public school teachers – including those in charter schools, which are public schools.