Corrected: A previous version of this story had an incorrect name for the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools.
The topic of education has been largely absent from the presidential race, and debate over charter schools—once a marquee issue in the national discourse about education—especially so.
But the upcoming elections still stand to impact the publicly funded, privately run schools that have found favor with previous administrations from both parties.
From big constitutional questions around the push for religious charter schools to more practical, local concerns such as procuring facilities and hiring teachers, the charter school sector faces a number of challenges that could be affected by the 2024 elections.
It may seem like charter schools have largely receded from the national political spotlight, eclipsed by the expansion of state policies to give families public money through education savings accounts, or ESAs, to send their kids to private schools or home school. But that’s not the case in many states and cities, said Todd Ziebarth, the senior vice president for state advocacy and support for the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools.
“Sometimes if you go by the various headlines, you would think that the charter school movement is done for, and there’s that narrative out there,” said Ziebarth. “But if you look at the reality in terms of parent demand and state action to make improvements, things are alive and well and moving forward, even in light of ESAs.”
The number of students attending charter schools nationwide more than doubled between 2010 and 2021, to 3.7 million from 1.8 million, and the number of charter schools rose by almost 50 percent, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. During the same period, the number of traditional public schools nationally fell. Charter schools also kept up their enrollment growth during the pandemic, even as it’s declined at traditional public schools.
That doesn’t mean there aren’t road bumps for the charter sector, Ziebarth said. Finding facilities to house charter schools, for example, continues to be a challenge, as many state laws don’t guarantee facility funding in their charter laws.
And strong political pushback to charters persists, Ziebarth said. In blue states, like California, where private school choice policies are unlikely to gain much if any momentum, opposition to charter schools remains strong. November elections could also shift the balance against charter schools in a few key states, Ziebarth said, in particular gubernatorial and legislative elections in Arizona, New Hampshire, and Pennsylvania.
At the same time, some charter school proponents say that universal private school choice programs have distracted school choice opponents, providing charter school advocates with cover to promote their preferred policies in relative peace.
This year’s Republican Party platform doesn’t even mention charter schools, while it does call for universal private school choice in every state. Ballot initiatives in a handful of states, such as Colorado and Kentucky, would amend state constitutions to remove barriers to private school choice programs—and also, in Kentucky’s case, charter schools.
Both the Republican Party platform and Project 2025, a sweeping conservative policy agenda crafted by the Heritage Foundation and several members of former President Donald Trump’s previous administration, propose eliminating the Education Department, which could affect important funding streams for charters, such as Title I and the Charter Schools Program. Project 2025 also calls specifically for eliminating Title I funding for schools serving high concentrations of low-income students.
“Federal funding is not the lion’s share of school funding, but it’s important, and it would have dire consequences,” said Robert Kim, executive director of the Education Law Center, a nonprofit legal advocacy organization. “I think that should be a cause for concern for all public schools, including charter schools.”
How ‘religious’ charters could change the educational landscape
While charters may have faded somewhat from the political discourse, that doesn’t mean they don’t have the potential to shake up public education, said Preston Green, a professor of educational leadership and law at the University of Connecticut.
One issue where charter schools have been making a significant number of national headlines is with the attempt by the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and the Diocese of Tulsa to open a virtual, statewide Catholic charter school. The state’s supreme court ruled that unconstitutional, but experts anticipate the case will eventually end up before the U.S. Supreme Court. (The state board that oversees charter schools in Oklahoma on Oct. 7 asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review the state supreme court’s decision.)
While the question of religious charter schools will not be an issue decided by the 2024 elections, said Green, it’s on policymakers’ radars.
“It’s certainly something that states are paying attention to, or should be,” he said.
The Democratic Party platform does address charter schools and calls for them to meet the same “transparency standards as public schools.” It also says that “public tax dollars should never be used to discriminate"—likely a reference to private school choice programs directing money to religious schools that don’t follow anti-discrimination laws.
That position is difficult to square with the concept of religious charter schools, said Green.
If a religious charter school is allowed, “that opens up the possibility of this same question occurring in blue states, that may not have voucher laws, but may have charter schools that are seen in the eyes of the Supreme Court as run by private boards, they could teach religious things,” he said, depending upon the details of any potential ruling. “I’m just saying though the national narrative has moved on, don’t sleep on the charter school question.”
How the election could affect federal funding for charters
While for the most part, the electoral contests that will matter most to charter schools are happening at the state level, there is one way charter schools may be impacted by the presidential election: the Charter Schools Program.
The federal program provides grants to states and nonprofit charter school management groups to open new charter schools. It also provides schools with facility financing help. The Biden administration placed additional requirements on the program by, for example, requiring applicants to conduct a “needs analysis” to prove a need for their new charter school. These new rules were not popular with many charter school advocates, including the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, and Project 2025 calls for rolling back those regulations.
Shavar Jeffries, the CEO of the KIPP Foundation, said the Charter School Program has been important for the expansion of KIPP Public Schools, one of the largest charter school networks in the country, and others like it. It should receive more funding, he said.
“Here at KIPP—but charter schools more broadly—clear, third-party, independent studies speak to the impact of our work in closing and even reversing opportunity and achievement gaps,” Jeffries said. “So, the CSP program should be increased significantly given the results we have seen and sadly now has been held flat. We have to fight every year to preserve the dollars that already have been made available.”
Funding for the program has remained at $440 million a year since 2019.
But ask Jeffries what the biggest challenges facing charter schools are, and several items are going to resonate with traditional district and school leaders: the ESSER funding cliff, learning loss, absenteeism, recruiting teachers, and access to rigorous college-preparation coursework such as Advanced Placement.
The big story this election—and the big missed opportunity—is how little education issues have been discussed this election, given the challenges U.S. schools are still facing from the pandemic, he said.
“We’re still in the midst of a historic shock to the system as it relates to educational opportunity for 50 million American public school children, and the fact that isn’t a primary part of the presidential campaign and the campaigns for Congress is absurd, frankly,” he said.
