The AFT Charter School Study: Not News. Point of View Essay

The recent flap over the American Federation of Teachers' (AFT) charter school report is surprising, not because the study used the wrong methods or reached the wrong conclusions, it didn't, but because AFT's conclusions are nothing new. The AFT study "is" the first to use the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) as its database but state-level reports from around the country have documented charters' problems for years. The author discusses the problems of charter schools by reviewing the summary statements from evaluations in three of the most active charter states, Ohio, Michigan and California.