Voters weigh charter school initiatives Independent public
schools on ballots in Georgia, Washington On Tuesday, voters in
two states -- Washington and Georgia -- will be weighing in on
charter schools. Charter schools are independent public schools
that have flexibility in certain aspects of education like
curriculum and length of the school day. In return for this
flexibility, they are held accountable for student performance.
The research is mixed on whether students in charters perform
better than their traditional public school counterparts. Some
cite the CREDO study from Stanford University, which found that
"17 percent of charter schools provide superior education
opportunities for their students." According to this study,
about half the charters did not fare any better or worse than
their traditional school counterparts, and about 37 percent of
the charters fared worse. Others cite research like that found
in the "Informing the Debate" study from the Boston Foundation,
which "found large positive effe