Isle charter schools do well but resources still lacking

The good news is Hawaii’s public charter schools, which teach only 6 percent of the number of enrolled students in a public education setting, are showing excellent signs of progress in Strive HI performance assessments beyond their small numbers.

The bad news is that Hawaii’s charter schools trail far behind on public resources to support student success, shortening its trajectory to reach longer-term goals.

Several charters scored high in the top tier of all public schools with achieve- ments in 11th grade American College Testing (ACT) scores, graduation rates and college matriculation.

University Laboratory School scored the highest in all these categories.

Kihei Charter School ranked second in the state in 11th Grade ACT scores.

West Hawaii Explorations Academy also took second place for four-year-graduation rates.

Lanikai Elementary and Malama Honua ranked among the highest-achieving schools in math and English language arts.

Several Hawaiian culture-based and language immersion schools also gained significantly in math and English language arts growth.

Public charter schools are reducing chronic absenteeism among high schoolers. Hawaii charters account for 8 of 19 top-performing schools in this indicator.

Halau Ku Mana, West Hawaii Explorations Academy, University Lab School, Myron B. Thomp-son Academy and Hawaii Academy of Arts and Sciences respectively occupy the top five slots.

What is unique about Hawaii’s top-performing charters is that many of them run kindergarten through 12th-grade classes. Some even run public pre-kindergarten programs because they know that high-level student achievement takes many years of investment.

Each of Hawaii’s 34 charter schools offers small settings. Although they have more autonomy to select their curriculum and channel resources to be innovators in education, charter schools are subject to the same federal and state standards as any traditional public school. They are also held accountable for academic, financial and organizational performance expectations set forth in their performance contracts. This sets a higher bar because an underperforming school may see its contract revoked by the Charter School Commission.

In spite of these significant gains, Hawaii’s charter schools struggle with a dismal $6,846 per student allocation for the current school year, giving us the lowest rate in the nation in a state with the highest cost to do business.

Funding for charter schools has not been restored to pre-recession levels, where allocations were $9,063 per student.

This funding must now stretch further to pay for salaries, required collective bargaining increases and teacher incentive pay, facilities costs, curriculum, equipment and supplies, utilities, services and a mountain of other costs required to run a school.

Unlike traditional public schools that are able to access other state funding sources for capital and equipment costs, charter schools have yet to see any sustainable funding for facility needs.

In the 17 years Hawaii has authorized public charter schools yet funded them with a smaller fraction of the same dollar that goes toward a traditional public school, many charter school leaders are achieving their vision through sheer grit.

There are many fractures as a majority of charter schools up for reauthorization next year are struggling to meet the state threshold for financial, academic and operational performance standards.

If we want to continue sowing innovation and success in education, the state Board of Education has an obligation to ensure that all schools are provided adequate resources.

With school-age children representing nearly 20 percent of our population and 100 percent of our future, policy makers and education leaders must do a better job investing and changing educational paradigm for the future success of Hawaii’s kids.

Jeannine Souki is executive director of the Hawaii Public Charter Schools Network.