Hawaii’s charter school law leaped to 14th place in a national ranking, up from 35th the previous year, as reform efforts took hold in the state.
"Hawaii overhauled its law in several areas, resulting in a large jump in the rankings," said Todd Ziebarth, vice president of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, which issued the report this week analyzing the strength of charter school legislation.
The report, "Measuring Up to the Model," ranks the 43 states that have charter schools. To score well, states should meet a range of criteria, including allowing a variety of charter schools, monitoring their performance and offering equitable access to funding.
The law governing Hawaii’s charter schools was completely rewritten last year to address concerns about quality and accountability at these largely autonomous public schools, which report to their own governing boards rather than the state Board of Education.
Senate Education Chairwoman Jill Tokuda welcomed Hawaii’s improved ranking.
"This is very positive news," said Tokuda, who co-chaired a task force that developed the legislation. "The law that we introduced last year was the work of both local and national leaders coming together to look at what was best both in Hawaii and across the country. That is the reason why Hawaii did move up the ladder so quickly."
The report ranked Minnesota’s law as No. 1 in the country, while Mississippi stayed at the bottom.
More changes to fine-tune Hawaii’s charter law are anticipated this session. The Senate Education and Judiciary committees will hold a joint hearing today at 1:15 p.m. on Senate Bill 244 in Conference Room 414.
Among its provisions:
» Prohibiting charter schools from discriminating against students based on criteria such as ethnicity, English proficiency and academic ability.
» Calling for criminal background checks for people working with children.
» Requiring Charter School Commission members to disclose whether they are employees, representatives or contractors of charter schools and abstain from votes in which they have a conflict.
Tokuda said neighbor islanders may testify at the hearing via videoconference, since many of Hawaii’s 32 charter schools are on the neighbor islands.
"As long as you have a webcam, you can participate," Tokuda said. "We want to make sure that people are not limited by geography if they want to participate in the process."
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ON THE NET
» The ranking report is available at www.publiccharters.org.
