Don’t forget how Charter Schools hurt local economies as well!

The biggest way they hurt local economies is by providing too many children a substandard education (and yes I know there are a few great charter schools but the list of bad actors and failed schools in Florida alone is legion).  If, with all their advantages they have, the ability to counsel out under performers and discipline problems, fewer numbers of ESOL, ESE and free and reduced lunch kids, and the ability to put requirements on patents, a charter school isn’t doing better than its public school neighbor then it is a failure.

One of the tricks charter schools are doing is having a parent company buy a property and then renting it back to a charter school often at a significant mark up. That money is sucked out of the local economy if that charter school’s management company is located elsewhere.  

The same thing happens to the management fees that many charter schools pay. That is even more taken out of local economies.

Many are staffed by Teach for America recruits who both do not put down roots and who do not advance much salary wise, furthermore this prevents qualified locals from getting jobs too.

Then since public school teachers typically get paid more than charter schools teachers (see rents and management fees as a reason) then this means money that would have been put in local economies were charter school teachers employed by public schools, isn’t.

Florida routinely sends tens of millions of dollars to charter schools that they turn around and send out of state. Money that if spend on public schools would provide better education outcomes and give a boost to the economy too.

Charter schools as Florida does them are bad business all around.