Ken
O’Brien
May 4th through the 10th is National Teacher
Appreciation Week. It is also National Charter School Week.
In what may be regarded as a poke in the eye to that
latter occasion, a new study has been issued that focuses on what it maintains
is a culture of criminal behavior that infects charter schools around the
country. Titled “Charter School Vulnerabilities to Waste, Fraud and
Abuse,” the report focused on 15 states representing large charter markets, out
of the 42 states that have charter schools.
The report, co-authored by the Center for Popular
Democracy and Integrity in Education, makes the point that the problem of
charter school waste, fraud and abuse, which it focuses on, is just one symptom
of the underlying problem: inadequate regulation of charter schools.
