By Blake Farmer
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wkno/local-wkno-891594.mp3
Nashville, TN – Charter schools are often called "labs of innovation," even by the country's top education official, Arne Duncan. "Charters are supposed to be laboratories of innovation that we can all learn from."
It's not just Duncan. Tennessee's education leaders and even the governor have said the state could learn a thing or two from the more flexible charter schools and harvest best practices. As part of WPLN's series on charter schools, Blake Farmer tests the sales pitch.
When asked to back up the "labs of innovation" claim, one expert points to data driven instruction. It's basically the use of information collected through testing to tailor lessons. The concept gained popularity in charter schools and is now widely used in traditional public schools.
"Which one of these does not belong?" Barbara Nishimoto said.
"I don't get it," Yasmine Murphy said.
"Oh, come on," Nishimoto says.
Barbara Nishimoto is the queen of data driven teaching at Nashville's Head Middle School. This is not a charter. In a windowless computer lab, she guides Yasmine Murphy and 20 other 5th graders through timed math exercises.
"Then it tells you if it's incorrect. This one I got wrong last time," Murphy said.
This class has struggled to understand some mathematic concepts. Nishimoto pulls out a binder with bar graph results from recent testing.
"This area in particular, algebra, was weak," Nishimoto said.
Nishimoto is re-teaching basic algebra to see if it sticks a second time.
Charter schools had to collect this kind of data when they got started in the 90s. That's because the independent schools had to prove they were effective in order to remain open. Alan Coverstone gives the movement some credit for popularizing data driven instruction, but not nearly all the credit.
"I would never point a straight line to the charters did it, the other schools copied it because I think there are innovative and creative individuals, leaders and teams of teachers in every school environment that are doing these things" Coverstone said.
Coverstone oversees charters for Metro Schools. He says supporters and opponents alike use the "labs of innovation" line. Backers say charters can help schools everywhere. Skeptics push for concrete examples of something that's been effective, then copied and pasted elsewhere.
COVERSTONE: "Neither side is correct. Both sides are kind of exaggerating that for their own benefits," Coverstone said.
There's no direct route for harvesting innovations. Coverstone says it's hard to know which ones are worth copying anyway. Maybe it's the longer school day. Maybe it's small group learning, a priority at Nashville's Smithson Craighead Academy.
"Can you all tell us what you're doing?" Principal Janelle Glover said.
"We're sorting," the student answered.
"You're sorting by what, though? Animals, by classification," Glover asked.
First graders are working in stations grouping similar items while others practice basic geometry. Principal Janelle Glover says Smithson-Craighead has volunteers in the classroom every day, making small group learning possible.
"And they also have a full time, eight hour assistant everyday in every classroom," Glover explained. The extra manpower makes the small group concept difficult to export. But even if a traditional school had the money to hire assistants for every teacher, Alan Coverstone says there's no certainty it would be effective.
"When you find one thing that seems to be the magic sauce, you really can't just automatically spread it around on everything else and expect to get the same results," Cornerstone said.
Every school has a unique culture, he says. They're in diverse neighborhoods with different students and a set of teachers and administrators all their own. And yet, the state of Tennessee is looking to find that special sauce and spread it around.
When the legislature expanded the state's charter school law last year, Senator Jamie Woodson explained to her colleagues.
"This would establish a process for the Department of Education to make sure that the best practices in the laboratories of our charter schools go into our traditional school systems" Woodson said.
"That has not been the focus as it should have been. We have not gone down that path," Education Commissioner Tim Webb said.
Education Commissioner Tim Webb says there's been no headway in collecting ideas from the state's 22 charter schools. But he says it will happen, especially as more open.
"We have sort of, if you will, the ability to compare and contrast what's happening to the students in the charter schools as opposed to those who are not so we can actually begin to look at that data," Webb explains.
That data may not show charters - on the whole - performing any better than traditional schools, says professor Joseph Murphy at Vanderbilt's Peabody College. He's the author of Understanding and Assessing the Charter School Movement. Murphy says there's a misconception that charters perform at a higher level and are more pioneering.
"If it's going on in a charter school and people like it, then it's an innovation. Right? New math program. Well, every school in America has a new math program. It may not be exactly the same one, and they don't call those innovation," Murphy said.
What charters do offer is choice, Murphy says. Want to get back to the basics? There's likely a charter for that. Want a school that's close to your neighborhood? There could be a charter for that.
"I like charter schools. I think they do some great things. I don't think they've ever lived up to the claim of the funders that they would be laboratories of innovation," Murphy said.
As much as that sales pitch is thrown around, Murphy says it falls flat. At least for now, charters don't appear to be having the "lighthouse effect" many had hoped would guide public education into the future.