To: Therese Murray (Senate President), Bruce Tarr (Minority Leader), Stephen Brewer (Senate Ways and Means Chair), Sonia Chang Diaz (Joint Committee on Education Chair), Alice Peisch (Joint Committee on Education Chair), and The Massachusett...

Maintain the Charter Cap and Support District Public Schools

I urge you to vote no on Massachusetts Senate Bill 2262, which would lift the cap on the number of charter schools in our state. Please vote against lifting the cap, and for protecting our district schools and our most vulnerable children.

A further expansion of charter schools, just four years after the last charter cap lift, will be devastating to district public schools, and to equitable opportunities for quality education for all children. Before you vote, consider these facts:

1. Charter schools take a disproportionate amount of state funding. A cap lift would have a dire impact on the financial stability of traditional public schools, and on children and families in urban districts. These financial consequences must be remedied before any expansion of charters.

2. Charters do not provide equitable services to students with disabilities or English Language Learners. Charters have not successfully educated all kinds of students, nor has the state held them accountable for inequities in student population and services. Although the new bill includes some minor accountability measures, these measures do not apply to currently operating charters, nor do they go far enough to ensure equity.

3. Charter schools do not outperform sending districts. Most have high attrition and out-of-school suspension rates, and teaching staffs that are both less experienced and less diverse than traditional public schools.

4. Charter schools operate largely without stakeholder accountability or consent. They are not accountable to municipal school boards, and most of their governing boards lack community, parent and educator voices.

Please support equity and sustainability in our public schools. Vote no on lifting the charter cap.

Why is this important?

QUEST (Quality Education for Every Student) is a group of parents who have come together to fight for quality, equity and transparency in the Boston Public Schools. We can be found at facebook.com/questbps and can be reached at [email protected].