selling charters as we war against the cronies

A helpful piece on tweaking public perceptions here...

 

Charters should be a no-brainer. (Vouchers are tougher, since there's a lot of bigotry toward religious education-- and people lack the policy imagination to envision the many secular schools that would pop up.) But even good obvious reforms get dicey when you're going up against powerful interest groups.

-more options for parents, students, and teachers

-more competition; less monopoly power

-lower costs for taxpayers

-from the literature (the handful of "gold standard" papers), modest (not large!) improvements in performance, particularly in the inner city (where one would expect the increased competition to make a bigger difference)