CHARTER SCHOOLS GAIN IN TESTING 57 PERCENT MEET FEDERAL TARGETS.

Byline: Naush Boghossian Staff Writer

Led by 63 Los Angeles Unified charter schools, charters statewide made stronger gains this year on standardized tests than traditional schools, even though they still lagged in overall scores, according to a study released Wednesday by the California Charter Schools Association.

A higher percentage of LAUSD charter schools also met their federal performance targets under the federal No Child Left Behind law than traditional schools - 57 percent of charters versus 39 percent of noncharters - according to the study commissioned by the charter group.

``This is a really big deal. It means that charter schools are working,'' said Caprice Young, CEO and president of the California Charter Schools Association. ``If the school district were to not just support more charter schools but also allow the noncharter schools to have both the flexibility and accountability charter schools have, students would do better.''

Young said the results, based on Academic Performance Index scores and growth gains from 2004 to 2005, are one more reason the LAUSD should include the innovative campuses in its strategy to reform the massive district, which educates some 720,000 students.

LAUSD officials questioned the results, saying their own calculations show that when they compared traditional schools and district-affiliated charters with charter schools, more district schools - 37 percent - met No Child Left Behind benchmarks. Thirty-three percent of independent charters met the goals.

Last year, the LAUSD's research branch studied promising practices at charter schools, but the report was inconclusive. A study this year will focus on answering the question of whether some of these practices actually increase student performance.

``The district is interested in the whole range of reform possibilities and has taken a position that it's more than happy to learn from charter schools to the extent there is something to learn,'' said Gregory McNair, chief administrative officer of the charter schools division at the LAUSD.

``Our research branch has indicated they have not done enough work to establish their practices are actually effective in making kids learn better.''

The debate over whether charters or traditional schools are more effective has gone on since the alternative campuses began growing in the 1990s. The schools receive state funding, but have more autonomy than traditional schools.

Charter advocates and opponents have cited academic studies supporting both views. Now, after a few years of state benchmark tests taken by both charter and noncharter schools, they are getting more of a critical mass of tests to compare.

The positive numbers reflect the persistence of charter schools and their tougher accountability system, which often results in closing down nonperforming charters, said Priscilla Wohlstetter, professor and co-director of the center on educational governance at the University of Southern California.

But now that hard numbers show that charter schools are making a difference, it's time to analyze what's working at these schools and replicate it at traditional schools, she said.

``I would argue we need to ... begin to see what are the promising practices in charter schools that can be replicated and disseminated to improve the whole public school system,'' Wohlstetter said.

According to the study, the LAUSD's charter schools were outperforming all district noncharter public schools by an average of 39 points on the 200-to-1,000-point API, the state's benchmark that helps determine No Child Left Behind compliance.

Also, one in four California charter schools showed significantly high growth rates - 50 points or more - on the state's accountability system, compared with one in 10 noncharter public schools.

With thousands of students on waiting lists, Young said her organization's focus now is to create more of the innovative schools to meet the growing demand. There are 85 charter schools in the LAUSD and the number is expected to grow by about 20 percent each year.

Young believes the key to charter schools' success is that they're tailoring their curriculum to student needs, teachers work harder and more closely with parents, and the schools have a more rigorous curriculum.

At the Magnolia Science Academy in Reseda, the nearly 400-student campus improved its API score from 636 in 2003 to 749 in 2005, a much faster pace than the district average over the same time.

Principal Engin Eryilmaz attributes the progress to parental involvement, classrooms of no more than 26 students, giving teachers more flexibility to teach, heavily incorporating computers in the core classes and making education more individualized for each student.

``We are not a school system with the ultimate solution. We run into problems, but once you don't have bureaucracy and once you can communicate with the stakeholders of a child's education very easily - and you can do this if you are a small school - you identify problems as soon as they appear and you solve them right away,'' Eryilmaz said.

Naush Boghossian, [phone]

naush.boghossian(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

2 photos, box

Photo:

(1 -- color) Seventh-grader Michelle Bustamante works in one of the computer labs at Magnolia Science Academy, a Reseda charter school.

Evan Yee/Staff Photographer

(2 -- color) no caption (students)

Box:

CHARTERS VS. TRADITIONAL SCHOOLS

SOURCE: California Charter School Association

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