Chalkbeat

Education news. In context.

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National

dacia toll

donor dilemma

National
June 6, 2019

Charter network says no to further donations from opioid-linked Sackler family

“Achievement First has decided not to seek further funding from the Sackler family or any of their affiliated foundations,” the network’s founder and CEO Dacia Toll said.

To and Through

National
April 4, 2019

Can scholarship dollars help solve the college ‘undermatching’ problem? This charter network wants to find out

The network’s Brooklyn board approved a plan to offer scholarships to students who opt to attend a more expensive school with a higher graduation rate.

money matters

National
March 18, 2019

Achievement First charter network, still receiving Sackler money, joins nonprofits weighing opioid-linked donations

Newly public documents detailing the Sacklers’ involvement have increased pressure on nonprofits that have benefitted from the family’s largesse.

achieving change

National
Updated March 1, 2019

‘Not a proud moment’: How turmoil at one school could shake up the Achievement First charter network

Turmoil at an Achievement First high school has escalated into a larger reckoning for the charter school network spanning three states.

exclusive

National
May 11, 2018

Two former staff members at Families for Excellent Schools planning a new pro-charter org

The group is being incubated at 50CAN, an education advocacy group with a presence in several states and where Andersen and Singh are currently employees.

exclusive

National
July 31, 2017

‘I think that’s blood money’: Arne Duncan pushed charters to reject funds from Trump admin if budget cuts approved

Former Secretary of Education Arne Duncan suggested that charter leaders refuse to accept federal charter school money if Trump’s cuts to education went through.

clashes in the space wars

New York
September 21, 2015

Charter leaders continue to battle de Blasio over space in public school buildings

At the heart of their criticism is the battle for limited space in city-owned buildings, which the de Blasio administration has been reluctant to offer to charters.
New York
April 30, 2012

Delayed charter sector self-assessment balances praise, critique

A chart comparing district and charter schools' principal turnover rates, from today's "State of the Sector" report. A sweeping look at who attends charter schools in New York City, and how they fare, shows that the sector excels at advancing academic achievement but struggles to enroll high-needs students and to retain staff. For the past nine months the New York City Charter School Center and a team of charter school founders have collected and crunched data on 35 different topics, including test scores, demographics, attrition, and enrollment. Their findings are laid out in a much-anticipated — and much-delayed — 40-page "State of the Sector" report, released today. The report represents an inaugural effort to be more transparent about how charter schools in New York City are doing. Coming from a group that more often celebrates charter schools' achievements, the report offers a blunt self-assessment of the sector, illuminating its shortcomings in student enrollment and staff retention while at the same making a case for it to continue to expand. For instance, the report acknowledges "striking" staff attrition trends — nearly one-third of city charter school teachers leave annually — but points out the sector's ability to achieve high academic results anyway. And while the schools serve low rates of students with special education and English language learners, the report emphasizes that those who do enroll tend to do better than their counterparts in district schools. The report was originally scheduled to be released nearly two months ago. But the center needed more time to verify the data, then held the report until it could be released along with "dashboards" showing individual schools' statistics, according to CEO James Merriman. Those dashboards were published on the center's website today, although they have withheld  some data, including staff attrition. 
New York
January 17, 2012

Sweating the big and small stuff at Achievement First's P.D. day

When principals and coaches at Achievement First charter schools conducted observations this fall, they found that many teachers fell short when using a classroom technique called "checks for understanding." The technique, in which teachers ask questions to determine in real time whether students are absorbing lessons, “was the most important thing for improving our students' achievement,” said Dacia Toll, Achievement First’s founder and co-CEO. Plus, she said, "We're not asking good questions in the first place." So as the charter network's annual professional development day approached, Toll took it upon herself to lead the checks for understanding session. That session, along with 48 other training workshops, took place Jan. 6 at a Marriott Hotel in Stamford, Conn. Throughout her 90-minute session, Toll drilled the standing-room-only audience of teachers on how to ask targeted questions to ensure students understand the key points of lessons, and how to apply them. The group went over the basic techniques to ask questions — flash cards, choral responses, hand signals, pepper questions, cold calls, class sweeps, and more — and then debated which ones were better in certain situations. For example, Toll said cold-calling students would not be effective if the goal is to grasp whether an entire class understood a lesson. In that case, she said, “You’re only getting data from one student." Teachers said the content of Toll's session wasn't earth-shattering – many reported learning some version of Checks for Understanding during their regular certification process — but provided an important refresher.
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