Agora Cyber Charter School Case Study

Aurum Preparatory Academy Charter School will serve a student body that reflects the demographics of the community that surrounds it, and is designed to provide a high quality option to our highest need children. Currently, in the target community within District 7, student academic performance does not substantially increase as students progress from elementary to middle school, there is not a district school in the target community that is above the 50th statewide percentile ranking, and there is underperformance and underrepresentation for specific subsets of minority students in charter schools. Our target community is centered around the intersection of 96th Avenue and Bancroft Avenue in deep East Oakland, reaching five primary neighborhoods

Surprisingly, there was more representation of African and Latino Americans in children’s programs than adolescent programs. This is a bittersweet result because although it is great that minority children are exposed to more figures that relate to their racial identity, it is still extremely disproportionate to the Caucasian majority. Another alarming concern is the decreasing number of representation as these children grow into their adolescence and the effect that it could have on their idea of self. It’s a forked path that either leads to learning about inequality and motivating to change it or it discourages them and creates the ideas that they are less than the majority, which in this case is the Caucasian

Equal access to quality education is a human right every individual deserves to acquire. However, disadvantaged communities are at risk when it comes to receiving quality education hence creating the achievement gap between colored students and white students. The article “In Their Own Words: Perceived Barriers To Achievement By African American and Latino High School Students” by Desireé Vega, James L. Moore III, and Antoinette H. Miranda and “Black Children Still Left Behind” by Ed Finkel both address the many factors that contribute to the achievement gap.

“The school districts with the highest minority enrollments receive an average of $877 less per student than school districts with the lowest number of minorities enrolled.” In turn, these children are able to go further with more resources readily available to them. However, children in less affluent school districts face serious educational shortcomings due to little investment in the beggared communities surrounding the school. It is more accurate to say that America has two systems of public education. The first system, based principally, but not entirely in the suburbs of America and in wealthier urban districts, is in many respects mediocre, specifically in comparison to international peers in advanced industrial nations. However, the second system, based principally in poorer urban and rural areas, is an absolute failure; in which an exceeding number of students dropout well before high school graduation. An astounding number of students receive high school diplomas that do not certify academic confidence in basic subjects. An outstanding number of students are unprepared for the world of employment. An incredible number of students are unprepared to matriculate to institutions of higher education or advanced training.

I teach first grade at Lowe Elementary School; my class is made up of twenty-four very diverse seven year-olds; they come from all over the city of Louisville, from a variety of socio-economic situations. Each student brings a unique personality to our classroom community, and they all work hard to become “smarter and smarter” and to “go to college”. Thirteen students are boys and eleven are girls. Of these twenty-four students, three of them are English Language Learners. Additionally, eight students receive tier two interventions and two receive tier three interventions in reading. In math, five students are tier two and four are tier three. I also teach one student who receives ECE services for a developmental delay. Within my class there is a wide achievement gap.

A majority of the students in Middle Tennessee Public Schools come from a low- income family household. The school in which I work, Clearview Middle School is not only low- income, but is also a “priority” school. Priority schools are in the bottom five percent in being in the category of lowest- performing in the school district. The population of students at Clearview Middle School are majority African- American, but the cultures among the school are rich and diverse. Many students at Clearview Middle School have high potential of achieving great academic success, but fall short due consistent classroom disruptions throughout the day.

Over the last decade, public schools have shifted their attention to the commitment of ensuring there is equal access to dedicated education programs for African Americans and other minorities, as well as to students with disabilities or limited English proficiency (Resnick, 2006) in combination with the standard rubric; public schools are adapting to the changing landscape of society, and broadening the scope of specialized curriculum to service more diverse students both culturally and ethnically in accelerating their academic ability. Children of both high and

Public education has had a negative effect on students; it’s often because of the bigger class sizes, poor test scores, and high crime in the surrounding areas. Public schools need to revise their system to determine what’s the best fit for their student’s educational needs. All children who live in a school district have a right to attend a district school. Many parents would like more options and opportunities for their child, and would like to be involved in their child’s education. Charter schools are part of the answer for a better educational choice for children’s academic achievement. Charter schools have many successful methods and continue to pave the way for children’s education needs .

Children are being denied equal educational opportunities. Yet, the issue of disparities only comes into question during budget sessions or for politician representative in congress, which is demanding or addressing these disparities. It is time that community’s leaders, parents, teachers and business, let their voices heard to their state representatives to improve funding disparities in urban school. Children are the future, regardless of their race, gender or social economic status. One person can make a difference, but when three or more come together, they can move

Despite the charter school model created by education reformers, the verdict is still out on their effectiveness. Recent studies demonstrate that overall performance has failed to accomplish their intended results. Individual states determine the laws each charter organization shall follow, which might account for the differences in performance across states. Although slight differences exist in the way charter schools operate among states, their effectiveness in improving student academic performance has proven to be less than what education reformers lauded as the answer to the ills of the American educational system.

“The socioeconomic achievement gap in education refers to the inequality in academic achievement between groups of students. The achievement gap shows up in grades, standardized test scores, course selection, dropout rates, and college-completion rates, among other success measures” (Ansell, 2017). Typically, when discussing the achievement gap, educators are comparing the academic progress of African-American students or Hispanic students to the progress of white students. More-often-than-not the white students will have more educational achievements than their non-white colleagues (Ansell, 2017). The most widely accepted theory as to why students with higher socioeconomic status (SES) do better academically is high parental involvement, access to economic resources and access to highly qualified teachers (Huang, 2015. Pg.6). Students of low socioeconomic status often live in poverty. This means that the student may not have sufficient school supplies or even someone at home to help him with his homework. There are numerous children in the United States’ school systems that are failing due to the achievement gap. These students are at a disadvantage because the school systems and teachers do not notice or even care about their home life and how it comes into play in their education. It is important for our nation to not only understand the achievement gap but take steps toward correcting it.

Ever since the establishment of equal education in the United States, there has been a disparity in academic success between children of different races. The education of African American children has become a prime example of this. As discussed in the historical text, A Letter to My Nephew, which was written during the time of the civil rights movement in the 1950’s and 1960’s, African Americans were not given equal opportunities to succeed educationally and could do little to change their futures for the better. They had to work much harder than whites to receive even a portion of the recognition and success that whites achieved (Baldwin 1). Although many today believe America has overcome this problem, it still remains a pressing issue in many aspects of society, arguably the most important being education. The racial achievement gap, an important term to familiarize with when discussing this topic, refers to the disparity in educational performance between students of different races (National Education Association 1). As of now, although the education achievement gap has been narrowing, there still remains a large disparity between African Americans and their racial counterparts. According to a study by Roland G. Freyer and Steven D. Levitt, professors at Harvard University and W.E.B Du Bois Institute, respectively, African American students enter kindergarten already significantly behind children of other races, and their test scores continue to drop

Some parents claim there’s nothing better than them. Others argue that they place profit above education. Whatever the opinion, one thing is certain; charter schools are becoming the most controversial public education issue in the United States. Charter schools have combined features of both public and private schools. The reason these schools are better for students, parents and the community are vast. Since they are exempt from the rules and policies imposed on public schools, they have some notable advantages. First, the teachers have more freedom to prepare lessons, and schools themselves can emphasize certain courses according to the necessity of the students. Second, they can offer limited enrollment to keep class sizes small, which

Charter schools enroll larger proportions of minority and low‐income students and smaller proportions of White students than traditional district public schools statewide: African American students make up 33% of the students in Texas’ open‐enrollment charter schools compared to 14% in Texas public schools, overall. Hispanic students make up 48% of the students enrolled in open‐enrollment charter schools, compared to the state average of 46%. Open‐enrollment charter schools have a higher percentage of economically disadvantaged students (70%) than the state average (56%), a lower percentage of students classified as limited‐English proficient (14%) than the state average (16%), and a lower percentage of students served in special education (10%) than the state average (11%).

After reading chapter eight of Spring, I believe that charter schools play a large role in our public education system, as well as the other multiple education systems talked about in the reading such as home-schooling, or private schools. Charter schools are in fact public schools, but they might not serve the same specific set of educational objectives that a public school would have. Another aspect of charter schools is that they have to take any state-required tests. A trend also found in charter schools is to serve primarily minority schools and low-income students. The percentage of student’s eligible for free or reduced-price lunch program greatly increased from 2001 to 2012. Charter schools play a large role in the public education