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In a Huffington Post op-ed, Tom Vander Ark suggests that states update their charter school laws to provide different pathways to authorization, as appropriate to conversion charters, turnarounds, innovative programs and existing operators with high-performing schools.

In other headlines...
‘Race to the Top Limps to the Finish Line’
‘Charter Schools Being Urged to Serve ELLs’
In Ohio, ‘Send School Aid Directly To Charters, Panel Says’
In Ohio, ‘High-Performing Charters Dominate Some Markets’

In a Huffington Post op-ed, Tom Vander Ark suggests that states update their charter school laws to provide different pathways to authorization, as appropriate to conversion charters, turnarounds, innovative programs and existing operators with high-performing schools.

In other headlines...
‘New Orleans Charter Schools and The Inaccuracy Of Language’
‘Freedom Gives L.A.'S Charter Schools Room to Be Great, Room To Be Corrupt’
‘Newark Public Schools Need Revolutionary Reform’

According to the Washington Times, the current generation of charter schools specialized in fields ranging from aviation to civic responsibility. "The movement is beginning to expand and grow as parents figure out that public charters are doing a great deal in closing the achievement gap and offering options that [traditional] public schools don't," said Peter Groff, executive director of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools.

In other headlines...
Duncan Cites New York’s ‘Breathtaking Courage’ in ‘Race to the Top’
‘Parents Push For Diversity in New Orleans' Schools’
After ‘Race’ Loss, Alabama Rep. Begins Stumping For Charter Schools
Cleveland Charter School Gets $1 Million Gift

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, Leslie Jacobs, former member of the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education and founder of Educate Now!, writes that student achievement has risen dramatically in post-Katrina New Orleans.

In other headlines...
‘Continue the Race’
‘NY's First All-Girls Charter High School Opens’
Empower Parents to Choose Charters for Black Males

Education Week marked the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina by examining the transformation of New Orleans, especially its educational system. “School choice has become a central and defining characteristic of public schooling in the city,” Education Week writes, with the charter sector “now the largest single provider of public education.”

In other headlines...
‘Hurricane Katrina Swept Away Years of Dysfunction in New Orleans Public Schools’
‘Chins Up, Heads High’ in New Orleans
‘It Works’
‘Why I'm Feeling Sorry for Secretary Duncan’

Most of the early bloggery on the Race to the Top results is focusing on the horse race. Many scribes are surprised that so many of the Round 1 finalists, who placed well in the first tier of Round 2, got knocked out. A lot are dumbfounded at the exclusion of Louisiana and Colorado, maybe the two most reformy states in the Union. There’s near-universal head-scratching at the number-three showing of Hawaii, a state that was running a four-day school week last year.

So how important was the charter component in judging? As our statement notes, most winners came from strong-law states (although tightly-capped North Carolina, charter-hostile Ohio, and worst-charter-law-in-the-country-state Maryland are baffling).

A Baltimore Sun editorial acknowledges that Maryland’s win of $250 million in the ‘Race to the Top’ federal grant competition “frankly came as something of a surprise to many observers.”

In other headlines...
‘Charter School Battle Didn't Affect New York's Chances Of Winning $700M’
In North Carolina, ‘Challenges Await In This New School Year’
‘Testing…1,2,3’
‘Prioritizing The Education Of Our Children First’
Duncan on Charters and Segregation
In Kansas City, ‘District Struggles To Shake Off Long-Held Perceptions, Compete With Charter Schools’

According to Education Week, a poll by Phi Delta Kappa International and the Gallup Organization found that support for charter schools continued to grow, with 65 percent of respondents saying they would back new public charter schools in their communities, while 60 percent supported “a large increase” in the number of charters nationwide.

In other headlines...
‘Nine States, D.C. Win Race for Aid to Schools’
North Carolina Wins $400 Million for ‘Charter Lite’?
D.C. Recognizes Charters in $75 Million ‘Race’ Win
New York Wins $696 Million in ‘Race’
‘Lack of Charter Schools Costs Kentucky Millions in Federal Education Money’
Missouri Wins $2.1 Million to Expand Charter Schools; Charter Act Survives Challenge
‘California Bill Holds Charter Schools to Open Standards’
Ohio Charter Schools Improving
‘Steal This Movie, Too’

According to the Atlanta Journal Constitution, cyber charter schools scored a victory yesterday when the Georgia Charter Schools Commission agreed to rethink how such schools are funded.

In other headlines...
‘Investing In Charter Schools a Smart Idea for Texas’
In South Carolina, ‘Haley Outlines Education Ideas’
‘Don’t Drop Out of School Innovation’

Earlier this week, the U.S. Department of Education announced $136 million in new Charter Schools Program (CSP) Grants.