From Deseret News archives:
Optional schools popular
County's charter academies have very long waiting lists
Unlike their public school counterparts — who started school last Friday — the first day of school for students at the Ranches Academy, a new charter school in Eagle Mountain, has been bumped back to Sept. 7 due to some delayed construction, said board vice president David Hadlock.
"It was just a rush job to get it done in time," Hadlock said. "We kind of got a late start on the building."
Ditto for Discovery, a new Provo charter school, where a remodeling project is not even close to being finished in time for its scheduled Friday opening — though students will be spending time learning outside the classroom for the next 10 days, director Dianna West explained.
The delays haven't affected enrollment at either school, however. And neither has a recent finding that some charter school students are performing at lower levels than their public school counterparts.
If anything, charter schools are becoming more popular, said Errol Porter, principal of Timpanogos Academy in Lindon.
"I think one of the big things that parents and students like is the consistency of curriculum across the grade levels," Porter said. "We do the same reading program so that you don't have three first-grade teachers doing something different."
That approach must be working — Timpanogos Academy has a waiting list of 600 students in addition to its currently enrolled 400 students. The same goes for the Ranches Academy. And Discovery has 96 students taking part in its unique "experiential" curriculum, which West calls "hands-on."
Porter dismisses the national comparison of test scores released last week by the U.S. Department of Education, which found that fourth-graders attending charters schools are about half a year behind public school students in both reading and math.
He said that the findings are biased because they represent a very select sample and don't reflect the academic success that many Utah charter schools have experienced.
"We don't lower the bar for struggling students," Porter said. "We give the students help to reach the bar."
Charter schools are independent public schools sponsored by local or state educational organizations that can operate outside of the traditional public school system.
They're not private schools, which means there won't be any religious curriculum. What there will be is a back-to-basics approach to math and reading used at Freedom Academy in Provo, or the application-based learning at Discovery.
The real appeal, Hadlock said, is parental control and choice.
"We just wanted a different option for our kids out here," he said. "It's not that we're disillusioned with the public school system and the schools out here, but we as a parental board over here like to have some control."
Even construction woes can be a plus at a charter school, West said. Since parents and students are closely involved, most pitched in to help move the remodeling along.
"It's been wonderful in some ways because families have helped out to get it done," West said. "We've had kids pouring cement and helping clean and painting walls. It's been a lot of fun."
E-mail: lwarner@desnews.com
