Last week, The Oregonian published an op-ed by NACSA president and CEO, Greg Richmond, arguing that the best way to improve the state’s charter schools is to strengthen accountability for their performance. Greg offered three strategies to do that:

• First, state law should clearly specify the performance levels charter schools must achieve in order to stay open. Those that consistently fail to achieve that level should automatically close.
• Second, charter school authorizers should publish an annual report detailing the overall performance of their schools, and authorizers who allow failing schools to stay open should lose their ability to authorize charter schools.
• Third, Oregon should create a statewide charter commission with the power to approve and monitor charter schools throughout the state. This commission would develop the capacity and expertise to authorize only good schools and to truly hold charter schools accountable.

Read the whole piece here.

Learn more about NACSA’s Policy Agenda for Charter School Quality here.