Unions were concerned that charter schools would be difficult to unionize, leading to losses of membership and union jobs. As far as school boards were concerned, chartering would diminish their power by allowing newly forming schools to apply directly to “authorizers” under state government jurisdiction. Though teachers unions generally had significant influence, particularly within the Democratic party, members of both parties wanted to stake out strong positions responding to perceived failures in the American education system . In addition, the prospect of vouchers loomed over the charter campaigns, in some cases smoothing the way for chartering. As one advocate in Connecticut said: “charters were advocated by groups whose embrace was intended to head off vouchers and other groups who saw them as a step toward vouchers or as the half-way to seek if they couldn’t get vouchers” . Similarly, in California, which adopted its charter law in 1992, advocates used the threat of a potential ballot initiative establishing a school voucher program to win votes. Though some Republicans would have preferred more radical policy shifts towards vouchers, many saw the charter laws as a step in this direction. Efforts to diffuse charter laws benefited also from a network of policy entrepreneurs sharing information and, in some cases, traveling state-to-state to draft bills and shepherd votes . There was also a growing network of supportive governors led by Lamar Alexander and Bill Clinton and operating through the NGA. Put together, this was a successful formula for the establishment of charter laws: by 2003, a full 40 states had passed charter school legislation.The simple tally of the adoption of charter laws presented in Table 1, though, obscures the significant variation in the specifics of these laws. In many states, charter opponents recognized that even if they could not prevent charter laws from being passed,greenhouse bench top they could use their political sway to dilute the laws and make it difficult for new charter schools to get a foothold. States that simply used “copy-paste” legislation from others were more likely to have weaker laws . By contrast, charter laws crafted to respond to a state’s specific needs generally were better for charter schools.
The favorability of a state’s charter law affected how much charter growth it would see. Growth depended heavily on states that had more generous funding formulas, higher caps on the number of schools that could be newly authorized, and less stringent authorization procedures . By 2000, around two-thirds of the 1497 charter schools that had opened were located in the 8 states whose charter policies were rated as an “A” by the Center for Education Reform .And the majority of charter schools outside of those 8 states were located in the 10 states rated as a “B”. Charter growth has remained concentrated in states with favorable charter laws.In 2017, the top 10 states in terms of charter penetration had an average charter law score from the Center for Education Reform of 151.7 , compared to just 109.4 in other states.The adoption of charter laws in the states has also changed the politics—as the literature on “policy feedback” effects would suggest it might . In the realm of social welfare, program beneficiaries tend to organize to protect and expand the policies that help them . Similarly, policies that benefit organized economic interests like firms and unions “feed back” into the politics by enhancing the resources these interests have at their disposal to make demands in the political sphere . The degree to which policies generate these supportive feedback effects factors critically into their durability and expandability . Reforms that reshape the politics by empowering supporters and disempowering opponents tend to prevail and potentially even expand. Reforms that fail to do so are often retrenched or eroded over time . In the case of charter politics, the obvious candidates to defend and expand charter laws, and thus drive feedback effects, are charter schools themselves. Charter schools owe their existence to the state charter laws adopted mostly in the 90’s and early 2000’s allowing charter schools to establish. They also receive critical funding from federal government programs. Their ability to sustain themselves and grow depends on the preservation and expansion of pro-charter policies—they are vested interests . Thus, a policy feedback perspective suggests that charter schools would leverage their growth in the K-12 education sector toward a greater political presence—both to defend against threats and take opportunities to expand the policies that benefit them.
This has occurred, to an extent. State charter school associations have emerged as important actors in education politics, particularly in states with significant charter school sectors. The California Charter Schools Association, for instance, has become a powerful interest group in California education politics—it spent roughly 18 million on lobbying and campaign contributions in 2015 and 2016.It has also leveraged the ability to mobilize charter parents, alumni, students, and school staff for political advocacy .In addition, leaders of large charter school networks have engaged in several high-profile political battles. For instance, Eva Moskowitz, the head of Success Academy Charter Schools, took center stage in mid-2010’s battles with New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio over co-location of charter schools with traditional public schools in city-owned school buildings . Yet, the political influence of charter schools themselves is also constrained. For one, they tend to have limited budgets. Even with federal funding, charter schools generally receive less money per student than traditional public schools . These funds are needed for educational purposes, generally leaving little left over for lobbying. And though charter schools can sometimes politically mobilize the parents of their students, the families served by charter schools are more likely to be low-income and people of color —groups that generally have less political sway. Nonetheless, as the role of charter schools in K-12 education has grown over the first two decades of the 21st century, so too has a powerful pro-charter advocacy coalition. Unlike the relatively shallow network of policy entrepreneurs driving initial charter school laws, elements of this coalition have maintained a steady presence in state capitols, local politics, and in Washington . Elements have also, in several cases, gone toe to-toe with powerful teachers unions . Many of these groups are associated with national networks—primarily Policy Innovators in Education Network and the newer 50-State Campaign for Achievement Now —that are active on charter policy and other education policy issues. Some accounts have suggested that certain wealthy foundations have played a significant role in bolstering this coalition through strategic grant-making.
Yet, the literature lacks systematic evaluation of the role of philanthropists in growing the pro-charter political coalition, and how this relationship has developed over time. One investigation that can help to illuminate the degree to which the charter school coalition is dependent on foundation funding is examining revenue sources for charter school associations. These associations, as mentioned above, have been critical to defending and expanding charter laws. We might suspect that the role of foundations in supporting charter school associations would shift over time. In the early 2000’s, with fewer charter schools to draw member revenue from, it is reasonable to think they’d be highly dependent on philanthropic funding—but, in the 2010’s, with the charter school sector better-established, they might have greater revenue from member schools, with foundation funding thus playing a relatively smaller role. I collect and analyze original non-profit revenue data for charter school associations to assess how revenue sources have changed over time. These data come from IRS 990 forms,cannabis dry rack which non-profits claiming federal tax-exempt status are required to file on a yearly basis. I examine the 32 organizations listed as partners of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools ,and the National Alliance itself. The IRS 990 forms provide organizations’ main revenue sources, and the total. The two largest line items, generally, in the revenue streams are 1) contributions and grants, and 2) program service revenue.While contributions and grants also include grants from the government, stakeholder interviews suggest the great majority comes from foundations—whereas the majority of program service revenue comes from member organization dues. The data demonstrate a massive growth in charter school association revenue between 2003 and 2018. The 13 charter school associations operating in 2003 took in just under $6 million in total revenue in that year. But by 2018 the number of charter school associations had grown to 33, and the total revenue had grown over 17-fold to over $100 million. Indeed, charter school association revenue has grown much faster than charter schools themselves. As expected, charter school associations relied heavily on contributions and grants in the sector’s early years. In 2003, for instance, only 21 percent of charter school association revenue came from program services, while 70 percent of revenue came from contributions and grants . What is striking is that this breakdown has remained roughly constant, even as the number of charter schools and size of charter networks has grown considerably. The amount of total charter school association revenue from program services has hovered between 17 and 22 percent of the total—while the amount from contributions and grants has hovered at closer to 80 percent.
Even as the charter school sector grew, the political advocacy arm remained dependent on philanthropic funding for critical financial resources. How did foundations become such important backers of the pro-charter coalition that has emerged over the past two decades? Here, I present a mix of qualitative and quantitative evidence suggesting that a policy feedback lens is critical to understanding the role of foundations in charter school politics. The broad point is that the adoption of charter laws in the states allowed foundations to make investments in new schools—which they later supported with investments in pro-charter political advocacy. Foundations played a limited role in charter school politics during the initial diffusion of charter laws in the 90’s. As discussed above, this was a period when a network of policy entrepreneurs was able to exploit a “window of opportunity” to push through chartering legislation—despite opposition from incumbent K-12 education interests. This changed when charter schools started to establish in the late 90’s in early-adopting states. At the time, newer foundations with living donors like the Gates Foundation were interested in expanding their education portfolios, and had a higher risk tolerance and desire to experiment than more longstanding organizations like the Ford Foundation and Carnegie Foundation . In addition to supporting existing organizations, these newer foundations also sought to promote organizations that would compete with the traditional educational system structure— what Mehta and Teles call “jurisdictional challengers.” Newer foundations were also seeking to invest in organizations in the education policy space that would eventually develop their own revenue streams, and no longer need philanthropic support. The passage of charter laws in the states and emergence of charter schools presented the opportunity for these foundations to do just that by funding charter schools. In addition to providing newer foundations the opportunity to fund jurisdictional challengers, the establishment of charter schools in leading states provided a crucial “proof of concept” for the legitimacy of chartering. Chartering’s legitimacy as an education policy reform was also bolstered by early assessments demonstrating charters’ positive effects on certain metrics of student achievement . The flood of new charter schools also produced significant demand for foundation dollars from the charter school sector. Charter schools generally only begin to receive significant funding from state and local governments once students enroll. While the federal Charter School Program provided some funding for school creation, the sector still had a huge need for seed funding. In the late 90’s and early 2000’s, philanthropists like the Gates Foundation, Walton Family Foundation, and Broad Foundation became a crucial source of funding. In addition to providing funds directly to schools, foundations also supported the initiation and growth of organizations like the NewSchools Venture Fund that would provide its own seed funding to new charter schools. Beyond providing seed funding, foundations offered many charter schools continuing grants that supplemented relatively scarce public monies once the schools were operating. While existing research has documented the important role of foundations in charter school politics , we have limited evidence tracing out empirically how foundation support for the charter school sector has progressed over time. In this section, I draw on IRS 990 data to bring empirical analysis to bear on this question.