Kenny Smith

As President Barack Obama urges the nation's educators to embrace charter schools, lawmakers in Tennessee and Georgia recently have made it easier for more students to attend the nontraditional public schools.

After a drawn-out legislative battle, the Tennessee General Assembly last week approved a bill that opens up charter school enrollment to poor students or those eligible to receive free or reduced-price lunch from the federal government.

Although the law affects only school districts with more than 14,000 students, which includes Hamilton County, it dramatically increases the number of students who can attend charters. Previously, only students who were failing or who were attending failing schools were eligible.

Last year, Georgia legislators voted to establish Georgia Charter Schools Commission, which can authorize a new charter school even if a local school board denies the charter application.

"In a sense, (the commission) would make it easier for charter schools," Georgia Rep. Tom Dickson, R-Cohutta and a retired educator, said Wednesday.

Similar to the commission's authority to bypass a local school board, the Georgia Department of Education can overrule the commission within 60 days of a vote.

The Education Department also can approve a charter school if a local school board denies the charter's petition, said Andrew Broy, associate superintendent for Policy and Charter Schools with Georgia's Department of Education. But those schools would only receive state funding, not local, Mr. Broy said in an e-mail.

This year, the Georgia Legislature also approved other charter school related measures -- one that allows charter schools to get state funds for capital projects and another that allows charter schools to use a school system's vacant buildings to house students, Rep. Dickson said.

looking forward

Tennessee education officials said they must wait for the opening of Ivy Academy and Chattanooga Girls Leadership Academy -- two charter schools scheduled to start this year in Chattanooga -- before they know how the new legislation will affect schools locally.

"It's really too soon to determine what the demand will be," said Rachel Woods, spokeswoman for the Tennessee Department of Education. "Since (Chattanooga has) never had them before, if those schools are successful, either you'll see new ones form or these will expand."

It's too late for the new legislation to affect the all-girls Leadership Academy because it already has selected this year's 75 students through a lottery process. The school, which is scheduled to open in July, fielded about 150 applications for the 75 sixth- and ninth-grade spots, officials said. The school plans to add two grades a year until it becomes a full middle-high school.

"I think we'll continue to have more applicants than we have the capacity to serve," said Maxine Bailey, one of the school's co-directors. "For me, the message is that parents are seeking alternatives and seeking choices."

Ivy Academy, which hopes to open in August, still has some space available at its environmentally themed charter high school, and leaders said they hope the new pool of applicants takes advantage of the opportunities.

"I don't know that we've received necessarily an influx of applicants because I'm not sure that the information has gotten out to people," said Steve Bontekoe, the school's director of programs and operations. "This really just opens the door to let students have their needs met in a greater way."

Tennessee's new law still requires that charter schools give first priority to low-performing students or those in failing schools, and any leftover space can then be given to poor students, Ms. Woods said.

Charter schools typically are found in larger Tennessee districts with a greater number of schools on the No Child Left Behind high-priority list, she said.

Hamilton County Board of Education Chairman Kenny Smith said the school district needs to remain discerning about which charter school applications to approve. When the students leave their traditional public school for charters, their per-pupil state and local funding goes with them, so some board members and Chief Financial Officer Tommy Kranz have expressed concern over the potential lost revenue.

But the new law "definitely changes the game," Mr. Smith said. "I think there will be more charter school applications, but I don't think we're going to be overwhelmed by it."

In Georgia, Catoosa County Superintendent Denia Reese recently said she is open to the idea of charter school proposals in her system and Rep. Jay Neal, R-LaFayette, said the non-traditional schools allow for more targeted instruction and more flexibility.

"More and more we are moving into encouraging (leaders) to look into charter schools, even charter systems," he said.

Rep. Dickson said he supports charter schools in some situations.

"What I have difficulty with is a charter school that doesn't really have a unique reason for existence," he said. "As I read about some charter school applications, I have a real sense that what we are looking at is a desire on the part of a group of parents to have a small school for their (children) to go to. That is not an efficient way to manage schools and not an efficient use of tax dollars."

But Mr. Broy said state officials are focused on maintaining a strong charter school program.

"Georgia has a very strong charter school program that serves a more racially and economically diverse group of students than traditional public schools, while getting equal, if not better, results," he said.

CHARTER SCHOOLS

Charter schools are meant to be innovative public schools that are given more freedom to experiment with methods such as longer school days, single-sex classes and academic themes such as technology or the environment.

In Tennessee, low-performing students, or those attending schools that are on the state's high-priority list because of poor standardized test scores, are given first priority to attend charters. If there is more space left over, poor students, or those who receive free and reduced-price lunches from the federal government, also can apply. Local school boards must approve a charter school's application, but if denied, charter officials can appeal to the Tennessee Board of Education.

In Georgia, any student living in the charter school's designated zone can attend the school. Groups or individuals wishing to create a charter school can be approved either by the local school board, the Georgia Department of Education or the newly created Georgia Charter Schools Commission.