NN4DA and the Tri-State Alliance to Improve District-Led Charter Authorizing were recently featured in the U.S. Department of Education’s Charter School Program’s Grantee Spotlight, in their October Project Director’s Bulletin on October 21, 2021.
NCSRC regularly features short interviews with CSP grantees in the monthly Grantee Bulletin. We hope that this feature allows grantees to understand each other’s work and builds a stronger knowledge and support network.
Today’s guest is Alex Medler, National Coordinator for the Tri-State Alliance to Improve District-Led Charter Authorizing, a National Dissemination grantee. The Alliance is a collaborative effort between the Colorado Charter School Institute, California Charter Authorizing Professionals, the Colorado Association of Charter School Authorizers, and the Florida Association of Charter School Authorizers, who together are creating the National Network For District Authorizing, or NN4DA.
NCSRC spoke with Medler about the challenges of organizing a multi-state collaboration, the need for national standards for district charter school authorizing, and more.
NCSRC: When did the Tri-State Alliance start and what are its goals?
ALEX MEDLER: We began three years ago with our CSP grant, but each of the three state associations existed before then.
CSP State Entity (SEs) grantees are required to spend a certain amount of their funding to state support systems, which includes strengthening authorizing. We partner with departments of education in our states in that. And we want all SEs and other grantees in those states to be aware of our work and our approach.
The three associations are using this grant to create and disseminate resources that help authorizers implement best practices. With this grant, and in all our work, we emphasize peer-to-peer efforts to improve professional practice that reflects the state context and that leverages nationally recognized tools and procedures.
Entering the fourth year, we’re strong. Over the summer, we launched the National Network for District Authorizing. That’s a sustainable national network of our three states and others. We’re in discussions with state initiatives or groups of authorizers in Oregon, Georgia, Maryland, and Idaho, as well as other states with various authorizer-support efforts. The NN4DA’s mission is to support state-level orgs and associations that strengthen authorizing. Let’s say an SEA in Georgia gives support to this initiative, then the districts in that state could come together and join. This could help them strengthen authorizing in the state by drawing on our wealth of authorizing best practices and established processes for launching a state association or initiative.
NCSRC: Why are you focused on district authorizing specifically?
MEDLER: There are roughly 1,000 authorizers in the country and about 90% of them are school districts. About half of all charter schools are authorized by school districts.
Our three states—Florida, California, and Colorado—collectively contain about 30% of the nation’s charter schools and 40% of the nation’s authorizers. We recognize that charter advocates have argued that we need state and alternative authorizers, not just districts. Sometimes they will say that you can’t trust districts because they’re inherently opposed to charter schools and there’s a conflict of interest. I have found that’s not really accurate.
Districts certainly vary in how they feel about charters. Our organizations are intentionally created with big tents. Regardless of a district’s history or current politics, we want them to feel welcome to join. Ultimately, I find that the professionals working in education want to see all children served well, and there are best practices in authorizing that help them move them in that direction. Having districts authorize charters is hardly a death sentence for the sector. California and Florida have two of the largest charter sectors in the country, and Colorado has one of the largest proportions of students in the charter sector. The role of districts changes from place to place. And far from going away, their authority is increasing in many places.
Our theory of change is that the districts, 25 or 30 years into their charter schools’ existence, will consider those schools and students to be fully in their district. As we promote best practices through peer-to-peer sharing and training, districts are eager to implement and learn. We take national best practices from larger organizations and partners, customize them for a state’s population and regulations, and bring it to them.
Our district members also develop best practices. Some districts—especially big ones like the L.A. Unified School District or Denver Public Schools—have practices that have been successful, and we share those. We also disseminate national tools, and we model them for more districts to use across the country.
Lastly, COVID-19 has really disrupted this work, like everything else. COVID has changed the way that states oversee schools, and we now see it moving towards more data sources, more perspectives, and a more nuanced understanding of what charters are dealing with. We’re having a lot of discussions about how authorizers can support improvement. That’s a change from even 10 years ago. We see more ownership by authorizers around schools’ success or failure. Addressing topics like serving students with disabilities during and after COVID is a great place to focus, for example. There are populations that were severely affected by the pandemic. Can’t we work together to help them?
NCSRC: What does the dissemination grant allow you to do that you wouldn’t accomplish otherwise?
MEDLER: None of the state associations were fully staffed before this grant. This grant allowed each organization to grow into professional organizations with staff, and expert consultants.
Each association now has dedicated staff for special populations, like English learners and students with disabilities. We did needs assessments in each state and had them all identify their priorities around student equity. The CSP grant has given each of these professional communities the chance to work on their own priorities that match their needs and assets.
We’ve grown more sustainable beyond the grant, too. We have funding from state departments of education and foundations. And we’re exploring fee-for-service work with districts as well. But the biggest money in the state to help this project comes from SEs.
NCSRC: What have been your most popular shared resources?
MEDLER: We share a lot from the other national dissemination grantees, NACSA, A-Game, and the California Charter Schools Association.
We have also created model contracts and lots of templates. Here are some examples:
Model application package rubric
Annual report template & Site Visit Rubric Package
With these, the end goal is to create a toolkit for authorizers customized to each state to help them navigate the process throughout the life cycle of the charter school.
We try to do our work with local partners too. For example, our emphasis at CACSA on students with disabilities encouraged the Colorado Department of Education to study enrollment obstacles, which we are now working on. A CDE study, conducted by the Center for Learner Equity, identified problems with charter school websites asking about disability status prematurely. We created materials in conjunction with our local CSO that are available here. We’re always trying to contribute to building state-level systems that support strong authorizing and successful charter schools.
If you would like your program to be featured in a future Grantee Spotlight, please email NCSRC. We look forward to hearing from you.