A new report ^[1] contains a sobering reality for would-be education reformers: Bad schools usually don’t get better. “After identifying more than 2,000 low-performing charter and district schools across ten states, analyst David Stuit tracked them from 2003-04 through 2008-09 to determine how many were turned around, shut down, or remained low-performing,” the Education Trust found.  “Results were generally dismal.”

“Seventy-two percent of the original low-performing charters remained in operation—and remained low-performing—five years later. So did 80 percent of district schools.”

Despite the claims of proponents of No Child Left Behind, many children obviously were, even as federal outlays on education exploded along with the budget for the U. S. Department of Education.

Malcolm A. Kline is the Executive Director of Accuracy in Academia ^[2].

If you would like to comment on this article, e-mail mal.kline@academia.org ^[3]