Charter School Board Accepting Public Comment on Alternative Education Policy

Contact: Audrey Williams 202-328-2748
[email protected]

Washington, D.C. —The DC Public Charter School Board (PCSB) voted 5-0 on October 15 to open public comment on a proposed policy that would give Alternative Education status to any diploma-granting public charter school that serves a significantly different population than a standard school.

PCSB is accepting public comments on the proposed Alternative Education Policy.  Under the proposal, a public charter school that serves a significantly different population than traditional and charter school serving the same grade levels would be classified as an alternative school.    "Significantly different" is defined in the proposed policy.

The public comment period opens October 22, and will close on Wednesday November 21.  A public hearing will be held on Monday November 19 at 7:30 p.m. at the DC Public Charter School Board, 3333 14th Street, NW, Washington, DC.

To submit written comments, please email Audrey Williams, [email protected], or mail them to DC Public Charter School Board, 3333 14th Street, NW, Suite 210, Washington, DC 20010. To sign up to testify at the public hearing, please email [email protected] or call the PCSB office at (202) 328-2660 by 3:00 pm on the day of the hearing to be placed on the witness list.  Please bring copies of your testimony.

In addition, the Board also voted to list only the Performance Management Framework (PMF) score and not the tier for Options Public Charter School and Maya Angelou Public Charter High School when the results of the PMF are released in November 2012.  Based on preliminary data collected in the development of the proposed policy, the Board believes that because these schools serve significantly different populations than other public schools, they should not be assigned a tier ranking.  The PMF is the PCSB’s evaluation tool for assessing and monitoring charter school academic performance.  It rates schools in three tiers with Tier 1 schools meeting standards of high performance; Tier 2 schools meeting minimum overall performance; and Tier 3 schools falling short of high performance standards, and showing inadequate performance.

About the PCSB: The DC Public Charter School Board (PCSB) is setting a national model for creating quality public school options through its rigorous review of new charter applications and effective oversight of charter school performance that is leading the transformation of public education in Washington, DC. PCSB currently oversees 57 public charter schools on 102 campuses serving more than 32,000 students living in every ward of the city. Learn more at www.dcpcsb.org.