A work in progress: Michigan's potent combination of interdistrict choice and charter schooling is forcing traditional public schools to take notice. Whether they respond is often a different story - Forum

Education Next, Winter, 2001 by David Arsen, David N. Plank, Gary Sykes

Policy choices on other questions are decisively important in determining how choice and competition affect local education systems. For instance:

* How much money do choice students bring with them? The competitive stakes of choice policies are defined by the amount of money that schools gain or lose when students switch schools. Systemic responses increase as the financial stakes grow.

* Can schools select their students? Every school has an interest in selecting the students that it chooses to admit. Rules that grant greater discretion over admission and expulsion decisions to schools may lead to competition based on the composition of enrollments rather than the quality of academic programs.

* How many choices do parents have? Rules regarding the supply of publicly funded choice schools have a powerful impact on both the nature and the extent of competition among providers. For example, a"cap" on the number of charter schools may simultaneously limit the competitive challenge to traditional public schools and intensify the competition among charter school applicants.

* How are schools held accountable? Choice policies rely on both market forces and standards to promote school accountability. The relative weight assigned to these two mechanisms matters greatly for the nature and extent of systemic effects. Choice policies are likely to produce more differentiated responses if accountability is mainly based on schools' ability to attract students. With increasing reliance on standards for curriculum, student assessment, or teacher certification, responses to choice will be less varied.

In the end, the systemic effect of school choice depends on the interaction between the rules embedded in statewide policy and the features of a local ecology. Actors in some areas will adopt new strategies in response to policy changes. Actors in other areas will remain unaffected. The effects of choice vary widely across Michigan, but patterns nevertheless emerge.

Responses to Charter Schools

Most Michigan charter schools are located in metropolitan areas, where the population is dense and diverse, and per-pupil funding is higher. Some rural charter schools target well-defined niche markets; for example, the Nah Tah Wahsh Public School Academy in the Upper Peninsula focuses its curriculum on Native American students. Within metropolitan areas, clear patterns emerge in charter schools' location. Charter school enrollment rates are five times higher in central cities than in high-income suburban districts. In suburban areas, charter schools are more likely to locate in districts with lower incomes, greater socioeconomic diversity, and close proximity to central cities.

Charter schools have elicited a range of strategic responses from organizations within the education system. Some responses are autonomous and competitive. Others are cooperative alliances with other organizations in the education system. Many schools, school districts, and EMOs are simultaneously engaged in both types of behavior.