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Press Release, Charter School

AFC Stands with Charter School Families

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Happy National Charter Schools Week!
AFC stands strong with charter school families who are seeking the very best education for their children. For years, charter schools have provided a lifeline to parents who need more options and opportunities for their kids.
Sadly, the Biden administration is threatening to obstruct charter school success by preventing the expansion of these high-performing and in demand schools.
Yesterday, our team joined hundreds of advocates on the ground in Washington D.C. to send a message about the need to protect and expand the opportunities provided by charter schools.
Charter school families gathered outside the White House to send a message to the administration on Wednesday. AFC Future Leaders Fellow and graduate of Howard Fuller Collegiate Academy Charter School, Sherlean Roberts, speaks with a reporter. Nathan Cunneen, a 2020 AFC Fellow and member of the AFC communications team, also spoke to the media.
Photo credit: National Alliance for Public Charter Schools
Walter Blanks, Nathan Cunneen, Hera Varmah, and Sherlean Roberts – one of our 2022 Future Leaders Fellows –  appeared in multiple media outlets to speak out for charter school families. Some of those interviews can be found here and here.
Also – in case you missed it, below is an excerpt from yesterday’s Wall Street Journal article about the threat facing charter schools. The full article can be read here.
We will continue to work to protect charter school options for families. Thank you for standing with us and the students who need more access to high-quality educational options.
Sincerely,
The AFC Team
Wall Street Journal: Democrats vs. Biden on Charter Schools
https://www.wsj.com/articles/democrats-vs-biden-on-charter-schools-program-regulations-school-choice-education-protest-parentsThe Biden Education Department continues to take heat for its proposed new and restrictive rules for a federal charter school grant program. Protests from parents and a growing number of Democrats are a warning to the Administration that its sneaky push to limit school choice is regressive and unpopular.
In a May 5 letter to Education Secretary Miguel Cardona, seven U.S. Senators—including Democrats Dianne Feinstein (Calif.), Michael Bennet (Colo.), and Cory Booker (N.J.)—wrote that the rules for applying for the Charter Schools Program funds do “not prioritize the needs of students” and limit “high quality choices to certain families.”
The Senators take issue with the requirement that schools applying for the money provide evidence of charter demand and declining enrollment in district schools. “This would empower federal reviewers to ignore state and local decisions to authorize new public charter schools,” they write. The requirements could “make it difficult, if not impossible,” for charters to access the federal funds.
Colorado’s Democratic Gov. Jared Polis also objects to the rules. The “community impact analysis” requirement would give “anonymous grant reviewers in Washington the ability to veto parent, community, district and state efforts to open a new school,” he wrote last month in the Washington Post. Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has also assailed the new rules and backed charters with donations from his foundation.
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