Creating and Sustaining Learning Communities: Early Lessons from Charter Schools

Abstract

There has been a rapid increase over the past 5 years in both the number of charter schools in the United States and the enthusiasm for the concept. Most research about charter schools has not addressed how charter schools create and sustain high-quality learning communities. This paper presents findings of a study that investigated how learning communities were created and sustained in 17 charter schools. The study examined how school missions were developed and translated into classroom practice; how charter schools learned from what they were doing; and what factors seemed to produce high-quality teaching and learning. The study identified four critical building blocks that charter schools tackled, with varying success, to create and sustain learning communities. The building blocks included the school mission, the school instructional program, the accountability system, and school leadership. The study also identified three enabling conditions that helped to explain variations in the success rates of the charter schools: the degree of school power/autonomy, the presence of supportive networks/organizations, and the presence of supportive parents. The paper offers tentative implications for both charter-school founders and sponsors, including a need for more detailed, concrete information from schools during the charter-application process, and clarification of the roles and responsibilities of charter schools within the state public education system, particularly with respect to accountability and technical assistance. (Contains 43 references.) (Author/LMI) ******************************************************************************** * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * ******************************************************************************** U.S. DEPARTMENT Of EDUCATION Office of Educational Research and Improvement EDU ATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) This document has been reproduced as received from the person or organization originating it. Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction Quality. Points of view or opinions staled in this docu merit do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy. PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) CREATING AND SUSTAINING LEARNING COMMUNITIES: EARLY LESSONS FROM CHARTER SCHOOLS Priscilla Wohlstetter Noe lle C. Griffin University of Southern California Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, March 1997, Chicago, Authors' Note: The research reported in this paper received generous support from the Danforth Foundation. We have also received support from the Consortium for Policy Researchin Education (CPRE), Grant No. OERI-R308A60003 from the National Institute on Educational Governance, Finance, Policy-Making and Management, Office of Educational Research and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education . We also would like to thank the following individuals for their assistance with data collection and their useful comments on earlier drafts ofthis manuscript: Charles Abelmann and Richard Elmore of Harvard University; Janice Ballou of the Eagleton Institute of Politics, Rutgers University; and Allan Odden of the University of WisconsinMadison. Opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Danforth Foundation, the U.S. Department of Education, or the institutional partners of CPRE. s2 BEST COPY AVAILABLE CREATING AND SUSTAINING LEARNING COMMUNITIES: EARLY LESSONS FROM CHARTER SCHOOLS Priscilla Wohlstetter Noe lle C. Griffin University of Southern California Authors' Note: The research reported in this paper received generous support from the Danforth Foundation. We have also received support from the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE), Grant No. OERI-R308A60003 from the National Institute on Educational Governance, Finance, Policy-Making and Management, Office of Educational Research and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education . We also would like to thank the following individuals for their assistance with data collection and their useful comments on earlier drafts of this manuscript: Charles Abe imam and Richard Elmore of Harvard University; Janice Ballou of the Eagleton Institute of Politics, Rutgers University; and Allan Odden of the University of WisconsinMadison. Opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Danforth Foundation, the U.S. Department of Education, or the institutional partners of CPRE.