The False Friends of Charter Schools

President Clinton has become a cheerleader for charter schools. Hurrah for that. Most of the dozens of charter schools we've visited are pretty terrific.

But when he calls for doubling federal funds for them (to $100 million next year) and visualizes 3,000 such schools by the turn of the century (up from 500 today), it's important to know what exactly he means by a charter school: Does the president insist on fully independent public schools that are free to innovate, to shape their own destinies, and to direct their own resources? Or will he, like his political supporters at the National Education Association and elsewhere in the public school "establishment," favor near-clones of conventional schools that must obey most of the usual rules even while waving the "charter" banner?

When a reform that rocks boats becomes a fad that everyone appears to endorse, one must ask whether it has retained its essence. (Is a cinnamon-raisin bagel--reportedly another Clinton passion--really a bagel, or just a sweet roll with a belly button?) Our travels to almost 50 charter schools in nine states over the past 18 months have led us to distinguish between the genuine article and faux charters that carry the name but are really just minor variations on the theme of "site based" management. If the fakes, lauded and aided by the false friends of charter schools, spread faster than the real thing, which continues to be bitterly resisted in one state and community after another, we may find that "support" for charter schools could prove lethal to this promising reform strategy. If the White House allows its prestige (and additional federal dollars) to buttress the fakes, Mr. Clinton's seeming enthusiasm for charter schools could...