Charter Fights for Life, But Stops Short of Court

While charter schools sometimes resort to lawsuits to stymie efforts to shut them down, many others wage their fights with less dramatic weapons, such as administrative appeals.

A case in point played out recently in Rhode Island, where a charter school won a last-minute reprieve last summer to stay open after a lengthy appeal process, thanks in part to intervention by the local mayor and even the governor.

But it was a close call. In August, a state hearing officer affirmed an earlier judgment by the Rhode Island Department of Education that Beacon Charter High School for...