Are charter school facilities on par with their public or private counterparts?
There needs to be an understanding about charter schools and facilities. Charter schools do not receive funding from the state for facilities. Every charter school must take money out of what's called a general fund and pay for facilities, either to build them, or lease them or renovate them. That takes a lot of money, and it takes a lot out of the charter school's budget. So, in essence, you've almost taken out possibly 30 percent of a budget for a charter school just to be able to operate its facility. Are charter school facilities on par with traditional public schools? In some cases, charter school facilities are much more beautiful, because they are not as old as a traditional public school. In other cases, a traditional public school just built a facility down the road a year and a half ago, and the charter school happens to be in a warehouse, so they're not on par. It just really varies. It varies from geographic area to geographic area; from school district to school district. But by and large, I think that charter schools happen to be clean places where kids learn, and they're safe places because they're mandated by law that they must be safe, and they must have certificates of occupancy by the local jurisdiction.
