Long-Term Data Show Charter Schools Do Not Harm Surrounding District Schools

New research counters long-held assumptions built on insufficient evidence

NEW YORK, NY — For years, critics of school choice have argued that charter schools harm surrounding district schools, contending, with limited evidence, that charters drain resources and select only the most promising students. In a new report for the Manhattan Institute, senior fellow Marcus Winters shows that this criticism is not supported by the data. Analyzing long-term outcomes, he finds that competition from charter schools does not appear to lead to public school declines.  Rather, the data show a small positive relationship between the proportion of charter students in a given district, and the test-score growth of students in surrounding district schools.

The U.S. is almost two decades into the era of charter school expansion, offering researchers the opportunity to analyze the long-term effects of increased school choice. As of 2009, the charter sector served at least 10 percent of students in 91 of the largest school districts in the U.S. Using test score data from across the country, Winters analyzes outcomes for students in these 91 districts over the past decade, finding no negative effects on district schools when a city’s charter sector expands. In fact, in both math and English Language Arts (ELA) he finds a very small positive relationship between charter school growth and district student test scores.

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