Innovation

Education Program Strategy: Innovation

Goal: Support policy-oriented efforts to expand the supply of high-quality charter schools to help close the achievement gap.

Theory of Change: Charter schools remain one of the nation’s most promising efforts to produce more excellent public schools, especially for low-income students and communities of color. Yet 20 years after the first charter school law was passed, too many states focus largely on expansion at the expense of quality. The Innovation portfolio supports efforts to improve and create high-quality charter options in Chicago, Indianapolis, and Minneapolis.

The Joyce Approach

Increase the capacity or impact of the statewide charter advocacy organizations or charter school sector advocates.

• Support statewide charter-support organizations to develop and advocate for policy agendas that address the critical issues facing the charter sector in each state.

Increase buy-in and demand by parents and community-based organizations in our geographic region for higher-quality charter school options.

• Support efforts to engage parents and community members in target states in advocating for the creation of more and higher-quality charter school options for families.

Improve understanding by the general public and policy makers of policies needed to increase the quality of charter schools.

• Fund national research that helps elevate issues that need to be addressed or that investigates the results of the charter sector.

Increase the current body of knowledge around school turnarounds and their link to charter schools.

• Fund research and policy development that shows how charter schools can improve chronically low-performing schools.

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