Oklahoma Education and You

Oklahoma’s charter sector tells two stories at once.

One story is inspiring: a set of schools that beat statewide performance and prove that better outcomes are possible for Oklahoma kids. The other story is uncomfortable: a set of charters that perform so far below state norms that the public case for diverting resources away from traditional districts collapses under its own weight.

The problem isn’t that charters exist. Families deserve choice. The problem is that Oklahoma’s accountability rules can accidentally reward a charter for being “less bad” than its immediate surroundings—even when it is still failing students.

Using 2025 report-card outcomes (district-level results, all students, all grades), statewide proficiency sits in the high-30s to low-40s: roughly 41% overall (Composite), about 39% in ELA, and about 38% in Math.

Against that yardstick, several charters stand out as proof-point schools—exactly what chartering is supposed to produce. Schools such as Le Monde International Charter, Dove Schools of OKC, and John Rex Charter School post proficiency rates well above the statewide level. Santa Fe South and Dove both perform at or above state proficiency levels with far greater numbers of economically disadvantaged students and English language learners. These are not marginal gains. They are the kind of results that justify growth, replication, and investment.

But the same data also shows charters with performance so low it should stop us in our tracks. Some schools post single-digit proficiency rates in core subjects. When a charter’s math proficiency is in the teens—or worse—and its overall proficiency is near zero, we are not talking about “choice.” We are talking about an academic emergency.

A charter sector that includes both excellence and collapse isn’t unusual. High variance is common in charter ecosystems. That’s exactly why accountability standards matter so much.

Oklahoma’s State Charter School Board’s charter performance framework allows a charter to meet academic standards by performing at or above the statewide proficiency rate, at or above the proficiency rate of the local district where the charter is located, or by improving meaningfully from the prior year in the charter contract term.  Other authorizers have lower standards for academic performance.

On paper, that looks reasonable. In practice, it creates a dangerous loophole: if the local district is already struggling, a charter can meet the standard by merely replicating local failure—without ever approaching statewide expectations.

That might be acceptable if charters were funded with “new” money that didn’t affect the rest of the system. But that is not the world we live in.

When public dollars follow students to charters, resources do not stay put. Traditional districts still pay for buses, buildings, special education obligations, and staffing needs that don’t disappear on a student-by-student basis. Enrollment shifts create real financial stress.

If Oklahoma is going to divert public funds from traditional districts into charters, the state must demand more than “we’re slightly better than the nearest struggling school.” That is not an accountability system—it’s a permission slip.

To be transparent, I was the superintendent at ASTEC Charter School for more than six years.   ASTEC’s proficiency rates have long been much lower than the state’s average.  However, we performed much better in chronic absenteeism, academic growth, graduation rate, and post-secondary opportunities.  Our justification for the number of students in the two lowest performance bands, basic and below basic, was that we were performing better than the Oklahoma City Public Schools sites with similar demographics.  While I made this argument, I always struggled internally with the knowledge that while our students typically came to us with academic deficits, we had some advantages over the Oklahoma City district schools.  As a school of choice, we dealt with far fewer serious behavior and attendance issues, and all our students had a family member interested enough in their education to seek out a school for their child.

Any honest conversation about charter performance must include the demographic and behavioral realities that shape outcomes. Charter enrollment isn’t random. Families choose charters, which means results can be influenced by selection effects tied to parent engagement, transportation access, stability, and the ability to navigate school options. At the same time, many charters serve high concentrations of low-income students and face the academic headwinds that accompany poverty, mobility, and unmet needs.

That nuance cuts both ways—and it actually reinforces why Oklahoma’s bar is too low. If a charter serves a higher-need population, authorizers should evaluate it fairly using growth and subgroup outcomes, and still require a clear, time-bound path toward statewide expectations. But if a charter benefits from self-selection and engagement advantages—families opting in, students more likely to attend consistently—then it is even harder to justify results that remain far below the state in core academics. A school that attracts motivated families should not be posting outcomes that resemble academic collapse.

In the twenty-plus-year history of charter schools in Oklahoma, forced closure due to academic underperformance has been rare.  Those schools that have been closed for academic underperformance typically were in the bottom five percent of schools in the state academically and were not showing improvement. That’s a low standard for a school of choice.   

Here is the simplest fix: if public dollars are going to be diverted from traditional districts, the default academic standard for charter renewal should be “close to statewide performance,” not merely “better than the local district.”

That does not mean every charter must instantly beat the state average. It means charters below the state should have to show one of the following: they are within a reasonable range of statewide performance and on a clear, sustained growth path that will close the gap on a defined timeline.

And there should be no “local district” shield for extreme underperformance. Single-digit proficiency in core subjects over multiple years should trigger intervention—period.

The point is not to pretend all schools serve identical students. The point is that public dollars come with public obligations. Oklahoma can acknowledge socio-economic differences while still refusing to normalize low performance. A charter shouldn’t earn renewal simply because it beats a nearby district that is also struggling—especially when that comparison may reflect the same neighborhood poverty and the same systemic barriers. “Better than the local failure” is not a public standard; it is a recipe for replicating failure under a new label.

Charters can be an engine for innovation and excellence. Remember, the charter movement started out as a teacher-led movement. But choice is not a moral exemption from meeting standards. If anything, schools that are granted special autonomy and receive public funding should be held to a higher expectation—because the state is asking taxpayers and communities to take a risk on a different model.

Oklahoma should celebrate and replicate the charters that outperform the state. And Oklahoma should be honest about the charters that do not.

Charters serve an important role in Oklahoma.  However, if charter schools are going to drive improvement in Oklahoma education through competition, the standard can’t be “beat the local failure.” The standard is to serve students well enough to compete with the state, or to show unmistakable evidence that you are getting there fast.

Because “choice” that replicates failure is not a choice at all. It’s just a failure with a different sign on the building.