{"id":15892,"date":"2025-03-26T12:12:15","date_gmt":"2025-03-26T13:12:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=15892"},"modified":"2025-03-26T13:58:20","modified_gmt":"2025-03-26T13:58:20","slug":"on-apples-to-apples-assessment-private-and-charter-schools-outperform-their-public-counterparts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=15892","title":{"rendered":"On \u2018Apples to Apples\u2019 Assessment, Private and Charter Schools Outperform their Public Counterparts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This post originally appeared at <a href=\"https:\/\/will-law.org\/on-apples-to-apples-assessment-private-and-charter-schools-outperform-their-public-counterparts\/\">https:\/\/will-law.org\/on-apples-to-apples-assessment-private-and-charter-schools-outperform-their-public-counterparts\/<\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"et_pb_section et_pb_section_0 et_section_regular\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_row et_pb_row_0\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_column et_pb_column_3_4 et_pb_column_0  et_pb_css_mix_blend_mode_passthrough\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_module et_pb_text et_pb_text_0  et_pb_text_align_left et_pb_bg_layout_light\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_text_inner\">\n<p>The News: The Wisconsin Institute for Law &amp; Liberty (WILL) released its annual <a href=\"https:\/\/will-law.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/ApplestoApples202553.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" data-link-type=\"web\">Apples to Apples report<\/a>, which highlights a widening achievement gap between Wisconsin\u2019s traditional public and choice schools. This trend has grown in recent years with no signs of slowing down.<\/p>\n<p>The Quote: WILL Research Director, Will Flanders, stated, \u201cOur 2025 Apples to Apples report includes the most recent student data from the 2023-24 report cards with additional demographic modeling to provide a true assessment that accounts for variables that drive academic performance. Once again, across a level playing field, choice schools in Wisconsin are performing better than their public-school counterparts.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>What is Apples to Apples? WILL\u2019s annual Apples to Apples report puts schools on a level playing field to fairly assess education in Wisconsin across public, charter, and private voucher schools.<\/p>\n<p>Demographic factors have historically played a large role in student performance. Any honest assessment of how schools and school sectors are performing must take these factors into account. However, much of the existing reporting on school performance ignores this reality.<\/p>\n<p>This annual report endeavors to incorporate factors such as disability and economic status through rigorous statistical modeling that controls for, and assesses the impact of, these student characteristics.<\/p>\n<p>Key Findings:\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Students in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program continue to outperform their public-school peers. Proficiency rates in private choice schools located in Milwaukee were about 14.30% higher in English\/Language Arts (ELA) and 14.18% higher in math on average than proficiency rates in traditional public schools in Milwaukee after controlling for demographic characteristics. These gaps are the largest in the years this report has been conducted.\u00a0\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>Statewide, private choice students outperform their public-school peers in ELA and math. Proficiency rates were about 8.57% higher in ELA and 5.42% higher in math for students participating in school choice statewide than traditional public-school students.\u00a0\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>Choice and charter schools have higher rates of academic growth than traditional public schools. Statewide, choice schools averaged 7.23 more growth points than traditional public schools. Charter schools averaged 1.94 more growth points.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Open Enrollment Rises Again: Wisconsin\u2019s largest school choice program is the public-school open enrollment program. This program allows students from one school district to transfer to another district that has open seats for the next school year. The program continues to gain in popularity, even as overall enrollment decreases.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<div class=\"et_pb_module et_pb_image et_pb_image_0\">\n<p>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"et_pb_image_wrap \"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"668\" height=\"466\" src=\"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-25-at-10.40.19-AM.png\" alt=\"\" title=\"Screenshot 2025-03-25 at 10.40.19 AM\" class=\"wp-image-42507\" \/><\/span>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n<div class=\"et_pb_module et_pb_text et_pb_text_1  et_pb_text_align_left et_pb_bg_layout_light\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_text_inner\">\n<p>Why These Findings Matter: Wisconsin is home to the oldest school choice program in the nation. It\u2019s critical that policy makers understand how choice schools perform while accounting for the fact that they often take on students from underserved communities.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>This year\u2019s report also comes after months of controversy surrounding the Department of Public Instruction for lowering standards to hide what we believe are underperforming schools.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Read more:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/will-law.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/ApplestoApples202553.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" data-link-type=\"web\">Apples to Apples 2025 Report<\/a>, March 2025<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"et_pb_column et_pb_column_1_4 et_pb_column_1  et_pb_css_mix_blend_mode_passthrough et-last-child\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_module et_pb_team_member et_pb_team_member_0 clearfix  et_pb_text_align_center et_pb_bg_layout_light\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_team_member_image et-waypoint et_pb_animation_off\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"617\" height=\"980\" src=\"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/WILL_Flanders_Color_002_WEB_980x617_100ppi_Sharpened.jpg\" alt=\"Will Flanders, PHD\" class=\"wp-image-9280\" \/><\/div>\n<div class=\"et_pb_team_member_description\">\n<h4 class=\"et_pb_module_header\">Will Flanders, PHD<\/h4>\n<p class=\"et_pb_member_position\">Research Director<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Flanders@will-law.org<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https:\/\/will-law.org\/on-apples-to-apples-assessment-private-and-charter-schools-outperform-their-public-counterparts\/\">On \u2018Apples to Apples\u2019 Assessment, Private and Charter Schools Outperform their Public Counterparts<\/a> appeared first on <a href=\"https:\/\/will-law.org\">Wisconsin Institute for Law &amp; Liberty<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This post originally appeared at https:\/\/will-law.org\/on-apples-to-apples-assessment-private-and-charter-schools-outperform-their-public-counterparts\/ The News: The Wisconsin Institute for Law &amp; Liberty&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":15894,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15892","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-will"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15892","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15892"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15892\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15896,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15892\/revisions\/15896"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15894"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15892"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15892"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15892"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}