Rep. Hudgins attacked public charter school, even as one opened in his district
On October 10, 2017, Rep. Zach Hudgins (D-11th District, Tukwila) sent out a prickly and ill-humored e-mail attacking public charter schools. It was part of a years-long effort by some lawmakers and the WEA union to get every charter school in the state shut down.
This past fall, however, the state supreme court ruled charter schools are part of the “general and uniform system of public schools,” ending, probably forever, the WEA union’s effort to get the courts to close down charters. The justices said charter school families are entitled to receive public funding, since they are part of the same statewide public education program as other schools.
Nevertheless, Rep Hudgins’ and other charter school opponents keep raising the same false claims: that charter schools take money from traditional schools (they don't); that charter schools are not accountable to the public (they are accountable); that charter schools “cream” only the best students (they don't, they take mostly underserved children); that charter schools do not serve English Language Learners (ELL) and special needs students (they do, a high proportion of charter families have ELL and special needs children); and that charter schools are no more effective than traditional schools (they are, particularly in urban communities with failing traditional schools).
Public charter schools are popular with parents and the broader public. Today in Washington state there are 12 public charter schools, serving 3,500 mostly low-income, minority students.
One, Impact Puget Sound Elementary (PSE), just opened in Rep. Hudgins’ 11th District. Impact PSE serves a full complement of eager 168 kindergarteners and first-graders, and will soon expand to a full K-5 school. These local families may not know that their own state representative voted to close their school.
The state supreme court has now dismissed the naysayers, and it looks like charter schools are here to stay. Now charter school families just need access to equal funding, but that’s a topic for another day.
