Factors that influence parents to choose charter schools
Abstract
In recent years the call for school reform has become a rapidly progressing movement of parents, students and whole communities seeking change in the way that students are being educated. Charter schools have emerged nationwide seemingly as the answer to mounting criticism of the traditional public school offering, as school stakeholders seek more educational choices for primary and secondary students. The emergence of charter schools in Indiana followed the call of the Evansville community to create a school with specialized curriculum for all. The success of this initial charter school as a nationally recognized high school is often imitated. The chosen Northwest Indiana study site is a charter school with a specialized curriculum focused on meeting the needs of any student applicant. This quantitative study uses questionnaire data from 61% of the chosen Northwest Indiana Charter School families. The study explores the parental perspectives about the school while comparing their satisfaction level with the charter school to that of past educational settings that their children have attended. The study further breaks down the influences that may drive a parent to select the charter school as their educational site of choice. The questionnaire response data was used to create a parent profile to describe in depth the demographic characteristics of parents who select the charter option. The study finds sufficient evidence that the charter school phenomena at this site can be attributed to like characteristics in the responding families rather than to differences based on income or race/ethnicity. There are not significant differences in satisfaction when the data is stratified using income and ethnicity characteristic factors. The study does find significant differences in satisfaction between the charter school and the student's previous school setting.
Degree
Ph.D.
Advisors
McInerney, Purdue University.
Subject Area
School administration
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