Two SABIS® charter schools ranked among the “Best High Schools" in the U.S.

April 26, 2013: Once again, U.S. News and World Report has ranked two SABIS® schools in the U.S. amongst the best high schools in the country.

The SABIS® International Charter School in Springfield, Massachusetts, and the International Academy of Flint in Flint, Michigan, received silver and bronze medal rankings, respectively, according to the “Best High Schools Ranking” for 2013.

To produce the 2013 Best High Schools rankings, U.S. News teamed up with the Washington D.C.-based American Institutes for Research (AIR), one of the largest behavioral and social science research organizations in the world. Over 21,000 public high schools in 49 states and the District of Columbia were analyzed and ranked based on a 3-step process.

First, each school’s student performance was analyzed to see if they were performing better than statistically expected for an average student in the state.

Second, results of each school’s least-advantaged students (African-American, Hispanic, and low-income) were analyzed to determine performance better than average for the same demographics in the state.

Third, and finally, the school’s College Readiness Index (CRI) was calculated based on the number of students who took at least one AP or IB test before or during their senior year, divided by the number of 12th graders for that year.

Among the 32 charter schools recognized in Massachusetts, SABIS® International ranked 7th, with a CRI of 21.3. The school, which is a perennial award winner, was ranked 1,729th nationally. Of the charter schools in Massachusetts to make the list, 6 received gold, SABIS® International received the only silver award, and 25 received a bronze ranking.

“We are very pleased to have been recognized for this award again in 2013,” said Ms. Karen Reuter, SABIS® International's School Director. “Credit goes to the SABIS® Educational System, a dedicated faculty and staff, and our amazing students, who overcome some big roadblocks to achieve success.”

In the SABIS® member school in Flint, Michigan, news of the release of the U.S. News rankings was received with an equal amount of enthusiasm. The International Academy of Flint was listed among the bronze medal winners. The school ranked 8th among the 77 charter schools in Michigan that made the Best High Schools list. The International Academy was founded in 1999 and currently enrolls 1,196 students in grades K-12. Ninety (90) percent of the school's students are minorities and 86% are from economically-disadvantaged families.

“The International Academy of Flint has made this list in 6 of the last 7 years,” said Ms. Traci Cormier, the International Academy's School Director. “We are proud to count it among our accomplishments and look forward to an even higher ranking in the future.”

SABIS® International and International Academy both implement the proven SABIS® Educational System, a comprehensive educational program that prepares students with a solid academic foundation and the skills needed to achieve success in a changing world.

To view the two SABIS® schools’ U.S. News and World Report listing, visit http://bit.ly/15EH0f9 (International Academy) and http://bit.ly/14N7Ima (SABIS® International). To learn more about the SABIS® Educational System, visit www.sabis.net or www.sabis.net/licensing.

Lift cap on urban charters in Massachusetts

April 25, 2013

By Nina Rees and Gerard Robinson

As former federal and state government education officials, we continue to be impressed by the performance of Massachusetts charter public schools. But we can’t help but wonder how a state that has opened some of the country’s highest-performing charters has failed to lift the cap on the number of urban schools that can open. Taking this simple step would create extraordinary new opportunities for families to benefit from the charter school experience.

A new Stanford University study confirms that charter schools are a smashing success in Massachusetts. The study, from Stanford’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes, finds that Boston charter schools are doing more to close achievement gaps than any other group of public schools in the country.

The typical Boston charter student gains the equivalent of more than 12 months of additional learning annually in reading and 13 months of greater progress in math. Statewide, charter school students gain the equivalent of one-and-a-half more months of learning per year in reading and two-and-a- half more months in math.

The Stanford study comes four years after a Boston Foundation report found that Boston charter schools dramatically outperformed both district and pilot schools. The academic impact from a year spent in a Boston charter was comparable to that of a year spent in one of the city’s elite exam schools and, in middle school math, equivalent to one-half of the achievement gap between black and white students.

MCAS results tell a similar story. In 2012, 20 charter schools, including many urban charters, finished first in the commonwealth on various tests. Many inner-city charter schools are outperforming even affluent suburban schools.

In February, the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education approved five more charter schools. But that isn’t nearly enough when many more high-quality charters are being proposed and over one-third of the students in urban Massachusetts public schools are still failing MCAS exams.

Just look at some of the charter applications the board turned down. One was from the founders of Boston’s Edward W. Brooke charter schools. One of the existing Brooke schools was among the urban charters earning the commonwealth’s best MCAS scores (in fourth-grade English and math and eighth-grade English). A second Edward Brooke school ranked number one in fifth grade English and math on the commonwealth’s growth model, which measures improvement in academic performance over time.

Another proposal that was rejected came from the founders of Everett’s Pioneer Charter School of Science, which topped the growth model for the eighth-grade English MCAS test. So was an application for the International Charter School of Brockton, a city that has no charters despite being among the school districts that performs in the bottom 10 percent statewide on MCAS.

The Brockton school would have been operated by SABIS, an educational management company. The company’s Springfield school dramatically outperforms the surrounding district and has been chosen as one of the nation’s top high schools by Newsweek and US News and World Report. Every member of all 12 of the school’s graduating classes has been accepted to college.

Two more schools would have been operated by graduates of the prestigious Building Excellent Schools fellowship. Fellows spend a year learning how to design, fund and lead a charter school. The program’s graduates have started over 50 schools in more than 20 cities serving nearly 20,000 students. They have a proven track record of closing achievement gaps, but none of their schools are here in Massachusetts, where the program is based.

A bill pending in the state Legislature would make it easier for urban Massachusetts families to benefit from schools like the ones recently turned down by the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education. The bill would eliminate the cap on how many students can enroll in charter schools in districts that rank in the bottom 10 percent statewide. More than 250,000 students — about 30 percent of the commonwealth’s total public school enrollment — attend schools in these districts.

With each study of Massachusetts charter public school performance, more anti-charter arguments fall by the wayside. The evidence of their success is overwhelming and the time has come to make the educational opportunity they represent available to many more of the commonwealth’s neediest families.

Nina Rees is president and chief executive officer of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools. Gerard Robinson is a former state education official in Virginia and Florida, and a member of Pioneer Institute’s Center for School Reform Advisory Board.

http://www.telegram.com/article/20130425/NEWS/104259839/1020/opinion

Boston Herald Editorial: Lesson in fairness

Boston Herald editorial staff
Thursday, February 14, 2013

The debate over charter schools has returned to Brockton, the scene of an unfortunate political battle over a charter school proposal back in 2008. The Patrick administration won that round by meddling in the application process. The administration has an opportunity now to prove the process is free of any improper political influence.

A group that includes former Brockton Mayor John Yunits has applied for a charter to open the International Charter School of Brockton, and plans to contract with Sabis, a for-profit company that runs successful charter schools in Springfield and Holyoke, to run it. Brockton is the only so-called “Gateway City” in the commonwealth without a charter school.

That distinction is thanks in part to former Education Secretary Paul Reville who back in 2008 quashed a similar application for a school in Brockton to be run by Sabis — against the recommendation of the commissioner of elementary and secondary education whose staff vetted the application and recommended it for approval.

Reville has moved on. His replacement? Matthew Malone,
who as superintendent of schools in Brockton until late last year helped lead the fight against the very charter application that is now pending. Just a few weeks before Patrick appointed him education secretary Malone proclaimed that Brockton doesn’t need a charter school and according to the Brockton Enterprise called the current application “an embarrassment.”

Malone will stay out of the final Brockton decision. And of course it is the default position of superintendents to fight charter schools that they (disingenuously) claim will “drain” money from district schools. As Patrick’s right hand on education matters he may now be singing a different tune, given the administration’s support for (limited) expansion of charter schools.

That tune should be that charter school applications — whether it’s this one in Brockton, or any of the others currently pending — must be evaluated strictly on the merits and according to the requirements of state law, and without interference by political appointees who see any particular advantage in the outcome.

Source URL: http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/opinion/editorials/2013/02/lesson_in_fairness

Give Brockton students a choice

By Jim Stergios
Executive Director

Jim Stergios

Pioneer Institute

The state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education’s vote later this month on a new set of charter school proposals is an opportunity to give thousands of Massachusetts kids access to a great school. The list of proposed charters includes the following schools in cities outside of Greater Boston:

• Argosy Collegiate Charter School in Fall River
• the replication of Boston's successful City on a Hill Charter Public School in New Bedford
• the replication of Springfield and Holyoke's successful SABIS charter model in Brockton (the International Charter School of Brockton)
• the replication of Chelsea's successful Phoenix Charter Academy in Springfield, and
• YouthBuild Charter Academy in Lawrence

In the Greater Boston area, there are also two charter proposals, replications of the Pioneer Charter School of Science to serve Saugus-Peabody-Lynn-Danvers-Salem and to serve Woburn-Stoneham-Medford-Melrose-Wakefield.

Several other charters are also asking for increases in grade levels served. Most of these charter applications come as a result of the 2010 education reform law that increased the percentage of students within poorly performing districts that can attend charters from 9 to 18 percent.

Over the next few days, I'd like to share a few videos of the charter proponents explaining the reason they are seeking to create new schools. Today's video is of Jose Afonso of SABIS International explaining the genesis of the application to create a K-12 school in Brockton.



The International Charter School of Brockton is to be operated by SABIS, an educational management company that runs highly successful charters in Springfield and Holyoke. Its Springfield school has been rated by both Newsweek and US News & World Report as one of the nation’s top high schools.

Those arguing against the new Brockton school, such as the district administrators, say Brockton doesn’t need a charter school. The fact is, however, that Brockton's MCAS scores rank in the bottom 10 percent statewide. While the city’s high school has seen modest improvement, performance in its elementary and middle schools has actually worsened since 2009.

In addition to dramatically better MCAS scores, the SABIS International School of Springfield’s 2011 graduation rate was over 90 percent; Brockton’s was less than 70 percent. In the 12 years that SABIS Springfield has had a graduating class, every graduate has been accepted to college.

As in Brockton, low-income and minority students make up the majority of SABIS Springfield’s students. Graduation rates for SABIS’ low-income, special needs, and minority students also exceed Brockton’s.

There is another reason for the new Secretary of Education Matt Malone and the Board of Education to approve this application that was cited by the Boston Globe editorial board for "jettisoning SABIS" and in the process
abandon[ing] minority families in more than a dozen communities. SABIS is one of the few educational systems in the state where minority students not only perform on par with white students, but outperform them, as well.

It went on to encourage SABIS "to come back" with another proposal, closing with the statement: "But the proposal should find a home in the Brockton area."

Last year, again, the Globe editorial pages chimed in support of SABIS' (successful) application to create a new charter school in Lowell.

The editorial page is absolutely right. And there is yet an additional reason to approve the SABIS application, besides the possibilities it opens up for Brockton students: It is an opportunity to rehabilitate the severely tarnished charter school approval process.

Massachusetts’ charter approval process, once considered a national model, has in recent years become politicized. A now-famous midnight e-mail from former Education Secretary Paul Reville cited political pressures in asking the state education commissioner to “see his way clear” to approve a Gloucester charter application, even though it didn’t meet the commonwealth’s rigorous criteria.

A Superior Court judge wrote that there was “considerable evidence” “the Board and the Commissioner blatantly ignored and violated state law” by approving the Gloucester charter for political reasons. The commonwealth’s Inspector General called the process by which the school was approved “defective.” Less than three years later, the state is closing the poorly performing school.

Mischief with the charter approval process has also prevented good schools from opening—and that is what the Board of Education can make right this year. In 2008, again because of political pressure, Mr. Reville persuaded the board to reject a proposed charter school in Brockton. It was the first time a charter proposal endorsed by the commissioner had ever been rejected by the board.

SABIS is back with an improved Brockton application, hoping the process will not be rigged this time.

Brockton officials are out in force, and this is a big test for the man who succeeded Secretary Reville last month, Matt Malone. Mr. Malone, until his move to become the new Secretary of Education for the Commonwealth, had been serving as the Brockton school superintendent. And, yes, he was very much involved, up until his departure, in whipping up anti-charter sentiment.

As always, district administrators will raise a hue and cry over money. Funding follows students from district to charter schools, but changes in the commonwealth’s charter funding formula reimburse districts are over a six-year period. Ultimately, districts receive more than double their money for every child selecting a charter school. Districts can no longer make the money argument with a straight face.

As the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education prepares to vote on a new group of charter schools, it should answer one simple question: Why should the options of children in one of the commonwealth’s worst-performing districts be limited to a modestly improving high school and elementary and middle schools whose already poor performance is only getting worse?

Crossposted at Pioneer's blog. Follow me on twitter at @jimstergios, or visit Pioneer's website.

Seasons Greetings and Best Wishes for the New Year filled with Warmth and Blessed by Peace

Brockton residents, officials show up to support or oppose charter school

Jenn Pham, SABIS graduate speaks in support of SABIS charter proposal

Enterprise News
December 19, 2012
By Alex Bloom
Enterprise Staff Writer

BROCKTON — Many local residents passionately defended the city’s schools as state officials considered both sides of a debate to open a charter school in Brockton.

More than 100 supporters and detractors of a plan to open a 1,200-student charter school turned out for a public hearing to comment on the proposal, which needs the approval of the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education.

Brockton High School Senior Lidia DeBarros, 18, was moved to tears defending the high school’s English Language Learner curriculum, which helped her learn English in less than a year-and-a-half after she arrived from Cape Verde.

DeBarros left the program and achieved top scores on MCAS tests, and is now looking at colleges.

“It taught me so much in so little time and these teachers still help me everyday,” DeBarros said.

Mayor Linda Balzotti, chairwoman of the School Committee, spoke passionately against the proposal, saying that it would pull top students out of city schools. She said Brockton is a place where education is a priority and leaders are focused on improving learning at all levels.

“In Brockton, we get it,” Balzotti said. “We know we have challenges to overcome, but we work together to meet those challenges head-on.”

Two board members and the state’s deputy education commissioner listened for two hours to dozens of speakers discussing the charter, which would be managed by the private, for-profit SABIS Educational Systems Inc. Local legislators joined many city councilors and School Committee members at the hearing.

Former Mayor John T. Yunits, who is part of the nine-member board of directors seeking to bring the charter school to Brockton, saw firsthand the achievements of SABIS in its Springfield school. He said the school, which will have students between kindergarten and eighth grade, would serve a population that mirrors the population in city schools.

“They agreed with me that if they came to Brockton it would be a complete lottery,” Yunits said. “There would be no differentiation.”

He had the support of at-large City Councilor Jass Stewart, a two-time mayoral candidate, who talked about his childhood experience in Dallas with mandatory busing that allowed him to get into a talented-and-gifted program.

“Frankly, anytime there is credible choice on the table, I will always be pro-choice,” Stewart said.

In 2008, the state board voted to reject a similar proposal, which also would have been contracted with SABIS.

Jose Afonso, director of U.S. Business Development for SABIS, said that the meeting’s speakers did not accurately describe his company’s record. He said SABIS does good work at schools in Holyoke and Springfield, where at-risk students are learning.

“Closing the achievement gap is an area that we’re very proud of,” Afonso said.

But the majority of speakers spoke out against the charter proposal, including John Condon, the city’s chief financial officer. Condon described how the charter school would impact funding. Condon responded to Afonso, who pointed out that Brockton is the state’s only Gateway City without a traditional charter school.

“I would submit that that is a a credit to the city – not a problem,” Condon said. “The reason it is a credit to the city is I don’t believe a charter school is necessary in Brockton.”

Parent Tammy DeAndrade talked about how the new charter could hurt Cape Verdean students. The city’s schools have recruited staff to specifically help the city’s large Cape Verdean population, she said.

“The services provided by these programs for the Cape Verdean community will not be provided in the SABIS schools,” DeAndrade said.

The board will vote in February on the charter proposal.

Boston Globe Editorial in 2008 denouncing the rejection of the SABIS Brockton charter application

The achievement gap wins one

EDITORIAL March 10, 2008

THE TOP priority for state education officials in 2008 is to close the academic achievement gap between white and minority students. But given a chance to do so last month, the state Board of Education retreated.

The Feb. 26 meeting of the nine-member board was a litmus test on charter schools. Charter supporters feared that the Patrick administration might shy away from approving additional charters, which operate independently of local school boards and teachers' unions. Local superintendents have complained bitterly about the loss of funding when their students decamped. Charter school backers held their breath. They exhaled only when the board voted to approve three of their four applications.

But it was a hollow victory. The one school that got shot down - the International Charter School of Southeastern Massachusetts - was the largest and boldest. Its rejection raises thorny questions about just how hard the Patrick administration is willing to push to achieve equity in education. This is an immediate challenge for the new secretary of education and the three new board appointees whom Patrick is expected to name soon.

The losing application came from a group of local educators, business leaders, and parents seeking to open a K-12 school in the Brockton area for 1,300 students. The founders proposed to contract for curriculum, training, and testing with the Minnesota-based SABIS Educational System, which operates a similar-sized charter school in Springfield.

From the start, the Brockton effort faced big hurdles: resistance from powerful school politicians; suspicion of SABIS, a for-profit entity; and concerns about the education management company's commitment to special-needs students in its Springfield operation. Acting Commissioner Jeffrey Nellhaus recommended approval of the SABIS proposal, but Board of Education chairman Paul Reville voiced sharp concerns. And the board listened to Reville, rejecting the Brockton SABIS school by a 7-2 vote.

But when the board jettisoned SABIS, it also unintentionally abandoned minority families in more than a dozen communities. SABIS is one of the few educational systems in the state where minority students not only perform on par with white students, but outperform them, as well. That accomplishment, combined with the fact that there is little charter school activity in Southeastern Massachusetts, should have balanced out other concerns with the application.

By high school, minority students in Massachusetts lag their white counterparts by more than 30 percentage points in math and English on the state's high-stakes Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System test. But that is not the case at the Springfield SABIS school, where 94 percent of black 10th graders and 84 percent of Hispanics scored in the proficient or advanced categories on the English section of the 2007 MCAS. That compares with 77 percent of white students statewide. In math, the school's minority students are catching up nicely to their white counterparts. The board erred when it rejected an opportunity for minority students to traverse the gap that swallows so many.

Touchy-feely? Not SABIS 
SABIS, an international company that operates 50 schools in 14 countries, isn't warm or fuzzy. The school stresses core subjects and tests relentlessly. Teachers work from weekly lesson plans that require each student to master specific skills and concepts before moving on to the next section. Good classroom participation, attitude, and homework diligence won't move a student forward unless he or she also tests well. And the proposed 7 1/2 hour school day leaves plenty of time for intensive tutoring.

Some educators dismiss the SABIS system of revisiting concepts and repeating exercises as "drill and kill." It doesn't suit everyone. Charter schools in Somerville and Foxborough adopted and later rejected the SABIS system. But it remains an effective way to get struggling students up to grade level. This army has plenty of volunteers. The 1,500-student SABIS school in Springfield has a waiting list of 2,677, the longest of any of the 61 charter schools in the state, according to the state's Charter School Association.

Board chairman Reville says SABIS shortchanged its special-needs children in Springfield. SABIS was out of compliance with certain special education requirements. But a Department of Education document noted that corrective action had been taken by 2006. Reville also points to the proprietary status of SABIS's trademarked weekly lesson plans and testing modules, calling them a possible "violation of the charter school law," which requires charters to serve as replicable models for district schools. It's a legitimate concern. But the best answer may be to lease SABIS materials and methods for the state's chronically underperforming schools instead of walling out the company. And state education officials don't appear to have a better strategy for rescuing its failing schools.

SABIS is asking the board to reconsider. It's unlikely. Members are loath to disrupt the Brockton school system, which makes exceptional efforts on behalf of students. Randolph, which might also find its students attracted by the SABIS option, is suffering from budget cuts and declining enrollment. Politically, SABIS might be wise to come back with a smaller proposal for, say, 750 students. But the proposal should find a home in the Brockton area. At the end of the school day, results, not intentions, are what matters.

Editorial: State should lift cap on new charter schools

A college fair held at SABIS International Charter School

By The Republican Editorials  on December 08, 2012

SABIS charter school in Springfield touted as a case for lifting the charter school cap in Massachusetts

Once viewed as an experiment, the charter-school movement has demonstrated its success as an education model that, in most cases, works extremely well – especially in urban communities where many public schools are classified as “underperforming.”

The charter-school story in Massachusetts provides ample illustration that it is possible to bridge the stubborn achievement gap between urban and suburban students. SABIS International – the first publicly funded charter school in Springfield – is a case in point. SABIS students placed in the top 25 percent among all schools in the state on the English and math MCAS test and outscored their peers at Springfield’s public schools by a margin of 30 percent.

SABIS is one of four existing charter schools in the city including Martin Luther King Jr. Charter School of Excellence, New Leadership Charter School and the Veritas Preparatory Academy, which opened in late August.

Two more charters – the Springfield Collegiate Charter School, designed to emphasize literacy, character development and college preparation, and the Phoenix Charter Academy, designed to serve at-risk high school students or drop outs – are poised to open in the city. We welcome the new charters, and we hope that the current cap on new charters, which was recently expanded, will be lifted again.

Enthusiasm for the new charter schools was evident last week during a hearing on the proposals in Springfield held by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. More than two dozens speakers, including business leaders and parents, urged support for the new charters and the innovative curricula they will offer.

While charter schools are not a panacea, the advantages they offer are helping failing urban students experience success. Unlike traditional public schools, charter schools have more flexibility over curriculum design, length of the school day and the hiring and firing of teachers. Of course, like all public schools, charters must prove their worth to the students and communities they serve.

On the whole, charter schools across the state are proving their worth by turning out students with higher test scores. It’s time to lift the cap to enable more urban students a chance at academic success.

Brockton school leaders debate pros and cons of charter school’s effect on funding

Brockton Enterprise
Decemeber 13, 2012

State Board of Education to host forum on proposal on Tuesday afternoon
BROCKTON —

Local educators disagree with charter school supporters on the impact a proposed charter school in Brockton would have on public school students.

Residents can tell the state Board of Education how they feel about the proposal at a 4 p.m. hearing on Tuesday at the main branch of the Brockton Public Library on Main Street.

The proposal to create the International Charter School of Brockton – backed by former Mayor John T. Yunits – has the school opening in 2014 with 500 students and expanding to 1,200 over a few years. Its location has not been determined.

If the charter school gets approved, state funds for education will be redirected from the Brockton Public Schools to the charter school for the students it educates.

“The financial impact on the district is always overstated by the district,” said Dominic Slowey, spokesman for the Massachusetts Charter Public School Association. “The state provides a healthy amount of reimbursement for money that gets transferred to charter.”

School district officials counter that a charter school would peel off Brockton’s top performing regular education students, leaving the district to foot the bill for expensive special education offerings as well as programs for non-English speaking students.

“If we were to have a lottery and they could only get what we gave them, that’s a whole different ball game,” said Aldo Petronio, the school district’s executive director of financial services.

Slowey pointed out that districts do not get money for students who leave for private schools, students who move to other communities, or for students who leave the country.

Brockton spent $12,540 per pupil in 2010-2011, according to the most recent numbers from the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. There were no figures immediately available on how much money would be taken from the Brockton public school budget for students who enroll at the proposed charter school.

But by way of comparison, Springfield’s SABIS International Charter, serving kindergarten through 12th grade, has 1,562 Springfield students this year, and receives $15.9 million of the district’s funds.

Here are some issues being debated about the proposal.

Regular education: If a student moves from a school district to a charter school, funding follows the student.

In the first year of the switch, a public school district receives 100 percent reimbursement per student for the money. The district then receives 25 percent reimbursement per student for the following five years.

“For six years the districts are getting money from the state for students they are no longer educating,” Slowey said.

But, Petronio said the slow departure of students to a charter school would not be enough to close an entire public school, meaning there would be less funding to operate the same number of buildings.

Special education: Slowey said that statewide, charters are starting to educate an increased number of special education students. Slowey estimated that about 12-15 percent of the 29,411 charter school students were special education students. Brockton had about 13 percent of its students as part of special education in 2011-2012.

“We’re not that far off from the district,” Slowey said.

Transportation: Depending on the location of the proposed school, Brockton may need to contract buses to transport charter school students. The district contracts buses at about $50,000 per bus.

Alex Bloom may be reached at abloom@enterprisenews.com.