Critics see problems in New York City charter study.

Critics see problems in New York City charter study. A REPORT ISSUED BY THE NEW York City New York City:see New York, city. New York CityCity (pop., 2000: 8,008,278), southeastern New York, at the mouth of the Hudson River. The largest city in the U.S. Charter Schools EvaluationProject in September, and since been held up as clear evidence thatcharter schools are doing a better job than traditional schools, is nowfacing criticism that its claim of being an "apples to apples"study just isn't true. The report, How New York New York, state, United StatesNew York,Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of City's Charter Schools AffectAchievement, examines the performance of students who applied foropenings in New York's charter schools, which are 94 percent filledthrough random lotteries. When researchers compared the academicperformance of those who were "lotteried in" with those whowere "lotteried out," they discovered a higher rate ofachievement in the charter group. Critics claim the report does not take into account the "peereffect," whereby a child learns not only from teachers but fromfellow students. Writing in Edwize, a blog sponsored by New York'sUnited Federation of Teachers, Jonathan Gyurko says, "Charterschools benefit from the fact that 100 percent of their students hailfrom motivated families; as a result, a charter student is surrounded bypeers who are there by choice--rather than by attendance zone." Alexander Hoffman, writing in GothamSchools, an online news sourceabout the New York City public schools, says the report is flawedbecause, in contrast to a medical study, it has no placebo group. Bothgroups--students in charter schools and students in traditionalschools--know what kind of education they are getting. "I know frommy own experience teaching that students who get their choice of schoolstake a bit more ownership," Hoffman says. "If they get theirsecond choice, or last choice, or somehow do not get their choice,that's a big hurdle for their teachers and parents toovercome." [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Led by well-known school choice advocate Caroline Hoxby Caroline Minter Hoxby is a labor economist whose research focuses on issues in education. She is one of only 24 Harvard College Professors[1] (a distinction awarded for excellence in undergraduate teaching) and is the Allie S. of StanfordUniversity Stanford University,at Stanford, Calif.; coeducational; chartered 1885, opened 1891 as Leland Stanford Junior Univ. (still the legal name). The original campus was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted. David Starr Jordan was its first president. , the researchers claim that since these two groups wereessentially the same--both comprised of students who sought admission tocharter schools--they were able to make a comparison in which wherestudents were educated, charter school or traditional school, was theonly variable. Among the report's findings: * Charter school students are more likely to be black and to bepoor than the average student in a traditional school. * Compared to lotteried-out students, students in a charter highschool increase their Regents examination scores three points for eachyear they are in the charter school before taking the exam. * Students in charter schools from kindergarten kindergarten[Ger.,=garden of children], system of preschool education. Friedrich Froebel designed (1837) the kindergarten to provide an educational situation less formal than that of the elementary school but one in which children's creative play instincts would be through grade 8close about 86 percent of the "Scarsdale-Harlem achievementgap"--a measure of performance differences between students inwealthy suburbs and students in low-income urban neighborhoods--in mathand 66 percent of the gap in English.