What Do Parents Think of Their Children’s Schools What Do Parents Think of Their Children’s Schools? EdNext Poll Compares Charter, District, and Private Schools Nationwide Samuel Barrows, Paul E. Peterson, and Martin R. West Program on Education Policy and Governance Harvard University December 13, 2016 Eliminate the funny enclosure

2016 EdNext Parents Survey Oversampled parents in the charter, district, and private school sectors as part of the nationally representative EdNext Survey conducted online by Knowledge Networks in May-June 2016 774 district-school parents 428 private-school parents 317 charter-school parents Sample weights used to match parent oversample to known characteristics of population with school-age children Together with companion study by Cheng and Peterson, provides the first nationally representative picture of parental perceptions across charter, district, and private sectors

College Graduates, High Income, Homeowners Charter parents are less likely to be . . . College Graduates, High Income, Homeowners

African American or Hispanic Charter parents more likely to be … African American or Hispanic

More charter parents live in. . . Urban areas, West

Comparing Parental Perceptions Satisfaction: 8 questions about aspects of school quality on a 5-point scale (very dissatisfiedvery satisfied) Problems: 7 questions about potential problems in school on a 3-point scale (not seriousvery serious) Communications: 6 questions about frequency of communications during past year on 4-point scale (none5 or more times) We report raw responses but control for differences in parental background characteristics when testing the statistical significance of differences across sectors

Charter parents more satisfied than District parents, less satisfied than Private parents Fly in bars here

Smaller differences across sectors in satisfaction with facilities, diversity, location Fly in bars here

Fewer Charter parents than District parents identify serious problems with social disruption in their child’s school Fly in bars here

Fewer Charter parents than District parents report problems with racial conflict and ability mixing, but many Charter parents see a lack of extracurriculars as a serious problem Fly in bars here

Charter parents report more frequent communication about some issues than District or Private parents Fly in bars here

Charter parents report more frequent communication about some issues than District or Private parents Fly in bars here

Summary Charter parents are more satisfied with their schools than District parents, but less satisfied than Private parents Fewer charter parents than district parents report serious problems with social disruption in their school, but more charter parents see a lack of extracurriculars as a concern Communications with parents appear to be more extensive in the charter sector than in the district or private sector Limitations: Perceptions may not reflect reality Can’t rule out possibility that differences reflect parent characteristics Limited sample size prevents examination of differences in perceptions by subgroup