Charter Board Membership in Post-Takeover Southern Cities: Transferring Reform Scripts Through Networks of Racialized Power

• In Event: Competing Influences: Governance, Unions, and Funding Mechanisms

Abstract

This paper investigates the relationship between charter authorization decisions and charter board memberships during the early years of the state takeover of New Orleans and Memphis public schools. We use data from charter applications to document charter board membership at proposed schools to elucidate what groups and social networks were privileged during the approval process in a takeover setting. We find initial patterns in authorized charter schools established in New Orleans were solidified into a racialized neoliberal reform script by the authorization decisions made in Memphis. In both localities, but especially in Memphis, authorizers preferred charter applicants with ties to CMOs and national reform organizations and boards which are less racially diverse, less local, and populated by business professionals.

Authors

• Amanda Lu, Stanford University

• Rachel Williams, University of California - Berkeley