Waiting lists to enter North Carolina’s charter schools grow longer every day, but despite the growing demand, the supply of charter schools remains limited to 100 across the state by the General Assembly.

The Blue Ribbon Commission on Charter Schools recently suggested that legislators increase the cap by six charters each year. More charters could be authorized if charter students perform well on standardized tests. While many charter advocates consider the recommendation encouraging, the panel has also recommended cracking down on poor-performing charter schools. State officials have already begun that process.

Critics have avoided clarifying why they do not consider charter schools’ overall results to be “innovative.” Charter schools have matched district schools’ results. But charter schools have proved they can produce competitive results without the assets their competition claims are needed. Charters receive far less taxpayer funding; they employ fewer certified teacher; and they operate, allegedly, with inadequate racial diversity — which their critics contend enhances the learning environment.

On the other hand, supporters of charters believe that results speak for themselves. Despite failing to distinguish between targeted charter schools, which serve at-risk students, from untargeted charter schools, which serve general populations, the N.C. Center for Public Policy Research reported that charters performed basically as well as the state’s traditional schools. Not only did the report fail to consider the two categories of charter schools, it also failed to account for the short time that some charters had been operating. Consequently, advocates of charters say the report highlights charter failures, not charter successes.

The skeptics of charter schools, such as Eddie Davis and Sheri Strickland of the N.C. Association of Educators, have expressed a wait-and-see approach to charters’ results. However, advocates believe charters have already proved what these critics are still waiting to see. Charter schools are adapting to and overcoming the traditional environment of public education. They are improvising and accomplishing more with fewer resources than traditional schools.

Advocates point to the administrative bureaucracy that encumbers traditional schools. Charters are designed to eliminate the inefficiency of that system. Principal John Betterton of Bethel Hill Charter School in Roxboro, values his schools self-sufficiency so much that when asked whether he would forfeit any autonomy for more funding, he said, “Not a chance.” BHCS is a North Carolina “school of excellence.”

Betterton also pointed out that he furnished the entire school with desks, chairs, and tables for $300. “Are the district schools doing that?” he asked. Betterton’s ability to maximize the value of a dollar has earned him the nickname Yard Dog from parents, because he constantly looks to salvage whatever he finds at yard sales.

Roger Gerber, director of The League of Charter Schools, said the state has not lived up to its end of the bargain, though. The state uses No Child Left Behind to regulate and rein-in charters, he said.

“By capping the number of charters and imposing more regulations, bureaucrats make it difficult for charters to truly compete,” Gerber said. He acknowledged that not all charters have the best philosophies. But, he said, “Unlike traditional schools, parents are free to remove their children at any time. [Charters are] more about quantifiable results and satisfying the client.”

Instead of exploring what charter schools are doing differently that enables them to compete with fewer assets, state officials and traditional school advocates continually charge that charters drain money from district schools and that uncertified teachers and unsatisfactory racial-diversity ratios plague charter schools.

Charter advocates do not agree. Denise Kent of Wake Forest’s Franklin Academy said charter schools receive money only for each student who is enrolled. “The argument boils down to whether one believes tax dollars should follow individual students or whether that money belongs to the districts,” Gerber said.

Charters’ results highlight reservations about the value of teacher certifications. Credible research supports claims that teacher certificates are insignificant. Professors from Harvard, Columbia, and Dartmouth expose the irrelevance of teacher certification in a report, Photo Finish. “Traditionally, states and districts have regulated teacher quality by focusing on initial qualifications. In writing the No Child Left Behind Act, Congress followed that same logic, requiring states to live up to the minimum hiring standards they have established. But is a highly qualified teacher more likely to be a highly effective teacher? Our results suggest not,” the report says.

No empirical evidence supports racial diversity enhancing learning, either. On the contrary, research by Harvard’s Ronald G. Fryer suggests the opposite. In “Acting White,” Fryer reveals that black students who do well academically in racially integrated schools face banishment and even violence from other blacks: “It’s less of a problem in the private sector and in predominantly black public schools.”

Lee Culpepper is a contributing editor of Carolina Journal.