Study Finds KIPP Schools Lose 15% of Students To Attrition EVERY YEAR

Well, this one way to keep the test scores up:

The Knowledge Is Power Program, a charter school network known for lifting the achievements of poor children through high standards and long hours of work, benefits from significant private funding and student attrition, a new study contends.

The study from researchers at Western Michigan University, to be released Thursday, estimated that KIPP schools receive more than $5,000 a year per pupil through private donations in addition to regular sources of public funding. It also found that about 15 percent of KIPP students leave the schools each year as they progress from sixth to eighth grades — and that those students often are not replaced.

Gary Miron, the study’s author, said KIPP schools in Washington and elsewhere often outperform regular public schools. “But they’re not doing it with the same students, and they’re not doing it with the same dollars,” he said.

Whether it's the KIPPsters, For Profit Geoffrey Canada's Harlem Children's Zone, Mistress Eva's Hedge Fund Charter School network or any of the other various charters around the country, the truth is that these schools are often NOT educating the same kinds of students with the same dollar amounts and whenever kids are problems either statistically or behaviorally, they are counseled out or just dumped.

This is NOT a strategy to improve public education across the nation.

Now if only the putz in the White House would realize this.