Research Reports

The SCSC partnered with WestEd to identify and document effective academic, operational, and fiscal practices used in charter schools across the state. It aims to produce practical guidance that is both evidence-based and context-specific. Findings from the study will be shared through practitioner-oriented channels and populate a searchable online resource for school leaders and teachers. This study is designed to support activities proposed under the state’s US Department of Education Charter Schools Program State Entity Grant (CSP SE Grant) to identify and disseminate charter school best practices. 

Ongoing

Annually the SCSC uses a value-added model to assess school performance. However, the COIVD pandemic presented challenges to using normal performance metrics. Specifically, due to school closures, state standardized assessments were not administered. Traditionally, a value-added model is based on test score growth between adjacent years. The absence of 2019-2020 test scores requires that the value-added score be calculated over a two-year period (i.e. growth from 2018-2019 to 2020-2021), referred to as a “gap-year VAM”. The report summarizes the modified methodology and highlights the related growth of state charters for the 2020-2021 school year.

Published: September 2022

The SCSC commissioned Georgia State University’s Center for State and Local Finance to analyze the economic impact of Georgia’s start-up charter schools on their communities. The research team broke the research questions down into four separate reports below.

To better understand the virtual charter landscape, including the types of students who attend virtual schools and are likely to be successful in a virtual educational environment, the SCSC contracted with Public Impact and the National Association of Charter School Authorizers to conduct an in-depth scan of the performance trends of online charter schools.

Published: February 2015

To support the establishment of strong start-up charter schools in Georgia and beyond, the SCSC commissioned researchers at Vanderbilt University's Peabody College to investigate best practices commonly found among successful start-up charter schools. This report summarizes findings from a study of charter schools in three states and interviews with organizations that support new charter schools through technical assistance, training, and resources in 11 states.

Published: September 2014