Rhetorical Analysis: Charter Schools, A Reaction To The Failing Public Education System

The Truth About Charter Schools

Charter Schools: A Reaction To the Failing Public Education System 

Teachers, parents, and students all undoubtedly have an opinion on every aspect of the public education system; from school lunches and cell phone policies to providing bathrooms for transgendered students, there is always something to talk about. Currently a major for discussion about the public education system is charter schools. There are two schools of thought when it comes to charter schools, people love them and view them as the savior of the public education system or they are hated and considered the downfall of public education. When it comes to peoples personal opinions there are very few places for neutrality.  While in America everyone is entitled to their own personal opinion, often times opinions are developed about things such as charter schools without actually knowing the facts surrounding them. Psyche Pascual expresses through unbiased diction, comparisons to other public schools, and intentional debunking of common myths in the article The Truth About Charter Schools  that charter schools are more similar to traditional public schools then one would like to believe, and charter schools when viewed without bias hold the potential to be a good new method of approaching educational environments.  

Psyche Pascual, an author for greatschools.com, provides insight on what a charter school truly can be defined as and what the myths surrounding them are, informing the reader of the truth about charter schools.  Pascual explains,” They are independent entities that have received a charter, which is a set of self-written rules (and promises) about how the school will be structured and run. Essentially, they are able to organize a school that’s outside the control of the local school district but still funded by local, state, and federal tax money. This allows charter schools to create free public schools that don’t have to follow the same regulations as district schools. Sometimes this results in a very high-performing school, sometimes not.”. The article argues for a better understanding of charter schools without expressing that they are solely good or bad. However while Pascual reviews the facts of charter school unbiasedly, the article makes it clear that the benefits outweigh the challenges of charter schools. Charter schools are a new development and like any new thing there are problems that must be solved, but in theory charter schools are a very good addition to the public education system.  

Pascual is very intentional about ensuring that the article holds no negative or positive bias on charter schools. The author instead offers both pros and cons to charter schools, focusing on myths and misconceptions with the aim of providing clarity. Pascual uses bulleted lists and carefully backed reasoning to guide the readers toawrds a clearer understanding of charter schools. The article is written in a way that shows no bias to being either for or against charter schools and instead simply breaks down the facts surrounding them. Pascual’s unbiased writing provides creditability to the article, making it difficult to allow the figures to be twisted in a way that is unrepresentative of charter schools. By showing no biases in their writing Pascual has intentionally shown that there are some obvious upsides to charter schools that do not often come to mind. Pascual has expressed to the reader that the positives of charter schools outweigh the challenges and that criticism of these schools come from a lack of understanding. This again, is Pascual claiming that a better understanding of charter schools will ultimently result in allowing readers to understand why charter schools are actually a positive development.   

Pascual compares charter schools to other public schools, explaining that charter schools are not so unexplainably different from traditional public schools. Charter schools are a new development that are creating a change in the traditional education system. It is hard to create change without a group of people going against a cause, and charter schools gaining momentum and popularity is no different. Because charter schools get to run off of their own individual rules and regulations they have stronger school values. These values can different wildly from those of a typical public school. Enforcing values and rules on an individual bases allows schools to do what is best for them, even when it goes against what is traditionally good for the schools system. Charter schools allow more room for creating change that truly benefits the students in them. Pascual expresses that charter schools have more control over curriculum and get to include important things that traditional public school curriculum leave out. Pascual often points out that charter schools believe that they are simply a reaction to the failing education systems; charter schools are the result of teachers, parents, and student who want more control over the quality and content of education received. 

There are teachers, parents, and students who strongly disagree with charter schools. These people rely on twisted facts and figures and a mindset that all change is bad. Pascual intentionally debunks myths surrounding charter schools to show that the misconceptions about charter schools only exist because some people refuse to see the benefit of any system of education that is not solely government ran. By refusing to acknowledge that some students are going to learn better and have a better experience in charter schools people have gained this mindset that there is only one way to learn . Pascual proves this wrong by citing that when test scores are a topic of consideration, charter schools do just as well as traditional public schools. Charter schools if anything provide students with more opportunities to take control of their own education. This is another way of Pascual pointing out that charter schools are really just the new and improved version of typically public schools .  

This article provides solid facts and figures that tell a unbiased truth about charter schools, encouraging the reader to look at them from many perspectives instead of simply one. Charter schools are not private schools for the poor, the classes they offer allow for a lot more individuality in students, and charter schools are not schools for only the smartest of kids. These are myths encouraged only by teachers, parents, and students who are stuck in the mindset that there is only one way to approach education. Because Pascual carefully outlined facts in this article, it becomes hard for the reader to argue that charter schools are a negative addition to the public education system. Pascual urges that people begin to look at charter schools as they truly are and not how people claim for them to be. Charter schools are new positive development that are reactions of the currently failing public education system.