Charter school advocates push enrollment shift in Oakland

Melrose Leadership Academy parents Kiera Swan (right) and Ian Hetzner (left) read over proposed school assignment changes during community meeting at Roosevelt Middle School in Oakland, Calif., on Monday, November 30, 2015. less Melrose Leadership Academy parents Kiera Swan (right) and Ian Hetzner (left) read over proposed school assignment changes during community meeting at Roosevelt Middle School in Oakland, Calif., on Monday, ... more Photo: Scott Strazzante, The Chronicle Buy photo Photo: Scott Strazzante, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 5 Caption Close Charter school advocates push enrollment shift in Oakland 1 / 5 Back to Gallery

Deep-pocketed education reformers have set their sights on Oakland, where they are pushing changes to the school assignment system used by parents that would include charter schools as well as the district’s traditional public schools.

Advocates for school choice and charters — including the New Schools Venture Fund and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation — have supported similar common enrollment systems in Denver, New Orleans and most recently in Boston.

But Oakland would become the first in California to bring charter schools into the school assignment process, even though the charters essentially compete with the district for students.

Superintendent Antwan Wilson wants this kind of one-stop shopping to help families find the best public school — traditional or charter — for their children. It’s not about politics, officials said.

“It is our obligation to the public to create a level playing field so that parents can have access to these schools,” said district spokesman Troy Flint. “It’s not about the district. It’s about what we can do for families to give them a better educational fit for their child.”

A common enrollment system would provide parents with a range of information on all Oakland public schools and then allow parents to list their top choices. At district schools, siblings of students already enrolled in a school, and those living in the school’s neighborhood, would continue to get top priority.

Charters would be able to set their own priorities, as allowed under the law.

While a formal resolution and vote isn’t expected until January, the school board is scheduled to hold a study session Wednesday, the first opportunity it has had to review and address the idea.

Critics have spoken at several community meetings, including one Monday night, saying they are concerned that common enrollment would mean using district funds to market charter schools to prospective families.

The district needs to fix an antiquated enrollment system and promote district schools first, said Oakland school board member Roseann Torres at the meeting.

“Doing this together is completely nonsensical,” she said. “Why should I advertise for the other guy?”

The current proposal heading to the board includes a broad overhaul of the student assignment system, improving technology and adding staffing and other resources to ensure parents can access — in several languages — the system online, at every school and at satellite enrollment centers across the city.

But those improvements are a package deal. The foundation funding that would pay for the estimated $1.2 million in upgrades is contingent on the inclusion of charter schools in the process, Flint said.

The common enrollment effort is supported by Oakland’s Educate 78, a nonprofit group focused on increasing access to quality schools, including the creation of new charter schools.

The organization, funded by charter advocates including Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, New Schools Venture Fund and Bloomberg Philanthropies, has covered the $300,000 in costs associated with the development of the proposal and initial public outreach, including consultants and community meetings.

Superintendent Wilson, a former Denver district official, proposed the common enrollment system to streamline a complicated and unpredictable system that requires families to fill out separate enrollment forms for the district and each charter school.

Sometimes students get into a district school and charters, showing up to one and leaving an unexpected empty seat elsewhere.

In addition, the superintendent believes having charter schools in the enrollment process will prevent the charters from gaming the system, enrolling a lower proportion of English learners, students with special needs or other high-need students than district schools.

While charter schools are public schools, they operate under a different set of rules. They have their own governing boards and can adopt their own policies related to instruction, staffing, discipline and expulsion.

They are required by the state to use a random student enrollment process, yet charters serve fewer special education students, especially those with the most severe disabilities, as well as fewer English learners.

In Oakland, about 11,000 students attend one of the city’s 44 charters.

Across the country, the idea of common enrollment is coming from market-driven reform groups, which believe that parental choice and competition for students will force low-performing and under-enrolled schools to innovate and improve.

That’s a bad idea, said Kim Davis, co-founder of OUSD Parents United, which advocates increased community involvement in city schools.

“We need to give our public schools the support, leadership and resources they need to become great, not throw them into competition with well-resourced charters and let them duke it out,” she said.

Charter schools would not be required to participate in the district’s common enrollment process. District officials, however, believe most will eventually sign up.

District officials said a survey conducted in October found that 73 percent of parents want one application for all Oakland public schools.

“Parents don’t care whether the school is a charter or traditional public school,” said school board President James Harris. “They don’t really care. They want a system that works.”

Jill Tucker is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: jtucker@sfchronicle.com Twitter:@jilltucker