Oopsy...

The National Association of Charter School Authorizers said 900 to 1,300 of the privately run, publicly financed schools should close because they are in the bottom 15 percent of public schools in their states. The Chicago-based group's members — such as the Los Angeles Unified School District and the State University of New York — oversee more than half of the nation's 5,600 charter schools.

[...] The call for closing poor performers carries special weight because it comes from an organization funded by charter-school advocates such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Walton Family Foundation.

It was Bill Gates and Alice Walton who were also the two largest financial backers of Initiative 1240, Washington's charter schools initiative. Funny how this report didn't come out until after the election.

I-1240 includes a provision allowing for failing charter schools to be shut down, but doesn't actually require it, and outlines no process for doing so. In reality, experience in other states suggests that charter school conversion is almost entirely a one-way street, regardless of academic performance.

But, you know, Alice Walton smartly inherited her fortune, so we should just trust billionaires like her to tell us how to educate our kids.