Responding to demand or undermining existing schools?

I was part of the High Mark Charter School review committee that gave the school advice on their charter before it went to the State Charter School Board.  Every volunteer there on behalf of the school talked about how the main reason for the school was because the district had refused to build a junior high school in their area, requiring students to be bused to multiple schools in other communities.

Charter Schools are a great solution to unresponsive school districts.  Sometimes that's needed when the district stays with an unpopular math curriculum (Alpine) and sometimes, like in South Weber, when the district's decisions break up a community's children.

Charters exist to provide educational options for parents who believe their children need something different than the local district offers.  That can include community schools, if what parents believe is good for their children is to attend school nearby in a community school with their neighbors.  And if that school has a great business and entrepreneurship model and curriculum, that much the better.

But the district and its defenders continue to think that education is about the schools, rather than the students, families, and communities they serve.  See the Standard-Examiner, which I believe has never wasted ink saying anything positive about charter schools.

The new school...has received some opposition throughout the city. "I think if it was just a junior high, there would be no opposition," said Mayor Jeffery G. Monroe. "But they're going from kindergarten through ninth grade, and I think the elementary school element has people concerned that it will pull some students from the elementary school and create a problem having both schools adequately staffed."