Education Reform in Kentucky

Education reform has been a topic for Kentucky government officials and citizens for over 20 years. The most significant piece of reform legislation was passed in 1990, and was known as the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA). This act instituted six basic initiatives, some of the most important being a focus on core subjects, community service, and self-sufficiency. Kentucky education has seen improvements in terms of equalizing funding among various schools, but still has a long way to go in becoming nationally competitive in its educational outcomes and standardized test scores.

One viable reform option that has gotten little attention is the possibility of voluntary charter schools, especially in areas of poor public school opportunities. The U.S. Department of Education defines charter schools as “tuition-free public schools freed from regulation in exchange for greater accountability.” In the charter school system, individual schools and administrations have more control over the structure of various curricula and school programs which provides for a more tailored emphasis for each student. And, by and large, students and parents felt that the students “{received} more individualized attention at the charter school than they did at their previous school.” These same parents said that they felt their students were able to learn more efficiently because teachers were more able to adapt their methods to fit the child’s individual learning style.

Another benefit of charter schools is their effect on the competitiveness of the education market. Recent research conducted by the U.S. Department of Education proves that voluntary charter schools will provide greater educational choices and help to create a more competitive educational market that encourages all schools to improve. The Department of Education’s research shows that the creation and inclusion of charter schools in school systems led to visible improvements in the test scores and student behaviors of almost every school in that school system, whether they were public, private, charter, or anything else.

Voluntary charter schools certainly provide one aspect to bettering the educational system in Kentucky. But while charter schools benefit students by creating a more competitive educational marketplace, one still needs to consider how to institute reform that better prepares Kentucky students for post-secondary education, should they choose to pursue it. One of the ways that absolutely every school in Kentucky can improve its educational standards is with the greater inclusion of advanced placement (or AP) classes. Advanced placement classes are those with a higher degree of difficulty that seek to prepare high school students for post-secondary education. One college admissions website says that some of the reasons AP classes are important are because they impress college admissions offices, help better prepare students for college-level curriculum, and help students to make better decisions after high school.

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Wikipedia