Puerto Rico Charter Sector to Grow in Second Year

Puerto Rico’s Department of Education held hearings on Friday, February 8, to consider the conversion of 30 traditional public schools into charter schools for the 2019-2020 academic year.

The island’s Education Reform Act, approved in March 2018, introduced charter schools as well as vouchers, with the stipulation that no more than 10 percent of schools could be charter schools and no more than 3 percent of students attend private or non-district public schools with the use of vouchers.

For charter schools, the baseline for determining the 10 percent was the number of schools as of August 15, 2018, which means that if more traditional public schools across the island are closed, the proportion of charter schools could in time exceed 10 percent.

In the first year following the Education Reform Act, there is only one charter school on the island: Vimenti, an elementary school in San Juan operated by the Boys and Girls Club of Puerto Rico.

According to an article published by Noticel, Vimenti started in August 2018 with a kindergarten and first grade, enrolling 58 students in total—31 of whom come from the neighborhood, 27 from other neighborhoods, and 13 classified for special education. The plan is to add one grade per year as students progress through school. 

Supplementary funding for Vimenti, reported Noticel, comes from the Colibri Foundation, which donated $1 million, and the singer Marc Anthony, who gave $500,000.

In the hearings last week, the Department of Education considered proposals for four more charter schools in San Juan, five in Humacao, one in Bayamón, three in Caguas, six in Ponce, two in Arecibo, and nine in Mayaguez. In contrast to Vimenti, these schools would not be new schools built one grade at a time but, rather, conversions from traditional schools to charter schools.

According to one school administrator with direct knowledge of the hearing process, it is expected that at least 13 of the proposed conversions will be approved for the 2019-2020 year while the remaining 17 will be approved for the 2020-2021 year.