I agree with Roger, a conversion school doesn't always do something different. There have been several (now no longer charters) conversion schools that early on just converted for the money. (In Georgia, the first charter law only allowed for conversions not start ups.)
And for a struggling school, simply changing the governance (which is what some conversion schools in Georgia do) isn't going to be enough. A vision is needed and probably appropriate staff is needed as well.
The other think I have found from personal experience and this is just my opinion, for a conversion charter school to really act like a charter school, they need a principal who embraces the autonomy of charter status (of course, different LEAs and SEAs give different levels of autonomy to conversion schools. Our principal who helped initiate, write and implement our charter was far too dependent on our LEA to be as successful as we have become with a principal that has a much stronger independent streak.
Posted as a reply to:
Converting to Excellence? by Roger W. Bourassa
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