I made a decision to keep sending my kids to public…it was a good school and highly regarded, however before they hit high school I wouldn’t have hesitated in a heartbeat to send them to one of several of our area charter schools. The bottom line is there are good and bad public systems and good and bad charter systems. I do, however, believe a good deal of “success” and “failure” of students lies on the parents. Parents come out of the woodwork when the hammer meets the nail and the failing school gets taken over by the state and in many cases closes. It’s a sad situation indeed. This is an article from 2014 about one school system on the western side of the state where I had an old friend who was a teacher, but it references the history of poor performing schools being taken over and closures. Again this is not a “new” thing.
My friend transferred to another public system when the school went charter for stability and to stay in the “public” system (of course) for pay and benefits. I also did a quick Google search to see what was happening to this school and unfortunately it appears the high school may not survive even as a charter and will be closed. But I think the story is all too familiar especially around the Detroit area.
http://www.mlive.com/news/muskegon/index.ssf/2017/02/muskegon_heights_calling_on_pa.html