You can do poorly. You can find yourself in the middle of political battles, but in the end, the school can't fail. The school system can't fail because it's essentially established in perpetuity. One of the things that needs to be added to the mix is the establishment of consequences. We need to actually hold schools responsible, not only for meeting the standards they set for themselves, but also for their students' capacity to meet standards we set for all students.
Every charter school is someone's dream.
Some group of people had a dream about what a school could and should be. I don't think that's true of every public school. When I read the charter proposals, I found that they are very moving documents about what should be different in the charter schools than in the other public schools. If a school is successful it's got to be flexible in the sense that it can refine and reflect on its practice. And I don't know too many public schools that do that.