It's not clear to me what charter schools are as there is no Australian equivalent. It might be the same as the system in NSW of selective schools, or is it just allowing students to go to any school no matter how far from home?

In NSW the ideology of 'choice' in the education system, an offshoot of rational, free market economics, has produced a mixed blessing. It has arguably led to an unfair distribution of government funding to schools and to winners and losers among school students. The impact on school results arealso mixed as they are in US schools as described in the article.

For governments it is the free market ideology of choice. For parents, it is the ideological twin traps of 'nothing is too good for my child' and 'the grass is greener on the other side'

Worst of all in my opinion, the increasing trend over the last decade or more students travelling further and further to school has had undesirable economic, social and environmental impacts. Many of these journeys are undertaken by a parent with only 1 or 2 children in a private vehicle - very inefficient use of family resources, increased traffic congestion, increased need for new imported cars and fuel, increased environmental pollution. The long distance student is often isolated from the school community after school hours.

All to preserve ideology.

Try the following. There appears to be no concensus that they are better.

www.edweek.org/denial.html?source=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com.au%2Fsearch%3Fq%3Dcharter%2Bschools%2B%26hl%3Den%26hs%3DJ4M%26lr%3D%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial_s%26start%3D10%26sa%3DN&destination=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.edweek.org%2Frc%2Fissues%2Fcharter-schools%2F&levelId=1000&baddebt=false

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charter_school