“We Make Our Own Rules Here”: Democratic Communities,Corporate Logics,and “No Excuses” Practices in a Charter School Management Organization

Abstract

Recently, there has been growing debate over the managerial and leadership practices of expanding charter school networks, often referred to as Charter School Management Organizations (CMOs). CMOs—which typically serve low–socioeconomic status students of color—are deeply tied to education reform efforts in the United States. Many CMOs consistently promote the belief that education can and should borrow heavily from the “best practices” of corporate culture and many have unlimited resources to enact their vision of educational success, closely aligned with what has been called “no excuses” schooling. Research on the daily practices of leaders working in a CMO remains limited; we know very little of how corporate ideologies are enacted in schooling. Drawing on ethnographic vignettes, I explore the daily life in one school within a CMO network considering to what extent corporate practices de-democratize education, produce neoliberal subjectivities, and shape experiences with learning for disadvantaged populations.