By Mike Bodeen · 21 May 2018
Arizona education is in the news, inside and outside of Arizona. We’re all familiar with the recent #RedforEd movement that took place across the country and successfully in Arizona. Per this effort, Arizona public school teachers will most likely be getting a raise to help bring more salary equality with schools across the country.
But #RedforEd’ was not the only education news to feature schools in Arizona.
In case you missed it, U.S. News and World Report just published their rankings for the best high schools in the country – as in the United States. Astonishingly 6 out of 10 Basis Arizona Charter schools were ranked in the top 10! Two other high schools in the valley were included in the top 20 as well.
https://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools/national-rankings
This ranking was not just for Charter schools, but included ALL high schools including public and private. Charter schools are technically categorized as a type of public school. On top of that Great Hearts Academy Charter School of Chandler was recently named the 4th best elementary school in the nation.
Well this is a real estate blog after all… So what’s the tie in?
The tie in is that the better the schools, the higher the values for real estate. A recent study by the National Bureau of Economic Research showed there is a strong connection between school expenditures and home values.
According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, there is a definite correlation between school expenditures and home values in any given neighborhood. A report titled, “Using Market Valuation to Assess Public School Spending,” found that for every dollar spent on public schools in a community, home values increased $20. These findings indicate that additional school expenditures may benefit everyone in the community, whether or not those residents actually have children in the local public-school system.
Another study by the Brookings Institution found that housing costs tend to be higher in areas where high-scoring schools are located. The study, which looked at the 100 largest metro areas in the country, found an average difference of $205,000 in home prices between houses near high-performing and low-performing schools. Homes around high-performing schools also tended to be larger, with 1.5 more rooms than homes near low-performing institutions. In addition, the number of rentals in areas near high-performing schools is around 30 percent lower.
I guess the elephant in the room question that I have is this: Can our non-charter public schools learn something from the Charter schools success? Especially from the Basis or Great Hearts model? If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, lets flatter the charter schools and learn from them.
Incidentally if you look at Basis Scottsdale information provided by the U.S. News ranking article, you will see that their percentage of minority students is 59%, so clearly, this does not fit a possible perception that the Scottsdale schools are filling the Basis Charter school up with rich white kids. Perhaps it means that parents who really want a top education for their kids are going to where that education is — in this case Basis.
So, along with additional funds for teachers and schools, let’s implement educational strategies how to best educate our kids. As Arizona is now growing stronger economically, with greater business diversity, strengthening our schools will promote greater community. Let’s focus now on increasing education excellence in all our schools. If you combine the economic engine with the educational engine, this state can radically change to be even greater than it already is.