Few communities have used charter schools as a restructuring strategy for turning around low-performing schools. But we do know that for those schools that have chosen this path, community engagement is critical to their success. By involving community members, parents, universities, foundations, and local organizations as partners, the request for change is grounded in support on behalf of the students who will be served by the school. Parent and community supporters can assist schools in the conversion process by helping to gather petition signatures, talking with teachers to convince them of the importance of this option, bringing their case to the district school board, and participating in decisions regarding the vision for the new school and planning for the charter.

Each of the three schools in San Diego started their conversion process by engaging members of their community. In San Diego, community involvement not only launched the conversion process, it also led to a strengthening of the schools once in operation. Ongoing university and parent support continue to make these schools strong.

This section provides examples of materials from these schools used in the process of converting them from schools in Year 4 program improvement to charter schools.