MCPSA Services

Advocacy

MCPSA offers a range of advocacy efforts, developed and managed by MCPSA Executive Director, Marc Kenen, Ed.D. Marc brings to MCPSA over 25 years of experience as an advocate for education; his campaigns have involved parent organizing, media relations, and lobbying.

School Organizing: Through this statewide network of charter leaders and friends, charter public schools across the state receive regular updates on key legislative matters. They have opportunities to organize and advocate for Massachusetts charter public schools.

Government Relations: MCPSA utilizes the services of Jack Brennan, former State Senator and Majority Leader. Jack is known as one of the most effective advocates on Beacon Hill, where he has represented the charter public school movement since 1993, the year charter public schools were first created in the Commonwealth.

Public Relations: Dominic Slowey, former reporter and former spokesperson for the Weld Administration, serves as consultant to MCPSA. Since 2001, Dominic has earned extensive coverage of charter public schools in daily and weekly newspapers throughout the state.

Data Analysis: MCPSA contracts with Community Partners Data Specialist, Bruce Bean. Bruce provides data analysis on both charter public schools and state finance, supporting MCPSA since 2002.

Web E-Advocacy: MCPSA utilizes Votervoice.net and Facebook.com, as a means for parents and supporters to stay up to date on legislative issues and send correspondence to their state legislators.

Dissemination

Best Practices and Resources:  Nearly 70 professionally edited papers appear here, documenting the best practices of administration & teaching as well as whole school models in the charter public school community.

Keeping the Promise: Through this federally funded, 3-year project MCPSA studied 5 high-performing urban schools, documented their keys to success, producing high quality research and a DVD.

Making Learning Visible: Through work with Harvard's Project Zero from 2005-2007, MCPSA helped facilitate collaboration between charter schools, district schools, and pilots. Teams came together to learn from one another and from Project Zero staff. See Charter Resources page on this site.

Administrative Services

Newspaper Clippings Service:  Through this free service, members receive (via e-mail) daily newspaper clippings on Massachusetts charter public schools; Web site access to clippings is also available.

Salary Survey: Through an annual survey, MCPSA compiles data on the salaries of administrators and faculty in Massachusetts charter public schools.

Delegate Assembly:  Each year, and recently twice a year (in November and the last Thursday in March), MCPSA convenes leaders from charter schools in the state, to hear legislative updates, discuss association initiatives, and network.

MCPSA Leader ListServe:  Facilitated by Dr. Kenen, the list serve allows charter public school leaders to share information and resources through the Internet. It‚s available to all 62 MA charter public schools and is utilized extensively.

Facilities Loan Guarantee Program at MassDevelopment: Dr. Kenen, through MCPSA, helped secure $10 million in U.S. D.O.E. charter public school facilities loan guarantees. The program is ongoing.

Technical Assistance

From its inception in 2000, MCPSA provided Massachusetts charter public schools with technical assistance. With the opening of our resource center, the Massachusetts Center for Charter Public School Excellence (MCCPSE), technical assistance is now primarily provided by MCCPSE. MCPSA continues to offer dissemination, support, and referrals.