State of Charter Authorizing 2015 Report

NACSA:

42 states and the District of Columbia. Collectively, authorizers oversaw 6,716 charter schools serving more than 2.6 million students.

School districts, also called Local Education Agencies (LEAs), make up the largest group of authorizers in the country. In 2014-15, there were 950 school district authorizers in the country, followed by 45 Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), 18 State Education Agencies (SEAs), 17 Not-For-Profit organizations (NFPs), 17 Independent Charter Boards (ICBs), and three (3) Non-Educational Government entities (NEGs), such as a mayor or municipality. Learn more about the different types of authorizers.

Authorizers also vary tremendously in the number of schools they oversee. More than one-half (52%) of all authorizers oversee a single charter school. More than four out of five (85%) authorizers oversee five schools or fewer. By contrast, the largest authorizer in the country, the Texas Education Agency (TEA), oversees 644 charter schools.