The nascent charter schools movement was growing not only in laws passed and schools opened, but also by developing the institutions necessary to sustain it.
The Center for Education Reform, a Washington D.C.-based think tank and advocacy organization, was founded by Jeannie Allen in October 1993. By 1995, two state-based organizations were launched: the California Network of Educational Charters in 1993 and the Colorado League of Charter Schools in 1994.
Michigan’s first statewide charter schools organization was different. In 1995 Michigan’s leading authorizer, Central Michigan University, launched the Michigan Resource Center for Charter Schools (“MRCC”). MRCC was not an advocacy organization. Instead, it was intended to help people and organizations open charter schools, support board governance, and advance excellence in school performance.
Soon after MRCC opened, the Charter School Friends National Network (“CSFNN”) was launched in 1996. CSFN was led by John Schoeder as a joint initiative of the Center for Policy Design and Hamline University (St. Paul). It was not a top-down organization, but rather it was organized as an active network of state-level charter support organizations like MRCC and the charter movement’s leaders.
MRCC and CFNN were followed by the founding of a variety of other organizations to support and advocate for the movement’s growth: Charter Schools Development Corporation (1997), New Schools Venture Fund (1998), the Center for Research on Educational Outcomes (1999), the Black Alliance for Educational Options (2000), and the National Association of Charter School Authorizers (2000).
Through Congressional support in 2001, MRCC expanded to serve the national movement. Its expanded mission was reflected in its new name: the National Charter Schools Institute. The following year CFNN began the process of forming a single, national organization, resulting in the launch of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools in 2005.
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