ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the practical problems faced by the state agencies: the Arizona department of education (ADE), the Office of the Auditor General, and the state-level sponsoring boards— the Arizona State Board of Education and the State Board for Charter Schools. Arizona citizens were receptive to the fundamental argument that schools should be subject to market accountability mechanisms and forced to compete for students. Politicians increased public support for the reform by using simplistic metaphors to justify the policy, in the absence of empirical research. Legislators failed to consider the details of how the policy would be implemented and managed. As a result, the state sponsoring boards, the ADE, and the auditor general's office have struggled to translate the charter school legislation into a working program. The origin of many practical problems faced by charter school entities can be traced back to a series of contextual factors that complicated the implementation of the charter school policy.
