The state’s 113 lowest-performing  schools seeking federal school-reform money includes eight charter schools. Their applying for a School Improvement Grant caught my eye, because that would appear to contradict state policy, which presumes that charter schools on the list of lowest achievers would shut down.

But a closer look reveals a more complex situation, with several schools in limbo and others already facing strict scrutiny by state or local regulators. And the number eight was off.

For starters, two – United For Success in Oakland Unified and Highlands Academy of Arts and Design in Twin Rivers Unified – were misclassified; they are actually district schools, according to district officials.

A third school listed, Edison-Ronald McNair Intermediate Schools in the Ravenswood District in East Palo Alto,  ended its affiliation with the for-profit operator, Edison Learning, two years ago because of poor test scores, and reverted to a district-run school.

The State Board of Education will decide this week whether a fourth school, Today’s Fresh Start Academy, can continue to operate. The K-8 school, serving low-income Latino and African-American students, is appealing the revocation of its charter by the Los Angeles County Office of Education. State Department of Education officials are recommending tight oversight, including a multi-page list of conditions, if the State Board does grant the appeal.

The survival of a fifth school seeking federal money, Stanford New Schools, another Ravenswood charter, is also up in the air. In April, the district revoked Stanford University School of Education’s charter for elementary grades because of bad performance. Stanford’s charter high school, which boasts a high college acceptance rate but low test scores, will be seeking a new charter authorizer. Turning itself around with a SIG grant is part of its strategy; the school has changed principals – one of the requirements for a SIG grant.

It’s questionable whether a sixth school, the Charter School of San Diego, should be on the list. The school is a dropout prevention program that works with students on the edge of quitting with the goal of cycling them back to district schools. Its test scores will never be high.

There was a long debate between the state and the feds as to whether alternative schools should be excluded. The feds suspect that some districts would purposefully divert their worst students to these schools unless they too were held into account. But alternative schools need to be measured by a different yardstick than simple test scores.

Voice of San Diego reported last week that  San Diego Unified trustees gave a second life to King-Chavez Arts Academy, the seventh school, renewing its charter for five years with a slew of conditions. They include disclosing information about the financial operations of the management group that runs the school and its consultants. Parents had pleaded with the board not to revoke the charter. Trustees had wanted to give the school three years to raise test scores or close down, but charter renewals must be for five years, even for low performers – a weakness in state law.

Cesar E. Chavez Charter in Santa Barbara, the final school, decided to reopen this fall essentially as a new school, with a new principal, a new charter and some new trustees after the  school district revoked the old charter because of low test scores. Those scores are the new school’s legacy.

Federal law doesn’t require that charter schools on the persistently lowest performing list close down – one of four intervention options that the Obama administration is setting as a condition for a grant. (A closure grant presumably would be small.) The state, in its application for $416 million in SIG money, however, indicated that closing should be the priority: “Persistently lowest-achieving charter schools are expected to select the School Closure intervention model. Charter schools selecting one of the other three intervention models must clarify how the intervention selected will create a significantly different instructional model and school culture.”

With the exception of the non-charter McNair Intermediate School, the charters, like other schools, are seeking money under the “transformation model.”  They are eligible for between $50,000 and $2 million annually for three years, though,  as small schools, they’d likely get less than the maximum. Transformation is the least burdensome, most flexible option; it doesn’t, for example, require replacing half of the staff, as does the “turnaround” model that McNair Intermediate is pursuing.

The charters on the “worst” performers  list– at least those whose charters aren’t about to be yanked – can legitimately argue that, they, like other public schools, deserve a chance to do better. They’re already on a short leash, facing strict  oversight and demands by state or local authorizers. SIG money, with a time line to turn around or close, could  make a difference.