HOUSTON — Charter schools now account for one-third of public campuses in Houston ISD’s boundaries, a new report shows, contributing to the rapidly declining enrollment that is prompting officials to call for the closure of a dozen HISD campuses.
Additionally, HISD has been left with a higher share of students with costly special education needs, straining the district’s finances, according to the report by the Texas Education Leadership Lab at the University of Texas at Austin.
The report shows a near match in campus closures from 2009 to 2025: HISD closed 20 schools, while charters opened 19 inside the boundaries.
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HISD enrollment has dropped by more than 30,000 students in the last decade, according to Texas Education Agency enrollment data.
HISD’s size potentially masks just how significant the impact of charter school enrollment is on certain neighborhoods, said David DeMatthews, Texas Education Leadership Lab’s founder.
“Houston ISD is geographically a very large school district. Some parts of the city are extremely affluent and have very few charters,” DeMatthews said. “And other parts are very poor and have a more saturated charter market.”
Texas saw its number of charter schools more than double to 1,058 campuses from 2009 to 2025, while traditional public school campuses only grew by 2%. Charter enrollment more than quadrupled in that same span to 472,280 students in 2025, while public school enrollment grew by 9%.
Public dollars follow students who leave traditional school systems, like HISD, to enroll in charter schools, meaning that this trend must be grappled with as educators consider staffing, budgets, bonds and long-term goals.
More than half of all Texas charter school seats are operated by 10 organizations, with IDEA Public Schools, Harmony Public Schools, KIPP Texas Public Schools and International Leadership of Texas topping the list, according to the Texas Education Leadership Lab.
HISD left with higher share of special education students
Even with skyrocketing charter school enrollment, traditional public schools are left with a higher share of special education students, the report shows.
The University of Texas at Austin experts found twice the enrollment growth of students with disabilities at traditional public schools versus charter schools from 2009 to 2025. Additionally, traditional schools have a higher percentage of special education students than charters, and the gap between the two is widening, according to the report.
That means traditional public schools are carrying a disproportionate share of costly services for special education students, according to the report, raising questions about whether Texas is meeting its constitutional duties to keep an efficient public school system and ensure special education for students with disabilities.
Charter schools are expected to comply with federal special education laws like traditional public schools, DeMatthews said.
“The special education law was written before charter schools existed (to this extent),” DeMatthews said, adding the law has not been reauthorized in two decades back when there were fewer charter schools. “So we have a really outdated law that doesn’t have adequate enforcement mechanisms. And so that leaves states with really broad authority. And, unfortunately, our commissioner and our TEA has not, I would say, closely monitored this situation and raised questions about what’s happening in charter schools in a variety of ways.”
It is the state’s responsibility to monitor compliance with the law and intervene when appropriate, the University of Texas expert said.
Charter schools enroll a smaller share of students with higher-cost disabilities — autism, intellectual disabilities and emotional and behavioral disabilities — than traditional public schools. Those students often need specialized teachers and aides, individualized instruction and other additional services, the report shows.
Nearly 16% of traditional public school students have disabilities, compared to 12% of charter school students, according to the report using 2024-25 school year data. The 10 largest charter management organizations average 11.4% enrollment of students with disabilities.
This disparity shows in the finances. Every major school district exceeds the state average for special education spending per student, while most major charter management organizations fell short.
Houston ISD spends $15,800 per special education pupil, compared to the state average of $12,912. Of the major charter management organizations, only IDEA spends above the state average, at $14,595.
Nearly 12% of HISD students are enrolled in special education, compared to nearly 10% of students in area charter schools.
The report’s authors recommend Texas needs “transparent, comparable information” to discern these differences in special education and suggested that Texas needs a funding system that more accurately reflects the intensity of services and those service costs.
“What we’re seeing across the state and within all of the large charter management organizations is the fact that they’re serving fewer students with disabilities,” DeMatthews said.
“Now, whether they’re discriminating, or they’re not creating the structures or supports for certain kids with disabilities, or they’re not marketing to those kids — it doesn’t change the fact that school districts are now educating a higher proportion of students with disabilities than their publicly funded peers that are in their communities,” he said.
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