I think this varies widely by state. In my state, charter schools have a lot more leeway than public schools, and rules have been relaxed a lot over the last decade. There are some wonderful, well-intentioned and well-run charters. And then there are a TON of for-profits run by large management companies that don’t give a damn about the kids they are serving. They put out nice marketing materials , talk a good game and have a few shiny bells and whistles to attract parents, but scratch the surface and you’ll find underpaid and undercredentialled teachers that may be making as little as $22,000 a year. Some are part time and paid hourly $12 - $20 an hour depending on experience. More like daycare teachers than actual teachers. My understanding is that they have to have a minimum percentage (not sure what that percentage is - maybe 80?) of their teachers licensed but the rest can be unlicensed and are considered ‘supervised’ by the licensed teachers.
It’s actually been a huge political scandal in my state with the heads of these for-profit companies giving huge donations to politicians who have gone on to relax the rules. And then they go on to take state per pupil money away from the schools, draining the public school budget.
These are not the same as well-run private schools or catholic schools that charge tuition and have a mostly middle to upper class target market. These charters are popping up in abandoned strip malls in run down neighborhoods and advertising to local parents as a better, safer option for their kids. And SOME of them are.
But I’ve done some digging into this world and come to believe 8 out of 10 here, at least, are for-profit scams draining money from the state budget with little return to the students or communities they are supposed to serve. The executive of one of these large charter companies is now in politics here himself, after amassing hundreds of millions of dollars while paying teachers an average salary of $28k at his schools.
A friend taught at one of these schools and the priority was not teaching - it was inflating daily average enrollment numbers to max money from the state. They were encouraged to mark students present even if they didn’t show up for this reason.