Choice, Competition, and Cognition: How Arizona Charter School Leaders Interpret and Respond to Market Pressures

Abstract

A key goal of school choice policies is to generate competition between schools, which should theoretically drive school leaders to improve their programs to attract and retain students. However, few studies examine how principals actually perceive and define competition. This article empirically examines school leaders’ conceptions of competition and their strategic behaviors using cognitive frameworks from new institutional theory, including sensemaking theory. Drawing on data from qualitative interviews with 30 charter school leaders in Arizona, we explore how leaders’ cognitive understandings of competition influence their actions in an educational “marketplace.” We find charter school leaders make meaning of “competition” in different ways, influenced by their local contexts and their conceptions of what actions are legitimate. Our work suggests that it is important to study the meanings of competition to school leaders, as it has important implications for schools’ competitive responses and, ultimately, student outcomes. Our work has important implications for policy makers seeking to expand school choice as it sheds light on how competition works in practice, with implications for equity and access.

School choice, including charter schools, school vouchers, and portfolio-management models, has been a popular urban education reform over the past several decades. A key tenet of this approach to schooling is the need for market-like competition to hold schools accountable, encouraging schools to improve and innovate. Some scholars worry, however, that the increased focus on corporate-like goals (e.g., standardization, efficiency, and marketing) necessitated by these reforms may have negative consequences for public schools with disparate impacts for diverse student populations and may erode social cohesion and a general commitment to democratic processes (Apple, 2006; Buras, 2014; Labaree, 2000; Lipman, 2011; Meier, 2002; Ravitch, 2010; Scott, 2013). Even with these concerns, school-choice reforms, especially in the form of charter schools, continue to rapidly spread to urban school districts across the country.

Despite strong theoretical claims about the power of charter-school competition to improve schools, the research has produced mixed findings. Theory suggests that choice and competition will ultimately improve student outcomes (Goldhaber & Eide, 2003); empirical evidence is mixed (Belfield & Levin, 2002; Ni & Arsen, 2010). Theory also suggests competition and relaxed accountability should lead to innovation (e.g., Chubb & Moe, 1990; Friedman, 1962; Lubienski, 2003); research reveals little difference between public and charter schools in terms of innovative practices (Lubienski, 2003). In fact, some have argued that competition for students may encourage schools to focus on superficial aspects, such as marketing, rather than improve curriculum and instruction (Gewirtz, Ball, & Bowe, 1995; Loeb, Valant, & Kasman, 2011; Lubienski, 2007). As the mixed evidence on the overall impacts of choice accumulates, we need more studies that unpack the mechanisms through which school choice influences schools, including how choice impacts the work of various stakeholders. In particular, more research is needed to understand how school leaders actually perceive and enact these policies—how they react to competition created by school choice and how they use their newfound autonomy to reorganize instruction. For example, even though charter schools theoretically have more autonomy, research suggests that the practices in charter schools are not substantively different from traditional public schools (Lubienski, 2003; Preston, Goldring, Berends, & Cannata, 2012), and charter schools may have become more like traditional public schools over time (Renzuilli & Paino, 2015). Institutional theory helps to explain why charter schools may often replicate established practices rather than innovate.

A key goal of school choice policies is to generate competition between schools, which should theoretically drive school leaders to improve their programs to attract and retain students (Betts & Loveless, 2005). However, we know little about how competition works. Previous studies have typically relied on quantitative measures of competition (e.g., Hoxby, 2002; Imberman, 2011; Ni, 2009), but empirical work suggests that competition is highly contextual, shaped by local conditions and policies (Arsen, Plank, & Sykes, 1999; Carnoy, Jacobsen, Mishel, & Rothstein, 2005; Hess, 2002). In particular, researchers have suggested that school leaders’ perceptions (Jabbar, 2015a; Levacic, 2004; Loeb et al., 2011), as well as local contextual factors, such as the average income level of parents in a school district or the organizational culture of the school (Maranto, Milliman, & Hess, 2010; Maranto, Milliman, & Stevens, 2000), play a role in the extent of competition felt and types of responses taken. Where studies do exist, they primarily focus on the experiences of traditional public school leaders in a competitive choice environment. Even though charter schools are just as pressured to enroll students and maintain a competitive edge, few studies examine how charter school principals perceive competition or how their perceptions influence their strategic actions in response to market pressures.

Furthermore, most research on competition in education relies on economic theories to examine school leaders’ actions. Yet, since Polanyi (1944), sociologists and anthropologists have argued that markets are embedded in society, underpinned by institutions and the state (e.g., Fligstein, 2001). As they consume or compete, market actors interpret the world around them, watching each other, picking up cues, and developing strategies that are informed by their cultural and cognitive understandings of what to do (Porac, Thomas, & Baden-Fuller, 1989; White, 1981). School leaders’ interpretations of the competitive environment may cause them to focus on particular features that guide their actions and ultimately shape how policy is enacted. School leaders are not only boundedly rational market actors but cultural actors whose decisions and actions are shaped by what they pay attention to and how they make sense of their actions (Fligstein, 1996; Spillane, Reiser, & Reimer, 2002).

This article empirically examines charter school leaders’ conceptions of competition and their strategic behaviors. Drawing on data from in-depth qualitative interviews with 28 charter school leaders in Arizona, we explore how leaders’ cognitive understandings of competition influence their actions in an educational “marketplace.” Our study thus describes how charter school leaders perceive and “frame a competitive arena” (Porac et al., 1989) and how those meanings and interpretations drive action or school practices.

We find charter school leaders make meaning of “competition” in different ways, influenced by their local contexts and their conceptions of what actions are legitimate. School leaders’ strategies in response to competition varied from marketing to finding a niche—activities that may not directly lead to benefits for students—with few leaders explicitly focusing on academic improvement as a competitive strategy. This may be, as we argue, because many school leaders viewed academics as part of their core work, which they believed should be buffered from competition. Competing with other schools through marketing and niche finding were seen as legitimate if they were an “extra” task on top of and separate from their everyday work. In other words, as long as decisions about the academic core were outside the influence of competition, schools could engage in competitive practices, such as marketing, even though such practices were not necessarily in the best interests of students. Indeed, leaders viewed marketing not as a superficial competitive strategy but as a way to respond to competition ethically, which allowed them to retain their commitment to their core educational mission. Our work suggests that it is important to study the meanings of competition to school leaders, as it has important implications for schools’ competitive responses and ultimately student outcomes. Our work also applies institutional theory to a relatively underexplored area—charter schools or other nongovernmental schools—schools that are theoretically free from many of the regulatory constraints faced by traditional public schools. Our work has important implications for policy makers seeking to expand school choice as it sheds light on how competition works in practice, with implications for equity and access.

Background

To examine how charter school leaders in Arizona interpret and respond to competitive pressures, we use cognitive frameworks from new institutional theory, including sensemaking theory. Sociologists studying markets have described how culture provides actors with a cognitive frame that shapes strategic action (Fligstein, 2001). Their actions are “embedded, constrained, and shaped” by these cognitive frames, as well as other structures (Fligstein, 2001, p. 148), which legitimize or delegitimatize particular institutions and actions (Beckert, 2010). These cultural understandings inform actions when, for example, an actor in a market watches other organizations, picks up cues, and develops strategies to compete (Porac et al., 1989).

School leaders’ cognitive frames thus influence their actions (Brint, Riddle, & Hanneman, 2006; Porac et al., 1989). We treat school leaders’ cognitive structures as institutions—a “crystallization of meanings” (Scott, 2007)—that provide stability and meaning to their behaviors in competitive environments. We also draw from sensemaking theory, which provides a framework for understanding the cognitive aspects of policy implementation, including how policy actors interpret or understand policies and how that influences their practices (Coburn, 2001; Spillane et al., 2002; Weick, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld, 2005). One assumption of school choice policy is that choice will generate “competition,” yet this term is used loosely in the policy discourse. Furthermore, in much of the empirical research, the definition of competition is drawn from economics, focusing on structural and objective dimensions of a market, rather than how school leaders perceive or understand the meaning of “competition.” A sensemaking perspective emphasizes the important role of actors’ cognition and meaning making in shaping policy outcomes.

School leaders interpret social structures and institutions, and their cognitive frames, in turn, form social structures—“taken-for-granted scripts” (Beckert, 2010)—of their own. For example, how school leaders interpret competition may influence their responses to it. School leaders’ perceptions socially construct and define the “marketplace,” a subjective structure based in perception and identity, which can impact strategy and outcomes (Brint et al., 2006). For example, who a school leader views as their competitor is shaped by and, in turn, shapes their own identity as a school, including the types of responses to competition they might adopt. School leaders, like other organizational leaders, frame a competitive arena, drawing boundaries between schools they perceive to be competitors and those they do not (Porac et al., 1989).

There is some suggestive evidence that this occurs. Levacic (2004) compared measures of “structural competition,” such as the number of schools in a given radius or enrollment fluctuations, with “behavioral competition,” a cognitive measure that was based on school leaders’ perceptions. Levels of perceived competition were not always correlated with evidence of structural competition, but they were correlated with gains on student test scores. Perceived competition thus shapes school leaders’ actions, with real implications for student outcomes. Similarly, Loeb et al. (2011), in a survey of principals in Milwaukee, found that distance, a common measure in the literature, was not the strongest predictor of which schools principals perceived as competitors. Therefore, leaders were interpreting and identifying their sets of competitors based on other factors. Some qualitative research has begun unpacking how this might operate. Scholars have identified “circuits” or networks, or hierarchies, of schools in which competition occurs (Gewirtz et al., 1995), which are shaped by historical patterns of segregation, race and class inequities, school performance, and city demographics (Bell, 2009; Gewirtz et al., 1995; Holme, 2002; Jabbar, 2015a; Ladd & Fiske, 2003; Woods, Bagley, & Glatter, 1998).

Taking a cognitive view of organizational action, legitimacy “comes from adopting a common frame of reference or definition of the situation,” or cognitive consistency (Scott, 2007, p. 47). Legitimacy, however, is not a static concept and is defined, in part, by what others are doing. New meanings may become dominant if nontraditional models of schooling are introduced, accepted, and legitimated. School choice policy, particularly charter school policy, has the potential to disrupt traditional understandings of schooling and education by introducing innovative models into the education system, granting greater autonomy to charter schools, incorporating new business models into school operations, and enabling the creation of more niche-focused schools. These types of reforms often draw upon individualist or profit-oriented goals or frameworks, applying them to educational settings. If these new models of schooling do not attain legitimacy, however, the innovative impacts of school choice policy may not be realized. Sociologists have noted that the pursuit of idealistic or collectivist interests is dominant in some types of social settings whereas individualist or profit-oriented goals might be dominant in others (Scott, 2007). Charter school leaders may have greater latitude in their interpretations of the environment, perhaps bringing in ideas from other sectors (e.g., business) due to their training or backgrounds and also in the range of responses they can take due to their greater autonomy compared to traditional public school leaders. Therefore, it is important to examine the meanings given and actions taken by charter school leaders in competitive educational environments.

At the same time, scholars who have applied institutional theory to the charter school sector have found that despite the emphasis on innovation and competition in school choice settings, the fact that charter schools seek legitimacy from intermediary actors, such as parents, community organizations, and foundations (Huerta, Fuller, Parker, & d’Entremont, 2011), and also “function within an active central state that encourages and rewards particular norms of practice” (Huerta & d’Entremont, 2010, p. 122) constrains the actions that charter school leaders can take (Huerta & Zuckerman, 2009). For example, Huerta and d’Entremont (2010) find that competition for resources often did not lead charter schools to alter current schooling practices, in part because charter schools were limited by institutional factors such as state accountability, pressures to mimic “successful” schools, and shared beliefs about “what a school should look like” (p. 146). Furthermore, there is little evidence of innovative practices in charter schools (Lubienski, 2003; Preston et al., 2012; Renzuilli & Paino, 2015). In a review of the literature, Lubienski (2003) attributes these patterns to organizational isomorphism, or the pressure to emulate established practices in successful schools. It is unclear how school leaders conceive of the range of options or actions available to them in a competitive arena.

Our study explores these theoretical ideas by examining how school leaders’ social constructions of competition, conceptions of legitimacy, and cognitive frames influence their strategic action in a competitive school-choice environment. Specifically, we ask: How do charter school leaders define competitive markets? How do these definitions shape behavior? Furthermore, how do school leaders define legitimacy (i.e., in idealistic/collectivist terms or individualist/profit-oriented terms)? How do definitions of legitimacy shape behavior in a competitive environment?

Data and methodology

To understand how school leaders make sense of their competitive environments and how their interpretations influence their actions, we conducted in-depth interviews (Patton, 1990) with 28 charter school leaders in Arizona. Interviews are the best method for capturing how participants make meaning or understand or interpret a phenomenon (Seidman, 2006). Our data come from a larger study examining school choice and competition in Arizona.

Arizona context

Arizona is an important but understudied site to examine school choice policy. Approximately 17% of public school students in Arizona attend charter schools (Ziebarth & Bierlein Palmer, 2016), and there is currently no cap on the number of charter schools that may operate. By 2016–2017, there were 547 charter schools operating in the state. Evidence on charter school performance in Arizona is somewhat mixed. Arizona charter schools perform highly on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, but evidence from CREDO (2013) suggests that charter school students in Arizona slightly underperform matched peers on student growth measures.

There are several key features of the charter school policy in Arizona worth highlighting. Charter schools can be authorized by various groups, including the state board of education, the state board for charter schools, an Arizona university governed by the board of regents, or a community college (Arizona Revised Statutes [ARS] 15, § 8). Charter schools must meet accountability and financial standards and undergo review by authorizers every five years (ARS 15, § 8). Charter schools must enroll all students who apply to the school when seats are available, unless the student was previously expelled from a school. If there are more applicants than seats, schools must hold a lottery or use some other equitable process (ARS 15, § 8). Charter schools are not required to provide transportation nor are transportation funds generally provided to charter schools.

Sampling

As part of our larger study, we contacted all charter school leaders in the state of Arizona to request their participation in the survey (n = 498). Of the 134 charter school leaders who responded, 71 said they might be willing to participate in a phone interview follow-up. We were able to conduct interviews with 28 of them. Our sample of schools included a range of charter school types, grade levels, and locations for maximum variation. We wanted to understand the range of interpretations that might exist across charter school types (see Table 1 for a summary of school characteristics).

Table 1.

Principal and school characteristics.

	Number/Percent
Principal Female	14 (50%)
Principal Years of Experience
1–5	2 (7%)
10–15	14 (52%)
16–20	5 (19%)
20+	6 (22%)
Charter School Type
Independent	11 (39%)
CMO	17 (61%)
Grade Level
K–5/6	6 (21%)
K–8/9	5 (18%)
6/7–12	4 (14%)
9–12	10 (36%)
K–12	3 (11%)
Alternative	8 (29%)
Total # of Schools	28

Data collection

We conducted interviews by phone between January and April of 2018. To capture school leaders’ perceptions, how they view their structural position in the market, and how they interpreted the regulative institutions and rules that govern their behavior, we used a semistructured interview protocol. We asked leaders about the pressures they faced in choice settings, which schools they viewed as competitors and why, how they perceived their local and state policy contexts, and the programs or strategies they adopted in response to competition.

Interviews lasted approximately 60 minutes. We audio-recorded and transcribed all interviews (see Appendix A for interview protocol). In preparation for each interview, we reviewed the respondent’s survey responses to create tailored questions for them.

Data analysis

To analyze school leaders’ perceptions of competition and their strategies in response, we coded the data in Dedoose. We began with a set of deductive codes from the literature, then modified our coding scheme after the first few interviews were coded to capture additional themes of interest (Miles, Huberman, & Saldaña, 2014). For example, we coded interview transcripts for perceptions of the educational system in general, perceptions of competition, as well as specific strategies used to compete (e.g., marketing or operational changes). Three coders coded the manuscripts after achieving “fair” agreement during a training. Because the agreement was only “fair” and not “good,” we decided to double-code each transcript. Each transcript was coded by two coders, and discrepancies were resolved through group discussion, which included a fourth coder (see Appendix B for our coding scheme).

We then reviewed coded data within each category, first noting general themes and patterns and writing memos about them. Next, we exported the data into a matrix (Miles et al., 2014) with rows for each school leader and columns to capture their perceptions of competition and their responses. This allowed us to look across the rows to see relationships between how leaders’ understandings shaped their strategic responses to competition, as well as patterns across the 28 participants (by looking down the columns). Finally, we wrote memos about patterns we observed in the matrix, including varying perceptions of competition, conceptions of legitimacy, and how these cognitive factors influenced their responses, which we used to write up our findings.

Findings

Overall, we find that school leaders perceived competition in different ways, influenced by their local contexts and their conceptions of what actions were legitimate. These conceptions shaped their strategic behavior and practices in response to enrollment pressures. In this section, we first describe school leaders’ varying perceptions and definitions of competition. Then we describe the nested sources of legitimacy and how leaders’ conceptions of “legitimate actions” in response to competition influenced their reported practices to recruit and retain students.

Orientations to competition

Competition was salient for charter school leaders in Arizona and was viewed as a key dimension of the choice environment by 26 of the 28 principals we spoke with. School leaders recognized the growing number of schooling options for families in Arizona, which they perceived to foster competition between schools. As charter schools expanded, there was increasing competition not only with traditional public schools but also with charter schools. Students and families “consider the other charter schools around our area,” one leader noted. Another leader perceived competition particularly, but not exclusively, with other charter schools in the area: “There’s a lot of charter schools here. And because we’re downtown [city], there’s a lot of schools within a very short distance.” One leader noted of the general environment:

There’s an awful lot of competition... . There’s an awful lot of schools. An awful lot of seats with not a lot of kids. When we talk about competition, it’s absolutely competition-heavy because families have a lot of choice options. With that we have to make sure that we’re ... dynamic enough that people are choosing us.

Other school leaders also noted the increasing sense of competition and the availability of more seats than students in the local area. One school leader noted the biggest challenge their school faced was the “retention of teachers and students.” She said: “There’s more competition than there was in the early days. Just the sense that the whole climate in [city] is that there are more choices. We’re a little more concerned about it than, say, five years ago.” Some leaders attributed this increase in competition, in part, to responses from traditional public schools who viewed charter schools as a threat. One leader noted that as public school superintendents “realize that choice is here to stay ... now they’re doing huge outreach.” The school leaders noted that even traditional public schools are “doing outreach,” or marketing, suggesting this is a legitimate practice. Another leader described a potentially less direct response by traditional public schools:

I don’t know if it’s the district itself, but it’s definitely people that are involved in the sites that are near our school or in the neighborhood of our school that may not agree with charter schools because they feel we’re taking their students.

According to the principal, these people “discourage students going to charter schools” because they viewed them as rivals.

“We’re a business:” Individualist perspectives on competition

We found that leaders had different orientations to competition and choice. Although these fell along a continuum, we categorized them as either “individualist” or “collectivist,” drawing on prior literature. Four school leaders seemed to adopt an individualist or market-driven ideology, using language associated with business or competition. For example, school leaders noted that parents were “shopping around” for schools, referred to themselves as “business owners,” or to parents as their “clientele.” One leader said:

We’re a business. Even though we’re a not-for-profit business, if we don’t have the kids in our classes, it just makes it harder for us to pay the bills. So, we operate like a business. Every charter school’s competing for kids.

The school leader noted that they competed with all schools in the area: “We compete with all of them. Everybody wants the kids. Everybody wants the kids. Every kid brings a dollar sign to their school.” Another charter leader connected student enrollment to funding, consistent with the ideas behind competition in schools: “When you have less students, obviously you have less funding, which equals less resources.”

Collectivist or idealistic orientations to competition

Seven leaders we spoke with invoked more collectivist or idealistic ideas of competition, indicating that choice does not necessitate competition. While they also acknowledged that competition existed, they believed that it was possible to collaborate with other schools and avoid some competitive practices. One leader noted that competition was getting “tougher” in the area but still collaborated with other schools to refer students: “My previous high school that I was principal at is probably about three miles up the road, so I mean, I recommend kids go there. We get a lot of referrals back and forth.” Other leaders similarly noted that they do not “actively recruit kids” or compete; they were more concerned about “being the right fit for the student.” One school leader even viewed competition negatively, as “stealing” teachers or students from other schools, and noted that their school did not engage in this type of behavior.

Other leaders collaborated with other charter schools. One noted that this was rare in the competitive environment in Arizona: “Typically, you don’t see charters collaborate at this level. There’s usually a competition.” A school leader said that he did not “mind” if other schools recruited his students, noting “as long as they do a good job for the student, I don’t care.” Another leader acknowledged that competition existed but described how they collaborated with other schools to ensure that each child found a good fit:

So we still do compete, in a way, for students when we have our open enrollment, but at the same time, when we notice that a specific student is having issues on a certain area, whether it may be in their life or academically, then—and we know that they can be more successful at another charter school or a different type of school—we try to help them out. And we contact the other school and see if they can help them out as well and if we see that they’re a better match, we try to have a parent transfer students over there so that their kid can be successful.

Competition as a necessary but unfortunate aspect of school choice

Seven leaders noted that competition was necessary but disliked the idea of it. These principals articulated a theory of competition and used language associated with this idea—“business,” “competition,” or “shopping for schools”—but had a more ambivalent perception of choice and competition in schools. One leader viewed competition as unfortunate. When describing relationships between his school and others, he said:

Unfortunately, very competitive ones. Yeah, like I said, it’s a competitive market... . I actually think we try not to compete with other schools, but ultimately it seems like it’s a competition, so you do have to put up advertising. You’re taking students from other schools.

Despite his recognition that competition was a reality in this context, he viewed this as a negative aspect of the current climate: “The situation in Arizona is the charter schools have been pitted against the public schools, so everyone is struggling for every student.” He attributed the problems in the system to larger structural policy issues, such as “the funding” and policy ideologies that have created a system “set up as a competition.” Another leader said of the necessity to compete, “Well, I don’t think anyone can afford to lose students at this stage.” Others tried not to compete until it got “tough.” These leaders did not fully subscribe to the idea of competition. Although they noted it was present, they found it was “unfortunate.”

Competitive practices

“Everyone has their own niche:” Minimizing competition

Ten leaders recognized that competition existed but reported lower levels of competition because their schools had more focused missions. These schools, which occupied market “niches,” perceived that they were somewhat buffered from competition. In particular, alternative, Montessori, and arts-based schools reported less competition due to their specialized programs. Several leaders noted that there was competition, “but we’re not competing for just the general, average student out there,” or that their schools served a “different population,” a “different clientele,” or offered a “different product,” which buffered them from competition. As one leader who managed a school in a rural area noted, “There’s really no competition around here. Like it’s apples to oranges because we’re a Montessori school and it’s an alternative to what the public schools are around here.” Another, who noted that he believed his school offered “a very different product,” said that as a result, “I wouldn’t say that we’re direct competitors with anyone.” A school that focused on serving a particular Native American tribe noted that they had consistent enrollment because of their targeted population and did not do “mass marketing.” Indeed, in some areas, school leaders noted, “Everybody has their own niche... . [School A] has its own niche. [School B] has their own niche... . I really don’t pay much attention to what they’re doing.” Another leader noted, “Because of the way the Montessori philosophy works, it doesn’t feel as competitive.” Occupying a niche thus buffered these schools from high levels of competition.

Although most schools occupying a market niche may have experienced less competition, they did sometimes compete with other schools with a similar niche program. One leader of an alternative school, for example, noted: “I think I compete with the alternative schools. Those are the ones I know the most about. Any school, any charter school that is a super traditional focus, I don’t tend to compete as much with them for kids.” Similarly, one school that emphasized the “whole child” noted that there was “maybe not as much competition because there’s not another high school like us that we might be competing against for students.” However, he felt this would potentially change as they expanded into lower grade levels:

Our middle school, opening up in the fall though, definitely is gonna have competition. We have a ... school here in the community that is a project-based school, and they are K–8. We have a Waldorf inspired school that’s been here for many, many years, and they’re K–8, so we’ll be competing with them a little bit more, those two schools in particular for our 7th and 8th [grades].

School leaders’ perceptions placed bounds on competitive markets. Yet as one of the school leaders said, even occupying a niche could not guarantee that a school would be protected from competition, particularly as new schools opened or existing schools expanded.

It’s choice, not competition

Four principals viewed student and parent enrollment decisions as somewhat idiosyncratic, a feature of the education system, something more akin to student mobility than to competition. One leader noted: “It’s not so much a competition as it is a stream of education flowing between the three schools.” He believed that the reasons for student departures were due to factors beyond his control, such as friends at other schools, transportation issues, “sometimes they just live closer to the school,” or “sometimes they like the online [schools] because they say it’s easier.” For these reasons, he describes that “there’s not a great need to go out and market... . I wouldn’t call it competing, it’s more letting the community know that we do have enrollment options.” In these ways, his perception of the drivers for families leaving his school led him to focus not on changes to the curriculum or instructional programs, but to do some minimal marketing to raise awareness but not necessarily to recruit families.

Another principal with high enrollment rates was not concerned with competition or losing families to other schools: “Sometimes parents just want something else, you know.” Other principals echoed this idea, saying things like: “It’s more of what would you like your student’s day to look like and how would you like that philosophy to look?” or “We have a pretty diverse set of school options, so to me, parents either kind of take their kids to the convenient school in terms of like proximity and things like that, or they kind of know what they’re looking for and they go find it.” These leaders were less likely to respond to competition by changing school operations or strategies, given that they felt that choice was simply determined by families and they could do little to sway those families’ decisions or preferences.

In attributing competition to an oversupply of schools and not enough students, some of these school leaders absolved themselves of responsibility to attract and retain students. The reason their schools were underenrolled, they argued, was due to a shortage of students in the area, not because of anything the school itself could control. One leader said,

I found that talking to several other charter schools recently in my area, we’ve all had enrollment trouble. There are like three new schools, and so there’s not quite the growth potential there for each of us anymore, I don’t think.

(Re)defining competition and seeking legitimacy

Regardless of their overall perception of competition or their disposition toward competition (i.e., individualistic or market-oriented perspectives; collectivist or niche-based competition; or competition as an unfortunate aspect of school choice), principals consistently expressed that curricular decisions were not directly influenced by competition. This buffering of the technical core of education from the influence of competition was related to principals’ ideas of legitimacy (i.e., what respondents perceived was legitimate for school leaders to do). In other words, changing curriculum simply to “compete” was not considered legitimate.

For the principals in our study, the primary source of legitimacy was making decisions based on what was best for students. For example, leaders described how “personal motivations” or school missions guided key decisions. One leader described why she opened her charter school:

I think that was a personal motivation, to really begin to think about how to enfranchise people, and I don’t think it’s like a competitive kind of, like, you know, the schools that purposefully doing things. I think it was more that large district schools have a huge, huge job, and thousands of kids and few funds... . It just seemed like there was a lot to be said for just a small school that was really dedicated to building relationships with students and families, and just helping people overcome the obstacles that you encounter in high school on the way to graduation and college.

This principal described how competition did not play a role in the establishment of her school.

Nine other schools also described how their decisions about changes to curriculum and instruction were buffered from competition. One leader described how the school did not “respond” to competition with changes to curriculum or instruction because:

We’re a defined curriculum. Our school takes a stance on education. We believe in core classical liberal arts for kindergarten through eighth grade and classical education. So that always grounds us, and people are attracted to us because we firmly believe in that philosophy in program ... so it’s not something that we change.

Other schools echoed this idea, noting, “We always look at curricular changes as what’s best for our existing students... . We don’t overtly make that change to try to impact attendance.” The leader described making some changes to the online curriculum because “that could impact the amount of students that were leaving” but emphasized that retention was not the primary reason for the change. She reiterated: “We don’t make curricular changes to increase enrollment. We simply look at existing students and service in their needs.” Another principal said they did not compete on academics because:

Our mindset is not that we really make curricular decisions to compete. We really have the mindset that we’re making curricular decisions to make success. Which I guess in a sense leads to competition, but our focus is not about getting kids in the door. Our focus is about the kids that we have. How do we make the best decision for them and what they need right now and into their future?

Similarly, principals described how other factors drove their decision making. One principal said:

We do what we think is the best education for the kids, and I don’t try to add stuff because it’s competition. Like for example, I did one year lose two kids to a district school that offers a bilingual program, and I did not then try to add a bilingual program in order to meet that need... . It’s so hard with this population to get the product that you want that we end up streamlining the program and just concentrating on the basics. And we’re successful doing that, but it means that I don’t get to add extra stuff that might make me more competitive. But I don’t think that it makes any sense to make curricular decisions based on enrollment. It only makes sense to make curricular decisions based on education.

Another school leader actually did add a Spanish language curriculum, but this too was not driven by competition but by the community: “It’s like a 90% Hispanic community, and so we do that because it’s a border town, really.”

Leaders described changing their curriculum based on data, their mission, or their current students’ needs. One leader noted that, rather than because of competition, “we make our curricular changes based on the data that we receive from our students... . We are constantly trying to improve the effectiveness of our programs.” However, he noted, this could sometimes “spill over into why parents want to send their kids to our school,” as a positive side effect, thus helping with recruitment and retention indirectly. Overall, leaders believed that internal curricular changes should be buffered from competitive responses.

As long as decisions about the academic core were outside the influence of competition, school leaders felt they could engage in competitive practices. When asked about their strategies in response to “competition,” school leaders tended to focus on marketing and recruitment, practices that school leaders identified as legitimate. As one leader said, “I think that’s part of what the marketing team is all about.” However, the principal clarified,

I don’t know if I would say that I’m competing so much as I’m wanting to ensure that people know who we are and what it is that we have to offer ... and let them make the decision as to whether or not we are a better fit.”

He viewed marketing less as a means to compete for students but rather to inform the community about the unique programs at his school. Indeed, leaders appeared to view marketing not as a superficial strategy to compete but as a way to respond to competition in an ethical way that allowed them to retain their commitment to their core educational mission. One school leader described that she did not make changes to their curriculum to compete: “We create our own curriculum around the state standards... . And we won’t change our curriculum just to get more students. We wouldn’t do that. No.” The school leader did focus on marketing the school but saw this as a way to recruit students without having to “change who we are.” She noted, “We haven’t changed our identity.”

Similarly, other school leaders also redefined “competing” as “marketing.” Even though one school leader did change his school’s curriculum to differentiate from the competition, explaining, “Five years ago, I made the determination that we were not going to be a traditional school and took a more constructivist route because I thought that would be a good differentiator,” he did not view this as a response to competition for students. Instead, he notes, “We actually don’t actively compete, which I know probably sounds really weird. But I don’t advertise. What we do is we just run a fantastic school every day.” This leader appears to understand “competition” as marketing, even though his actions to differentiate his school would fall under a traditional definition of school competition as described by policy makers and researchers.

These principals seemed to view “competing” as distinct from their core academic work. In the context of public education, this focus on improving the core academic work of the school due to student and family needs and school mission may give charter leaders legitimacy in a competitive environment. Their behaviors were driven by these conceptions of what was legitimate. They did not respond to competition by changing or improving academic programs because they perceived that to be their core work—the work they were going to engage in regardless. These perceptions may explain why some survey findings, including ours (Creed, Jabbar, & Scott, 2017), find little competitive response in terms of changes to the core of schooling—curriculum and instruction—and more changes to marketing efforts, for example. Marketing could thus serve as a way of “complying” with market logics and dynamics without making substantive changes to the school’s programming, either because of legitimacy, efficiency, or a strong commitment to the school’s existing educational mission.

Discussion and conclusion

Arizona school leaders generally perceived that they operated within competitive environments. However, school leaders varied in how they defined the competitive markets they interacted with. Drawing on interviews with charter school leaders from across Arizona allows us to add further nuance to the existing literature about what influences the networks in which competition occurs (Bell, 2009; Gewirtz et al., 1995; Holme, 2002; Jabbar, 2015a; Ladd & Fiske, 2003; Woods et al., 1998) by examining school leaders’ mental models of competition and what actions are deemed legitimate in competitive educational settings.

School leaders also defined or redefined competition in their own ways, influenced by their conceptions of competition and legitimacy. For example, leaders defined competition in some cases as marketing, not differentiation or changing instructional practices. This narrowing of the definition of “competing” related to ideas of legitimacy. In other words, it was legitimate for school leaders to make decisions based on what is best for their students; they do not make decisions solely to boost the bottom line. These types of statements may be necessary based on the defining characteristics of the education system. First, parents are sensitive and responsive to whether a school has their child’s best interests at heart, and if a school is seen as profit-driven rather than student-driven, this could lead to parents leaving the school. Furthermore, school leaders need to balance meeting the needs of current students (retention) with the needs of attracting prospective students (recruitment). The retention of students likely dominates given the benefits of stable/consistent enrollment and better knowing the needs of current rather than potential students. Because of this, schools needed to adopt cognitive frames that redefined all competitive actions as benefitting students and families rather than as competition, and when it was necessary to “compete,” to describe it as an unfortunate reality, something the school leaders must do but do not want to do. We find that school leaders were more likely to label marketing as competition because they considered it a way of letting people know that their school exists. They did not label differentiating their schools (filling a niche) as competition because that suggests a motivation that does not come from “what is best for students.”

These findings can help us interpret the actions of school leaders. Prior studies have found that principals focus on seemingly superficial strategies in response to competition, such as marketing, rather than changing their core academic programs (Jabbar, 2015b; Loeb et al., 2011). However, our work shows that principals were responding to competition in ways that were legitimate in their institutional environment. Rather than a superficial strategy, leaders viewed marketing as a legitimate way to compete, simply letting parents and families know about the work they were already doing, rather than making changes to the instructional core of the school solely to compete.

We also find that, contrary to many policy makers’ assumptions, choice does not necessitate competition between schools, and collaboration can occur even in a competitive environment. For example, some leaders described collaborations with other schools, often in the service of finding a better fit for each student. These leaders believed that school choice was primarily about parents having more options and finding the right school based on their preferences, rather than competing for students. Finally, several schools in our study considered themselves specialized, occupying a niche, which could buffer schools from competition if they were the “only” school of their kind in a given area. These findings suggest that the expansion of school choice and market-driven reforms in education are not always interpreted in the ways policy makers intend, with implications for practice. If, for example, school leaders do not perceive competition or interpret it in a particular way, they may not respond in systematic ways to the competitive pressures policy makers seek to introduce.

Our work also illuminates future directions for research that uses institutional and sensemaking theory to understand educational markets, privatization, and school choice. Given the underlying assumptions of many choice policies, institutional approaches can help to explain patterns in the literature that do not conform to the expectations of economists. For example, cognitive and institutional lenses can highlight how sensemaking plays a role in various school choice settings and how institutions shape the decisions and practices of different market actors (e.g., parents, students, school leaders), which can help to explain the varied outcomes in the school choice literature. Our study revealed that school leaders’ interpretations of legitimate responses to competition constrained and shaped their actions. Sensemaking occurs within institutional contexts and is shaped by what is perceived as legitimate in a particular context (Weber & Glynn, 2006). Charter school leaders, for example, seek legitimacy from parents, community organizations, and philanthropic foundations (Huerta & d’Entremont, 2010), and this constrains their actions. Our work thus highlights the interaction between cognition and legitimacy. Sensemaking is a micro process, embedded within a macro system that constrains and shapes the sensemaking process (Weber & Glynn, 2006). While not the focus of this study, future work exploring Weick et al.’s (2005) insight that sensemaking can operate as a proactive process and as a reactive process could provide further nuance into how decisions are made and interpreted. Principals, for example, may make sense of their actions after the fact to comply with legitimated practices, rather than to proactively construct meaning before acting. The relationship between sensemaking and legitimacy is a relatively understudied and underexplored area, especially in education, but represents a potentially fruitful route to better understand how market-based reforms are enacted, implemented, and how they do (or do not) lead to outcomes from a noneconomic perspective.

Furthermore, future research could examine how educational policies at the state and federal level interact with current ideas of legitimacy among key actors in schools, as well as parents, communities, and policy makers. While our work examined patterns across principals situated in different contexts, future research might examine how leaders’ responses varied based on the communities and local contexts in which they were embedded, broadening the case to look at how the local environment interacts with individual principals’ cognition and practices. Future research might also examine the extent to which leaders are complex sensemakers who have to navigate and interpret multiple, and sometimes competing, messages from policy and the community. Examining how they choose which to adopt and which to ignore and where there might be possible contradictions in their views could help to further illuminate the complexity of competition and how it influences leader strategy and practice.

Biographies

Huriya Jabbar is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy at the University of Texas at Austin. Her research examines the social and political dimensions of market-based reforms and privatization in education.

Benjamin Creed is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Leadership, Educational Psychology, and Foundations at Northern Illinois University. His research focuses on topics related to school choice, school finance, and transitions in the pre-K–20 educational system.

Appendix A: Interview protocol (selected questions)

Background

How did you become a [principal, CEO, or most recent position title] at this school? When did this school open?

Tell me about what you do in a typical day.

What would you say are the biggest challenges you currently face at this school?

Enrollment

What types of students do you aim to serve?

What neighborhoods do students at your school come from? (Probe for zip codes, if available)

What transportation do they use to get here?

On the survey, you mentioned schools [A, B, and C] were feeders. Can you describe these relationships?

On the survey, you mentioned schools [X, Y, and Z] were where your students often attend after they reach the last grade in your building. How, if at all, do you help families navigate the next choice?

How, if at all, has enrollment changed since you’ve been here?

Why do you think these changes occurred?

How do you think these changes have affected your school?

How, if at all, has the type of students who attend your school changed over time?

How do students enroll in your school?

What is the application process like?

Can you describe other schools that your students or their parents have considered?

How do you find out that they are considering other schools?

When students leave your school or select other schools, where do they typically go? (Probe: traditional schools, charter schools, private schools, schools in other districts)

When do students leave your school?

How do you usually find out about this?

What are these schools like? (high-performing, low-performing, demographics)

Where are they located? (nearby, far away)

What’s your sense of why these students leave your school?

In what ways, if at all, has this situation influenced your decisions?

Some of your students arrive after spending some time at other schools. Which schools do they come from?

Why do you think these students leave those schools?

How do they adjust to your school?

How, if at all, does this affect your school overall?

Competition

Does your school do anything to enroll more students?

Can you give me an example (Probe: curricular changes, instructional changes, marketing, operational changes)

In your survey, you noted that you [believe/do not believe] your school competes for students. Can you tell me more about that?

[If compete] Can you give me an example of when this happened?

In your survey, you noted that you [make/do not make] curricular or instructional changes in order to compete for students. Can you tell me more about that?

[If compete] Can you give me an example of when this happened?

How did you decide to make these curricular/instructional changes?

In what ways is your school unique or different from other schools?

In your survey, you noted that you [use/do not use] outreach or advertisements in order to compete for students. Can you tell me more about that?

[If compete] Can you give me an example of when this happened?

Where do you do the outreach?

What do you think you gain from this kind of outreach and advertising?

Who typically puts together those materials?

[If compete] What other strategies, if any, do you use to make your school more competitive?

[If “YES” to compete, INSERT TAILORED LIST OF QUESTIONS FOR EACH LEADER, AFTER REVIEWING SURVEY]. For example:

You mentioned the following schools as competitors: [A, B, C]. I’m going to ask you about each one of these in a bit more detail.

First, can you tell me more about what makes A a competitor? (Walk through all; if too many, focus on those marked as high competition. If still too many, get through at least five schools.)

You also mentioned that you do not compete with some schools [e.g., D, E, F]. Can you tell me a little about why you don’t view D as competition?

What is your relationship like with your school board?

What organizations does your school partner or collaborate with?

What is the nature of your partnership activities?

Do you ever collaborate with other schools? [probe for nature of partnership, public/charter, etc.]

Are you a part of a charter school network?

If yes, how does the central office of the CMO or organization oversee your work?

Appendix B: Codebook

Code	Code Description	Definition/Examples
DESCRIPTORS: Used for categorizing whole sources, applied to whole transcript
GENDER	Respondent Gender	e.g., Male, Female
YEARS OF EXP	Respondent Years of Experience in Education	e.g., 8
GRADE LEVEL	Grades Served at School	Elementary Middle High K–12 K–8 Other (specify)
SCHOOL TYPE	Standalone CMO—affiliated with charter network
ALTERNATIVE	Yes No	Is school an alternative school/second-chance school/credit-recovery school
COMPETITION FOR STUDENTS
PERC-COMP	Definition of competition provided directly, or meaning/significance of competition suggested. Understanding of competition What do they think they are competing for? (better bottom line, better outcomes/performance, mission) Why a school is a competitor Or lack thereof	Ex. “you’ve got to sell your school” Social inclusion and social justice aims “collide” with market values Ex. “Because we are next door to them, we compete for the same students.” Ex. We don’t have to compete Ex. Competition is there, but it isn’t a primary concern; educating students to the best of our ability is.” Ex. “Ultimately, we are a business. We have to attract students to make money.”
COMP-LOSS	Enrollment loss, and anything related to it	Mention of enrollment loss
COMP-GAIN	Enrollment gain, and anything related to it	Mention of enrollment gain, Ex. We received new students and it made us have to add new intervention programs
COMP-TYPE	Type of school (direct-run, private, CMO charter, standalone charter, particular mission/focus) that poses competition	Mention of any type of school that poses a threat (other school parents choose, offers more services, has more resources) Ex. “Some parents go across town to send their kids to X public school” Ex. “think about all those kids that go to private school that could be going to our school” Ex. We only compete with other college-prep schools Ex. Our students would really only consider other alternative schools and there aren’t any in the area.
COMP-GRADE	Mention of grade level as it relates to competitors or enrollment issues	Ex. “We only compete in Kindergarten”
COMP-CIRCUITS	Competition occurring in circuits or networks of competitors based on market hierarchy	Ex. “First, you’ve got the top tier—that’s your KIPPs, your Lushers, your high-performing charters ...”
COMP-GEOG	Geographic dimensions of competition or enrollment	Ex. They are close by, so a lot of parents consider them
PRACTICES TO COMPETE FOR STUDENTS: Identified by principals as part of working in competitive enviornment
PRACT-ACAD	Academic strategies Better educational practices, curriculum, test scores in response to competition or demand	New academic programs, new curriculum, test scores increase
PRACT-NONE	No identified strategies Incapable of effective response due to weak leadership Waiting for other schools to close, enrollment to increase	Aspects of school enrollment not being addressed, waiting for enrollment to increase in other ways (passively)
PRACT-EC	Extracurricular Extracurricular activities adopted in response to competitiomn	After school programs, sports, etc.
PRACT-MKT	Marketing	Type of information presented in marketing materials. Source of funding for marketing Materials, flyers, billboards, etc.
PRACT-CLIM	School climate or culture Behavioral strategies, discipline changes in response to competition Community engagement, parent engagement in responses to competition	Efforts to improve school climate, safety, trust. e.g., “we have a strict environment” Creating spaces for parent engagement, responding to parent demands
PRACT-OPER	Operational responses in response to competition Business Operations: funding, budgeting, purchasing Increased efficiency Cuts to expenses (not necessarily resulting in efficiency) Transportation issues, bus passes, carpools, lunch programs School facilities/buildings	Evidence of efforts to increase efficient use of resources. (Less resources, same outcome.) Leveraging grants, cutting back nonessentials, finding ways to do more with less. Just cutting expenses.
PRACT-INFO	“Watch” other actors, not consumers Information on competitors	“We see that other schools are using X compensation scheme.” Ex. “I didn’t know so many schools existed.” Ex. “We keep track of where students go—I can show you the spreadsheet.”
PRACT-NICHE	Try to contain or control competition or uncertainty Niche schools (view themselves as distinct from others) Schools use same policies, practices—reduces competition Strategy to compete by recruiting or retaining specific populations of students that they target (e.g., homeless, ELL)	“Our school is the only X type of school.” “All schools now have the same behavioral policies”
PRACT-RECRUIT	Practices related to recruitment of students Descriptions of admissions process Recruiting students from other schools serving same grades Alliances with feeder schools Differentiate between marketing and recruitment.	e.g., Some of our parents are getting calls saying that the school has an open slot. e.g., open houses, parent nights e.g., work with elementary schools to recruit students “We have a strong clientele from our feeder schools”
PRACT-SCREEN/SELECT	Manipulation of student body, prescreening, counseling out behaviors	e.g., “We might take more students after Oct. 1 if they are really good students.” e.g., Telling parents they aren’t a good fit e.g., indicate in any way that they are an exclusive school- only for some families (but not a niche)
PRACT-OTHER	Other practices not listed above or where you aren’t sure they count	e.g., ““I try to get all my staff to see we are competing for students, I have PD sessions about this every semester – we need to compete, we need to work harder to compete!”
POLICY & REG: Districts, Policy, and Regulation
PERC_STATE_REG	Role of government (state, federal, local policies/regulations/department of education/politics) Mention of accountability Regulations, policies that affect school governance/choice architecture (school finance, student assignment, transport, vouchers)	There’s a new voucher program that is taking away students. The state gives us less funding per student.
CMO-REG	CMO or charter board regulations, policies that affect school governance/choice. Diff types of CMO intervention Evidence of CMO/district support to school (or lack of support).	e.g., CMO policy on marketing, assignment Our central office handles all the marketing
INTERMED-REG	Regulatory role of other intermediary orgs in the area, beyond the charter school or CMO or charter school board Other organizations/nonprofits that support the charter school	e.g., ACSA helps us with X each year
PERC_OTHER REL TO STUDENT COMPETITION	Perception
PERC-PARENT	Principal’s view of parents, students, and community in general Principal’s views of parents’, students’, and community’s perception of the school Principals’ views of what matters to parents/families (may include student if in HS)	“These parents are not educated” (deficit views) Role of parent/community perceptions of school as unsafe or underperforming. (history of school as under-performing). Ex. “Parents don’t think they can get a quality education here.” Lack of reputation or name in the community
PERC-SYSTEM	Their perceptions of how schools should work Actors’ perceptions, beliefs, and understandings of markets in ed generally or of school choice, or ideology (broad views that can drive their actions, i.e., curricular approach, professional development philosophy)	“We have school choice so that every parent can select the best school.” This is broader than just perceptions of competition “We don’t change our curriculum to compete for students; we do it because that’s what schools do” “We’re a public school, we’re open to everyone.”
TEACHERS	Anything to do with teachers (i.e., what teachers are best for this school), Human Capital, Teacher recruitment, retention	Any issues related to staff, teachers’ working conditions, hiring, firing, pay, “productivity,” retention, e.g., “masters degree”
COMP-TEACHERS	Evidence of competition for teachers/perspectives on competition for teachers. Explicit reference to competition, or response to our question about competition for teachers	Any issues specifically related to competing for teachers with other schools. (May be some overlap with “Teachers” category)
COLLABORATION	Evidence of cooperation or collaboration between schools	Ex. We send kids to the other schools in our network if we don’t have space. We host professional development seminars with another charter school in the area.