Written by  Joanne W. Golann , Vanderbilt University ____ Charter schools are 30 years old as of 2021, and the contentious debate about their merits and place in American society continues. To better understand what happens at charter schools – and as a sociologist who focuses on education – I spent a year and a half at a particular type of urban charter school that takes a “ no-excuses ” approach toward education. My research was conducted from 2012 through 2013, but these practices are still prevalent in charter schools today . The no-excuses model is one of the most celebrated and most controversial education reform models for raising student achievement among Black and Latino students. Charters, which are public schools of choice that are independently managed, show comparable achievement to traditional public schools, but no-excuses charters produce much stronger test-score gains . No-excuses schools have been heralded as examples of charter success and have received millions...