Many of the charter schools fill narrow educational niches. Marriott Hospitality, for example, is a high school providing training for the hotel and restaurant industry. The Elsie Whitlow Stokes elementary school has immersion programs in French and Spanish. And the Integrated Design & Electronics Academy gives teenagers a mix of vocational, military and college prep classes.

The menu of specialized offerings appeals to many parents, who say that the regular school system, in addition to its long-standing management problems, is not flexible enough to develop their child's particular interests or learning style.

"I don't think my son would do well in a traditional school with lots of rote work and lots of drill," said Julie Doar, explaining why she enrolled her 8-year-old son at the Children's Studio School, an elementary school where the lessons transcend traditional subjects, the classes are multi-age and the instructors are professional artists, some with no previous elementary teaching experience.

On a typical morning at Children's Studio this spring, a painter and a choreographer were guiding a dozen students in a sun-drenchedclassroom through lessons in geometry, dance and 17th-century architecture. One group of youngsters was weaving a loose lattice of string. Another was measuring floor tile. At each stage, the two teachers were making connections between mathematical symmetry, the Palace of Versailles and the invention of ballet. Outside the classroom, the hallways were crammed with mobiles, paintings, sculptures and chimes.

There are no charters in the most affluent neighborhoods of the city, where most of the top-scoring traditional schools are located. Parents in those neighborhoods are likely to send their children to private school or to raise money to pay for additional teachers and programs at their neighborhood public school.