Book excerpt: This is a book about ethnocentric niche charter schools. What are they? When did they first appear? From where did the term come? How do they differ from regular charter schools and from district-run traditional public schools? Each subject chapter was created by a team consisting of at least one educational researcher and at least one charter school practitioner. The goal is to make the book readable for everyone (policymakers, parents, teachers, older students) while providing a framework of rigor from which to view each charter school. Hence: the teams. The authors took special pains to create a book which exhibits the objectivity of the educational researcher while, at the same time, inviting the reader into each school by painting a human picture of its ethos. Each chapter contains a description of the school told by people who actually taught or learned or sent their children there.