La Crescent Montessori Academy

“Teacher's arrest begs more questions.” La Crosse Tribune (WI), 1/31/2013

School administrators had few answers Wednesday for why Jason David Barker — a convicted felon and special-education teacher now charged with molesting his students — was able to land job after job at area charter and private schools.

Barker was director of the special-education program at La Crescent Montessori Academy until earlier this month, when several of his students confronted him at school in a plea to stop the abuse, prosecutors said...

La Crescent Montessori school administrator Tammy Stremcha declined to comment Wednesday about Barker and referred all questions to the school’s attorney, Dawn Harris.

Harris declined to comment on the school’s procedure for hiring new employees, and would not say if the school conducts background checks...

Barker’s latest charges accuse him of ongoing inappropriate relationships with at least three young girls at La Crescent Montessori Academy, offering what one described as “weird touches,” hugging, and requests they sit on his lap only after he closed the door...

According to court records, Barker was convicted in Minnesota’s Ramsey County of felony criminal damage to property in 1995, and of third-degree burglary in 1994. No further details on those crimes were available Wednesday.

He was charged in Anoka County in September 2006 with disorderly conduct and furnishing alcohol to minors, according to court records. He pleaded guilty later that year to the count of disorderly conduct, and the furnishing alcohol charge was dismissed, records show...

Barker was already working at the La Crescent Montessori Academy in May, when prosecutors say he brandished a knife, reached into a car and threatened to stab a couple he accused of cutting him off during a bicycle ride on the east end of Winona.

Barker pleaded not guilty. The school promoted him to special-education director four months later...

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Fairview Charter School

“Former Lutz principal removed from new Wisconsin job.” Tampa Tribune (FL), 10/15/2011

TAMPA -- Milwaukee school officials have removed a new principal from her job as they investigate reports from Lutz about the financial collapse of the private school she operated here.

Wendy Alexander was removed from her job Friday as principal of Fairview Charter School, where she supervised about 75 teachers and staff in a kindergarten-through-eighth grade program with more than 600 students.

Alexander founded and operated the Hand in Hand Academy in Lutz, shut down last month just four weeks into the new semester after seven years in business.

Some parents at Hand in Hand said they made payments to Alexander as late as mid-July without knowing she had just lost her bid for bankruptcy protection to stave off foreclosure of the school. Debts had grown to more than $2 million...

Alexander was interviewing for the Milwaukee Public Schools job as far back as April and was hired in May.

The school district there learned in September about Alexander's "personal business issues in Florida," according to a statement from Roseann St. Aubin, district spokeswoman.

"Since that time," the statement said, "we have been engaged in an ongoing review of the matter."

A former Florida employee of Alexander's brought the matter to the district's attention...

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“Tuition payments gone as Lutz school shuts down.” Tampa Bay Online (FL), 10/11/2011

LUTZ -- Parents were blindsided when the Hand in Hand Academy announced in an e-mail that it was shutting down Sept. 16, seven years after it first went into business and four weeks after opening for the new semester.

Some say they paid registration and tuition as late as mid-July under pressure from Principal Wendy Alexander, even after Alexander lost her bid for bankruptcy protection to stave off foreclosure.

"She was telling us one thing and turning around and it was totally something totally different," said Michael Hanke, a financial planner, who says he wouldn't have enrolled his child if he'd known about money problems. "She made you want to trust her."...

[Sherman Brod, her foreclosure lawyer] said Alexander never saw the collapse coming until the bitter end.

But records show she accepted her new job before July 8, when Hand In Hand Academy defaulted in the corporate bankruptcy case.

Bankruptcy records show that Lisa Astl, an office worker and part-time teacher at Hand In Hand, signed the check that helped trigger the bankruptcy default.

"I only wrote the check in good faith," said Astl. "I didn't think it would bounce."...

Alexander and Astl were arrested together in 2009 and charged with resisting arrest.

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“Felony DUI is embarrassing but not a disqualifier.” St. Petersburg Times (FL), 12/13/2009

PORT RICHEY — A Pasco County sheriff's sergeant was patrolling U.S. 19 at 1:30 a.m. on a Monday when he clocked two women in a blue Toyota pickup at near 90 mph.

The preschool workers appeared drunk, and they gave deputies each other's last names, the report said. The driver refused the breath test.

Lisa Marie Astl's fourth DUI arrest since 1995 earned a felony designation reserved for repeat offenders.

But as far as the state was concerned, the 38-year-old teacher could keep her job at Hand In Hand Academy in Lutz.

Any discipline would be up to school leaders.

In this case, however, the woman riding shotgun was 41-year-old Wendy Viles Alexander, Astl's boss and Hand In Hand's founder. Deputies charged her with a misdemeanor, giving false information to a law enforcement officer. It was her first arrest, state records show...

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Allegation: Authoring legislation to benefit wife's charter school operation?

“Senator faces ethics complaint.” Baraboo News Republic (WI) 6/11/2011

Sen. Luther Olsen, R-Ripon, violated a state ethics law when he authored legislation to financially benefit his wife, a liberal advocacy group alleges in a complaint.

Olsen has not responded to the complaint. But in an interview Friday, his wife called the allegation "ridiculous."

The complaint, filed Friday with the state's Government Accountability Board ,says Olsen inserted language in a bill that would allow a nonprofit headed by his wife to establish a charter school, and thus qualify for additional state funding.

"Sen. Luther Olsen believes he is above the law and that he can use his office to benefit himself and his wife," said Scot Ross, executive director of One Wisconsin Now, the group that filed the complaint...

Olsen co-sponsored a bill that would allow cooperative educational service agencies, known as CESAs, to establish independent charter schools.

CESAs are regional nonprofits created by the Legislature to provide education services to school districts. Olsen's wife, Joan Wade, is the agency administrator of CESA 6...

CESA 6 could benefit under the bill, because the agency would then be permitted to move forward with a proposal to turn an environmental center it runs into a charter school. The bill would provide funding for each child that enrolls in a CESA charter school.

The Senate Education Committee, which Olsen chairs, debated the bill Tuesday. As initially written, the bill would have only allowed CESAs to establish charter schools within their boundaries. But Olsen and Sen. Alberta Darling, R-River Hills, offered an amendment to the bill - which was ultimately approved - to change that provision and allow CESAs to set up the schools outside their jurisdiction...

[Sen. Chris Larson, D-Milwaukee] asked Olsen whether there was a specific case he was referring to. Olsen chuckled as he responded, "There could be."

The CESA administered by Olsen's wife operates the Fallen Timbers Environmental Center for the six school districts that own it. The center is located near Seymour...

A representative of one of the six districts that owns the environmental center said Friday there have been no public discussions similar to what Olsen described...

But Wade, Olsen's wife, readily admitted Friday she has considered a scenario in which the environmental center would be converted into a charter school and run by CESA 6...

But Ross of One Wisconsin Now said Olsen's action on the charter school bill is different because it directly benefits his wife by providing her employer with increased financial stability.

"If you were in charge of an organization and that organization were to have a guaranteed source of funding, you have pretty much guaranteed yourself continued employment," Ross said Friday. "I think that's fair to say."...

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New Hope Institute of Science and Technology

FORMER CHARTER SCHOOL HEAD ACCUSED OF EMBEZZLEMENT INDICTMENT ALLEGES WOMAN STOLE MORE THAN $300,000 IN FEDERAL MONEY; January 24, 2008; Associated Press 

The U.S. attorney's office accused the former head of a Milwaukee charter school Wednesday of embezzling more than $300,000 in federal money.

A grand jury indicted Rosella Tucker, 54, of Milwaukee, on two counts of theft from a program receiving federal funds.

Tucker started New Hope Institute of Science and Technology in 2003, according to a U.S. attorney's office news release. It was a subsidiary of Tucker's New Hope Child Development Center, which also included her voucher school, Tucker Institute of Learning.

The indictment alleges that Tucker embezzled more than $300,000 from 2003 to 2005 from New Hope Institute of Science and Technology, which received federal money. She served as director of New Hope Institute of Science and Technology and New Hope Child Development Center, prosecutors said.

But Milwaukee Public Schools closed New Hope Institute of Science and Technology in 2006 for failing to meet its financial obligations.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel previously reported that the school was unable to pay its employees on time consistently and owed money to the school district and on its building insurance.

There was also some question about a 2002 BMW X5 valued at $43,700, plus $6,392 in finance charges. The district told the school to sell the vehicle in 2005, but it remained licensed to New Hope Child Development Inc. and someone named Haider Bokhari when the district decided to close the school.

Tucker could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted.

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