Crown Ridge Academy

“San Bernardino charter school shut down.” San Bernardino Sun (CA), 9/19/2012

SAN BERNARDINO - More than 100 students who had been attending a charter school for at-risk children stayed home Wednesday, and they won't be going to Crown Ridge Academy ever again.

Neither will the school's teachers, all of whom the charter school director says are owed months of pay without a clear path to collect that money.

The board of the San Bernardino City Unified School District, which allowed the school to open in 2009, revoked the charter Tuesday night after determining that there was no realistic way for the school to dig itself out of a deep financial hole...

A big chunk of the school's problems came from spending a large grant twice, [board president, Steven Bielinski] said, and officials made other mistakes, but those people have been replaced...

It might be worth taking a risk on money coming in if the school were producing good academic results, but its test scores are far below those of other district schools that also serve English-learning students, said board member Judi Penman.

Crown Ridge is the latest charter school in the district to face potential shutdown.

Casa Ramona Academy lost 100 students beginning in the 2010-11 school after complaints of physical problems, inadequate instruction for English learners and classes that didn't qualify students for admission to state universities.

And the Public Safety Academy faced years of complaints about fiscal mismanagement and cronyism until that charter school's founder was removed from the board.

The district approved five-year extensions to the charters of both schools this spring.

[Board member Margaret Hill] worried this could be another stain on the reputation of the district and the city...

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Imagine Academy of Careers Middle School

“Former St. Louis charter school instructor charged with raping student.” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 9/5/2012

ST. LOUIS • Prosecutors have charged a former St. Louis charter school instructor with raping a student last month.

Ronald C. Wilkerson, 41, of the 1200 block of North Euclid Avenue, was charged Aug. 31 with two counts of forcible rape, one count of forcible sodomy, two counts of second-degree statutory rape, one count of statutory sodomy and two counts of witness tampering.

Authorities said Wilkerson, a former instructor at one of the Imagine charter schools, twice raped and sodomized a 14-year-old girl last month and threatened to hurt or kill her family if she told anyone about it...

Wilkerson was a communication arts teacher at the Imagine Academy of Careers Middle School... The victim had attended the school.

After years of financial and academic troubles, the state education board closed Imagine's six charter schools this past spring. The public charter schools were run by the for-profit Imagine Schools Inc. and were independent of city school system.

Wilkerson was on the company's payroll through the end of July, Waters said.

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STATE OF MISSOURI  VS WILKERSON, RONALD C

http://www.circuitattorney.org/docs/Ronald%20Wilkerson.pdf

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Tennessee Virtual Academy

“TN virtual school draws criticism.” The Tennessean (TN), 9/10/2012

As state officials lambaste the Tennessee Virtual Academyfor low achievement scores and discuss new oversight methods, the school’s management company is facing an investigation in Florida, overcoming a list of citations issued in Georgia and recovering from reports of poor results in many of its schools.

The virtual academy allows students in grades K-8 to take all their classes online, monitored by a certified teacher. It is managed by K12 Inc., a publicly traded for-profit company that has contracts for differing levels of involvement with at least 2,000 other schools across the nation.

In its first year, the Tennessee academy ranked among the bottom 4 percent of districts in the state on a measure that shows student progress from year to year.

State Rep. Joe Pitts, D-Clarksville, called the school “a risky experiment that blew up in our face.”...

However, Tennessee is not the only state where the management company has been criticized.

A research paper published in July by the National Education Policy Center at the University of Colorado Boulderrecommended national education officials slow down the approval of virtual schools while examining effectiveness and cost. The study showed achievement scores of K12 students were not on par with those of traditional schools.

A class-action lawsuit against K12 is pending in a U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Virginia claiming the company made inflated claims about its student achievement in an effort to inflate stock prices...

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More at http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2012/09/tennessees-k12-inc-virtual-school.html?spref=tw

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SMART Charter School

“Financial problems close three charter schools in Broward.” The Miami Herald (FL), 9/14/2012

Parents, students and teachers are unexpectedly scrambling to find a new school.

The abrupt end was punctuated by locked doors and silence at one school, and with a chaotic gathering of parents and students at another.

But the story at three Broward charter schools was essentially the same on Friday: financial problems had led to closure, leaving parents and students to unexpectedly scramble to find a new place to enroll.

“We should have had way more time to look for other schools for our kids,” said Nicole Williams, whose son Alfonso was a 10th-grader at Eagle Charter Academy in Lauderdale Lakes, one of the three schools now closed. Also closing this week were the nearby SMART Charter School (run by the same company as Eagle Charter), and Touchdowns4life Charter School in Tamarac, which was founded by former Miami Dolphins running back Terry Kirby.

Williams said the school sent her a notification letter on Wednesday...

Broward school district officials said Eagle and SMART shut down because of shrinking enrollment, and district spokeswoman Tracy Clark said Touchdowns4life’s closure was due to “funding” issues — likely also enrollment-related, since charter schools are funded almost entirely based on the number of students who attend...

Annual audits for all three schools show deep financial troubles...

The parent company of Eagle and SMART, according to the most recent audit, owed a $1.2 million debt to the IRS for unpaid payroll taxes...

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“Three Broward County charter schools abruptly close.”Sun Sentinel (FL), 9/14/2012

Three Broward County charter schools abruptly closed this week, leaving parents scrambling and exposing a potential dark side to schools designed to be appealing alternatives to traditional public schools.

Touchdowns4Life, a financially troubled school in Tamarac founded by former Miami Dolphins running back Terry Kirby, closed its doors Tuesday. On Wednesday, Eagle Charter Academy and SMART Charter School, both operated by the same company, informed parents they would close their doors and gave parents until Friday to pick up student records.

All three cited low enrollment as the cause. Neither parents nor the Broward County School District, which issues the charter contract to the schools, say they received any notice before this week that the schools were on the verge of closing...

The sudden closure of the three schools has also raised questions about who oversees them. Neither parents nor the school district, which contracts with the schools, had prior warning, said district spokeswoman Tracy Clark...

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VLT (Value Learning and Teaching) Academy

“Audit flags ethics questions at charter school.” Cincinnati Enquirer (OH), 9/11/2012

A local charter school overpaid an employee $3,333 and committed possible ethics violations, according to the Ohio Auditor’s Office...

In one case, the school accepted a bid from a janitorial company even though it was higher than other bids. The company’s owner works for the school and is married to the superintendent. In the other case, the superintendent signed a $17,000 summer contract for her daughter. Both are potential conflicts of interest...

Lee said the school has been contracting with the janitorial company for years and has not had any prior issues. But in 2009, The Enquirer reported that the auditor’s office flagged the same janitorial service company contract in 2007, noting the potential conflict of interest.

VLT is one of the larger charter schools in the area, serving around 800 students in grades K-12. Its academic rating last year was Continuous Improvement, the third highest of six categories on the Ohio Report Card...

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Excelsior Charter School

“Rodeo Clown Stirs Controversy After Making Racist Joke About First Lady.” CBSLA, 9/18/2012

CRESTON (CBSLA.com) — A rodeo clown didn’t leave many people laughing in San Luis Obispo County this past weekend when he made a racist joke about first lady Michelle Obama.

Michael Hayhurst, a professional rodeo clown and barrelman, got on the PA system at the 17th Annual Creston Classic Rodeo Saturday and said, “Playboy is offering Ann Romney $250,000 to pose in the magazine, and the White House is upset about it because National Geographic only offered Michelle Obama $50 to pose for them.”

Parents at an Excelsior Charter School in Victorville said they can’t believe it, especially because Hayhurst serves as the school’s superintendent...

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From DataQuest (Excelsior Charter School, a.k.a. Excelsior Education Center"

 Ethnic/Racial (STAR)

	Percent
Black or African American	5
American Indian or Alaska Native	0
Asian	0
Filipino	1
Hispanic or Latino	34
Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander	0
White	49
Two or More Races	5
These percentages may not sum to 100 due to responses of: other, multiple, or non-response.

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Laboratory Charter School of Communication and Languages

“Feds charge Philly charter school mogul in massive fraud.” Philadelphia Inquirer (PA), 7/24/2012

A charter school mogul was charged today in a multimillion-dollar fraud case by the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Dorothy June Hairston Brown, who received accolades for students' test scores and gained notoriety for collecting large salaries and suing parents who questioned her actions, was indicted on multiple counts of wire fraud, obstruction of justice, and witness tampering.

Brown, 75, and four executives from her charter schools, were charged with defrauding three charter schools of more than $6.5 million in taxpayer funds.

U.S. Attorney Zane David Memeger announced that a federal grand jury had returned a 62-count indictment against Brown and four of her trusted employees...

A former Philadelphia school district principal, Brown founded three small charter schools in Philadelphia: the Laboratory which has campuses in Northern Liberties, Overbrook and Wynnefield; Ad Prima in Overbrook; and Planet Abacus in Tacony.

In addition, in 2005 she helped create the Agora Cyber Charter School, which provides online instruction to students from across the state in their homes.

Brown served as the chief executive officer simultaneously at Laboratory and Ad Prima and as a consultant to Planet Abacus until October of 2008, according to the nonprofit tax forms the schools filed.

She stepped down from the posts after the state law was changed that July of that year to bar charter administrators from collecting multiple salaries from schools or from companies that provide services to charters schools.

Brown was paid $150,000 for working 30 hours per week at Laboratory until that October and $115,904 for a 30-hour week at Ad Prima. In addition, she was a paid consultant to Planet Abacus and Agora, which at that time was headquartered in Devon.

Despite relinquishing the administrative titles, Brown retained control of day-to-day operations of Ad Prima, Laboratory and Planet Abacus, according to sources with knowledge of the schools...

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