Pennsylvania Department of Education Secretary Gerald L. Zahorchak announced today that the Pennsylvania Department of Education has stopped making payments to the Agora Cyber Charter School because of ongoing concerns over misuse of taxpayer funds.The department filed suit in the Commonwealth Court this week seeking to have an independent trustee or receiver appointed to oversee the operations of the cyber charter school in place of Agora's board of trustees.
The chairman of the state Senate Education Committee said yesterday that allegations of the misuse of millions in public money by a Devon cyber charter school "further underscore" the need to overhaul the state's charter law. "I will not stand by and accept this type of abuse of public trust," said Sen. Jeffry E. Piccola (R., Dauphin), a staunch charter supporter and one of the sponsors of the state's 1997 charter law. He said he was troubled by allegations detailed in a state Department of Education lawsuit that the Agora Cyber Charter School's board of trustees had engaged in fraud by allowing millions of dollars in taxpayer money to benefit a company owned by the school's founder, Dorothy June Brown.
Another story of fraudulent behavior in charter schools. The Pennsylvania Department of Education yesterday filed suit against Agora Cyber Charter School in Devon, alleging fraud and breach of fiduciary responsibility by its board of trustees. The civil complaint maintains that cyber charter's board entered into improper contracts with the Cynwyd Group LLC., a management company that was co-created by Agora's founder Dorothy June Brown "for the purpose of making money from managing and operating the school."
The Ohio House on Thursday revealed a major rewrite of Gov. Ted Strickland's school-funding plan that would funnel more state money to poor districts and successful charter schools. Strickland proposed a dramatic overhaul of Ohio's school funding formula that would boost the state's share of the cost and reduce what taxpayers are expected to contribute to their local schools. His proposed "evidence-based" education system would require schools to use programs based on research findings and would set standards for students, teachers and districts. Districts would be audited annually and could be shut down for repeated failure to meet academic and operating standards.
Read this article about how charter schools are becoming private schools with public funds. When charter schools were created in Minnesota during the early 1990s, they were not allowed to own buildings. Because the programs were new and experimental, the thinking was that it was unwise for them to take on long-term mortgage debt.But as the number of programs grew and space was sometimes tough to finance, the Legislature agreed in 1997 to give charters building lease aid of up to $1,200 per pupil.
Think about the money somebody will get for leasing a site for a new school.
Kandil said an unidentified property owner was offering a seven-year lease for a building in Hanover that is three times the size of the school's 17,000-square-foot building. Kandil said he was not sure whether the owner wanted his name publicly known but that he had followed Chesapeake's growth and was willing to provide $1.2 million in pledged renovations to get a steady tenant in light of the tough economic times
An editorial in Oklahoma taken Obama to his word of supporting charter schools.
Some states that allow charter schools — Oklahoma included — haven’t embraced them as the hotbeds of innovation they often are and can be. Instead, they’re painted as money-grubbing, disreputable interlopers. That attitude does nothing to help children who can’t read or write well and are languishing in subpar schools.
The Department of Education has to intervene because parents don't get response or information from Charter school. In Colorado Springs Colorado, the Academy D-20 Charter schools is investigated by the Department of Education among other reasons for failing to eliminate conflict of interest,financial transparency and implement adequate financial controls, and demonstrate adequate accountability, maintain open records and provide the public with access to documents and information.
What supporter of charter schools in Washington DC want. In Washington DC budget cuts are affecting both vouchers and charter schools. Supporter of such measures are demanding no cuts and more funding. The charter schools have actually been masters at doing a lot with less," says Adriana Quiñones-Miranda, deputy director of Friends of Choice in Urban Schools (FOCUS). "We really want equal funding."
Superintendent Hanson says the district still needs clarity on KIPP's finances and clarity on uncredentialed KIPP instructors. The letter of good standing from the Superintendent of FresnoUnified would allow KIPP to apply for more than 4-million dollars in prop 55 funds it qualified for 5 years ago.
The only group that seems capable of stopping O'Connell is Oakland taxpayers, because they have never approved sending their tax dollars to charter schools. But will any of them file suit? The Oakland school board is suing State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell for raiding the district's accounts and giving $450,000 to charter schools. O'Connell is a big charter schools backer and has received oodles of campaign cash over the years from wealthy charter school supporters.
Look what a charter school in Niagara Falls, New York will get and how it affects the school district. The amount of state aid money the district pays to Niagara Charter School will increase $402,125 next year, partly because this year’s amount owed was under paid. Approximately, 300 Niagara Falls students attend the charter school, taking $3.5 million in funding away. Bianco pointed out that amount is similar to the amount the district has to cut this year to balance its budget.
Another charter school experiment that is both costly and ineffective. District officials commissioned the report at a cost of $10,000 in response to the discovery that the parent organization of El Portal Leadership Academy had skimmed about $400,000 from teacher retirement funds to pay for salaries and programs.
Charter schools affect the finances of school districts and cause some more unintended problems in times of crisis. The growth of the charter school movement is having a direct effect on SLPS’ finances. For every student who enrolls in a charter school, public money that would otherwise go to the school district goes instead to the charter school. However, some argue that this is not necessarily a problem because the school district has fewer students to educate as a result of the trend.
A problem in the congress of Utah regarding funding charter schools. The congress in Utah is still debating about funding public education and charter. Is fairness the issue?
Corruption in charter schools. This is an example from Philadelphia. The federal investigation began in the spring after The Inquirer reported that the Philadelphia School District inspector general was investigating allegations of nepotism, conflicts of interest, and financial mismanagement at Philadelphia Academy Charter School in the Northeast.
This appears in a small-time blog magazine, but exemplifies perfectly the kind of rationalization of vouchers and charter schools that pervades the public arena. Congress is preparing to pass a budget which takes away funding from Washington DC's Opportunity Scholarship Program, which makes it possible for 1700 kids a year — mostly African-American — to escape from the worst public school system in the country and attend a charter school or a private school, thus giving them a chance at a better future.
Who is lobbyingthe Do E. Considering all of the controversy surrounding charter schools in New York City right now, it would be interesting for someone to search the lobbying database for other charter school operators and see how many of them have lobbied the City Council or the Department of Education in recent years.
Charter schools' problems surfacing in Philadelphia . While many Pennsylvania's charter schools are hailed in their communities as educational beacons, the state auditor general has found financial and ethical problems at charters across the state.
Patrick lifts hopes for charter plan - GloucesterTimes.com, Gloucester, MA. "Certainly it is perplexing that (Patrick) is proposing to finance It makes no sense to fund additional charters under new arrangements at the same time that many districts are underfunded," Farmer said. "It just doesn't make sense to spend on things when you can't fund school districts.
If a private school is in finance trouble, can it be split to become a charter school?
Are charter schools the solution to problems in public education in general or can it be used to problems in a particular situation like this one?
Any private school in financial trouble put their name on the list of charter schools. In New York, major Bloomberg suggests to convert Catholic schools into charters, just like that.
New Debates Over Church, State, School and Charters. With the support our federal government to charter schools, now private schools in financial trouble can become charter schools, but the religious component in non-secular private schools now plays a factor in the decision.
New York City News Service - CUNY Graduate School of Journalism » Blog Archive » Principal Issues at Hebrew School. Resistance to the Brooklyn Hebrew school inspired newspaper opinion pieces and blog entries, but hasn’t produced the level of controversy that engulfed the Ben Gamla and Khalil Gibran schools.
After a three-week trial and nine hours of deliberation, the jury convicted William and Shirley Pierce of Minneapolis on all 13 counts, including conspiracy, filing false tax returns, and mail and wire fraud. A federal grand jury Monday convicted the onetime owners of a former St. Paul charter school on charges they defrauded the school to pay for vacations, luxury cars and private homes.
Brenda Belton had some gall, by her own admission. As charter school oversight chief for the D.C. Board of Education, she repeatedly stole from the school system, arranging about $649,000 in illegal school payments and sweetheart contracts to herself and her friends.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Bradley J. Schlozman, United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, announced that a former president of Allen Village School’s board of directors was indicted by a federal grand jury today for embezzling from the Kansas City, Mo., charter school. He was also charged in a separate indictment, along with a Gladstone, Mo., man, with mortgage and investment fraud schemes.
Many charter schools have encountered trouble for mishandling taxpayers' money, but state and federal prosecutors don't often pursue criminal charges against them. State government usually goes after errant charter operators through the regulatory process or in civil courts. Some charters clean up their accounting procedures and repay their debt to the state. Others close down and never repay their debts, which stem mostly from inflating student attendance figures.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Operators of California's biggest charter school system pocketed much of the $139 million the state gave them, spending a fortune on fat salaries for family members, side businesses and overpriced textbooks, according to a state audit issued Thursday.The audit paints a damning picture of the California Charter Academy -- four charter schools that enrolled thousands of students from 1999 until August, when it closed amid the yearlong investigation.
Texas has 206 charter schools, and 93 of them are in hot water for bilking the state out of millions of dollars by overcounting their enrollment. At $5,400 a pop, a few imaginary students here and few not over there, and before you know it, you've enough for a new Suburban with longhorns on the front.
The former superintendent of a Dallas charter school that collapsed in bankruptcy filed for personal bankruptcy herself shortly after she left the school in 2006, court records show. Delores Beall, who ran Lynacre Academy, filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy in July 2006 with nearly $200,000 in outstanding debt, including mortgages and credit card payments, according to bankruptcy filings.