NC rejects two for-profit charter schools. Education board splits along partisan lines.
A divided State Board of Education rejected two new North Carolina charter schools on Thursday that would be managed by for-profit companies.
The state board voted 7-4 to reject American Leadership Academy-Monroe in Union County and 6-5 against Legacy Classical Academy in Rockingham County. Both schools would have been managed by for-profit companies as part of their networks of charter schools.
Only Mountain City Public Montessori, which would be an independently run charter school in Buncombe County, received approval on Thursday. The state board unanimously agreed to let the school open in 2023.
Under state law, the two rejected charter schools are required to get a second vote from the state board. The Charter Schools Advisory Board, which had previously recommended all three schools, is expected to vote again on the two schools next week before sending them back to the state board.
Members of the state board’s Democratic majority raised concerns about giving funding to for-profit charter school operators, which is allowed under state law. They also raised concerns about the extensive control both management organizations would have over the charter schools.
“The governance issue is very mixed,” said state board vice chairman Alan Duncan. “It raises a lot of issues because a for-profit EMO (education management organization) is taking large numbers of functions. In fact, one could almost argue all governance functions, including hiring and firing and everything else.”
GOP backed charter applicants
But supporters of the rejected applicants pointed to how traditional public schools also contract with for-profit vendors for services. The parental demand is high for the new schools, especially for American Leadership Academy-Monroe.
“I don’t, quite frankly, think that the 2,000 families that have expressed interest in attending this school in Monroe care whether or not this is a for-profit entity or a non-profit entity,” said State Superintendent Catherine Truitt, a Republican.
All the Republican members of the state board and John Blackburn, who was appointed by Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper, voted for the rejected charter schools. J. Wendell Hall, another Cooper appointee, voted for Legacy Classical but against the Monroe school.
All of Cooper’s other appointees voted against both schools.
GOP Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson recused himself from the vote on the Union County school because his wife is a member of the board of directors.
Expanding too fast?
Charter schools are taxpayer-funded schools that are exempt from some of the rules that traditional public schools must follow. There are more than 200 charter schools across the state.
Student enrollment in charter schools is almost 20% higher than before the COVID-19 pandemic, EdNC recently reported. At the same time, enrollment in traditional public schools is still below pre-pandemic levels.
Part of the growth since the pandemic comes from the rapid expansion of Arizona-based Charter One in North Carolina.
Charter One and American Leadership Academy were founded by Glenn Way, who has made millions of dollars building, selling and leasing properties to the charter schools he runs in Arizona, The Arizona Republic has reported.
This year, Charter One opened Wake Preparatory Academy in Franklin County and American Leadership Academy-Johnston in Clayton. Both were the largest charter school openings in state history, according to Ashley Baquero, director of the State Office of Charter Schools.
The state board will also vote soon on a 2,050-student K-12 school that Charter One wants to open in 2024 in Garner.
“i have concerns that we don’t really know enough about the academic performance in these schools to go ahead with another one,” said state board member Jill Camnitz.
But state board member Amy White pointed to data showing how 15 of Charter One’s 17 charter schools in Arizona got an A or B grade in that state’s grading system.
Camnitz said that success in Arizona doesn’t necessarily translate into success in North Carolina. But White said they need to accept the Arizona data unless critics are saying that state doesn’t hold charter schools to high standards.
Legacy Classical would be managed by American Traditional Academies, a new company hoping to establish charter schools in the state.
Charter school management fees
Groups applying for charter schools in North Carolina have to be non-profit entities. But they can contract with a for-profit organization to manage the school. Some states only allow charter schools to contract with non-profit management organizations.
Management organizations are allowed to collect fee payment of up to 15% of revenues that charter schools receive. The for-profit management companies make money not just through fees, but often by providing school buildings that the local board uses.
“How do we make the hard choice of whether we have the dollars go to we as the profit making EMO body or whether we will allocate those dollars to the children?” Duncan said. “The for-profit situation complicates this.”
White said that if the board was going to hold the 15% fee against charter schools, then they should use the same level of scrutiny on all state Department of Public Instruction contracts.
“It’s a standard of doing business that is built into most, if not, all contracts,” said White, who voted for both the Union and Rockingham schools.
Truitt and White argued that having companies like Charter One run schools is a benefit. They pointed to how Charter One provided $100 million to help open Wake Preparatory Academy and American Leadership Academy-Johnston before they got any state funds.
“I struggle more with our non-profit charters who don’t have the experience, the track record, the funds to prioritize students,” Truitt said. “Here we have a situation where we have an EMO with a track record, with stability, with funding.”
This story was originally published December 1, 2022 at 4:28 PM with the headline "NC rejects two for-profit charter schools. Education board splits along partisan lines.."
