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JUNE 22, 2014 CHARTER SCHOOLS UNSUPERVISED Taxpayers, students pay when school operators exploit weak laws governing the system By Karen Yi and Amy Shipley | Staff writers Unchecked charter-school operators are ex- • A Coral Springs man with a history of foreclo- ploiting South Florida’s public school system, sures, court-ordered payments, and bankruptcy collecting taxpayer dollars for schools that quick- received $100,000 to start a charter school in ly shut down. Margate. It closed in two months. A recent spate of charter-school closings illus- • A Hollywood company that founded three trates weaknesses in state law: virtually anyone short-lived charters in Palm Beach and Collier can open or run a charter school and spend public counties will open a new school this fall. The two education money with near impunity, a Sun Senti- Palm Beach County schools did not return nearly nel investigation found. $200,000 they owe the district. Florida requires local school districts to oversee South Florida is home to more than 260 charter charter schools but gives them limited power to schools, many of them high-performing. Some intervene when cash is mismanaged or students cater to students with interests in the performing are deprived of basic supplies – even classrooms. arts, science and technology, or those with special Once schools close, the newspaper found, dis- needs. tricts struggle to retrieve public money not spent Like traditional public schools, charter schools on students. are funded with tax money. But these indepen- Among the cases the newspaper reviewed: dent public schools can be opened and operated • An Oakland Park man received $450,000 by individuals, companies or cities, and they are in tax dollars to open two new charter schools controlled by volunteer governing boards, not just months after his first collapsed. The schools local elected school boards. shuttled students among more than four locations When conceived two decades ago, charter in Broward County, including a park, an event hall schools were designed to be free from heavy and two churches. The schools closed in seven oversight to encourage innovative approaches to weeks. education. • A Boca Raton woman convicted of taking But that lack of regulation also can allow abus- kickbacks when she ran a federal meal program es. was hired to manage a start-up charter school in In recent years, South Florida has seen a rise in Lauderdale Lakes. charter-school closings because of spikes primari- 1 CHARTER SCHOOLS UNSUPERVISED A 2014 INVESTIGATION ly in Broward and Palm Beach counties. cations that outline their plans in areas including Fifteen charter schools in Broward have closed instruction, mission and budget. The statutes in the last two years. That number doubled the don’t address background checks on charter ap- county’s total closures since charter schools first plicants. Because of the lack of guidelines, school opened in Florida 18 years ago. Seven charter officials in South Florida say, they do not conduct schools have closed in Palm Beach County in the criminal screenings or examine candidates’ finan- last two years. That’s more than a quarter of the cial or educational pasts. district’s historic total. That means individuals with a history of failed Eight of those failed schools lasted about a year schools, shaky personal finances or no experience or less. Five didn’t survive three months. running schools can open or operate charters. “These are our tax dollars,” said state Sen. Jeff “The law doesn’t limit who can open a charter Clemens, D-Lake Worth. “And to let them be used school. If they can write a good application ... it’s for a school that is only going to survive for one or supposed to stand alone,” said Jim Pegg, director two years is a huge waste of resources.” of the charter schools department for the Palm Another 29 charter schools are expected to Beach County school district. “You’re approving open in South Florida this fall. an idea.” That’s why the Broward school district did not Easy to open weigh Winston A. Thompson’s financial back- ground — a long history of court-ordered pay- State law requires local school districts to ap- ments to creditors, foreclosures and a bankruptcy prove or deny new charters based solely on appli- — before it gave him more than $100,000 in public money in 2013 to start a charter school. How charter schools work Thompson, a longtime dean at Broward Col- SCHOOL DISTRICTS lege, had pitched an innovative idea: a charter Local school districts divide tax money school for students interested in taking college between traditional public schools and courses. charter schools, based on the number of students enrolled. He welcomed students to College Bound Academy of Excellence in Margate last fall. Two months later, Thompson shut down the charter, PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOLS SCHOOLS forcing 60 students to find new schools in the middle of the year. Thompson said he could not afford buses to transport students. One teacher complained of owed wages and said students lacked textbooks. Records show the school owed about Elected school boards Volunteer governing boards $141,000 to its land- Local school boards make Charter schools are set up as major spending decisions non profits and governed by lord. and are accountable for individual volunteer boards “The thinking and every dollar. that allocate the school’s tax planning was not dollars. done adequately ... Management companies I’m not blaming any- Two out of three schools in one except myself,” South Florida hire manage- ment companies to handle said Thompson, 61. operations. This is where “In my case, I put school districts often lose track of spending. my own money into the project; I wasn’t 2 CHARTER SCHOOLS UNSUPERVISED A 2014 INVESTIGATION looking to make a living off of that project.” Charter-school advocates say the complexity THE APPLICATION of the application, which can run more than 400 Florida requires charter-school applicants to pages, weeds out frivolous candidates. But school outline their education plans and budgets, but officials in Broward and Palm Beach counties they are not asked to disclose their experience told the Sun Sentinel some applicants simply cut in running schools or their financial or criminal and paste from previously approved applications backgrounds, if they have any. available online. Key requirements Palm Beach County school officials say they • Proposed budget received, and rejected, an application for Premier • A research-based curriculum plan Palm Charter High School in 2013. The applica- • Educational mission and target student tion had references to “Lee County” and even population used student demographics for the wrong school • Services offered for students with special needs district. • Management plan and governance structure Local districts also must approve applicants be- Not required fore they’ve identified buildings for their schools. • Disclosure of criminal record State law prohibits districts from requiring char- • Financial history ter operators to provide certificates of occupancy • Experience in running schools until 15 days prior to the first day of school. • Previous affiliation with failed schools In the case of the two iGeneration Empow- • Identification of the facility where classes erment Academies in West Palm Beach, district will be held officials requested a certificate of occupancy for their shared building for several weeks but never received it. Difficulties securing a facility trig- gered a host of problems that led to the schools’ quick closure. it hired to operate the schools months before they The iGeneration Academies opened 11 days closed. after classes were supposed to begin in 2013. “What was supposed to get done, never got As students showed up for class, parts of the done,” said Stephanie Velez, manager of oper- building remained under construction. Class- ations for InterVisual Technology, the parent rooms had not undergone required fire inspec- company of InterVisual Education. “There was tions and sometimes lacked air conditioning, dis- nothing we could do at that point.” trict documents show. The iGeneration charters InterVisual founded and managed another bused their high schoolers on unauthorized daily school in Immokalee. That school also was shut field trips because they didn’t have enough seats down by the Collier County school district last at the school, records show. December. District officials cited the school for On one trip, they lost a student. Though she employing uncertified teachers and failing to sub- was found four hours later, district officials imme- mit required financial reports, documents show. diately shut down the schools. InterVisual will open another school this fall Because of the quick shut-down, the iGen- in Davie, but company officials have no plans to eration charter schools were overpaid nearly manage it. $200,000, according to the Palm Beach County “We’ve had our taste, and we didn’t like it,” school district. The schools have not returned the Velez said. money. The company that founded the iGeneration Students pay the price charter schools, InterVisual Education, blamed A former teacher at the Ivy Academies stored the schools’ demise on the management company her classroom supplies in the trunk of her car. 3 CHARTER SCHOOLS UNSUPERVISED A 2014 INVESTIGATION Every morning, she’d wait for a phone call to find School enrollment out where classes would be held that day. Broward County has seen a dramatic shift over the last decade in its public school population. “I would never know where we [were] going,” New charter schools have lured students from said teacher and former middle school dean Kim- traditional public schools with promises of innovative programs and no tuition. berly Kyle-Jones. “It was chaotic.” 2013 The two Ivy Academies lasted only seven 37,608 Broward County weeks. charter school Gained The schools, managed by Trayvon Mitchell of enrollment by year 24,047 Oakland Park, opened in 2013 at the Signature students Grand reception hall in Davie.

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