A Sweetwater school board member wants to hold a discussion behind closed doors on Superintendent Jesus Gandara's behavior, a possible first step toward putting him on leave.
In the wake of a series of Union-Tribune stories, Bertha Lopez wrote in an email Monday to the Sweetwater Union High School District board that she wished to "give the board the opportunity to discuss the recent activities of Dr. Gandara in regards to his credit card expenditures, travel expenses, and the hiring of two public relations firms through the district's law firm."
She pointedly mentioned in her email that she had previously requested to put Gandara on administrative leave. Lopez said in a Tuesday interview that she never got a response to that request.
San Diego Unified is taking the first step toward shutting down a charter school that's been wracked by months of controversy, arguing that it violated a slew of state laws and failed to live up to its own founding charter.
Such shutdowns are rare. The last time that San Diego Unified came close to shutting down a charter was four years ago with the Children's Conservation Academy, which closed on its own, and the last actual revocation was in 2006, when the A. Phillip Randolph Leadership Academy was shuttered.
If the school board decides to push forward and hold a public hearing on whether to close the school, it will be a dramatic demonstration of its new, tighter leash on charter schools. Charters are publicly funded but independently run, with limited oversight from the school districts that approve them in the first place.
