This is a sampling of The Education Report, Katy Murphy's Oakland schools blog. Read more atIBABuzz.com/education. Follow her at Twitter.com/katymurphy.
Nov. 29: Thirteen binders of material from the American Indian Model Schools charter school organization were delivered to the Oakland Unified School District offices this week in response to the "notice of violation" it had received this fall from OUSD.
The prospect of OUSD shutting down three of the city's top-scoring schools, displacing 1,210 students, stems from a Fiscal Crisis & Management Assistance Team report that was released in June. Auditors cited numerous examples of self-dealing and conflicts of interest by the organization's founder, Ben Chavis, and his wife, Marsha Amador.
Prompted by whistle-blower complaints and, later, a formal request from Alameda County Superintendent Sheila Jordan, investigators spent months poring through records. In June, they reported finding that Chavis, Amador and their numerous real estate and consulting businesses had received about $3.8 million in public funds between mid-2007 and the end of 2011. The organization's governing board, which is responsible for ensuring tax dollars are