FAME’s Demise: Lessons from a Failed Charter School
On June 30th, Alameda County’s FAME School (Families of Alameda for Multicultural/Multilingual Education Public Charter) closed its doors for the last time. The decision of the Alameda County Office of Education to deny the school’s request to renew its charter, a decision that was upheld when FAME then sued for a reversal in state court, brings FAME’s 15-year educational experiment and its management’s learning experience to an end. While FAME will not be teaching students when a new school year begins this fall, there are lessons here to be learned, lessons that policy makers and those responsible for chartering and overseeing charter schools can learn.
California, along with 41 other states and the District of Columbia, include charter schools in their formula for providing quality public education. First seen as laboratories where local school districts could develop new programs, charter schools have been widely adopted in response to the belief that the public school systems in many areas fail to prepare children for a successful future. Charter schools allow parents to choose their child’s school from a competitive marketplace that offers an array of options. To encourage a variety of providers to enter the market, charter operators are given significant latitude in their approaches to education and are freed from many of the rules and regulations that govern traditional public school systems.
While each state’s approach to chartering is different, all result in numerous independent organizations, for-profit and nonprofit, being given franchises to operate one or more publically funded schools, each in its own unique way. The burden of ensuring each of these schools provides an effective educational experience, uses public funds appropriately, and is a viable operation falls on the various bodies that are allowed to grant charters. FAME’s story illustrates how this process can go wrong. And since charter schools will remain a significant part of our public education system, FAME’s story can help us see where we can make improvements.
FAME was launched as the Bay Area School for Independent Study (BASIS) in an effort to support the growing number of home-schooled children. The FAME website describes how in 2001 its founders decided to begin a charter school:
“Before the enactment of the California Charter School Act in 1992, parents seeking alternative educational opportunities for their children had few options. With the establishment of charter schools, California opened the door for new and innovative schools such as ours to open. Parents and students were already learning at home and BASIS became an anchor and support for many families who were seeking validation, collaboration, and connectivity within their chosen educational model. BASIS offered two enrollment options. One allowed students to receive daily instruction through classes taught at our Oakland Resource Center. The other allowed students to work at home with their parent educators monitored by a credentialed BASIS teacher. Our method, now known as Personalized Learning, relied on the empowerment of parents to partner in the educational process and work closely with teachers and other support staff to ensure that students made appropriate academic and social progress.”
With a location in Oakland, one might think that the Oakland School Board would have responsibility for deciding upon the creation of a new school in their district. But in California, like most states permitting charters, local districts are only one of a number of potential authorizers. In fact, by 2012, more than 60 percent of charters issued nationally were coming from a body other than a local school district. The purpose of this open system is to overcome the resistance of local school districts to charters entering their turf. But there is a danger in this approach, as the FAME story well illustrates: The chartering authority may not have the competence or the resources to effectively evaluate the applicants or supervise these schools once they are in operation. And by chartering in this manner, these new schools cannot be well integrated into an overall plan for the needs of any particular population or geography.
FAME’s founders took advantage of this flexibility and sought their initial charter from the Sunol Glen (CA) USD, a district with a total enrollment of 250 K-12 students. Located more than 30 miles from the Oakland home of FAME, it was a district in which two of FAME’s founders had political clout.
With the granting of this charter, Sunol Glen’s school board and staff took on oversight responsibility for a school that in its first year would serve nearly twice as many students as they did in their own school, with a program that was introducing a new format of education and which was distant from their offices. How much support to this new organization could they provide? How much resources were they able to devote to ensuring that this startup met all of the requirements of a public charter school? Who was responsible for assessing Sunol Glen’s ability to meet its responsibilities as the issuer of a charter?
What seemed to have not troubled Sunol Glen’s reviewers was the total lack of school experience that BASIS leadership had. Over a decade later, a 2012 grand jury looking into allegations of serious management failings found the BASIS board and its founder/CEO were not competent to run the school.
But with their charter in hand, FAME was in business and the school was launched. Their charter gave them access to a level of state funding based on the number of children enrolled in their programs. With this source of funding now secured and with no limits placed on the school’s ability to grow, BASIS took advantage and let demand set their course.
And they were successful in attracting students. Their program included direct support for homeschoolers, an approach they called “personalized education,” and a more FAME’s Demise: Lessons from a Failed Charter School | Nonprofit Quarterly: