Gene V Glass: Education in Two Worlds: A Citizen's Encounter With a Charter School

Gene V Glass: Education in Two Worlds: A Citizen's Encounter With a Charter School:

A Citizen's Encounter With a Charter School

I have on this blog exposed some of the unusual workings of Challenge charter school in Glendale, Arizona. In short, Greg Miller, who until recently, was Chairman of the Arizona State Board of Education. is the owner of Challenge charter school, from which he, his wife and his daughter draw more than $400,000 in salary annually. While this would set off conflict-of-interest alarms in nearly any other state in the Union, in Arizona it is simply business as usual. Last fall, the Arizona Governor decided he wanted to remove Miller from the State Board. Miller apparently could read the handwriting on the wall and he agreed to leave. As he walked out the door, Miller told the press that he agreed to quit if he got some assurances that the charter school he runs would get "political protections that I no longer could provide." He doesn't simply profit from his conflicts of interest, he's actually proud of them.

So when a parent recently contacted me about an incident of unprofessional treatment by the staff of Challenge charter school, I was not surprised. But that parent's experience should stand as a warning to other parents who consider doing business with the company known as Challenge Charter School: Arizona's First Official Core Knowledge School.

The parent speaks:The other day we had a horrific experience with Wendy and Pam Miller [the principal and board member, and Greg Miller's daughter and wife, respectively] at Challenge Charter School. We had never met them before but we were the first on the list in 2015 for Kindergarten open-enrollment. We completed all subsequent paperwork on-time.

However, last Friday my wife received a patronizing voicemail from Wendy Miller stating that she reviewed our March 2017 updated information form and compared it to our February 2017 updated information form and found a discrepancy. She then continued by saying she was so sorry but that we would need to start from the beginning and complete an entirely new open-enrollment

Gene V Glass: Education in Two Worlds: A Citizen's Encounter With a Charter School: