Charter schools scramble to become legal as new school year nears
With the new school year just days away, hundreds of San Diego-area charter school students and their parents are waiting to see if their school will be legally allowed to exist.
For years, independent study California charter schools, many of which combine in-class and online instruction, had opened “satellite” locations outside of the school district that authorized them under the assumption that state law allowed it. Every charter school needs authorization to operate, whether it be a school district or a county education office.
These “satellite” schools were controversial because they took students — and state funding — away from districts that didn’t have a say in authorizing them. It was often easier way for such charter schools to get approved, because their authorizing school district would not be losing students to the charter school.
In 2016, an appeals court ruled that charter schools can no longer have satellite locations outside the boundaries of the authorizing school district. So charter schools that already had these satellites were forced to find ways to comply with the court decision. Many charter schools got waivers from the state that gave them about a year of extra time to do so.
In order to comply, some charter schools have simply closed satellite locations that couldn’t get authorized, had too few students or wouldn’t survive financially as their own school. That’s why Julian Charter School closed its San Diego and Alpine locations at the end of June, said Jennifer Cauzza, Julian Charter School’s executive director. Some schools have also combined locations and shuffled students around.
But mainly, charter schools have petitioned the school districts in which their satellites are located, asking them for authorization.
Charter school leaders describe it as an arduous process that has taken so long, it's beginning to spill over into the new school year. Charter school officials had to draft applications, often with as many as 1,000 or more pages, for each satellite location.
“If you wonder why it took so long, that’s why it took so long,” Cauzza said.
The issue frustrates charter school leaders because they have been operating schools for years, and now they’ve found themselves relying on different school districts to authorize them and let them stay open.
“It is crazy, it is complicated, and it’s sad because it was working well to begin with,” Cauzza said.
This almost became a problem for the National University Academy charter school network, which was authorized by the Lakeside Union School District but had a satellite dual language school in the Vista Unified School District, as well as other locations.
The charter school asked the Vista school board this year to authorize the Dual Language Institute, which has about 260 students.
Vista denied the application for a number of reasons, including that the charter school’s Continue reading: Charter schools scramble to become legal as new school year nears - The San Diego Union-Tribune
How Goldilocks Opened a Charter School That Nobody Wanted
Big Education Ape: Satellite charter schools under fire - The San Diego Union-Tribune - https://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2016/10/satellite-charter-schools-under-fire.html
Big Education Ape: Charter challenges appellate ruling to state Supreme Court - The San Diego Union-Tribune - https://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2016/11/charter-challenges-appellate-ruling-to.html
