Schools Without Rules:
An Orlando Sentinel Investigation
Florida private schools rake in nearly $1 billion in state scholarships with little oversight.
Part 1 of 3 Parts
By Leslie Postal, Beth Kassab and Annie Martin Staff Writers
Private schools in Florida will collect nearly $1 billion in state-backed scholarships this year through a system so weakly regulated that some schools hire teachers without college degrees, hold classes in aging strip malls and falsify fire-safety and health records.
The limited oversight of Florida’s scholarship programs allowed a principal under investigation for molesting a student at his Brevard County school to open another school under a new name and still receive the money, an Orlando Sentinel investigation found.
Another Central Florida school received millions of dollars in scholarships, sometimes called school vouchers, for nearly a decade even though it repeatedly violated program rules, including hiring staff with criminal convictions.
Despite the problems, the number of children using Florida’s scholarship programs has more than tripled in the past decade to 140,000 students this year at nearly 2,000 private schools. If students using Florida Tax Credit, McKay and Gardiner scholarships made up their own school district, they would be Florida’s sixth-largest in student population, just ahead of the Jacksonville area.
“The scholarships are good. The problem is the school,” said Edda Melendez, an Osceola County mother. “They need to start regulating the private schools.”
Melendez complained to the state last year about a private school in Kissimmee. The school promised specialized help for her 5-year-old twin sons, who have autism, but one of their teachers was 21 years old and didn’t have a bachelor’s degree or experience with autistic children.
“I feel bad for all the parents who didn’t know what’s going on there,” she told the state.
Last year, nearly a quarter of all state scholarship students — 30,000 — attended 390 private schools in Central Florida. The schools received $175.6 million worth of the scholarships, which are for children from low-income families and those with disabilities.
During its investigation, the Sentinel visited more than 30 private schools in Orange, Seminole, Lake, Osceola and Brevard counties, reviewed thousands of pages of public records and interviewed dozens of parents, private school operators, state officials and policy experts.
Unlike public schools, private schools, including those that accept the state scholarships, operate free from most state rules. Private school teachers and principals, for example, are not required to have state certification or even college degrees.
One Orlando school, which received $500,000 from the public programs last year, has a 24-year-old principal still studying at a community college.
Nor do private schools need to follow the state’s academic standards. One curriculum, called Accelerated Christian Education or ACE, is popular in some private schools and requires students to sit at partitioned desks and fill out worksheets on their own for most of the day, with little instruction from teachers or interaction with classmates.
And nearly anything goes in terms of where private school classes meet. The Continue reading: Florida private schools get nearly $1 billion in state scholarships with little oversight, Sentinel finds - Orlando Sentinel
Schools Without Rules: An Orlando Sentinel Investigation
The Orlando Sentinel spent months reporting on Florida’s scholarship programs, which will send nearly $1 billion to private schools this year. The Sentinel also reviewed thousands of pages of Florida Department of Education documents, court records and other materials in addition to interviewing dozens of people, including parents, students, school operators and policy experts.
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