Marin students disrupted by San Diego charter school scandal
Two online charter schools closed by court-appointed receiver
Just as the new school year is starting, dozens of Marin children could be in educational limbo because of recent indictments in Southern California involving online charter schools.
Richard Kipperman, the court-appointed receiver in a San Diego County case involving accusations of a multimillion-dollar online charter school scam, announced in an August 15 letter to California school districts that he was closing the online charter schools involved in the scandal. In Marin, the closures affect 143 students from kindergarten through 12th grade.
Of those students, 141 were enrolled in an independent study program called California STEAM Sonoma II. The others are 12th-graders enrolled in Uplift California North Charter.
“The Receiver intends to transfer each student’s records to the student’s school district of residence on or about Sept. 30, 2019,” Kipperman said in his letter. “Thereafter, parents, guardians, schools or school districts may request copies of the student’s records from each district.”
Mary Jane Burke, Marin County superintendent of schools, said she has sent the names of the children and their grade levels to each of the affected school districts in Marin. Those include Ross Valley, Novato Unified, San Rafael City Schools, Larkspur-Corte Madera, Tamalpais Union, Reed Union, Bolinas-Stinson Union, Sausalito Marin City, Miller Creek, Lagunitas, Mill Valley and Shoreline Unified.
District officials are planning to contact each of the families directly to make sure the students have found another option, she said.
“I’m going to make an assumption that if your child is signed up for a virtual school and it closes, that you’re signed up for another virtual school — but I don’t really know,” Burke said. “If there are children who, as a result of this, are not yet registered for school, we CONTINUE READING: Marin students disrupted by San Diego charter school scandal
