Mercedes Schneider takes a close look at Arizona, known as the Wild West of charters.
What she finds is a state where the ethics laws are even laxer than those of her home state of Louisiana.
The charter sector in Arizona is unregulated, unsupervised, and has a firm lock on the taxpayers’ dollars.
Money rules.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Thanks to you, Diane, and Mercedes for posting this. We need more and more people in Arizona to understand what is happening here. I think most people don’t understand or get what is being done to our public schools by charters. I don’t want to believe that it is because they don’t care.
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My pleasure, Dottie. Happy to help raise public awareness.
Sometimes its hardest to see what is happening in one’s own backyard for being too close to the situation. When an issue garners national attention, more “locals” might be able to better see the situation.
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Once again someone who is supposed to be an expert either is unaware or someone put the hammer on them to eliminate any mention of the DOE OIG report on the total lack of accountability in charter schools in Florida, Arizona and California. The report is DOE-OIG/A2L0002. How many times do I have to put in this and other blogs etc. before anyone will wake up? Are we not talking about charter schools in Arizona? Does the report mention Arizona? What is the intellectual problem here? Possibly ethical also. Everything stated is true. But there is no closer. Would not hold water in a court of law. No proof. No authority. End of message. Wake up. Disturbing!! Is not Rhees former husband Huffman and does he not have custody of their children?
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George, the results of that Office of Inspector General (OIG) report are based more on the California and Florida charters, with scant information presented on Arizona. The goal of the report is to censure the USDOE’s Office of Innovation and Improvement (OII) for lack of federal oversight, and the report achieves its goal without offering great detail on the Arizona charter situation.
I did read the OIG report immediately after it was issued, and I forwarded the report to Louisiana Legislative Auditor Daryl Purpera with an official request for a performance audit of Louisiana’s charters. Furthermore,I have written about the OIG report recently in some work I am doing regarding Florida charters since the report offers more details on the charter situation in Florida.
I did edit my post to include a statement about the OIG report as per your suggestion. But let me tell you, I do not appreciate the way that you attack my credentials and my work when all is not exactly to your liking. All you had to do was suggest that I include the report, and I would have considered doing so. Nevertheless, in the end, my work belongs to me, and what I choose to include is my decision.
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George, can you post the link to that report?
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Link is right here:
Click to access a02l0002.pdf
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I agree, Dr. Schneider, that the OIG report privides little information about AZ. I have stumbled on a report published in 2011 by a national charter school oversight group that is far more damning. Maybe you have already read it:
Click to access buildingcsqualityaz.pdf
According to this report, the Arizona State Board for Charter Schools (ASBCS) authorizes and oversees 98% of the 500+ charters in the state. They oversee one of the largest portfolios of charters in the nation. They are also, according to the report, the “most understaffed charter school authorizer in the nation.” For example, according to the report, the ASBCS has 71.1 schools for every FTE, while the national average is 5.6 schools per FTE.
Another Arizona tidbit: The Vice President on the ASBCS board is Peter Bezanson, second-in-command at Great Hearts Academies, and headmaster at Scottsdale Prep Academy. He also chairs the board’s Academic Framework Subcommittee.
Thank you for your excellent work on our state’s behalf. I don’t understand why the Arizona charter school travesty does not garner a higher profile nationally. Our state is one of the worst offenders!
Best,
Suzanne Winkel, PhD, English Literature
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Suzanne,
If the charters police themselves, that’s a sure sign of trouble. It means no accountability, no oversight.
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Agree! What is our best line of defense? Or, is it simply too late. . . .
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Speaking if conflicts of interest, I believe Lisa Graham Keegan and her buddies had a lot to do with the charter free-for-all that invaded Arizona and destroyed what was once a pretty good public school system. As a graduate of both the AZ K-12 system and higher ed, it makes me sick to see what has happened there. Unfortunately now it looks like Washington State is about to suffer the same fate unless the State Supreme Court puts the kibosh on charters here.
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Speaking OF
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