A new, for-profit charter chain named Pansophic is planning to take over charter chain schools in Ohio. The linked story was published in June, but there have been no follow-ups since then. Either the deal was completed or is pending.
Pansophic is a new company founded by Ron Packard, formerly of McKinsey, Goldman Sachs, and the online giant K12. As CEO of K12, Packard was paid $5 million yearly.
The company also expects to acquire charters run by for-profit Mosaica in Ohio. Pansophic will become the biggest for-profit charter chain in Ohio.
“Akron-based White Hat Management reportedly sold off management of 12 elementary charter schools Friday to an out-of-state, for-profit company that could acquire a third charter school company, an attorney for the charter schools’ public boards said.
“The two deals would make Pansophic Learning the largest for-profit operator of Ohio charter schools, which has become a taxpayer-funded $1 billion private industry.”
White Hat has produced poor academic results for 20 years.
Now, Ohio’s for-profit charter schools will be outsourced to a Virginia corporation that also focuses on the bottom line: profit.
Are these for-profit schools really public schools or are they profit centers that hoodwink parents to enroll their children?
This is what Ohio’s charter law says (thanks to reader Bethree):
“Opening paras of Ohio charter school law: “3314.01 (A) (1) A board of education may permit all or part of any of the schools under its control, upon request of a proposing person or group and provided the person or group meets the requirements of this chapter, to become a community school… (B) A community school created under this chapter is a public school, independent of any school district, and is part of the state’s program of education…”
Is a school owned by a for-profit corporation in Virginia still a “community” school? Is it a “public” school?
How much more of this flimflam will the voters and taxpayers of Ohio tolerate? Do they care about the education of their children?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
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Buying, selling and profiting off of schools – who ever would have thought such a thing? If you’d have told me this 20 or even 10 years ago, I would have told you to adjust your tinfoil hat. My how the worm has turned.
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Before taxpayers can care, they have to be educated and the power and greed driven corporate deformers are doing all they can to control the message those people learn from. Fool the most people for as long as possible is the goal.
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It’s impossible to hold an Ohio lawmaker accountable for a charter school because they’ve placed these two layers between the state and the school- there’s the state contract with the sponsor (the charter) and then the sponsor contract with the school. If the school has an “operator” that’s yet another contract layer that insulates lawmakers.
You have to peel the layers of contracts to even reach anyone who is elected and accountable.
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The Ohio charter situation is one thing, but I don’t think charters and vouchers will end up doing long term damage to Ohio public schools. We’ve had unregulated charters for 15 years and they expand vouchers every year- 93% of Ohio students still attend public schools.
That’s where the long term damage will show up- existing public schools- our state government is completely captured by “ed reform movement” activists- they either denigrate or ignore the vast majority of schools. Public schools are really resilient but this situation can’t continue forever. We can’t have the entire state government focused on 7% of schools. That won’t work. I think the push is going to have to come from public school parents. They’re going to have to remind Ohio lawmakers that there are still public schools in their districts. I suggest “reminding” them by replacing them with people who support the public schools that 93% of children attend, but that’s just a suggestion 🙂
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That money wasted won’t come back, either.
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They won’t even protect public investment in charter schools, after tens of millions of dollars have gone missing. This is their new “regulation”, which isn’t a regulation at all.
“The bill would require operators and boards to specify property ownership in all new and renewed contracts. The bill also would ensure that fiscal officers are independent of operators, and it would require more transparency from those serving on charter boards.
“If you’re an independent board, and you’re putting everything you own and don’t own down in writing ahead of time, you’re much more likely to make a decision that is not going to result in a bad outcome,” said Chad Aldis of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, which supports school choice and sponsors 11 charter schools in Ohio.”
By the way, I know this is impolite, but can I ask why the huge group of public employees I’m paying in Columbus are letting a charter lobby group write this law? Why is the Thomas B. Fordham institute drafting my state laws? They helped create this mess. Can we hear from someone who is actually on the public payroll down there?
http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2015/09/23/reform-bill-would-indirectly-help-schools-keep-equipment.html
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Charters have been around for well over 20 years now and when the primary aim of publicly funded schools is ostensibly to make students “college and career ready,” the public has a right to know where kids have ended up, especially when students attended lucrative charters that have been allowed to continue even though they’ve been low performing “for 20 years.”
Are most of the kids who went to those schools college grads or skilled trades people with stable jobs and decent incomes today, or are they school dropouts, low-wage Walmart “associates,” flipping burgers at McDonald’s, under-employed or unemployed? Where is that info, from supposedly data enamored education “reformers?”
THAT is the information parents should be getting before they enroll their kids in charters (either for-profits or non-profits with money laundering departments) which suck funds, resources and students from neighborhood public schools.
Where is that info published? Surely that data could be readily tracked by the government, if they wanted to, such as through SS#s and IRS data banks.
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Oh, I’m sure our dear friend Joe Nathan could provide that information. Paging Dr. Nathan.
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He’d probably just tell us about the kids who went to the few charters that were decent because they were established by genuine educators, not provide info on all the students who attended charters started by non-educators in it for the money.
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You- all can follow the various charter lobbying groups in real time, today. They’re writing their own regulatory law as we speak:
http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2015/09/e-school_giant_ecot_with_15000_students_wants_to_count_the_same_as_tiny_charter_schools_in_state_evaluations.html
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Cheap trick capitol, Columbus, Ohio. Pansophic can buy a politician for pocket change.
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This article doesn’t directly apply to the growth of the charter industry, but it does. Robert Reich is coming out with a new book, “Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few,” next week. He also wrote an opinion piece for the NY Times, September 18, “Big Tech Has Become Way Too Powerful: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/20/opinion/is-big-tech-too-powerful-ask-google.html?_r=0
Our fight against the privatization of public education has to be put in a larger context. Being able to speak to people who really are not invested in public education can be reached if we address the impact on the larger society.
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Yes, yes, yes – everyone needs to read this book. I have an advanced reader’s copy that I’ve already pawned off on two others and will continue pawning it off as often as I can. It is clearly written in laymen’s terms explaining how the rich and powerful have rigged the game up front. When people talk about taxing the rich, they’re the first to complain about “redistribution” and “socialism”. But Reich very clearly shows how they’ve manipulated the market (or, rather, manipulated the government to manipulate the market) to redistributed wealth upward in the first place. It’s not about “government vs. free market” since the government creates the market. It’s not even about the size of the government. It’s about who the government responds to and whose interests it protects. Those of you who teach high school should possibly try to get this book in your students’ hands (and brains).
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