I know this sounds ridiculous, but remember this is Ohio. In Ohio, the charter industry can get away with almost anything!
Stephen Dyer discovered a study completed in 2013 by researchers at Ohio State University finding that ECOT (the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow) produces more dropouts than any other charter school in the state.
So, naturally, it makes sense (or no sense at all) for ECOT to apply to become a dropout recovery center.
Four years prior to the school’s application to be considered a dropout recovery school this summer, the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow — the state’s oldest and largest online school — was found to be Ohio’s leading producer of high school dropouts while only recovering 1.5 percent of those dropouts.
In a 2013 report completed by Ohio State University’s Education Research Center, the authors concluded that between 2006-2010, ECOT produced 13,000 dropouts, or 21.5 percent of all dropouts in Ohio’s charter schools. In 2010 alone, ECOT had 2,908 dropouts — nearly double the number of the Cleveland Municipal School District’s 1,600. At the time, Cleveland had nearly double the students enrolled as ECOT had, according to the report.
Of its nearly 3,000 dropouts, only 75 returned. Quite a record.
And now the state is considering ECOT’s request to become a dropout recovery and prevention center.
What a farce!
Diane Ravitch's blog 
WOW … SICK! Wonder how smart the people of Ohio are? Hope they are smart enough to see the SCAM. Happy I don’t teach in Ohio anymore.
Thank YOU, Diane, for being a beacon of light for us. We do NEED YOU. This country needs YOU. STAY HEALTHY. Sending you LIGHT!
Sadly, based on an anecdotal sampling of my neighbors and friends, few of them care. Even those who are public school teachers.
They should put Bill Gates in charge of the drop out program.
Oh wait, they already did.
“A pattern for success”
Gates dropped out
Which bred success
Little doubt
That dropout’s best
Design a test
That none can pass
And Gates’ success
Is theirs at last
Good one.
Of course it is a farce. A continuation of the scam that’s gives the perception of accomplishments without accomplishing anything. Don’t they know to resolve the drop out situation they must change education from one that Thomas Jefferson called “Raking a few geniuses from the rubbish” to one that takes students from where they are, on their pathway to success.
Now there are 2 choices for teachers when a student is progressing slowly through the system of education. Pass them on without learning or failing them into oblvion. What if a system had something similar to an IEP for all? And students would move forward, at their best rate using failure as a natural part of the learning process rather than a means to push students out of school.
But that would make too much sense.
I think that the charter school and voucher industry KNOW that they are: Making this country GRATE, not great. It’s about $$$$$$, power, and White Supremacy.
The craziest part is apparently no one can do anything about it- not the governor, not the Ohio Dept of Ed, not the attorney general and not the legislature.
ECOT calls the shots. We’ll see if the Ohio Supreme Court can rein them in- that’s the last firewall.
90% of Ohio kids attend public schools. You’d never know it looking at what our state employees spend their time on, but is in fact true. They have now spent THOUSANDS of hours dealing with this ONE charter company. Every other school in the state takes a backseat to ECOT.
We should work on a new book called “The Audacity of Greed.” We could devote a whole chapter to Ohio. There are so many tales of lies, alt. data, cheating etc. When the money train dries up on one path, they reinvent themselves to access money on another track, even if the change makes no legitimate sense whatsoever. Parents need to catch on fast; most of “reform” is all about the cash.
Which ed reformer had the brilliant idea of shoving the neediest kids in the state in front of a computer screen all day, anyway?
Does that make ANY sense? They get LESS interaction with teachers and other students?
They can sell this cut rate garbage somewhere else. I suggest they push it in the cities where they live- NYC and DC and Boston. Stop pushing it in Ohio.
I don’t know when this state became the dumping ground for every crackpot ed reform scheme and scam, but it has to stop. Put in in your own states. Don’t dump it here.